Mexican Supreme Court Compares Wal-Mart’s Labor Practices to Dictatorship

Hey “Lee” go down to Mexico, see if they’ll be willing to look the other way. (when you drop the soap)

Vouchers handed out to employees as part of their salary could only be used at Wal-Mart stores, the employee said.

The Wal-Mart business model only works if you have middle class buying power. Mexican employees are so poor they really can’t afford to shop at Wal-Mart so ‘vouchers’* insure that payroll money won’t be spent elsewhere.

Perhaps it’s time to return Eduardo Castro-Wrong to Mexico to quell the peon revolt!

*I guess vouchers are better than what the Mexican cart wranglers get....nada!

8/1/2008

Costco execs face stock option lawsuit
Shareholders seek removal of those it says are involved
By ANDREA JAMES
P-I REPORTER

A shareholder lawsuit accuses Costco Wholesale Corp. insiders of illegally backdating stock options, and it proposes removing senior managers and board members involved.

· Read the complaint (PDF)
The lawsuit alleges that Costco leaders were part of a scheme to manipulate information to “secretly maximize” personal profits. The scheme reaches back to 1997, the lawsuit says.

Shareholder Sandra Donnelly, with the help of Bellevue and San Diego law firms, filed the suit in King County Superior Court on July 17 on behalf of Costco against 20 of its current and former leaders.

“Costco’s business reputation has been severely damaged by defendants’ selfish actions, which portray a company compromised by a systemic lack of managerial integrity,” the suit says.

Issaquah-based Costco, the largest U.S. wholesale club chain, would not comment on pending litigation, a spokesman said Thursday.

The U.S. Attorney’s Office opened a grand jury investigation into Costco’s stock option granting practices March 15, 2007, to determine if the company had violated federal law. That investigation was continuing as of Thursday.

“The evidence is in the complaint and the complaint is based on publicly available sources,” said Jim Fosler of Fosler Law Group Inc., the Bellevue company co-handling the suit. The primary Bellevue lawyer in the case was not available Thursday because of a death in the family, and Fosler did not know how to reach the plaintiff.

The San Diego law firm Robbins Umeda & Fink LLP, which specializes in shareholder litigation, did not return repeated calls.

Before June 2006, Costco used stock options to compensate executives and more than 1,000 of its employees. Stock option grants are a widely accepted compensation practice that gives the recipient the option to buy stock at a certain price. (For example, if someone has an option to buy stock for $10, and the stock’s market price rises to $25, then the option is worth the difference, because someone can exercise the option and immediately sell the stock, netting a $15 profit.)

Stock options are designed to align the interests of executives and shareholders, because executives benefit when the price rises.

Backdating is when a company misrepresents the date of a stock option grant to make it appear as if the stock was awarded at a cheaper price. The practice can line executives’ pockets with shares they can sell for a profit without risk. Backdating also cuts tax expenses, resulting in tax fraud.

The lawsuit against Costco executives alleges, “Several options grants were consistently dated at monthly lows.” The odds that the company would have by chance picked the lowest price of a particular month for an option award are 1 in 694, according to statistical analysis cited in the lawsuit.

The Securities and Exchange Commission, the Justice Department and the Internal Revenue Service have opened investigations into more than 100 companies suspected of backdating options.

“Backdating isn’t just a way for insiders to distort how much they’re really paying themselves and others in the company – it also involves issuing stock at cheaper prices than what would be paid if the rules had been followed,” SEC Chairman Christopher Cox said in a May 2007 speech in New York. “For that reason, it threatens a company’s shareholders in a very direct way.”

The 67-page Costco lawsuit carries some serious accusations, but it appears to make at least one math error. On page two, the lawsuit notes that Costco executives received grants March 13, 2000, when the price was $43, and that the company’s share price “more than doubled over the following four weeks.”

For that to be true, the price would have had to be more than $86, when in reality, on April 13, 2000, the stock closed at $54.63. Costco stock has never closed above $80.

Costco acknowledged in October 2006 some “imprecision” in its option dating owing to sloppy record-keeping, but not illegal behavior. In light of a growing awareness of stock option scandals, the company had commissioned its own review of its stock option practices.

