Last week Virginia's Orange County Board of Supervisors vote to approve the building of a new Wal-Mart Supercenter within the historic boundaries of the
Wilderness Battlefield - and one of the most significant battlefields of the Civil War. The Civil War Preservation Trust has been fighting Wal-Mart on this location for over a year - seeking an alternative location and compromoise - and after last week they desperately need everyones help to stop Wal-Mart from moving forward and opening the door to further destructive development.
Even State Senator Creigh Deeds, the Democratic candidate for Virginia Governor, has written a letter to the president and CEO of Wal-Mart pleading with him to move the location off the historic battlefield. Wake-Up Wal-Mart is helping in this fight and you can too by also writing a letter on the Civil War Preservation Trust's website and also help spread the word yourself.
More from Blue Virginia and the Washington Post below:
There has been a lot of talk this week about the surprising move by Walmart to publically support President Obama’s health care reform plan, supposedly positioning themselves as a
leader in the fight to bring health care to all Americans. As we mentioned in a post on our blog
yesterday, this might be easier to swallow if Walmart had any history of leading by example. Instead, they usually do just the opposite.
Given
Walmart’s long record of trying to build a positive
reputation on ineffective work-arounds to health care coverage
for employee, the recent revelations about sacrificing quality for cheap perescription drugs, and their deceptive PR campaign that severely overstated their workers’ health
care coverage, it’s not hard to understand our skepticism. [get the details in the extended entry]
(This kind of coverage of important local events is terrific! - promoted by Jon Kantrowitz)
Edwin Lopez (at left), a New Britain resident and member of Connecticut Working Families, was recently fired from his job at the New Britain Wal-Mart, after seven years of employment, for offenses he claims were largely fabricated. Edwin says the firings had more to do with race.
There are fairly large number of practices at Wal-Mart that we object to. But out and out racism against the people working there is around as bad as it gets. So, we held a rally to highlight the pattern, to call on the store to create an official 'no harassment' policy to allow Spanish speaking Wal-Mart workers to communicate in Spanish with Spanish speaking customers without fear of retribution or punishment, and to call on Attorney General Richard Blumenthal to open an investigation into discriminatory practices.
The most excited part: the Attorney General came to the event and agreed to investigate.
The event got covered in the New Britain Herald (read the story) and the Courant (read the story), and also on NBC 30 news.
Our rally is also the topic of the New Britain Herald's online readers poll. Go to the front page at www.newbritainherald.com and in the left column, you can vote whether you believe that employee complaints about racial discrimination at Wal-Mart are valid on the left hand side.
The rally was attended by several dozen members of the New Britain community, including a bunch of very energetic sign holding kids, as well as local elected officials. Read on to see pictures. Here's a taste:
What's new and news, from your daily source of leftist extremism:
Does Wal-Mart's reputation in Connecticut need to be damaged further? Apparently so, as commonweal documents Wal-Mart's SLAPP lawsuits to muzzle opponents to the proposed Groton store.
Tom Swan ran a session at the Democracy for America Night School, Holding Elected Leaders Accountable. (PDF link here.) It's a guide to help plan effective constituent meetings with elected officials.
Speaking of DFA, the Norwalk / Silver Star DFA will be having a universal healthcare discussion at their meeting tonight (no linky, website down).
There's also a Planned Parenthood phonebank in New Haven, an Amy Goodman appearance at Connecticut College, and a Bridgeport Young Dems meeting tonight - for more info, see the events calendar in the top left.
It's rare that a statement is so brazen that it's able to shock me, here in 2007, but this one does it:
Harwe, 26 at the time, was rushed to the hospital, where she learned that her left vertebral artery had been crushed. In the days and years that followed, Harwe suffered from paralysis, vision loss, weakness and coordination problems, a paralyzed vocal cord and an inability to swallow. Today, she still uses a feeding tube.
Harwe plans to tell state lawmakers Monday that she had no idea stroke was one of the risks of cervical manipulation by a chiropractor. The legislature's Public Health Committee is considering legislation that would require chiropractors to inform patients, both in writing and verbally, of the risks and possible side effects of their treatments.
State chiropractors say the legislation is unnecessary and unfairly punitive. They argue that a state law requiring a patient to give informed consent before a procedure is excessive given the statistically remote risk of injury and death.
"[A]t best this proposal is a misplaced attempt at patient advocacy and is perhaps prejudicial against the chiropractic profession," said Dr. Matthew N. Pagano, D.C., president of the Connecticut Chiropractic Association.
But this morning, in an extraordinary meeting in Washington, the chiefs of Wal-Mart Stores and the Service Employees International Union will stand together and agree on a series of goals for achieving universal health coverage, according to people briefed on the matter.
The two men might even shake hands.
The meeting between H. Lee Scott Jr., the chief executive of Wal-Mart, and Andrew L. Stern, president of the S.E.I.U., which caps months of secret conversations, could be the beginning, however tentative, of a détente between the nation's largest employer and its labor critics.
At least on one issue. But the issue - providing affordable health insurance - is arguably the biggest facing both Mr. Stern and Mr. Scott. Wal-Mart, which insures fewer than half its workers, has identified health care as potentially the biggest vulnerability to its image and business, and the S.E.I.U., one of the country's biggest unions, has called it the No. 1 priority for its members.
So during today's meeting, Mr. Stern and Mr. Scott will announce a campaign to seek public acceptance of several principles of health policy. One goal is universal health coverage by a specific date, somewhere around 2012. Another is the idea of shared responsibility, emphasizing that individuals, businesses and government all play roles in financing health care and expanding coverage.
Executives from AT&T, Intel and several nonprofit organizations will also participate in today's meeting.
Notable in their absence were representatives from health-insurance companies. Despite the cash that they're willing to dump into anti-healthcare ad campaigns (Harry and Louise, anyone?), the insurance industry, in the long-run, will be overwhelmed by U.S. corporations who need universal healthcare to keep their businesses competitive.
For-profit health insurance is a lot like asbestos: dangerously obsolete. When even Wal-Mart understands that, our political leaders are flat out of excuses on this issue.
Edwin Lopez (at left), a New Britain resident and member of Connecticut Working Families, was recently fired from his job at the New Britain Wal-Mart, after seven years of employment, for offenses he claims were largely fabricated. Edwin says the firings had more to do with race.
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