Wal-Mart To Fund Wildlife Habitat

[Kadie]

Wal-Mart To Fund Wildlife Habitat
Deal May Improve Retailer's Image

POSTED: 5:53 pm PDT April 12, 2005

WASHINGTON -- The world's biggest retailer is taking on a huge conservation project.

Wal-Mart is pledging to spend $35 million to make up for the wildlife habitat lost under its big corporate "footprint."

The retailer plans over the next 10 years to buy an amount of land equal to all the land its stores, parking lots and distribution centers take up. That would conserve at least 138,000 acres in the U.S. as "priority" wildlife habitat.

snip...
The deal helps Wal-Mart recapture public goodwill. It has faced criticism over its labor practices and its effects on smaller retailers, and also settled a Clean Water Act violation last year.

more...
http://www.thekcrachannel.com/money/4373704/detail.html

[asjr]

1. In its patio department?

[TexasSissy]

9. LOL LOL! n/t

[Krupskaya]

2. You might fool others, Wal-Mart...

But you don't fool me. So don't even try.

[jdj]

23. damn, wtf do they have against poor people?

they'd rather save rabbits and raccoons than give people health insurance????

I love animals, but Jesus Christ.

[leesa]

3. Far too little...far too late. What about the economic devastation you

have wrought?

[Greybnk48]

4. I "heart" Huckabees!! n/t

[Toucano]

11. It's like they didn't watch the whole movie or something.

If Shania Twain shows up as spokesperson, I'll freak right out!

[MuseRider]

5. Good for them but

it is still not enough to make me ever darken their doorstep.

[demgrrrll]

6. Waving hand wildly..I know I know it will be a Nauga farm

The Naugas will provide us with all the Naugahyde we can use on those old recliners. Thank you Wal Mart!

[Liberal Veteran]

7. How about they fund their fucking insurance program for their employees?

Then worry about trying to appeal to us lefties?

[Javaman]

8. "lost under its big corporate footprint."

Does this include all the business's you killed, or the people you put out of work?

Behind close doors at china-mart....

Underling crawls into board room on hands and knees. All the while adverting eyes from the china-mart high poobah...

Underling: B-B-Boss, I have a great idea....

Poobah: (big booming voice ala wizard of oz) You? You! Have a great idea????

Underling: Ahem, excuse me...a great idea has formed in my head from your divine will, sir..

Poobah: quit your sniveling and get on with it!

Underling: We should build a wildlife habitate....

Poobah: WHAT!!!!

Underling: I'm sorry sir, I'll whip myself after I explain...

Poobah: You are wasting valuable seconds of my life!

Underling: We build a wildlife preserve to attract more people, then over time, we install rides and begin our move on Disney and 6 Flags...

Poobah: Hmmmm, interesting, go on...

Underling: Then we take over motel 6 and the whole picture is completle. Wal-mart can then become World-mart world of shopping fun! People will never leave.

Poobah: Genius! I never cease to amaze myself with my pure and simple genius. What? You still here??

Underling: Oh sorry sir...

Underling pauses.

Poobah: Yes! What is it!!

Underling flinches.

Underling: I was hoping for a raise for the idea you willed into my head...

Poobah: Arrrrr! Begone with you! And feel lucky that you are only going to whip yourself!!

Underling: Thank you sir, you are indeed kind.

[orleans]

19. nicely written Javaman (theater major? english major?)

got any more scripts you'd like to share?

(i was thinking of writing something on that "revelations" crap that is t.v-ing tonight/tomorrow/whenever. we could have a script-off (script-off is similar to a "walk-off" demonstrated in the movie zoolander only in relation to writing rather than modeling))

[Javaman]

25. Thanks...

I write screen plays, although none have been purchased yet. lol

I lean towards cynical comedy. :)

Yeah, that Revelations thing is just ripe for satire.

Funny, I wrote a little piece on here about 2 weeks ago, called "Tele-Pope", but the moderators didn't think it was funny and pulled it.

Perhaps it was in bad taste with the Pope on his death bed and all, but the timing was just so right for satire considering all the media hype. I was very surprised they pulled it.

A script off would be a fun idea. I wish though that I was more diligent in my writing, meaning, I'm more of a spontaneous writer when it comes to satire. However, my screenplay writing is more research oriented. Go figure.

[orleans]

28. "tele-pope" sounds like it would've been a stitch

(is that tele as in telephone?)

so the day has come and gone. i started to watch revelations and turned it off within the first five minutes. i thought i could sit through it but apparently i just really wasn't in the mood.

however, i did just get a copy of that "vast left wing conspiracy" by byron york. it looks like a nice little book waiting for a satire to come along and sweep it off it's feet.

i'm surprised the mods pulled your tele-pope - maybe you should've posted it in atheists forum?

good luck with your screen plays.