Directors Dan Evans, a former governor and U.S. senator; Bill Gates Sr., the father of Microsoft’s Bill Gates; and Charles Munger, vice chairman of the board for Berkshire Hathaway Inc., conducted the review along with independent counsel and forensics experts. (Munger is one of the 20 named in the shareholder lawsuit.)

The three directors found that in April 1997, Chief Executive Jim Sinegal and Chairman Jeff Brotman each benefited from up to $200,000 in questionable stock option grants. Chief Financial Officer Richard Galanti also had received grants for which record-keeping was not done properly. Both Galanti and Sinegal opted not to receive bonuses in 2006.

Former local employees sue Kmart

FROM STAFF REPORTS
Published: Tuesday, July 29, 2008 4:30 AM EDT
Eight Hazleton-area women say in a federal lawsuit that they were unjustly fired from Kmart two years ago, according to published reports.

The former employees, all of whom worked for Kmart in the Hazleton area for more than 10 years, filed lawsuits against Kmart Corp. and Sears Holding Corp. this summer in federal court in Scranton.

One suit was filed June 6 by attorney John Dean, Scranton. Dean is representing former employees Andrea Cervasio, Mary Lou LaBuda, Sandra Malt and Darlene Novak, all of Hazleton; Dolores Piscura, West Hazleton, and Elaine Belko, Tresckow. A second suit was filed July 21 by Tracey Sharp, who is administering the estate of Congetta Ustonofski of Hazleton, who died May 6.

The suit alleges the store’s claims of downsizing was just an excuse so the company could replace higher-paid, full-time employees with part-time workers who earned less.

The Ustonofski suit states she was paid $14.38 an hour and was notified of her termination Jan. 6, 2006. Kmart told her that her position was terminated based on a numerical rating system. At first, the store manager ranked employees for termination but it was rejected by Kmart’s corporate office because it did not eliminate enough of the store’s longest-serving and oldest employees, the suit alleges. It also claims that Ustonofski was not given an opportunity to accept a lesser-paying job.

The lawsuit alleges Kmart violated the Age Discrimination and Employment Act, the Pennsylvania Human Relations Act and the Retirement Income Security Act. The suit is seeking compensatory and punitive damages for the former employees, along with an injunction preventing Kmart from continuing in the alleged discriminatory practices.

Sears and Kmart merged in 2004.

Ustonofski was employed with the company for 27 years, the Standard-Speaker reported in 2006. She was the store’s human resource manager and was replaced by a younger colleague whom Ustonofski said she helped train.

Some of the employees fired that same year worked at Kmart when it was under the name Kresge’s and was housed in downtown Hazleton. Malt worked at the store for more than 44 years. Belko was employed there for 33 years.

At the time of the terminations, a Sears spokesman said the job cuts occurred without regard to age, years of employment or health benefits, the Standard-Speaker reported. Cuts were in response to a decline in sales, the spokesman said.

The company told the fired employees that if they waited six days after being fired they could reapply for part-time jobs at minimum wage.

February 10, 2006 1:48 PM PST

Blind patrons sue Target for site inaccessibility

Bruce Sexton says he’s one of many blind individuals who can live more independently because of the Internet.
When it comes to shopping, for example, the 24-year-old college student doesn’t have to get to and navigate brick-and-mortar stores or ask employees for help. Rather, with the help of a keyboard and screen-reading software, he can navigate a Web site and make his purchase.

Or can he?

Sexton, along with a blind advocacy group, filed a class action lawsuit this week against Target, alleging that the retail giant’s Web site is inaccessible to the blind and thus violates a California law that incorporates the Americans with Disabilities Act.

The suit, filed in Northern California’s Alameda County Superior Court by Sexton and the Baltimore-based National Federation of the Blind (NFB), claims that Target.com, “contains thousands of access barriers that make it difficult, if not impossible, for blind customers to use.”

For example, the suit charges that visual information is missing “alt-text,” or invisible code that allows screen readers to detect and vocalize a description of an image. In addition, the site lacks accessible image maps, an impediment to jumping to different site destinations, the suit says. As a result, Sexton, who attends the University of California, Berkeley, says that while he can search the site for specific products, he’s unable to associate prices with those goods.

