Why must avoid confusing legal and moral duties. Just because one can find a moral duty does not mean that a legal duty exists, and only legal duties are enforceable. Meanwhile, the moral duties apply equally to all, and no one who has not donated money himself can fault Wal-Mart specifically. Let he who is without sin cast the first stone.

Finally, what about Wal-Mart’s obligations to its shareholders? Wal-Mart itself is large, but the ultimate effect of paying the money would be a decrease in profits, which would ultimately hurt stock prices, which would impact primarily the retirement plans of middle class workers. Wal-Mart does not, in my opinion, have a right to engage in acts of charity: it should leave the decision to its shareholders individually.

She had the option of staying on the Wal-Mart plan and having her medical expenses paid for, however she chose to pursue a legal suit against the persons responsible for her injury. She made a poor decision of lawyers who asked for far too little and took way too much; why should Wal-Mart and the other employees who are in the health care plan have to pay for her poor decision?

When your typical Joe reads the phrase “retail giant”, what does it conjure up images of? It paints the exact image you think it paints. An overreaching corporation that shouldn’t be trusted. But why does that image come up, instead of a giant, efficient company that drawfs its competition, and is a symbol of American productivity?

It’s because America has had a bad history with such big corporations. The shot heard ’round the world that started the Revolutionary War has corporate malfeasense, in part, in its roots, specifically, the East Indian Tea Company and its anti-competitive regulation that it set up with the government of England.

Upton Sinclair and the meat packaging companies of Chicago is another example. America reacted to such muckraking because it understands that too much unregulated power in the hands of one small group of people can lead to abuses of that power.

Why didn’t the American people react the way your typical right winger does when The Junglel was published in the early 1900′s? Why didn’t they look at the book and scoff at it, because everyone involved was doing so voluntairily and under contract, so it must be legitimate?

If someone falls into the meat grinder and ends up getting killed, isn’t that THEIR problem for not being more responsible about their actions in the workplace?According to right wing ideology, working in a meat grinding plant is risky, and you assume that risk when you sign up to work there. If you don’t want to risk that, then don’t sign the contract!

Isn’t it that cut and dry with you people?

America isn’t that kind of country, and you bastards react the way you do to articles like the one you critiqued because you KNOW it’s not that kind of country, you just WANT it to be.

You ache for the old days of people not giving a shit about anything that isn’t occuring within arms length of them, which I’d argue was well, well before any sort of Enlightenment thinking. You can’t stand that one person might care about another person. Why else would you be angry at an article that can be perceived as pro-”underdog”?

So its not this particular peice of journalism you have a problem with. It is how the American people will understand what is being said that you have a problem with.

Personally, if I were Walmart, I’d let them keep the money. But there really is nothing that any of us outside the case can (or should) do, so I really don’t see the point of the article. I guess I have to agree with you, Shaun.

>Brian

I do not agree with you with the fact that she doesn’t need the money. She does! The air she still breathes might be free, but everything else in her life comes with a price tag, and she will never be able to work again!

Grow some heart and compasion for those who need it–You never know when your turn will be. There is nothing wrong with making money whether is a little or a lot, but there is something very wrong (specially for those who have so much) with stressing out a family that has already gone thru so much pain and suffering by taking away the money left that could at least pay for this disabled person to be a little more comfortable while she is here on earth!