Hating Wal-Mart

Well the Left does anyway. Living in Providence, RI, I had to drive to Massachusetts to do all of my shopping at any big retailers. It was maddening and not by accident. I had many conversations with neighbors over the lack of big retail shopping and you should have seen the darkness fall over their faces. It was like bringing up the option of inviting the Devil himself to dinner.

The nearest big retailers that were actually in the state of Rhode Island was in Warwick. Pretty far down I-95 from where I was living.

I bring this all up because the issue is getting a lot of play right now in the blogosphere. The Corner has a great entry. I really loved this from Democratic Leadership's Coucil Ed Kilgore:

In the southern small-town, rural and exurban communities I know best, and among the low-to-moderate income "working family" voters Democrats most need to re-attract, Wal-Mart is considered pretty damn near sacrosanct. And if Democrats decide to tell these voters they can't be good progressives and shop at Wal-Mart, we will lose these people for a long, long time.

Maybe it's different in...other parts of the country, but probably not too widely. And I defy you to find a credible political strategist in states with a big Wal-Mart presence who will tell you otherwise.

If you think we've been damaged as a party by culturally conservative working-class perceptions of us as people who want to take their guns away, you ain't seen nothing yet if we become perceived as the party that wants to take Wal-Mart away. Indeed, it's the one thing we could do, other than espousing actual racism, that might finally give Republicans a breakthrough among minority voters, who heavily shop at Wal-Mart where the option's available.

Heh, Heh, Heh....Go ahead and keep on demonizing Wal-Mart: It's great sport to watch.

Update: Kilgore direct link added. (Thanks to RightRI)