Sexton, who is president of the California Association of Blind Students, said he has always been too frustrated with Target.com to reach the point of actually buying something. If he did get to the checkout point, he would face an additional barrier: the Web site requires the use of a mouse to complete a transaction, noted plaintiffs’ attorney Mazen Basrawi, who works for Berkeley, Calif.-based Disability Rights Advocates and is also blind.

For a blind person, using a mouse makes it more difficult to gauge one’s bearings on a site, explained another representative of the Disability Rights Advocates.

“A blind patron cannot purchase anything at Target.com without sighted help,” Basrawi said, adding that Target.com is just one prominent example of many corporate sites that fail to meet minimum Web accessibility standards. “This is the tip of the iceberg.”

A Target spokeswoman told CNET News.com on Friday that the company has not yet been served with legal papers, and therefore cannot comment on any specific allegations. “However, we strive to make our goods and services available to all of our guests, including those with disabilities,” reads a statement from the company.

Specifically, the suit argues that Target is violating the California Disabled Persons Act, which guarantees full and equal access for people with disabilities to all public places. It also argues that Target is violating the California Unruh Civil Rights Act, because blind patrons have been denied full and equal access to Target.com and have been provided services inferior to non-disabled patrons.

The lawsuit seeks changes to the Web site, an admission of the alleged violations by the company, and an undesignated amount of damages to plaintiffs as well as attorneys’ fees.

But Baltimore-based plaintiffs’ attorney Daniel Goldstein said the suit’s larger goal is educating companies about Web site accessibility issues that can be fixed relatively inexpensively. He added that there are financial incentives for doing so, particularly with the growing numbers of blind baby boomers who are Web consumers. “We’re just forcing retailers to make more money,” he said.

The NFB wrote to Target in May, asking it to make the site more accessible, according to the plaintiffs. Negotiations broke down in January, which led to the filing of the lawsuit, the organization said.

Target.com is “powered by Amazon.com,” something defined on the site as utilizing “Amazon.com technology and patented Web site capabilities such as 1-Click checkout to make shopping faster and more convenient for you.”

Basrawi says it’s not clear if that Amazon technology is leading to the inaccessibility issues, but he knows of other “powered by Amazon” retail sites that are problematic for the blind.

This is just the latest in a series of lawsuits filed related to Web accessibility for the blind. Goldstein represented the NFB in a case against America Online that ended in a 2000 settlement that led to better Web service for the blind, he said. And in August 2004, Priceline.com and Ramada.com agreed to make their Web pages easier to navigate for the blind and visually impaired as part of a settlement with New York Attorney General Eliot Spitzer.

Sears Data Breach Draws Lawsuit

A New Jersey resident has filed a $5 million class action lawsuit against the retailer charging breach of contract and a violation of the Consumer Fraud Act.

By Thomas Claburn
InformationWeek
January 7, 2008 05:20 PM

Following revelations that Sears’ ManageMyHome.com site exposed customer purchase data to any online visitor who asked about it, a New Jersey resident has filed a $5 million class action lawsuit against the retailer.
In a complaint filed on Friday in Cook County, Ill., where Sears has its headquarters, plaintiff Christine Desantis alleges that the company’s exposure of customer data represents a breach of contract and a violation of the Consumer Fraud Act.

More Internet InsightsWhite PapersSmall Business Web Design Guide Part I: SEO Tips for Small Business Websites Simple Tricks To Ace the Subnetting Portion of Any Certification Exam The $5 million sought is to cover payments to affected consumers and attorneys, and the cost of injunctive relief; no individual is seeking more than $75,000, according to the legal filing.
The crux of the case is that Sears “failed to take reasonable steps to ensure that [consumers’] private information was secure,” according to the complaint.

“Implicit in Sears’s contracts is a good faith and fair dealing provision, requiring Sears to disclose whether and to what extent it makes publicly available customers’ personal information and to take reasonable steps to insure that the private information of [customers] is not easily accessible by the public,” the complaint states. “Not only does Sears fail to make such disclosures, it makes contrary disclosures on its Web site, listing the specific circumstances—none of which are germane to the instant case—under which Sears does share customer information with others.”

The complaint also alleges that Sears’ failure to promptly and prominently disclose the security breach on its Web site constitutes a violation of the Consumer Fraud Act, a claim that shows how much disclosure laws like California’s SB 1386 have changed the expectations of corporations following a data breach.

