While ordinary working-class people across America were queuing for the new PlayStation 3, one fellow had a bright idea — dropping his boss's name at Wal-Mart to get the next-gen console sent over on the QT for the boss's family.
Unfortunately, the boss was former Sen. John Edwards, John Kerry's would-be veep and famous nemesis of Wal-Mart's evil dominion over the Earth. The hypocrisy was delicious: It was on the same day Edwards was talking to union activists about Wal-Mart's labor policies. But it didn't work. The staffer was lucky Wal-Mart didn't send an empty box weighted with rocks. Merry Christmas!
Edwards is a historical footnote with admirable hair, and it's doubtful he has a political future as long as the Good Ship Hillary's wake swamps all other boats.
If he wishes to be his party's point man for their anti-Wal-Mart agenda, fine. He'll impress the sophisticates who think the place is full of morbidly obese people in scooters buying 96-pound slabs of fudge and VHS copies of "Left Behind" movies. It will strike a genuine chord with rural shoppers who hate Wal-Mart so intensely they go there only three times a week, and can never forgive the company for offering a plasma TV at the same price as the 64-roll pack of Charmin. Who could decide? It's cruel.
Yes, there's a great seething hatred of Wal-Mart out there, and one of these days some candidate will ride it straight to the White House, where he — or she — can finally do something about low prices, employment contracts freely entered into by adults, aggressive business practices, and that whole downmarket Cletus-goes-to-Branson ethos the company has. Can't trust the market to do anything about it. Sure, the market had its way with Woolworth's, Kresge, Kress, Ames and dang near every department store not named Macy's or Nordstrom, but Wal-Mart? It'll stand a thousand years. We need laws, stat.
But that's not the interesting part of the story. Nor is the fact that the person who made the call was a volunteer — you mean Edwards doesn't pay his staffers a living wage with full medical/dental and a $200 deductible for eyeglasses? Must have been a hangup in the paperwork. No, the telling part was in Edwards' conference call statement to the union activists. Said the AP story:
"Edwards ... repeated a story about his son Jack disapproving of a classmate buying sneakers at Wal-Mart.
"`If a 6-year-old can figure it out, America can definitely figure this out,' Edwards said."
If you Google around, you'll find the full details of the Parable of the Ethically Challenged Footwear. From an anti-Wal-Mart Web site:
"The best story of the speech was when Edwards talked about his son Jack. When Jack learned someone had bought something at Wal-Mart, Jack politely reminded the person that Wal-Mart doesn't treat its workers fairly."
Young Master Jack needs better manners. It's possible the kid didn't have access to a Bruno Magli outlet store, and his folks shopped at Wal-Mart because it fit their budget — in which case being lectured by the scion of a millionaire trial lawyer is a little like scolding classmates for drinking Tang instead of having Alfred hand-squeeze a dozen Valencias.
But never mind that. What the story reveals, in the end, is the tiresome fashion in which our betters insist on politicizing not just every aspect of adult life, but every detail of their children's world.
Everything is fraught with fashionable morality. Reasonable stewardship of the world turns into solemn denunciations of people who don't recycle; reasonable lessons on staying healthy end up stigmatizing people who enjoy a puff or a snoot as ethical degenerates. Daddy, look! That lady is SMOKING! She's causing an undue burden on an already strained health care system! Avert your eyes, my child. G-d will punish her.
You could say that if a 6-year-old can figure it out, then the concept has been presented so simplistically it lacks a real-world application. But that doesn't matter; what counts is the satisfied glow of a right-thinking parent when the Young Pioneer chants back the party line.
At least we know that factory conditions in Sony's Asian plants must be top-notch. If Master Jack wanted one, it must have passed moral muster.
