Wal-Mart Chief Offers a Social Manifesto

[flashl]

Source: NY Times

KANSAS CITY, Mo. — Wal-Mart pledged Wednesday to cut the energy used by many of its products 25 percent, to force the chain’s suppliers to meet stricter ethical standards and to apply its legendary cost-cutting skills to help other companies deliver health care for their employees.

In a lofty address that at times resembled a campaign speech, the chief executive of Wal-Mart Stores, H. Lee Scott Jr., said that “we live in a time when people are losing confidence in the ability of government to solve problems.” But Wal-Mart, he said, “does not wait for someone else to solve problems.”

He then laid out sweeping plans for the company on several health and environmental issues, and he hinted that even more ambitious goals might be on the horizon. Mr. Scott said, for instance, that Wal-Mart is talking to leaders of the automobile industry about selling electric or hybrid cars — and might even install windmills in its parking lots so customers could recharge their cars with renewable electricity.

With the new commitments, Wal-Mart is trying to cement its reputation as a leader in areas where it was once known as a laggard. The initiatives are the most visible sign to date that Wal-Mart, which spent much of the past decade defending itself against criticism of its business practices, has gone on the offensive.

NY Times

Read more: http://www.nytimes.com/2008/01/24/business/24walmart.html?em&ex=1201323600&en=53b4af382e42f50f&ei=5087%0A

---

A different tune than the old corps have not social responsibility.

[Uben]

1. Good!

Then why doesn't Walmart stop its practice of hiring part-time employees so it won't have to pay for their benefits? The guy is a ll
iar and a spinster, and we aint buyin it!

[flashl]

4. The 'slow down' is impacting Wally World, they depend on spending habits by payroll cycles. nt

[Virginia Dare]

8. Their business model has finally come back to bite them on the ass..

It's finally come down to people not being able to afford even the cheap crap that they offer up everyday. So now they are suddenly "socially aware". If there is a hell, every single person in this country will burn in it forever due in large part to what Wal-Mart has done to this world.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Glass_(businessman)

In 1992, NBC news series Dateline interviewed Glass during an investigation into Wal-Mart's "Made in America" and "Bring It Home to the USA" marketing campaigns.<1> The show aired footage of children working in factories in Bangladesh making clothes destined for Wal-Mart, as well as footage of Wal-Mart stores with "Made in America" signs hung over imported goods. When asked about children in Asia working in sweatshop conditions, Glass' reply was "You and I might, perhaps, define children differently,"<2> and then said that since Asians are quite short, one can't always tell how old they were. Glass was shown photographs of one factory that burned down with the children still locked inside. He responded, "Yeah...there are tragic things that happen all over the world."<3> Glass stormed out of the interview, which was terminated immediately by Wal-Mart. On the CNBC Special "The Age of Wal-Mart" the quote "I see Wal-Mart as a big speeding truck just waiting to hit something" was attributed to him.

[flashl]

17. Absolutely right.

It reminds me of the aftermath of 911, while confused Americans were huddled in their homes, the message from the decider was ‘you need to go out and shop’.

[saigon68]

25. People who work at Wally World shop at the

Dollar Store-- Where the Crap is more shoddy and cheaper. Also the dollar store sells out of date canned goods to the poor for 33 cents a can

[Virginia Dare]

26. I guess that's why..

you will often find a Dollar Store very close to a Wal-Mart?...:shrug: I've often thought the two had some sort of relationship.

[BleedingHeartPatriot]

2. I love how the CEO's say government can't solve problems, all while begging the Fed for a rate cut.

:eyes:

MKJ

[flashl]

3. After they 'drown it' in the bathtub. nt

[Virginia Dare]

9. Wal-Mart has been one of the greatest of the corporate welfare beneficiaries..

this country has ever seen. I'm quite positive the taxpayers have been collectively screwed out of trillions of dollars by Wal-Mart.