A Sears spokesperson said the company does not comment on pending litigation.

Home Depot case revived by court

Two-edged ruling: Backdated stock options caused price to deflate, retirees’ lawsuit claims.

By RACHEL TOBIN RAMOS
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Published on: 08/05/08
A class-action lawsuit filed by Home Depot employees against former company CEO Robert Nardelli and several directors has gotten a new lease on life.

The case has been revived by a federal appellate court decision that both gives a lifeline to the retirees while being pro-business, said two lawyers who studied the case.

Chester Higgins Jr./The New York Times
(ENLARGE)
Financier Kenneth Langone in his office in Manhattan in March 2004.

Jerry S. Mendoza/AP Photo
(ENLARGE)
Chrysler LLC chairman and chief executive Robert Nardelli answers questions from the press corps during an Automotive Press Association luncheon at Detroit Athletic Club on Friday, Sept. 7, 2007 in Detroit.

Home Depot:
• More on Home Depot


The lawsuit, possibly worth tens of millions of dollars to current and future retirees, alleges that Nardelli, and other directors like co-founder Ken Langone, mismanaged the employees’ defined-contribution plan by purchasing Home Depot stock even though the executives backdated stock options. As a result, the suit claims, Home Depot’s share price deflated when the backdating scheme was revealed, making the value of the employees’ stock portfolio plummet.

The suit initially was dismissed by the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Georgia in Atlanta. Then on July 31, the 11th Circuit Court of Appeals in Atlanta partially ruled in favor of the employees’ class action, meaning the case can move forward.

“We’re pretty happy with the result,” said Jeffrey Norton, an attorney with Harwood Feffer in New York who represents the class of Home Depot employees. The class includes any employee since 2001 who invested in their 401(k) portfolio with Home Depot stock, he said. That includes current employees. There are about 330,000 U.S. Home Depot employees.

The suit was filed under the Employee Retirement Income Security Act. Norton says the basis of the claim is that Home Depot employees’ retirement portfolios would have done much better if the company had bought different stock.

Norton said it’s called the “alternative investment” theory.

“In ERISA cases,” he said, “the damage is measured not by stock price, but on how well this individual or plan would have done had the money been prudently invested in a better-performing stock.”

Norton said that tens of millions of dollars are at stake. The claims, he added, most likely would be paid from insurance money, not from Nardelli’s, Langone’s or Home Depot’s wallets.

Two lawyers at Atlanta’s Ford & Harrison see the appellate court ruling as pro-business because it forces employees to complain first to the company before filing a lawsuit.

“I like the opinion,” said Joelle Sharman, a partner who works with ERISA cases. She said she generally represents employers and insurance companies, and she thinks the ruling could have repercussions far beyond this case.

“It puts all these extra procedural hurdles in front of the retiree, and it gives the employer a chance to fix the error if it did have an error,” added Tiffany Downs, also with Ford & Harrison. Neither are involved in the case.

Already 2 years old, the case is far from over. Now, Norton must file an administrative appeal with the Home Depot committee that oversees the retirees’ investment portfolio.

“I have very little faith that the Home Depot plan administrators are going to say, ‘Yes, we think you’re right. We breached our duties to the tune of tens of millions of dollars and we’ll reimburse your plan for that,’ “ said Norton. “That’s why we argued it’ll be futile to go down that road, but that’s what the 11th Circuit requires. I presume eventually we’ll have our case back in district court.”

Home Depot is eager to hear the claims outside the courtroom.

“We’re pleased that the court of appeals said that the plaintiffs must now pursue any of their claims outside of the courtroom,” said Home Depot spokesman Ron DeFeo. “We will address their claims in the appropriate administrative forum.”

Several lawsuits were spawned by employee and investor anger at Nardelli, who left Home Depot in January 2007 with a $210 million severance package after a tumultuous six years as CEO. A group of shareholders recently settled a suit for $14.5 million against Home Depot, all for attorneys’ fees.

Nardelli is now CEO of the privately held Chrysler auto giant. His compensation is not made public.

