Free Republic

Texas Governor Rick Perry is being called to task by an author and investigative journalist for vetoing bills that would have blocked construction of the controversial Trans-Texas Corridor. Dr. Jerome Corsi has been one of the leading voices warning the American public about the consequences of the Trans-Texas Corridor, which will be part of a superhighway -- purported to be four football fields wide -- that will allow Mexican trucks to enter the U.S. and traverse the core of the country all the way to Canada. The best-selling author asserts that Governor Perry cleared the way for construction to begin...

TAMPA - When Karen Armatrout died in 1997, her employer, Wal-Mart, collected thousands of dollars on a life insurance policy the retail giant had taken out without telling her, according to a lawsuit filed in U.S. District Court. Armatrout was one of about 350,000 employees Wal-Mart secretly insured nationwide, said Texas attorney Michael D. Myers, who estimated the company collected on 75 to 100 policies involving Florida employees who died. Myers is seeking to make the Armatrout lawsuit a class-action case on behalf of the estates of all the Florida employees who died while unwittingly insured by Wal-Mart. "Creepy's a...

WACO, Texas (BP)--If an Internet user types the word “gay” into the search engine for Wal-Mart’s online bookstore, more than 1,000 titles turn up -- including titles from “Gay Power: An American Revolution” to “The Gay Disciple: Jesus’ Friend Tells It His Own Way.” Granted, some of the 1,000-plus titles are duplicates and a few are written in opposition to the homosexual agenda, but what is clear is that Wal-Mart continues to dabble in supporting a lifestyle that is contrary to what many of its customers believe is natural and safe. By offering book selections that cater to the gay...

Faced with public demonstrations of discontent by its employees, Wal-Mart Stores has developed a wide-ranging new program intended to show that it appreciates its 1.3 million workers in the US and to encourage them to air their grievances. As part of the effort, Wal-Mart managers at 4,000 stores will meet with 10 rank-and-file workers every week and extend an additional 10 percent discount on a single item during the holidays to all its employees, beyond the normal 10 percent employee discount. The program, described in an internal company document, was created during a volatile six months period, starting when the...

The line outside the new Wal- Mart in Kearny began form ing long before the 8 a.m. grand opening on Wednesday. This corporate behemoth is opening stores everywhere on earth these days, including this 43rd outlet in New Jersey, built on the foundation of a vacant trucking terminal a mile or so from the New Jersey Turnpike. You may have heard that Wal- Mart treats its employees as disposable parts, paying low wages, offering lousy benefits and crushing any effort to form a union. That's all true, which explains why almost half their employees quit every year. But on Wednesday...

The Wal-Mart Model The American economy continues to surge ahead, though you won't read much about it in mainstream media. Economic growth in the third quarter was 4.1 percent--despite Hurricane Katrina!--the 10th consecutive quarter with growth over 3 percent. Unemployment is 5.0 percent--lower than the average for the 1970s, 1980s, or 1990s. Since April 2003 the economy has created a net 5.1 million new jobs. Core inflation is only 2.1 percent, and gas prices, which surged above $3 a gallon after Katrina, are now down around $2. Productivity growth for the five-year period of 2000-2005 is 3.4 percent, the highest...

THERE'S A COMIC side to the anti-Wal-Mart campaign brewing across the country. Only by summoning up the most naive view of corporate behavior can the critics be shocked — shocked! — by the giant retailer's machinations. Wal-Mart is plotting to contain health costs! But isn't that what every company does in the face of medical inflation? Wal-Mart has a war room to defend its image! Well, yeah, it's up against a hostile campaign featuring billboards, newspaper ads and a critical documentary movie. Wal-Mart aims to enrich shareholders and put rivals out of business! Hello? What business doesn't do that?

We've heard all the horror stories about the retail giant. They're just not true. STEVE MAICH There's a place on the western edge of Cleveland that encapsulates the story of the city -- its proud industrial past, its slow depressing decline, its hopes for a brighter future. But the battle now being waged over that patch of land tells an even bigger tale. It's called the steelyard flats, a 130-acre plot of barren wasteland at the intersection of Interstates 90 and 71, in what was once the heart of Cleveland's thriving steel industry. The site has sat idle since 2000,...

