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Starting now, Wal-Mart Watch will be periodically updating you on some of the new comments submitted to our Employee Speak-Out site.  These comments are sent in from visitors to our site who are former or current employees of Wal-Mart and its sister companies, who have been victims of the systematic abuse and discrimination that Wal-Mart is known for inflicting upon its employees.  Remember that if you have a story to tell about working at Wal-Mart, we encourage you to tell us about it - we’ll put it up on the web and let your voice be heard.

As we look forward to the next 4 years, we hope that this website will be among the many tools that Wal-Mart workers use to help change Wal-Mart and their lives for the better.

Workplace stress leads to tragedy for pregnant worker:

“I was a manager in the housewares department. I just got my separation notice from them for not returning to work from my leave of absence. There is a reason I didn’t return; I feel they are responsible for the death of my baby.”

Anonymous on Age-Based Termination:

“Wal Mart is systematically targeting anyone over 40 years of age for firings through systematically assigning the heaviest, most back breaking jobs to that class of people in the facility. Managers are encouraged to pressure senior employees into quitting and firing to ensure that young strong backs are maintained in the facility.”

Anonymous on How Not to Vote

I attended a meeting that was conducted by a market manager. We were not told to not vote for Obama

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Check out this week’s issue of the Wal-Mart Watch Weekly Update for Elected Officials – a compilation of Wal-Mart news from across the country and beyond.

This week’s issue centers on a new website launched by Wal-Mart Watch which details the retailer’s political contributions, positions on specific legislation, and spending on lobbyists and industry trade groups. The website, Walton Influence, also includes similar information on the Walton family and the family’s related enterprises.

In addition, you’ll read about a number of legal issues, the most important of which could be affecting the health of millions of Americans. Bloomberg News and the San Francisco Chronicle, among others, are reporting on how tests of several of the best-selling brands of bottled water (including Wal-Mart and Sam’s Club private label brands) have been found to contain mixtures of at least 38 different pollutants, including bacteria, fertilizer, and industrial chemicals. These findings could result in a lawsuit against the retail giant.

And finally, check out our “Stateside” and “Wal-Mart International” sections to find out what’s going on with Wal-Mart around the country and across the globe. You’ll read about how Maryland’s closing of certain corporate tax loopholes has resulted in millions of dollars in increased state funds, and why employees in Illinois are protesting Wal-Mart’s electioneering activities.

Wal-Mart Watch Weekly Update for Elected Officials [October 16, 2008]

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Wal-Mart Watch has launched a new website - http://www.waltoninfluence.com - which analyzes and tracks the Walton family’s and Wal-Mart’s growing influence on American politics.

Although Sam Walton believed his company should stay out of politics and stick to retailing, Wal-Mart’s strategy changed immensely after his death. From 1999 to 2007, Wal-Mart’s lobbying expenditures for outside firms increased 7425%. Although Wal-Mart attempts to tout its bipartisanship, the Wal-Mart PAC has given the vast majority of its over $7.5 million in the past decade to the Republican Party and other conservative groups.

With more than $12 billion in profits last year, Wal-Mart is the biggest and arguably most powerful corporation in America. Sam Walton’s heirs, the majority owners of the company, are worth over $100 billion - making them the wealthiest and certainly one of the most influential families in America.

During the past year, Wal-Mart Watch conducted an analysis of public lobbying and political contribution records for the Walton family and Wal-Mart Stores, Inc., in order to determine how this influence is used to affect politics and policy. The conclusion is clear: Wal-Mart and the Walton family spend millions of dollars every year to fund an extreme right wing corporate agenda that is often directly at odds with the interests of Wal-Mart’s workers and shoppers.

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We’ve been following a story in recent weeks about how Wal-Mart wants to build a 141,000-square-foot supercenter on the edge of Wilderness Battlefield National Park in central Virginia. The plan came under heavy opposition in July by several historical/environmental/civil war preservation groups, collectively known as the Wilderness Battlefield Coalition, when they drafted a letter to Wal-Mart CEO Lee Scott.  The letter expresses the deep concern many feel over the proposed store: 

This Super Wal-Mart would be built within one-quarter mile of the National Park and would pave the way for desecration of the Wilderness with unnecessary commercial growth. Such a large-scale development is inappropriate next to a National Park.