Lowes Faces Another Unpaid Overtime Lawsuit

February 14, 2008 - 11:30 AM
Category: Workplace InjuriesTags:

Unpaid Overtime0 Comments Print Article Feed A Texas woman has filed a class action against Lowes Home Center alleging Lowes violated the overtime pay requirements of the Fair Labor Standards Act. The woman, who was a warehouse employee at a regional distribution center, claims that Lowes owes her unpaid overtime, and did not credit her for time that she performed required work for Lowes before and after her scheduled shift, including checking in her hand-held computer, completing paperwork, and driving to her work area. The suit requests class certification for all Texas Lowes employees, and seeks damages for unpaid overtime, liquidated damages, attorneys’ fees and costs, and pre- and post-judgment interest. In addition to the Texas suit, Lowes faces similar lawsuits alleging violations of the FLSA in ten other states.

Wednesday, June 18, 2008
Safeway pays $2.7 million for lawsuit settlement

Pleasanton supermarket giant Safeway Inc. has agreed to pay $2.7 million to settle a lawsuit brought by six California counties, including Solano, according to media reports.

The suit charged that Safeway (NYSE: SWY) had inaccuracies in its pricing and weighing practices, leading to overcharging of customers, according to the district attorneys’ offices in Solano, Napa, Marin, Santa Cruz, Sacramento and Fresno counties. The case reportedly began when the retailer failed to get the correct permits to add soup stations to its delicatessens in its remodeled stores.

Safeway officials reportedly cooperated in the matter and did not admit any wrongdoing. Consumers who may have been overcharged will not be reimbursed directly, but the $2.7 million will cover court fees and fund future investigations into consumer protection matters.

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The boards of mortgage finance companies Fannie Mae (FNM.N) and Freddie Mac (FRE.N) were set to meet on Saturday to discuss a government plan to place the companies under federal control, sources said.

The U.S. Treasury Department plan to put the two government sponsored enterprises, which own or guarantee almost half of the country’s $12 trillion in outstanding home mortgage debt, into federal conservatorship could amount to the largest financial bailout in the nation’s history.

Woops! We did it again!

McCain and Enron

Throughout his career, McCain has been an enthusiastic champion of financial industry deregulation as a member of the Senate Commerce Committee from 1997-2001 and 2003-2005. McCain voted, according to a Washington Post financial columnist, with his “campaign’s general co-chairman and domestic policy adviser, former Texas senator Phil Gramm. The Politico’s Lisa Lerer reports that not only did Gramm author the 1999 legislation that repealed Glass-Steagall, the New Deal law restricting the speculative activities of banks, but after Gramm left the Senate, he lobbied Congress on behalf of the Swiss bank UBS when the banking lobby wanted Congress to overturn state laws restricting predatory lending and the issuance of mortgages to prospective home owners who could not afford them.” http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/conte… McCain, like Gramm, has been a supporter of the “Enron Loophole” that allowed Amaranth Advisors hedge fund, a commodities futures trading company, to attempt in 2006 to corner the natural gas market, a criminal violation for which the fund was recently handed a $300 million fine. http://www.consortiumnews.com/2008/051908a…

McCain also has a direct connection with Enron, having received money in campaign contributions from Ken Lay’s Death Star. “We’re all tainted by the millions and millions of dollars that were contributed by Enron executives,” John McCain told CBS’ “Face the Nation” Sunday. McCain then acknowledged receiving $9,500 from Enron in two campaigns. http://www.time.com/time/business/article/… Gramm’s wife, Wendy, was on the Enron Board of Directors, and Gramm was the architect of much of the “reform” while he chaired the Senate Banking Committee, including a move to exempt electronic trading of electricity from regulatory oversight. According to Time Magazine, Gramm and his wife were at the forefront of many of the illicit practices that led to the firm’s massive ripoffs and ultimate collapse:

On Jan. 14, 1993, in the final days of the first Bush administration, Wendy Gramm – as chairwoman of the Commodity Futures Trading Commission – pushed through a key regulatory exemption removing energy derivatives contracts and interest-rate swaps from federal oversight.

That was a major financial boon to Enron, where Wendy Gramm landed five weeks later as a member of the board of directors. She also became a member of the audit committee that signed off on another one of Enron’s fraudulent schemes, partnerships that hid the company’s growing debt.