That's what one hears as the giant retailer sops up the vitality from middle-class families, local communities, and the national economy . This happens in three different but related ways. First, there's the clobbering of Main Street: Wal-Mart moves in on the edges of towns, and the much smaller downtown merchants, unable to match its prices, soon go under. Second, there's the miserable wage and benefits package offered by Sam Walton's creation. And third, there's Wal-Mart's purchasing strategy, which seems to be about buying American-made products only as a last resort -- to the point that today Wal-Mart, by itself,...

Wal-Mart (WMT) is the favorite whipping boy of labor unions and leftists who blame the retail giant for everything from low wages to a lack of health insurance. But don't tell the people of Oakland, Calif........Wal-Mart workers and customers see things differently. Take those at the new store in Oakland. Built on a once-empty field, it has brought 350 jobs averaging $10.82 an hour to a heavily minority area. It'll also bring in a half-million badly needed tax dollars.And how many people applied for those 350 jobs? 11,000. No, we didn't accidentally add a zero. That's 31 applicants for each...

When I was a kid growing up in a small Louisiana town, there was exactly one place to buy groceries: Gerald's. It was properly called the Red & White, but nobody ever used the store's proper name. Gerald was the town grocer, and the word people used to refer to the place reflected their relationship to it. It was personal, not merely commercial.

Wal-Mart Stores Inc. (WMT.N: Quote, Profile, Research), which has gained a reputation for leaving opponents limping into bankruptcy court, is taking on Target Corp. (TGT.N: Quote, Profile, Research) in a fight that it just might lose. Wal-Mart, the No. 1 retailer, is widening its array of stylish-but-cheap goods in hopes of winning over middle-income customers, putting it head-to-head with a rival that has proved it can compete and thrive against a company six times its size. "Can Wal-Mart make merchandise improvements that will drive incremental sales? Absolutely," said Darrell Rigby, head of the global retail practice at consultants Bain &...

Americans are junkies. We’re addicted to consumerism. We’re addicted to things––and China is our main supplier. China is the man. In 2004, according to the U.S. Census Bureau, we imported a whopping $197 billion worth of goods from China, and exported $35 billion worth of goods to them, chalking up an I.O.U. for $161 billion in the process. China is the main supplier feeding our consumer habit, but Wal-Mart, according to the Congressional Committee on Education and the Workforce, is China’s biggest street pusher, responsible for slinging up to one eighth of the Chinese goods sold in the United States....

As Wal-Mart Stores Inc. has grown into the nation's biggest grocer, St. Louis is one place where its Supercenters have been curiously scarce. Now, Wal-Mart says the area needs more of its grocery megastores. "We really like St. Louis," said spokesman Ryan Horn. "We're looking very closely at a number of places in the St. Louis area, and that's not going to change." A lot of others wish it would.

MONTREAL (Reuters) - The Canadian unit of Wal-Mart Stores Inc. closed a store in Quebec on Friday where employees had obtained union certification and were seeking a first labor contract. Kevin Groh, spokesman for Wal-Mart Canada, said the 130,000-square-foot Jonquiere store closed at noon. Its 176 workers will be paid until May 6, the original target date the company had set for closing the outlet. "It's slightly misleading to say it closed a week early," Groh said. Union officials accused Wal-Mart of shutting the store a week earlier than planned to avoid publicity over the controversial closure. Yvon Bellemare, president...

Wal-Mart Leaves Bitter Chill Quebec Store Closes After Vote to Unionize By Doug Struck Washington Post Foreign Service Thursday, April 14, 2005; Page E01 JONQUIERE, Quebec -- The baby buggies are all gone. In electronics, only "Le Gros Albert" and a few other leftover DVDs remain. A few pairs of pink boots are left in the shoe department. Over in household goods, red and yellow liquidation tags dangle beside thin skillets as Wal-Mart prepares to close.

ROGERS, Ark. -- Wal-Mart is "good for America" and the barrage of criticism against the company is an effort to protect the status quo in retailing, President and CEO Lee Scott said Tuesday in a sharp attack on organized labor and retail rivals. Addressing about 50 journalists gathered at the company's media conference -- it first ever media event – Mr. Scott defended its wages and health care plans, criticized by labor groups as inadequate, and said that the company is able to save customers big money as it drives costs out of its system. "Innovation and competition tends to...

