Oh, the irony.

The shade from the Wal-Mart Neighborhood Market sign is minimal around noon; still, six picketers squeeze their thermoses and Dasani bottles onto the dirt below, trying to keep their water cool. They're walking five-hour shifts on this corner at Stephanie Street and American Pacific Drive in Henderson—anti-Wal-Mart signs propped lazily on their shoulders, deep suntans on their faces and arms—with two 15-minute breaks to run across the street and use the washroom at a gas station.

Periodically one of them will sit down in a slightly larger slice of shade under a giant electricity pole in the intersection. Four lanes of traffic rush by, some drivers honk in support, more than once someone has yelled, "assholes!" but mostly, they're ignored.

They're not union members; they're temp workers employed through Allied Forces/Labor Express by the union—United Food and Commercial Workers (UFCW). They're making $6 an hour, with no benefits; it's 104 F, and they're protesting the working conditions inside the new Wal-Mart grocery store.

Perhaps we should organize some picketers to protest the low wages and harsh working conditions for the anti-Walmart picketers.

Posted by roy on September 13, 2005 at 12:20 PM in Ramblings | 7 Comments

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Comment posted on September 13th, 2005 at 09:58 PM
Man, there is a ton of irony in there. It's like a big circle. You really can never figure out who is getting the worst of it. :-)
Comment posted on September 13th, 2005 at 07:50 PM
liberalism = unsustainable contradictions

so is conservativism, but not nearly as blatant (which makes it even more vile to some).
Comment posted on September 13th, 2005 at 11:30 PM
Whatever happened to our capitalist? Liberalism is de facto right-wing libertarian ('Capitalist') thinking. I suppose you are using some mangled definition.

Pretty funny story, however.
Comment posted on September 14th, 2005 at 04:56 AM
Do you know what "de facto" means?

"De facto" liberalism is anything but capitalism.

But I suppose you are using some mangled definition...

<a href="http://www.dictionary.com">www.dictionary.com</a> --> use it.
Comment posted on September 15th, 2005 at 12:25 AM
Sorry; de jure.

'Liberalism refers to a support for individual liberties and limited government. The term is generally used with a reference to a particular policy area, e.g. "market liberalism" or "social liberalism".'
Comment posted on September 16th, 2005 at 03:12 PM
So, "de facto liberalism" is the mangled definition?

You've accused me of mangling the word 'capitalism' by using it to refer to an absolutely free society, i.e. the theoretical version of capitalism, as against capitalism de facto.

Now you're getting upset that I'm using 'liberalism' to refer to de facto liberalism. Further, liberalism 'de jure' (which is an improper use of the term, de jure) is such a vague Kantian idea that has no relevance to serious politics.

I guess the mangled definitions are the ones that don't fit your amoral agenda. This I'm assuming, because I'm sure you're not trying assert superiority based on semantics; when it comes to verbal precision, you're owned. English was my first language.
Comment posted on September 13th, 2005 at 01:43 PM
Fe-y.