McCain claims that his role in Keating was merely to help out a local constituent in dealing with Washington bank regulators. McCain, his current wife, and father-in-law were, in fact, Charles Keating’s business partners in a Phoenix shopping mall, received in excess of one hundred thousand dollars in campaign contributions from Keating, and accompanied Keating on his private jet to his private resort in the Bahamas on multiple occasions, gifts which McCain did not report until they were discovered. Yet, McCain, hand-picked as Barry Goldwater’s successor, got a slap on the wrist from the Senate Ethics Committee when this came out in the Keating-Five inquiry.

A second Senate panel wasn’t so sanguine. The 1992 Kerry Commission report concluded that the Keating affair was far more serious than a mere domestic banking scandal: “the financial dealings of BCCI directors with Charles Keating and several Keating affiliates and front-companies, includ(e) the possibility that BCCI related entities may have laundered funds for Keating to move them outside the United States.” http://www.fas.org/irp/congress/1992_rpt/b… Out of the five Senators accused, only McCain and Glenn ever ran again for office, with McCain the sole survivor.
____________________________________________
2008. Mark G. Levey~~~~Democratic Underground

Bank Tied To John McCain’s Son Goes Under

Andrew McCain Served On Silver State Bank’s Board Until July Before Leaving; Bank’s Failure Marks 11th Of The Year

WASHINGTON, Sept. 6, 2008

(AP) Regulators on Friday shut down Silver State Bank, saying the Nevada bank failed because of losses on soured loans, mainly in commercial real estate and land development.

It was the 11th failure this year of a federally insured bank.

Nevada regulators closed Silver State and the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. was appointed receiver of the bank, based in Henderson, Nev. It had $2 billion in assets and $1.7 billion in deposits as of June 30.

Andrew K. McCain, a son of Republican presidential nominee John McCain, sat on the boards of Silver State Bank and of its parent, Silver State Bancorp, starting in February but resigned in July citing “personal reasons,” corporate filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission show. Andrew McCain also was a member of the bank’s audit committee, responsible for oversight of the company’s accounting.

The younger McCain, who is the chief financial officer of Hensley & Co., the beer distributorship of which Cindy McCain is chairwoman, is the Arizona senator’s adopted son from his first marriage. ~~~~~~~~~CBS

ddrb in
Do you think America will ever know what went on in Dick Cheney’s Energy Summit? We can all see the outcome.

Isn’t it great, how this site has EVOLVED from a anti-Wal-Mart site, to a PRO Obama, anti McCain (Republican) site!!

“Isn’t it great, how this site has EVOLVED from a anti-Wal-Mart site, to a PRO Obama, anti McCain (Republican) site!!"~Bob (RDS)

I can make it a pro working people site again.

R E M E M B E R
J O N Q U I E R E
Q U E B E C
Home of Walmart worker Abuse

R E M E M B E R
J A C K S O N V I L L E
T E X A S
Home of Walmart Worker Abuse

“Isn’t it great, how this site has EVOLVED from a anti-Wal-Mart site, to a PRO Obama, anti McCain (Republican) site!! “

RDS in

Well, It was Wal*Mart who fired the first shot. That being said, Wal*Mart is a huge political entity. I don’t know how well it serves Wal*Mart watch’s cause by breaking it into a partisan issue. It can only serve Wal*Mart. The only thing Wal*Mart actually fears is people united. They thrive in a divided society. I personaly can’t wait for the election to be over. But no matter who wins, they will have a heck of a job ahead of them. I’m as guilty or more so for going off topic. The “baiters” that go off topic should be addressed by the people who run this thing.

BTW RDS,
One thing that I don’t blame on Wal*Mart is my poor spelling and grammer. Maybe I’ll take a class a better myself.

Here’s to happy days and a long Indian Summer!

“Maybe I’ll take a class a better myself”
Boobie in the rubber room- AKA Slimey the limey!

Take a class in history & politics as your thin strip of intellectual tinsel picked up from the classics of community politics really shows!

You tell the village idiot (screwed) why we were in Vietnam, your rhetoric makes it obvious YOU WEREN’T THERE!

The village idiot goes on to quiz you if we won or lost, YOU say we lost. Again YOU WERENT THERE! And because YOU WEREN"T there YOUR opinion is WORTHLESS!