[Javaman]

29. I couldn't stomach the revelations show either....

I turned it on about 1/2 hour into it, and the pseudo-nun spouted something about the liberal media, that was it for me. Off it went. Such drivel. Nothing more than special effects in the name of god. So exhausting.

I haven't heard of that book. I will look for it.

Briefly here is the tele-pope skit...(as best as I can recall it)

New from Ronco, Tele-Pope!!!

From the same people that brought you Tele-Rabbi, Tele-Calif and Tele-Lama, bring you Tele-Pope!
Have you always wanted that audience with the pontiff and found that line was just to long? Now, with Tele-Pope you can have and audience with the divine one right in your own home!

Little Johnny: It's like he's right here in our own living room!

Aunt Stella: Tele-Pope makes me feel like I'm at the Vatican with plastic covered furniture!

And as a special offer, each Tele-Pope comes with a free Pope hat!

If you act now, you will also get the limited addition mini Pope mobile with fully poser-able John Paul II action figure!

Don't let time slip by, the end of the world is right around the corner!

Get Tele-Pope now!

Seemed pretty harmless to me, I'll repost in the atheist forum, thanks for the Idea.

[TexasSissy]

10. Well, they may be on to something. It's a start. And it's better than

NOT funding a wildlife habitat.

But they have a way to go.

[applegrove]

12. Will that be just beyond where all the billions of female chinese

babies have been aborted because of their sex? In China somewhere I presume. You know..the place you are really, really from.

[hatrack]

13. How 'bout a little greenwash, Scarecrow?

Will that be 138,000 acres based on the current acreage occupied by Sprawl-Mart, or what it'll be ten years from now? Given their fever dreams of expansion, I'd say 138,000 acres isn't nearly enough.

Hmm . . . a ten-year project. And, of course, that's a whopping $3.5 million per year, which isn't even the sweat off the Walton heirs' collective testicles.

Who will handle the lands in question? The NPS? The Forest Service? BLM? The Nature Conservancy? Woodsy Owl?

Will these "wildlife habitats" permit hunting and fishing, or will they be off-limits to some of Wal-Mart's most faithful customers?

And what about the developers? Could it maybe be that Wal-Mart, if they run into financial development, would do a Charles Hurwitz and flatten/drain/log/mine/plow or otherwise develop their holdings if financial "need" beckoned?

Will this be old-growth forest areas, undeveloped swamps - or might it perhaps be acres and acres and acres of struggling loblolly pine plantation or endless miles of land due for strip mine "reclamation" snapped up because it's cheap?

Maybe Bush can coordinate his Earth Day "celebration" with Wal-Mart's. They deserve each other.

[ima_sinnic]

24. great post! sums up the hypocrisy and unanswered concerns vy well

... unfortunately the vast majority of ChinaOutlet shoppers will not look beyond the "feel good" bullshit to find out that, in the details, this "land conservation" PR move will not amount to much of anything at all that's worthwhile.

[Jack Rabbit]

14. That's because we are going to put evil corporations . . .

That's because we are going to put evil corporations on the endangered species list.

[Arger68]

15. They'll probably sponsor canned hunts

on the land.

[shanti]

16. isn't that special

this is some bullshit that they are using to sway the people's bad feelings about walmart....they should be spending it on their EMPLOYEES first! :grr:

[MADem]

17. Ah, yes, those folksy ads

Smiling people, soft lighting, lotsa pastel colors....

Woman: I started out scrubbing toilets in the ladies room, now I am MANAGER of the CARD DEPARTMENT! (Voice-Under: WalMart...making underpaid, powerless women feel important!).

I simply don't go there, and I feel for those who have little choice due to living in a rural area with no other options. All I can say for those who must shop there, think about every purchase, and if they have a suggestion box, use it, often!

[Neshanic]

18. The smell of desperation. See? Selling out to the Chinese ...

does have it's advantages. Think of all the advice they are getting from their Communist buds.

The Chinese know how to play, and they are instructing grasshopper the fine art to play the long game.

[Daphne08]

20. Too Little Too Late! I'll never darken their door again!

[Piperay]

21. Good for Walmart

BUT that doesn't make up for the habitat that is now under their parking lots or the small stores driven out of business and the downtown areas of small town American that are ghost towns now. Walmart you SHOULD do this, don't expect mucho thanks because you owe the public much much more than that!

[natrat]

22. what is gross is that they are doing it for public relations

definitely not from their hearts cuz we know where they are

[Demonaut]

26. I guess rats are considered "wildlife", their corporate HQ is a start

[Kool Kitty]

27. Not that I don't like wildlife and

animals, but wouldn't this money be better spent making their workers' lives better? You know, like paying them a decent wage, providing insurance, etc.? Pure PR bullshit. Sorry, Walmart-you still won't get my business. Greedy bastards.

[Chomskyite]

30. They planning on adding any park benches

. . . so their workers can at least afford a place of residence?