Wal-Mart Denounces Health Bill Retailer Says Maryland Could Lose Future Jobs By Michael Barbaro Washington Post Staff Writer Thursday, April 7, 2005; Page E01 ROGERS, Ark., April 6 -- Wal-Mart Stores Inc. yesterday said approval of a bill that would require it to boost health care spending in Maryland could endanger its plans for growth in the state, including a new distribution center that would employ as many as 1,000. The company questioned the motivation behind the bill, which is backed by a top competitor and its labor union. Wal-Mart "will have to rethink its future growth in a state...

To: Assignment Desk, Daybook Editor, Labor Reporter Contact: Pat Purcell, 973-583-9651 (cell - on site); Paul Blank of the Wake-Up Wal-Mart Campaign, 202-466-1503 or 310-701-3003; or Anson Kaye, 202-412-4004, for Rep. Weiner News Advisory: -- Local Activists, Rep. Anthony Weiner Call on ABC's Good Morning America to Drop Wal-Mart as Sponsor -- Demonstration Organized for Tuesday in Front of Good Morning America's Studio In front of ABC's Good Morning America (GMA) studio, local activists, community leaders, and Congressman Anthony Weiner will call on ABC's News President David Westin to immediately drop Wal-Mart as the sponsor of GMA's patriotic-themed "Only in...

BENTONVILLE, Ark. (AP) - The U.S. House has approved a federal highway bill that includes $37 million for widening and extending the Bentonville street that provides the main access to the headquarters of Wal-Mart Stores Inc. The company says it asked U.S. Rep. John Boozman, R-Ark., to help get federal money for the proposed project. U.S. Rep. Don Young, R-Alaska, added an amendment that put the work into the $284 billion bill, which is now before the Senate. Wal-Mart spokesman Jay Allen said the company wants Eighth Street improved so the 10,000 workers at company headquarters will have an easier...

It sounds counterintuitive. But a new report says the secret to retailers' survival in a Wal-Mart world isn't about attempting to outrun the 800-pound retail gorilla but about the ability to maneuver around it, according to a recent study entitled "Outsmarting Wal-Mart" from the global retail practice unit of New York-based consulting firm Bain & Company. So who's thriving in a Wal-Mart world? The report's authors, Darrell Rigby and Dan Haas, picked Best Buy (Research) in consumer electronics; Walgreen (Research) in pharmacy products; Wal-Mart's arch-rival Target (Research) in the discount arena; PetsMart (Research) in pet supplies; and privately held regional...

Here’s a shocker. I love Wal-Mart. I know it’s almost always on the receiving end of bad press. It ruins neighborhoods. It puts small businesses out of business. It wrecks the balance of trade. It pays its workers poorly and treats them mean. It makes overseas workers into slaves. That's what the news says. The truth is that Wal-Mart is a major blessing for most Americans who live close enough to one to shop there and for the people who work at them. My smart friend C.L. Werner in Omaha made the point really clearly. When a Wal-Mart opens in...

Wal-Mart, the world's largest retailer, launched a national advertising campaign to counter long-term critics of the company's employment policies. "Wal-Mart is working for all Americans. Some of our critics are working only for themselves," company president Lee Scott said in an open letter that was published as a full page ad in more than 100 newspapers, including the New York Times, Wall Street Journal and USA Today. Scott said it was time for the public to hear the "unfiltered truth" about Wal-Mart, and time for the company to stand up on behalf of a workforce that includes 1.2 million Americans....

I don't know about you, but I sort of miss the days when Wal-Mart was harmless. You know, back when they were just a mammoth conglomerate putting small retailers out of business and forcing manufacturing jobs overseas, thus helping to cripple the U.S. economy. They were almost lovable then. Now, though, they're downright scary. It's not just that every time you go into one you get this niggling feeling that you might just never come out, like a Roach Motel. It's more that Wal-Marts have become little planets unto themselves, where the citizens all laugh at our silly Earth customs,...

