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Wall Mart does so many things right: incredibly efficient distribution, the toughest purchasing in the world, and stellar use of technology (for a long time, Wall Mart owned the largest telephony switching system in the SE United States). They invest where they need to, in distribution automation and information systems, and cut corners everwhere else they can get away with it. The fact of the matter is that they do what they were "elected" to do extremely well. From this point of view, Wall Mart is one of the best run companies in the world. Will people realize that "the game is not worth the candle?" Certainly this is what the documentary makers are hoping.

I appreciate the balance in your post about Walmart. Yes, they do so many things right, as you say.

I am not sure that I can think of the executive leadership of Walmart as evil in the same way as Nazis or Bush and I can't get as riled up on the topic of Walmart as on the topic of abortion, say, but the whole Walmart does disturb me.

I'd like to think of them as folks who just have religion -- corporate zeal -- and that they just like to sing the company song "Always low prices!", but it is more than that. If not evil, they are at least bad. It's one thing when an entity gets so big that they have disproportionate leverage over the people and institutions they deal with....but then to deliberately, cold-bloodedly perfect that unfair leverage into a science... That's bad. Evil?

Beyond the economics, I am perhaps most disturbed by the cultural leverage of the various Walmarts. Trust me, I have no interest in buying a 2LiveCrew CD from Walmart and I have never had the urge to rent Natural Born Killers from Blockbuster or anywhere else. And I would defend to the death their right not to sell or rent either of these...ummm, unless, of course, they are the only stores in the whole of the US of A. Well, anyway, I don't think that any particuar retailer should be expected to carry any particular art, but the notion that any large chain should be able to dictate content back to producers and consumers (change lyrics, covers) is repugnant. Of course the fact that we have artistic production concentrated in so few hands means that this is hardly the sole fault of Walmart or Blockbuster....

Sigh.

The fact that anti-Walmart sentiment is concentrated in folks who do not feel economically compelled to shop there is interesting. I'd like to thing that railing against Wamart isn't just a way to make "tornado bait" jokes at the expense of folks who are dealing with a whole different economic calculus. But I don't hate the folks shopping at Walmart. I just want Walmart to be a different company. To play fair....

...oh, but then they wouldn't be able to, Katrina efforts notwithstanding, cover the entire earth like low-priced blue kudzu.