Wal*mart needs to pay fair wages.

When Wal*Mart moved into a small town near us with one of their Super Centers, they wiped out about 75% of all of the local businesses. There isn't a competing grocery store within 15 miles.

From Forbes
(Click on the link to read more)

To Wal-Mart: Enough! No More Taxpayer Subsidized Profits For You

For years, Wal-Mart-and other large retail operators-have been piling up huge profits by controlling their labor costs through paying employees sub-poverty level wages. As a result, it has long been left to the taxpayer to provide healthcare and other subsidized benefits to the many Wal-Mart employees who are dependent on Medicaid, food stamp programs and subsidized housing in order to keep their families from going under.

With Medicaid eligibility about to be expanded in some 30 states, as a result of the Affordable Care Act, Wal-Mart has responded by cutting employee hours-and thereby wages-even further in order to push more of their workers into state Medicaid programs and increase Wal-Mart profits. Good news for Wal-Mart shareholders and senior management earning the big bucks-not so good for the taxpayers who will now be expected to contribute even larger amounts of money to subsidize Wal-Mart's burgeoning profits.

But, at long last and in a move gaining popularity around the nation, the State of California is attempting to say 'enough' to Wal-Mart and the other large retailers who are looking to the taxpayers to take on the responsibility for the company's employees-a responsibility Wal-Mart has long refused to accept.
Walmart Pays Workers Poorly And Sinks While Costco Pays Workers Well And Sails-Proof That You Get What You Pay For Rick Ungar Rick Ungar Contributor
Walmart Bails On Obamacare-Sticks Taxpayers With Employee Healthcare Costs Rick Ungar Rick Ungar Contributor

It's about time.

Legislation is now making its way through the California legislature-with the support of consumer groups, unions and, interestingly, physicians-that would levy a fine of up to $6,000 on employers like Wal-Mart for every full-time employee that ends up on the state's Medi-Cal program-the California incarnation of Medicaid.

The amount of the fine is no coincidence.

A report released last week by the Democratic staff of the U.S. House Committee on Education and the Workforce, estimates that the cost of Wal-Mart's failure to adequately pay its employees could total about $5,815 per employee each and every year of employment.

Definition if irony

The Demon Sheep Trilogy

Protecting The Sanctity of Marriage

I first saw this on Crooks and Liars

Should California Ban Divorce?

The Republicans should love this - they do so respect the sanctity of marriage that you just know this has to be right up their alley.

Rob Cockerham interviewed John Marcotte, a Sacramento man who filed a petition with the California Secretary of State to get a voter's initiative onto the 2010 ballot in California that would make it ban divorce.

RC: Are you going to hit the streets collecting signatures for the initiative?

John: We're going to set up a table in front of Wal*Mart and ask people to sign a petition to protect traditional marriage. We're going to interview them about why they thing traditional marriage is important, and then we'll tell them that we are trying to ban divorce. People who supported Prop 8 weren't trying to take rights away from gays, they just wanted to protect traditional marriage. That's why I'm confident that they will support this initiative, even though this time it will be their rights that are diminished. To not support it would be hypocritical. We're also going to collect signatures in front of "Faces," the largest gay nightclub in Sacramento.

This post came from Boing Boing where you can find an image and links to the full interview.
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So Typical Of Holier-Than-Thou Republicans

Republicrats Screw Californians

Not so long ago, perhaps last fall, California decided to try to set higher automobile gasoline consumption regulations than the Federal Government. Their motives seemed decent enough - they have one of the highest air pollution rates in the country and they wanted to protect their people and their environment from further harm.

Almost immediately, because they loves them some big business and they did not want the automobile manufacturers to have hurt feelings, the EPA ruled that California could not set their own standards. There can be no other logical reason for this than the Republicans protecting the profits of their friends in big business. In other words, screw the average citizen of California - let them eat poison.

Senator Barbara Boxer (D - California) decided that she didn't like this, so she called for hearings in the Senate over the EPA's actions.

Surprise, surprise! The EPA does not wish to turn over the documents related to their decision making on the matter. They counter that the Senate should just go away and leave them alone to take good care of their friends.

Honest to God - it is just beyond my ability to understand the position that the Republicans have taken here. How can one believe that the interests of business should trump the interest of trying to improve the human condition? Is it a love for money? A hate for poor people?

Can anyone reading this explain it to me?

For more on this, link here.

Did You Know - California Ethics

More interesting than important...

From SFGate.com...

Hollywood party girls don't have a monopoly on trouble in California. A disproportionate number of the state's congressional Republicans are facing ethics questions that threaten to sink their careers and their party's political fortunes too.

Of 201 House Republicans, at least six are known to have attracted the attention of federal investigators — and four are from California. Their woes come in the wake of the lurid corruption scandal that sent ex-GOP Rep. Randy "Duke" Cunningham of San Diego to prison last year for taking $2.4 million in bribes.

Breakin' the Law

It's so sad it's almost funny. Another conservative Republican running for Congress has been accused of crimes, but refuses to withdraw from the election. Even his own party wants him out for seding letters to Latino voters informing them that they could be arrested if they voted.

I know there are some crooked Democrats out there, but the Republicans have currently lost sigth of what this nation is all about.

Read more here in the LA Times