The giant retailer's low prices often come with a high cost. Wal-Mart's relentless pressure can crush the companies it does business with and force them to send jobs overseas. Are we shopping our way straight to the unemployment line? A gallon-sized jar of whole pickles is something to behold. The jar is the size of a small aquarium. The fat green pickles, floating in swampy juice, look reptilian, their shapes exaggerated by the glass. It weighs 12 pounds, too big to carry with one hand. The gallon jar of pickles is a display of abundance and excess; it is entrancing,...

Wal-Mart's cost too high for workers, merchants By BILL DANIO and SUNG SOO KIM With more than 3,000 stores and super centers in the country and more than 1.5 million employees worldwide, there is no denying that Wal-Mart, which wants to build a 135,000-square-foot store in Rego Park, Queens, is a Wall Street darling and a rip-roaring success story. More and more, however, people are beginning to see that Wal-Mart's incredible expansion is only one side of a more complicated story. The other side of the narrative finds Main Street shopping areas closed all over the country. It finds regional...

LITTLE ROCK, Ark. - Wal-Mart Stores Inc. is expanding the definition of "immediate family" in its employee-ethics policy to account for laws in states that recognize domestic partnerships and civil unions. The change drew quick praise from a major gay-rights lobbying organization. The revised policy, which was disclosed Wednesday in a filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission recognizes that in some states "immediate family" includes an employee's same-sex partner. The revisions deal with sections of the company's ethics code that bar employees from using confidential information to benefit themselves or immediate family members and from approaching Wal-Mart's suppliers about...

By Susan Jones CNSNews.com Morning Editor January 28, 2005 (CNSNews.com) - A homosexual advocacy group is applauding Wal-Mart, a company more often vilified than praised by liberals, for including same-sex couples in its new definition of "immediate family." The Human Rights Campaign said Wal-Mart defined "immediate family" in a conflict-of-interest policy it filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission this week. That policy says Wal-Mart employees may not use confidential information they get on the job for their own benefit or for the benefit of their "immediate family members." According to Wal-Mart's policy, "Immediate family members include (whether by birth,...

WASHINGTON (AP) -- Wal-Mart Stores Inc., the world's largest retailer, will pay $135,540 to settle federal charges that it broke child labor laws, the Labor Department said Saturday. The 24 violations, which occurred at stores in Arkansas, Connecticut and New Hampshire, had to do with teenage workers who used hazardous equipment such as a chain saw, paper balers and fork lifts. Wal-Mart denied the allegations but agreed to pay the penalty. A spokeswoman for the Bentonville, Ark., company said Wal-Mart was preparing a statement Saturday. Child labor laws prohibit anyone under 18 from operating hazardous equipment. The company also agreed...

RALEIGH --It was only a matter of time. Two owners of a Wal-Mart in Wilson have filed suit in federal court to challenge $2 million in local-government incentives for a planned Target store in the county. "This is a very peculiar thing to have the government decide it wants a particular brand of store, and it's willing to pay it $2 million to come to town," said the plaintiffs' attorney. North Carolina's escalating use of tax subsidies to "close deals" with potential private employers was destined to provoke the state's existing businesses. While there are many different arguments, both legal...

As much as the AFL-CIO would have liked it to happen on US soil, a union finally received certification in Quebec, Canada to open contract talks with Wal-Mart. Wal-Mart Canada will close the store in Jonquiere, Quebec, citing union demands that wouldn't allow the store to operate efficiently and profitably. This is no laughing matter if you are a fan of the free market. Wal-Mart is hated by the unions because they are highly profitable and are non-union. Anytime the unions can take a dig at WM, the liberal media is more than happy to air their greivances. I read...

Last week, Wal-Mart's Canadian division said it would close its first unionized store in North America, making Quebec the latest battleground in the retailer's struggle against unions. Wal-Mart's decision triggered vicious rebukes from leftist Canadian politicians. David Christopherson, a Canadian Member of Parliament, even called Wal-Mart's decision to close the store "economic terrorism." It is difficult to understand how workers are exercising their free choice by banding together to negotiate with their employer, but Wal-Mart is the corporate equivalent of Bin Laden because it is choosing not to stay in business under the union's terms. Putting that aside, there is...

