General Discussion
Related: Editorials & Other Articles, Issue Forums, Alliance Forums, Region Forumsthe Obama that promises is a different guy, and far less powerful, than the Obama that acts
http://www.truth-out.org/opinion/item/24068-always-low-wages-more-pollution-why-barack-and-michelle-obama-relentlessly-shill-for-walmartThough it was an insult to working people and to many of his abject and fervent supporters, it should have been no surprise. It wasn't President Obama's first wet kiss to Wal-Mart and with almost three more years in office to go it won't be his last. Still the willingness of the Obama Administration to do the bidding of Wal-Mart shows just how hollow has become the pretense of elected black Democrats to representing the poor and oppressed.
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Of course labor audiences in 2007 and 2008 were where Obama pledged to renegotiate NAFTA, and immediately raise the minimum wage as soon as he took office. The president never mentioned raising the minimum wage again till about 2012 when Republicans were safely in control of the House of Representatives, and instead of renegotiating NAFTA, President Obama is engaged in secret negotiations to extend it across the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans. Evidently the Obama that promises is a different guy, and far less powerful, than the Obama that acts.
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Wal-Mart was even allowed, along with McDonalds and other large, low-wage employers, to shape the drafting of regulations governing Obamacare, in ways that exempted the retailer from having to ensure large numbers of its workers for the first several years.
The fiction that elected Democrats represent poor and working people and stand for safeguarding the environment is just that a fiction. There is a new neoliberal paradigm that allows Democrats to mumble a few words about raising the minimum wage when the other party controls Congress, that claims the moment they took office was the day the oceans stopped rising. If these were curable bugs in the political system, votes and advocacy would wake enough people up to change them. But what if they're not bugs in the system at all. What if these are its core and immutable features? What then?
KoKo
(84,711 posts)Walmart into 30% of the Grocery Market which would cut out other grocery stores from moving into those areas. I guess the thought is that they "sell cheaper goods" that those in poor areas can afford, but the way they've exploited their workers and encouraged more and cheap goods from China has cut out local suppliers. I know many feel that Obama had to deal with the cards he was dealt once he became President. But, Dixon is correct. He did run on issues that we Democrats cared deeply about and our Party supported him. He hasn't done much of anything that Dixon is talking about which maybe he could have when he had the House & Congress and huge popular approval from the people who elected him. So there is discouragement in Democratic Voters who did feel our party stood for the issues he campaigned on. After those 8 years of hell under Bush II and Clinton Scandals we were also so hopeful the Real Change would come. We are going to have to work a heck of a lot harder in the future to roll back what's already gone on in the years we've held the Presidency. Not all Obama's fault, of course, but that our Party leaders seemed to be supportive of policies that they ran against.
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Wal-Mart has been a leader in the corporate practice of weaponizing its charitable giving, turning it into a lever to open new markets in urban America, to neutralize and isolate opposition, and to curry favor with local political figures. Wal-Mart made it rain on selected charities and ministries in areas like Newark and Chicago when it needed to colonize those new markets. President Obama recognized this achievement in the corruption of Democratic party politics in March 2014 by nominating Wal-Mart's chief of charitable giving to head up his Office of Management and Budget.
Wal-Mart was even allowed, along with McDonalds and other large, low-wage employers, to shape the drafting of regulations governing Obamacare, in ways that exempted the retailer from having to ensure large numbers of its workers for the first several years.
djean111
(14,255 posts)Coupons for "healthy food" - only $25, but hey!
Then I saw I had to buy the food from Walmart.
How cozy.
Tossed the mail.
KoKo
(84,711 posts)That's pretty disgusting...but, I guess can be spun as helping those who only have WalMart as a place to shop. (Leaving out it's a Monopoly and it's other issues)....but then there's the link to an Insurance Company showing the ties.
Is this all they could do? "Let the poor get coupons from their insurance companies" and we have done what we could because the USA NEEDS WALMART and China for the cheap labor that gutted our American Jobs? How can this not be seen as Corporate Oligarchies running our country. And, both party's policies seem to differ little on this issue or bailing out Wall Street Crooks and the Bankers and Heads of Regulatory Agencies who allowed the "Second Great Financial Crash" since 1929.
But..."nothing to see there....move along." Is it Hillary or Jeb for 2016...
geek tragedy
(68,868 posts)Proof:
http://blackagendareport.com/content/supreme-court-why-we-vote-democrats
And what does Dixon think of Elena Kagan? His take: