There are four more screenings of Walmart: The High Price of Low Cost this week. Worth seeing.
A couple things stuck me about the movie. There's a story in the end of the movie about Inglewood, CA and how they kept Walmart out of town. I remember the story of how Walmart paid for an voter's initiative to except them from local zoning, and that it failed. This part of the movie reminded me of the difference between professional politics and amateur politics.
There's also subtle points in the movie, a picture of George W. Bush on an Arizona anti-Walmart activist's wall and a former hardware store owner in Ohio saying that he's "a conservative," where you realize that this isn't a partisan issue. Or at least, we haven't made it a partisan issue. It's not like the Democratic Party is beholden to the Waltons:
Republican candidates are the big winners in this year's election. They received about 85% of the company's (Walmart's) contributions, including those of its political action committee, employees and children of founder Sam Walton.
Wal-Mart's rise is significant because of the impact it might have on congressional debates about health care, labor and other hot-button regulatory issues, says Larry Noble, the center's executive director. "They're clearly making a move," he says.
The company has more than $250 billion in annual revenue. (No. 2 is General Motors, with $187 billion in annual revenue.) Wal-Mart is also the USA's biggest private employer, with 1.2 million workers.
We always say that Democrats win on home-front issues, economics, healthcare and the environment. Using Walmart as a wedge and forcing Republicans to defend them... I don't know, why wouldn't it work?
3 comments:
I believe that Hilary Clinton was on Wal Mart's board of directors. So both parties should be on the hook for Wal Mart's explosion.
Very true. I wasn't trying to say that Dems are pure on this point, but that we should make a better effort pointing out the economic injustice that Walmart and the type of world it represents. We should work harder to fight it as a party.
Happy buy nothing day.
Yes I would agree. We forced changes with NIKE, so it is possible and all the mishugoss last Friday made it a showcase.
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