[Sam Ervin jret]

13. "we will build a Wal-MArt Here, if you give us the land tax free"

"we'll bring jobs" - shitty jobs

we'll bring goods and services - shitty service and toxic goods

we'll be good neighbors - and pollute and make your town look like every other wally town - say goodbye to your home town

[underpants]

5. This is encouraging but don't be fooled they are just responding to public will

and,a t the same time, still trying to change their image

Still all in all this in a good thing.

[jasmine621]

6. And "responding to public will" is a bad thing, right? nt

[Virginia Dare]

10. It depends on what your motivation is..

if it's pure greed, which in this case I'm sure it is, then no.

[Sam Ervin jret]

14. It is when it's a shallow self serving attempt at your own self preservation

AND YOU STILL DON'T GET IT!!

[underpants]

23. Welcome to DU

:hi: if'n I haven't before

[underpants]

24. No of course not-My point was to be weary of this

and don't assume that they are just doing for altruistic reasons.

[flashl]

12. You make a good point, when a heavy weigh move to offer the little guy a 'leg up'

no matter what their motives may have some beneficial effects. Yet, my deeply held suspicions cause me to believe that the benefits may not be long term or far reaching.

[lagavulin]

33. No, this isn't a positive development. It's an incredibly destructive...

...corporation trying to do whatever it can to keep getting away with what it's doing for as long as possible. It's like watching Dow-Corning advertise its toxic products as "green", or Monsanto telling its idiot farmer-proletariats that they are all working together to "feed the world".

I thought this was a great quote a while back, from an interview with author Kim Stanley Robinson:

“...The word sustainability is now code for: let's make capitalism work over the long haul, without ever getting rid of the hierarchy between rich and poor and without establishing social justice. Sustainable development, as well: that's a term that's been contaminated. It doesn't even mean sustainable anymore. It means: let us continue to do what we're doing, but somehow get away with it.

By some magic waving of the hands, or some techno silver bullet, suddenly we can make it all right to continue in all our current habits. And yet it’s not just that our habits are destructive, they’re not even satisfying to the people who get to play in them. So there’s a stupidity involved, at the cultural level.

BLDGBLOG: In other words, your lifestyle may now be carbon neutral – but was it really any good in the first place?

Robinson: Right. Especially if it’s been encoding, or essentially legitimizing, a grotesque hierarchy of social injustice of the most damaging kind. And the tendency for capitalism to want to overlook that – to wave its hands and say: well, it’s a system in which eventually everyone gets to prosper, you know, the rising tide floats all boats, blah blah – well, this is just not true.”

[Phred42]

7. What a miserable Pompous Ass

“we live in a time when people are losing confidence in the ability of government to solve problems.”

What Fascist, self-fulfilling and self-serving BS!

People haven't lost confidence in GOVERNMENT - they are waking up to the fact that Republicans cannot be trusted with their hands on Government. H. Lee Scott Jr. and the Fascist elite are THE problem.


http://www.commondreams.org/views05/0906-21.htm

"You Can't Govern if You Don't Believe in Government"
by Thom Hartmann

In a May 25, 2001 interview, Grover Norquist told National Public Radio's Mara Liasson, "I don't want to abolish government. I simply want to reduce it to the size where I can drag it into the bathroom and drown it in the bathtub."

Norquist got his wish. Democracy - and at least several thousand people, most of them Democrats, black, and poor - drowned last week in the basin of New Orleans. Our nation failed in its response, because for most of the past 25 years conservatives who don't believe in governance have run our government.

[Virginia Dare]

11. Government has done nothing but the bidding of corporations going on 30..

years now. All of a sudden corporate America realizes this country is entirely fucked up. It's a big DUH moment for them.

[EmperorHasNoClothes]

21. The ability of government to solve problems

such as paying for healthcare for all those uninsured wal mart employees for instance?