Thinking Outside The “Big Box” Brief Analysis No. 501 Friday, Frebruary 18, 2005 by Pamela Villarreal Neighborhoods, city councils and the media are debating whether to welcome or discourage big-box retailers. While Wal-Mart comes to mind, big-box retailers are defined as any free-standing store greater than 50,000 square feet, and most big-box stores now range in size from 90,000 to 200,000 square feet. Critics claim that large retailers crowd out mom-and-pop competitors and replace them with windowless warehouses filled with minimum wage workers. Big-box retailers promise economic benefits such as sales tax revenues, jobs, competitive wages and low prices. But...

Those low-cost goods at Wal-Mart ultimately come at a high price: lost jobs, lower wages and unsupportable U.S. trade deficits. Wal-Mart is the single largest importer of foreign-produced goods in the United States, and the majority of its private-label clothing is manufactured in at least 48 countries around the world—and almost none in the United States. Wal-Mart’s biggest trading partner is China. The world’s largest retailer bought some $12 billion in merchandise in 2002, from China, nearly 10 percent of all Chinese goods sold in this country that year. Through November 2004, the United States was running a $147 billion...

February 21, 2005 — While some welcome Wal-Mart to the city, others protested the store's long-standing position when it comes to unionized workers. Out goes the old Helene Curtis building. In comes Chicago's first Wal-Mart. "It made god sense to bring jobs to your community. It made sense to take out something old and put in something new," said Ald. Emma Mitts, 37th Ward. Alderman Mitts has led the way in bringing the retail giant to the West Side despite protests from some of her constituents. While a marching band tried to outplay protesters, they continued to have their voices...

OGDEN - The city Redevelopment Agency took the first steps Tuesday toward condemning three properties in a downtown neighborhood to make way for a Super Wal-Mart. The Ogden City Council, acting as the agency board, voted 5-2 to negotiate or, if necessary, exercise its right of eminent domain to condemn two homes and a vacant lot. The owners of one home and the lot have died and heirs could not come to agreement on selling the properties to the city, said City Attorney Norm Ashton. The owners of the second home have moved out of state and have not been...

Jury Awards $7.5 Million in Wal-Mart Case Federal Jury Awards Man With Cerebral Palsy $7.5 Million in Wal-Mart Discrimination Case The Associated Press Feb. 25, 2005 - A federal jury has ordered Wal-Mart Stores to pay a Long Island man $7.5 million after ruling the retail behemoth discriminated against the man because he has cerebral palsy. Patrick Brady, 21, was hired for a job in the Wal-Mart pharmacy department in Centereach, N.Y., during the summer of 2002. After one day in the pharmacy, he was reassigned to other responsibilities, including collecting garbage and shopping carts from the parking lot. The...

Wal-Mart faces a class-action lawsuit that claims it knew full well its cleaning contractors were hiring illegal immigrants, paying them slave wages and locking them inside the stores at night. All in the name of everyday cheap prices by Brita Brundage - December 23, 2004 Wal-Mart. That boxy behemoth with its neatly stacked rows of toilet paper and DVDs, trampolines and hooded sweatshirts, cheese balls and wrapping paper. With its employees wearing the signature bright-blue smocks emblazoned with sunny yellow smiley faces. Here, shoppers push carts piled high with discount electronics, cookies and XXL T-shirts along endless waxed aisles that...

There are dark clouds on the horizon for cities, which for decades have used eminent domain or its threat as a tool to replace run-down neighborhoods with tax-generating, job-creating businesses. Not only are courts across the nation beginning to side with private-property rights' advocates, the Utah Legislature is cracking open the door to have a look. This is at the behest of educators and Gov. Olene Walker, who note the loss of revenue to schools from some redevelopment projects. Cities also are paying attention to Kelo v. City of New London, a case scheduled for arguments before the U.S. Supreme...

DAVENPORT, Iowa (Reuters) - There was no mention of illegal immigrant workers or sex discrimination claims as Wal-Mart Stores Inc. (NYSE:WMT - News) opened a massive new supercenter here, one of 39 stores it opened nationwide in a single day. Store manager Jeff Teague handed out giant-sized checks to area charities. A local pastor said a prayer. A Wal-Mart employee sang the national anthem, and a high school band belted out "Hang On Sloopy" at a ribbon-cutting ceremony on Wednesday that drew hundreds of shoppers. Even as Wal-Mart faces intense scrutiny over its labor practices -- highlighted by a government...