Wal-Mart vs. The First Amendment

by Erin Banister

If you're new here, you may want to subscribe to my RSS feed. Thanks for visiting!

The Pensacola News Journal has a flare for irking people at times, but what newspaper doesn’t? Mark O’Brien, a columnist for the Pensacola News Journal, had this to say about Wal-Mart:

“I like Wal-Mart prices the same as the next shopper, but there’s a downside,
too. Many Wal-Mart employees lack the fringe benefits and insurance that makes
the difference between existence and a good quality of life. Yet, we customers
pay a surcharge from a different pocket — subsidizing health care for Wal-Mart
employees who can’t afford it.”

Mark went on to comment that 10,000 children of Wal-Mart employees are part of Georgia’s state health-care program, costing taxpayers nearly $10,000,000 (ten million dollars) yearly.

How did Wal-Mart react to these staggering figures?

Did they write an opinion piece to fight the column? Did they dispute the validity of the piece?

No. They now refuse to run the Pensacola News Journal in Wal-Mart. Nothing said about the state of their employees (who are obviously living right at or below the poverty level). They didn’t dispute the validity at all - they just now refuse to carry the Pensacola News Journal in Wal-Mart.

Bob Hart, manager of a Pensacola Wal-Mart, said this:

… his stores couldn’t tolerate a newspaper that
would print the opinions of someone who was as mean and negative as Mark
O’Brien… Mr. Hart said he wanted the newspaper to get its racks off his lots. But
he also said that if I fired Mark, we could talk about continuing to sell the
newspaper at his stores…

So, let me get this right - your business gets bad press and you refuse to sell the newspaper in your store unless the columnist is FIRED. When did this behavior become appropriate?

And not to say anything about the real abuse here - the Wal-Mart employees. At least the grocery employees (in my area) have a Union to fight their battles - why aren’t Wal-Mart employees granted the same respect?

This whole thing just churns my stomach.

No tags for this post.