Your a fake, phony and an idiot & from the sounds of it a foreigner. (you would have to be to tell a idiot like screwed we lost in Vietnam) Go back to England, Australia or what ever rock you crawled out from under.

Here’s a quote from a Real American Veteran, who was in Vietnam-two tours!

American Soliders are not losers, Only those who will admit defeat can be defeated!

The Ayers Connection

William Charles Ayers and Barack Obama have been friends for decades.

There is clear evidence that their lives and dealings have been intertwined for many years.

We have reason to believe that Obama and Ayers were friends way back in 1986.

They even served together in 1995 on the Annenberg Challenge, overseeing the distribution of about $50 million to area schools.

That same year, Ayers hosted Obama in his own home and donated to his campaign.

What does the association between Ayers and Obama say about Obama’s political views and perspective?

Ayers was an anti-American, traitorous radical who will stop at nothing to push his hateful communist agenda.

In the 1960s and 70s, he was a leader in the notorious underground terrorist group, the “Weathermen.”

The Weathermen declared war on the United States government and they bombed over 30 establishments (leading to multiple fatalities, including police officers).

Obama’s friend Bill Ayers

“Kill all the rich people. Break up their cars
and apartments. Bring the revolution home,
kill your parents, that’s where it’s really at.”
William Ayers

Ayers is unapologetic about his terrorist activities.

Incredibly, on Sept. 11, 2001, Ayers is quoted by The New York Times as saying, “I don’t regret setting bombs … I feel we didn’t do enough.”

How could a man like Obama associate with such a dangerous radical? And even defend him?

And now Obama, Ayers friend, could be sitting in the White House next year — unless we tell the American people the unvarnished truth about them!

source-NewsMax

McCain Manager: ‘This Election is Not About Issues’
UPDATE, 6:18 pm: In reaction to Rick Davis’ comments about the election not being about issues, Barack Obama campaign manager David Plouffe released the following statement: “We appreciate Senator McCain’s campaign manager finally admitting that his campaign is not in fact about the issues the American people care about, which is exactly the kind of cynical old politics people are ready to change.”

ORIGINAL POST

Rick Davis, campaign manager for John McCain’s presidential bid, insisted that the presidential race will be decided more over personalities than issues during an interview with Post editors this morning.

“This election is not about issues,” said Davis. “This election is about a composite view of what people take away from these candidates.”

Davis added that issues will no doubt play a major role in the decisions undecided voters will make but that they won’t ultimately be conclusive.
Davis generally dismissed the controversies surrounding McCain’s vice presidential pick—Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin—as a media creation but did acknowledge that her acceptance speech, which seems likely to come tomorrow, is critically important to defining who she is to the American public.

As for the speech itself, Davis said a generic, “masculine” speech was being prepared before the pick was made and, now that Palin is the choice, she is adapting the speech to her own needs and personality.

Davis demurred when asked when Palin will sit for interviews with major news organizations, pointing out that now would not be the right time given the “combative” attitude the media has seemingly adopted toward Palin. Pressed on the issue, Davis insisted that “we allot a lot more access in our campaign than any campaign in modern political history....we’ll get around to it.”

Davis did admit, however, the challenges of running for president as a Republican in this political atmosphere.

“We are in the worst Republican environment since Nixon in 1972,” said Davis. “We take that seriously. We get the joke."~~~~~~~WaPo

Onward Christian Soldiers in:
“American Soliders are not losers, Only those who will admit defeat can be defeated! “

Well at least you got one thing right (correct).

Maybe you should pack up and open a “mission” in China. I think Wal*Mart’s work is finished here. They could probably use your preaching over there.

Onward Christian Soldiers

Own any Fannie or Freddie stock? Wal*Mart economics at work for the Chinese and Russian Governments.

