Incredible Vision at Wal-Mart

Special to FreeRepublic ^ | 28 March 2008 | John Armor (Congressman Billybob)

[Congressman Billybob]

I’m grateful to an article in the National Post on Friday, 28 March, by Colby Cost for bringing this item to my attention. It is about Wal-Mart, but has nothing to do with the legendary business model of that company. Or, does it?

As the article recites, shortly before Hurricane Katrina hit New Orleans on 29 August 2005, Lee Scott, CEO of Wal-Mart, send a memorandum to all the regional and store managers in the region about to be hit. His message said:

“A lot of you are going to have to make decisions above your level. Make the best decision that you can with the information that's available to you at the time, and above all, do the right thing.”

This is an incredible message. Normally, when a disaster strikes in any large organization and communications are cut off, the subordinates are expected to batten down the hatches, protect themselves and wait for instructions. Lee Scott told his people to do the exact opposite.

What model was he following? It was the military model. There are times in battle that communication is lost. The soldiers and squad leaders on the ground don’t have the option to stand still and wait it out. Lives are on the line, and therefore they must act, even on partial or inadequate information.

The article mentioned how well the US Coast Guard functioned after Katrina. With speed and precision they set up rescue, triage, and transportation to functioning medical facilities outside the zone of destruction. How well did Wal-Mart do in this disaster?

Here is what the article says about that: “In Kenner, La., an employee crashed a forklift through a warehouse door to get water for a nursing home. A Marrero, La., store served as a barracks for cops whose homes had been submerged. In Waveland, Miss., an assistant manager who could not reach her superiors had a bulldozer driven through the store to retrieve disaster necessities for community use, and broke into a locked pharmacy closet to obtain medicine for the local hospital.

“Meanwhile, Wal-Mart trucks pre-loaded with emergency supplies at regional depots were among the first on the scene wherever refugees were being gathered by officialdom. Their main challenge, in many cases, was running a gauntlet of FEMA officials who didn't want to let them through. As the president of the brutalized Jefferson Parish put it in a Sept. 4 Meet the Press interview, speaking at the height of nationwide despair over FEMA's confused response: ‘If [the U.S.] government would have responded like Wal-Mart has responded, we wouldn't be in this crisis.’ ”

The article refers to a study of private responses to the Katrina crisis by many businesses. Steven Horwitz, an economist at St. Lawrence University in New York, noted that other “big box” companies like Home Depot and Lowe’s handed out millions of dollars in inventory, for free, to people in desperate need.

I have one, large question about this story. Why hasn’t it been reported before? Why didn’t it make the cover of Time magazine, or a story on “60 Minutes”?

The image which some “social activists” seek to apply to Wal-Mart is a large, impersonal corporation that has no interest in either the lives and welfare of its own employees, or the lives and welfare of the communities in which it locates. Of course, every time Wal-Mart opens a hiring office for an upcoming store, there are hundreds of applicants for every available job, If that fact was as widely reported as the rants of the “social activists” that image would not last very long.

But the real fight over Wal-Mart concerns unions. It is a non-union business. And unions are on the liberal, Democratic side of the political spectrum, as are about 80 percent of all reporters and editors. Now, it becomes clearer why this extraordinary story of the freedom to act that Wal-Mart gave its people, and how they used that, has not been widely reported.

Sometimes, the simple truth about a real situation can blow the invented story out of the water. And, we cannot have that, can we?

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About the Author: John Armor practiced in the US Supreme Court for 33 years. John_Armor@aya.yale.edu He is running for the 11th Congressional District of North Carolina.

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[Marysecretary]

Yes, it is, but the media only gives you what bad people are doing, RARELY, if ever, what good goes on at the same time. That’s why I hate the media. Love, M

[conservatism_IS_compassion]

I’ll bet Wal-Mart got paid back dollar for dollar for every item they “donated”.

Does anyone have a copy of their 2005 tax returns? Their accountants should be fired if they did not take advantage of this major write-off.

I'm confident that they wrote off the wholesale cost of the inventory which they intentionally allowed to "leak." I certainly hope so. But I have a news flash for you: a deduction is not the same as a tax credit - Walmart still was out the cost of restocking the shelves and warehouses of the stock which it donated, just like you might itemize your charitable contributions but thereby reduce your tax liability by only about a quarter on the dollar, not dollar for dollar.

And even if they got a tax credit and were reimbursed dollar for dollar, that would be no profit for WalMart other than the good will which they obtained for it. And if the government is going to have a Federal Emergency Management Agency throwing money at natural disasters, in principle they should do it precisely by giving incentives to Walmart et al to put their shoulders to the wheel in just the way that is reported in this article. In which case FEMA would, quite properly, be paying Walmart for the donated inventory and giving Walmart a profit to boot. And that, I am confident, has not happened. Because if it had, the Democrats and the media would be having a cow over it.

[nralife]

“The Corp is doing some digging in the BC for levee fill and it is right uo against one of main rail lines out of the city. When the water starts flowing I’m afraid it will undercut the railway bridge and cause it to collapse. The only time I have seen the spillway open it was really turbulent and fast flowing. I hope that I’m wrong big time.”

Oh my. Thanks for the response. Lets hope you are wrong!

[Radix]

"If war breaks out, and China stops providing their goods, I have every confidence that the American people will be able to get our paper-drink umbrella, refrigerator magnet, and disposable razor factories up and running in a heartbeat.

You are an optimist!

[Yardstick]

Yep, I hear ya. Walmart is cool. I like their bake-it-yourself pepperoni pizzas. One of my favorite pairs of jeans I got at Walmart, and I’m kind of a jeans snob.