The Civil War Preservation Trust has launched an entire website to spread the word and garner support against the plan. They were quoted this week in an article from NBC-29:

According to Brent Lawrenz of the Civil War Preservation Trust, “It’s going to put a tremendous pressure on Route 20 which is 2 lanes and they’re proposing to re-route part of it through key battleground area.”

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Several stories are out today warning consumers about dangerous dog food and soccer goals that are available at Wal-Mart and other retailers. 

But the biggest story here is the ‘voluntary recall’ of 600,000 more ‘Simplicity’ bassinets available at Wal-Mart and other retailers, in a story from Wall Street Journal.  This, barely three weeks after the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC) issued a recall of 900,000 similar bassinets that Wal-Mart took its sweet time removing from their website.

The CPSC, in cooperation with the retailers affected by this week’s recall - including Wal-Mart - issued this statement.  I wonder why then, Wal-Mart appears to still be selling several of the models (Camille and Providence) listed as dangerous by the CPSC (and Wal-Mart themselves!) on its website?

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There’s still way too many bloggers talking about last week’s Wall Street Journal story for us to give an accurate run down of all of them. But that’s not the only thing going on in the world of Wal-Mart this week: our Friday Blog Round-Up has the details.

WAL-MART RECOMMENDS LEAVING CARBON OFFSET DETAILS “VAGUE”
We caught a post earlier this week from Sustainable Industries, which mentioned that Wal-Mart has come out against defining carbon offset standards. Given the company’s desperate attempts to be seen as environmentally friendly, we found this a bit shocking, and we weren’t the only ones…

To Everything: Term, Term, Term [Grist]

In comments to the Federal Trade Commission earlier this year, Wal-Mart asked the agency not to define the terms “carbon offsets” or “renewable energy certificates” in order to keep the terms flexible and to retain their “less tangible nature.”

Carbon Offsets: To Define or Not to Define? [Green Tech Media]

Wal-Mart has attracted plenty of attention for its environmental initiatives, including more energy-efficient lighting – the chain surpassed a goal to sell 100 million compact fluorescent light bulbs in 2007 – less packaging and a goal of removing nonrenewable energy from all its products, although an Environmental Leader report released in May found that most consumers didn’t identify the company as socially responsible, in spite of its significant green marketing.

Why is Wal-Mart lobbying against carbon-offset guidelines? [Christian Science Monitor Bright Green Blog]

Wal-Mart has been taking many major steps go green in recent years. The mega-retailer has taken steps to assess the carbon footprint of some of its products, and it has become the largest buyer of organic cotton and of locally grown produce...So you can imagine my surprise when I came across Wal-Mart’s comment on the Federal Trade Commission’s attempts to standardize carbon offsets.

Walmart Against Setting of Carbon Offset Guidelines [Carbon Offsets Daily]

There seem to be loopholes in Walmart’s argument as well - it argues that the FTC should refrain from setting concrete offset guidelines as there is lack of “widespread consensus about the precise contours of what constitutes a carbon offset or a REC”. But isn’t that exactly what the FTC is looking to rectify?

My good deed for the day. [The Writing on the Wal]

The Christian Science Monitor has noticed that despite its vaunted green reputation Wal-Mart doesn’t want the government to formally define carbon offsets in order to facilitate pollution cap and trade programs. Confused? So is the guy who wrote the blog post...Therefore, he called Wal-Flack Central (aka the Wal-Mart Press Office) for clarification...Can you imagine what the Wal-Flack who took that call must have been thinking?

a) “At Wal-Mart, we are very concerned about…”
b) “At Wal-Mart, we do not comment on pending legislation…”
c) “Let me tell you about all our other wonderful environmental programs…”

After the jump, bad deals, jalapeno peppers and the Griswold family makes their mark on the American retail landscape.

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