In Ayn Rand's Atlas Shrugged the productive, inventive minds of the world are constantly belittled and attacked by the envious and agenda-driven in a society whose squeaky wheel gets the most grease. Sound familiar? R. Galloway
The left keeping Wal-mart out of the hands of the poor for the good of the poor is at once
laughable and disgusting. From Ted Kennedy no less. What does he know about working, actually paying for things through hard work? Here's Teddy "I can swim but she can't" Kennedy waxing poetic on Wal-mart;
We are working hard in Congress to make the Wal-Marts of the world accountable to workers, families and communities. We have introduced legislation to expose Wal-Mart's practice of dumping responsibility for health care for its employers on the American taxpayer. We have introduced the Employee Free Choice Act to give workers a voice at work and to stop anti-union intimidation tactics. We continue to fight for an increase in the minimum wage, to ensure that no one who works for a living lives in poverty. We have sponsored legislation to ensure equal pay for men and women. And we are increasing penalties against companies with dangerous working conditions.
Where does this murdering drunk get off giving business advice?
Successful business people who have made it on their own have a healthy respect for the effort and the system of capitalism that make success possible. Jack Wheeler describes it brilliantly here.
Envy-appeasement explains why Hollywood is so liberal. The vast amounts of money entertainment stars make is so grossly disproportionate to the effort it took them to make it that they feel it is unearned. So they apologize for it. The Liberal strategy is to apologize for his success, his country’s success, his civilization’s success, in order to appease the envious.
Liberalism is thus not a political ideology or set of beliefs. It is an envy-deflection device, a psychological strategy to avoid being envied. Liberalism is the politicalization of envy-appeasement.
Rich children with their unearned inheritance are easy targets for guilt mongering by the envious. So they assume a posture of liberal compassion as an envy deflection device.
"Please don't envy for my father's money ---look at all the liberal causes and government social programs I advocate!" Teddy Kennedy is the archetype of this phenomenon.
Wal-mart was forced to drop its plans for its first New York city store. And New York was the loser for it. The lower middle and middle class was the loser for it.
A "coalition" of lefties is planning hundreds of
anti-Wal-Mart actions nationwide in mid-November as the key retailing holiday
season kicks into gear. The Nov. 13-19 campaign, dubbed "Higher Expectations
Week," is being coordinated by Wal-MartWatch, an "umbrella group" started early
this year by maverick union leader Andy Stern, head of the Service Employees
International Union.
Uh, what? Wal-mart Watch? WTF? Here is the board;
Wal-Mart Watch is a 501c3 organization
'devoted to studying the impact of large corporations on society, and its advocacy arm, Five Stones [I am looking into these folks]The Center’s Board of Directors includes:
- Andrew Stern, President, Service Employees International Union [old time labor, shocka!]
- Judy Lichtman, Founder, National Partnership for Women & Families [typical lefty feminazi ]
- Chellie Pingree, President and CEO, Common Cause ["It's a really good time to be one of the good guys when the bad guys are so bad," Chellie Pingree said.]
- Carl Pope, Executive Director, Sierra Club [environ-mentalists? huh?]
- Roger Wilkins, George Mason University [welfare lawyer from Cleveland, Ohio turned Pulitzer Prize-winner, Wilkins is
best know for his role in exposing Watergate in the '70s]- Ed Goeas, The Tarrance Group [token pollster]
I argue Wal-Mart would provide jobs, generate tremendous sales, and offer low prices that would benefit low-wage earners greatly.
Wal-Mart pays above minimum wage, has an excellent pay plan, always promotes from within and has an excellent benefits package. And WTF is wrong with the lowest prices in town?
An economy of abundance works! Not an economy of scarcity! Read Basquiat, Economic Sophisms.
Wal-Mart makes it possible for lower wage earners to purchase items
the could never afford at regular store prices. Wal-mart enhances the
quality of life for ALL AMERICANS.
These limo libs speak for who? Not
for them, they don't shop at Wal-Mart, believe me. They speak for the
little guy? HA! The little guy needs Wal-Mart.
Wal-Mart is an exemplar case history of a great AMERICAN success
story but the lefties hate when the American experiment works. They trot
out their Lenin/Marxist bullshit and fail to mention 100 million people murdered at the hands of communists outside of war.
Market based economies work. Let the market
handle inferior merchandise............people will stop buying it and
buy higher quality goods, if they want to.
I believe the undoing of American competitive edge has more to do with collectivist unionizing and decimated meritocracy.
Freedom, choose freedom. Not various shades of slavery
whether it be forced union membership and dues (something I experienced
when I signed on to work for The New York Daily News), impossible
taxation, heavy tariffs, and crippling government regulation.
I live in New York and believe me when I tell you it's a welfare
state and has become increasingly IMPOSSIBLE to make any kind of
money/profit here.
FREE THE PRODUCERS. CREATE AN ENVIRONMENT THAT IS FRIENDLY OPEN TO THE PRODUCER. STOP PUNISHING THE PRODUCERS.It seems to me the left is attempting to "kill the messenger"
Back in the late 70s early 80's the ILGWU put my daddy's factory out of business. Impossible demands and automatic wage increases forced him out of business. HE HAD NO CHOICE.............helloooooooooooooooo.
So what did he do? Necessity is the Mother of Invention. He
subcontracted to a non welfare state (North Carolina) and then to
Taiwan...............we are not talking child slavery, or slave labor
here.
We must remove the shackles on the American producers. We must advocate for a FREE economy. Get the governement off our backs! DON'T TREAD ON ME.
The key question to ask of any action, is whether it was undertaken with a gun held to the head. This is a vital question because of its economic results.
Tom, hamster motortime wrote;
If Walmart does not hold a gun to the head of a man who purchases a product, this indicates that the man is choosing to spend his money in this manner- that he is picking on option out of other alternative ways to satisfy his wants. He buys the product because he values the alternatives less. Mutatis mutandis if Walmart purchases his labor- both value his labor more than the alternative.
The Asian manufacturers who supply Walmart with products, do not hold guns to the heads of the Board of Directors. Walmart purchases those goods because they value them more than their alternative.
Now, freedom is not a key to utopia- reality imposes limits within which humans may live, and you will find that these limits prohibit precisely the utopias sought by the barrel of a gun. Do not ask whether this freedom could be better, but whether the use of force in these transactions could achieve the results you seek without negative effects greater than would occur in a state of freedom. In other words: how many people living in "subsistence wages" now, would be dead under your system of interventionism, or any variant of it?
UPDATE: NOVEMBER 27th: Apparently I have a new career here. heh heh