[InkAddict]

29. What he didn't say was that everyone that does not own an

electric car/hybrid will be charged $5 to park in their newly fenced, surveiled lots, so I guess my savings from changing light bulbs should pay for parking to shop at Wal-Mart - at least until I can afford a used hybrid - NOT!

[Nickster]

15. So Mr Wal-Mart, how many of your employees will be able to afford an electric car? How many of your

own employees will be able to afford the wonderful healthcare savings that you've muscled out for your clientel?

[Javaman]

16. "to apply its legendary cost-cutting skills"

you know what those skills are? threatening american manufactures with no sales unless they cut their prices. Otherwise china-mart will outsourse their products to mainland.

this is nothing more than polishing a turd, painting it green and calling it sustainable.

more total bullshit from the colossal bullshiters out to make a buck on the newest marketing fad.

I absolutely love this line, “we live in a time when people are losing confidence in the ability of government to solve problems.” But Wal-Mart, he said, “does not wait for someone else to solve problems.”

Also known as: we own you, we own the government, we will soon own the air, water and land. You either bow down before us or we will fuck you so hard that prison will look like a vaction.

fuck china-mart!!

[boricua79]

18. A step in the right direction

as long as they're actively trying to overcome the past reputation they have, I have no problem with redemptive and beneficial policies.

[Sam Ervin jret]

22. Did you even read what it said?

Help health care by showing them how to cut costs like WAL MART does? What? are we all going to China for our doctors appointments now? Oh! no, sorry. Help others cut cost like they do. My mistake - so their companies can get poison from china, cut their workers hours to part time so you have less full time workers therefore less people on the health care plan. Yes very progressive.

What was I thinking even Wal-Mart wouldn't expect their people to go to China for their health care. That's silly. Right? They wouldn't do that would they?

Shit! I hate when I give them ideas!

[closeupready]

31. What this is about is, they know that people are mad, and that a Democrat is going to win.

So they are trying to take charge of discussions about change before the curve. In other words, if THEY can start discussions NOW about how to make changes before changes are imposed upon them by a Democratic administration, then they can control where that discussion goes, lessening the burden at a future time.

I hate to be so cynical, but making money is their supreme agenda. (Which is neither good nor bad, but informative as to what's really going on here.)

[EmperorHasNoClothes]

19. Great, so one of the most evil companies in history is now

slightly less evil.

Funny how everything they're doing will benefit them financially, though. But I'm sure they're just doing it for purely altruistic reasons.

[Sam Ervin jret]

20. It's not the government we don't trust. hell we barely have a government

It's you god damn greedy companies that produce nothing, add nothing, and create nothing to/for our world but greed, poison and pollution that we don't trust.

Will you stop trying to spin us.

AT my age and after what Ive been through, I'm the Damn NO SPIN ZONE. AND I'm NOT THE ONLY ONE.

[flashl]

27. Speak the truth. What government? nt

[Hugin]

28. Excellent!

Thanks for speaking out... Defeating confidence in government is what this Norquist scheme is all about.

[closeupready]

30. Do they smell change in the air, or what?

:D This is a pre-emptive strike.

[GliderGuider]

32. Orwellian BS!

24/7 shopping madness


Wal-Mart's 24-hour shopping goes year-round
Waterloo Record - 4 Jan 2008
Groh says Wal-Mart will continue to operate on a 24-hour basis in markets such as Kitchener as long as shoppers demand the convenience. ...
Wal-Mart 24/7 shopping madness
London Free Press - 5 Jan 2008
And maybe you've got other things on your mind -- like shopping. But if you ask me, the news that Wal-Mart will operate 25 of its Canadian stores ...



They don't give a tinker's damn about people. The 40-hour work week is gone the way of the dodo and the Sunday Day Of Rest (RIP).
And another nail in the coffin of Government By and For the People.

Oh, great God Corporation! Deliver us from Labour Rights! Deliver us from healthy circadian rhythms! Deliver us from sunlight and time with children and stable marriages!