Asia September 8, 2008,
Asian Stocks Soar on Fannie, Freddie News
The U.S. bailout of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac sent indexes higher in Japan, Hong Kong, Korea, and Taiwan. But Chinese markets defied the trend
by Bruce Einhorn, Moon Ihlwan and Hiroko Tashiro

It’s been a long time since markets in Asia had such a good start to their week. After waking up to news of the U.S. bailout of Fannie Mae (FNM) and Freddie Mac (FRE) announced by Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson on Sunday, investors in the region sent most Asian markets soaring on Sept. 8. Japan’s Nikkei index rose 3.3% and Hong Kong’s Hang Seng jumped 4.3%. Smaller markets showed even more dramatic gains: Korea’s benchmark Kospi index was up 5.15% and Taiwan’s Taiex 5.6%. Investors “gained a sense of security,” says Tsuyoshi Segawa, equity strategist at Shinko Securities in Tokyo. After Paulson’s move, “people expect that the financial crisis in the U.S. will be eased.”

Markets found reassurance in the plan Paulson unveiled on Sunday that will effectively nationalize the two companies (BusinessWeek.com, 9/7/08), which have $5 trillion in outstanding debt and mortgage-backed securities. The U.S. government is also replacing the chief executives of Fannie and Freddie and, if need be, will invest as much as $100 million in each company.

Paulson Admired in Asia
The move is winning approval from investors worried about the impact of the U.S. subprime crisis on banks in Asia. Paulson’s leadership has also won him admirers in Japan, where some observers compare his relatively speedy action with the half-hearted measures taken by Japanese policymakers during the country’s “lost decade,” the years after the collapse of the 1980s-era Japanese property bubble. “He’s responded much more quickly than the market expected,” says Yoshikio Shimamine, chief economist at Dai-Ichi Life Research Institute in Tokyo. “I really envy [Americans] to have a man with such leadership. We didn’t have anyone like that here.”

In the ranks of Asia’s central bankers, perhaps the biggest Paulson fan club is now to be found in Seoul. Korean banking officials have had to contend with rumors that the country faces a liquidity shortage in the face of a steadily weakening won and its banks’ ongoing exposure to the U.S. crisis. The South Korean currency has dropped 13% so far this year amid speculation that the Bank of Korea was short on cash to defend it. The central bank has not confirmed the size of the exposure to the subprime meltdown, although the local media has estimated it to be about $30 billion. That’s relatively small compared with Korea’s foreign exchange holdings of $243 billion, but that didn’t stop speculation from dampening market sentiment. Paulson’s move “will help reduce the market concern about the [Bank of Korea’s] FX reserves” wrote Young Sun Kwon, an economist at Lehman Brothers (LEH), in a Sept. 8 research note.

Did concern in Seoul and other Asian capitals about the U.S. crisis help force Paulson’s hand? An economist at the Bank of Korea who asked not to be identified doubts there was any concerted lobbying or other pressure from the region’s central bankers. Still, the economist adds, the cost of letting Fannie and Freddie fail would have been “disastrous.” Such a move “would have led to the total collapse of the U.S. housing market and been a huge blow to the global economy.” ~~~~~~~~~~(Asia Online,Businessweek)NOTE: The above piece is page one-the reactions of OTHER Asian economies,NOT including China.The previous posts,(remarking upon China’s reaction to Fannie and Freddie bailouts. ) were from page TWO of this same Business Week article.

...this site has EVOLVED from a anti-Wal-Mart site...

Thanks to Dan, the site has EVOLVED into an anti BIG BOX site. More power to ‘em.

...a PRO Obama, anti McCain (Republican) site!

By word count there are more anti Obama posts than McSame thanks to Onward Christian Coward*, but the bigger issue is that the pro Wal-Mart bunch are just about all right wingnut Republicans.

Ok, boys and girls, here’s two new terms for your vocabularies.

</u>Moral hazard: the incentive to take on risk when insured against failure. In the context of market activity, it is really about being incentivised, because of the insurance or assurance provided by a third party, to take on unusual risks that could fatally damage the enterprise.

If there has been one uninterrupted trend of the past century, it has been the steady <u>socialization of risk—especially financial risk. ~ WSJ

Basically what “socialization of risk” means is fat cats take risks and if things go bad the taxpayer bails them out. Oops, I forgot, we’re not supposed to call it a bailout anymore. Now it’s “backstopping”.

Costs the same though.

When they discovered my father was an admiral, they took me to a hospital. ~ John McSame

Sorry, I forgot to tag my asterisk…

Onward Christian Coward*

You wanna dance in the parking lot, old man?

Bwa-ha-ha-ha!