Yeah, this baby didn't grow in a hothouse or a mexican field

dog gone put up a post yesterday about Walmart (that picture's worth a lot more than 1,000 words)and it's dishonest representation of itself as an "All American" company. Walmart has stripmined the commercial districts of countless small towns in the U.S.--those small towns about whose values the Teabaggist Walmart shoppers are constantly keening. They screw their employees, their customers and their suppliers as much as is possible. They are not just non-union, they are rabidly, reflexively and, often, illegally ANTI-UNION.

Walmart, while making billions in profits for its major shareholders (most of whom are the Walton family and their management teams*), pays their employees much less than a living wage and manages to give them pretty much nothing by way of employee benefits.

I saw that photo and read the first two comments and it made me think of the photo of an Amish farmer, holding a tomato that came from his own fields.

I'm not nuts about Amish religious beliefs but you can't fault their work ethic.

Ben's not a big man, maybe 5'9", about 175 lbs., but he's got forearms like Popeye, from driving his teams of Belgians, among other things, and could probably crack a nut--a coconut--with his bare hands. He's a quiet sortaguy with a passel of kids, some of whom work the stand with him at the farmer's markets and, I'm sure, in the gardens and fields at the farm.

I'm not sure how this photo will scale if you enlarge it, but if you can focus on his hand you'll see dirt in his cuticles and a lot of wear and tear on those hands. Yet, he holds that tomato like it was a baby. The day that I took this photo he was dealing with a customer who was complaining about having bought tomatoes that looked ripe but weren't (not from Ben) at the previous farmers' market. Ben picked up a tomato and held it in his hand. He did not squeeze it to see if it was soft. He simply hefted it in his hand and felt the weight of ripeness.

This will be my only semi-civil post of the week. Enjoy.






*     http://wiki.answers.com/Q/Who_owns_the_most_stock_in_walmart  --not the definitive source but they provide links. If there are any Walmartbots out there who want to dispute the data, just supply some of your own.