There are religious groups trying to get their members to boycott Walmart because the giant merchandiser hangs "Happy Holiday" signs instead of "Merry Christmas" signs in its stores.
There are a lot of good reasons to boycott Walmart, and I don't shop there. Their employment practices are terrible. They do everything they can to stifle union activity so that they can continue to pay their employees minimum wages. Most of their employees cannot afford the health insurance they offer, and are forced to rely on Medicaid, which the rest of us pay for. They draw in suppliers, and then pay less every year for their products so that the suppliers are forced to close their plants in the U.S. and manufacture their products overseas. Even Levi Jeans finally caved to Walmart and closed its last U.S. plant. I prefer to buy stuff made in a country that has good labor laws. Then there are the illegal immigrants who clean the stores at night and don't even make minimum wages. Walmart was shocked (!) to discover there was illegal hiring going on in the back room. Even Walmart commercials, with the yellow smiley face shooting down prices is reason enough not to shop there.
But to boycott them because they took the "Christ" out of shopping? Well we just know that Christmas is all about the shopping, don't we?
He said:
A Penny Saved Is Impossible
The further through life I drift
The more obvious it becomes that I am lacking in thrift.
Now thrift is such a boon to its possessor that years ago they began to tax it,
But it is a bane to him that lacks it
Because if you lack it your will go into a shoppe and pay two dollars for a gifte.
But if you possess it you find something just as good for a dollar fifte.
A penny is merely something that you pull several of out of your pocket before you find the nickel you need for a telephone call, if thriftlessness is in your blood,
Whereas to the thrifty a penny is something to be put out at stud.
Thrifty people put two-cent stamps on letters addressed to a three-cent zone,
And thriftless people on the other end pay the postage due and the thrifty people chuckle and rub their hands because the saving on every six letters represents a year’s interest on a dollar loan.
Oh that I were thrifty, because thrifty people leave estates to delight their next of kin with;
Oh that I were thrifty, because then not only would I have money in the bank to pay my bills, but I could leave the money in the bank because I wouldn’t have run up the bills to begin with;
Oh that I were not a spendthrift, oh then would my heart indeed be gladsome,
Because it is so futile being a spendthrift because I don’t know any places where thrift could be spent even if I had some.
Ogden Nash
She said:
The Coin
Into my heart’s treasury
I slipped a coin That time cannot take
Nor thief purloin---
Oh, better than a minting
Of a gold crowned king
Is the safe kept memory
Of a lovely thing
Sara Teasdale
