Come on, people - say it with me: WOOOHOOO!

Sanity for once has prevailed and the proliferation of the Evil Empire of Retail has been stopped in Bend (for now anyway) - Bend city hearings officer denies Wal-Mart’s proposed 217,000-square-foot Supercenter.

I refuse to shop there, and have signed petitions supporting a citizen action to stop the new Wal-Mart. I'm certainly not rich (is a freelancer ever?), but I refuse to support an empire who treats their employees like crap in exchange for saving 20 cents on a bottle of shampoo.

You might be saving a buck by shopping at Walmart, but you're also helping proliferate poverty by supporting a retailer who is so greedy, it doesn't see fit to pay a living wage to the very people on who's back it has built its empire. The only way to truly stop them (and their continued abuse of their employees) is to STOP SHOPPING THERE.

Like I said elsewhere, sometimes Walmart is the only option for some people to GET a job. At least two of the people I know that work there aren't "treated like crap". Have you ever worked there? Or someone in your immediate family?

I mean, it's great to stand on principle, but many of those with "principles" have never tried "poverty". Just a thought.

I have tried poverty. I was on WIC and OHP when my first child was born because my husband and I were both in college and those student loans just don't cover living expences.

Even at our most poor, we would NEVER EVER shop at WalMart. Do you realize how many WalMart workers need to go on public assistance because WalMart DOES NOT give their workers a living wage or health care? WalMart even refuses to dispence certain perscriptions that go against their right wing values. How many hard working store owners have been put out of business by the monolith? I won't even get started on their treatment of women, senior, or disabled workers.

Sorry, but just because you're poor doesn't mean you have to give up your principles. One WalMart is already more than enough for this town.

To anonymous - why, if you could not afford to take care of yourself, are you pumping out kids that you can't afford?

I have no sympathy for people that don't manage their own lives, make poor choices, then whine and complain because they are not getting paid more money for basically having no skills.

The union-sponsored complaint about Wal-Mart workers is totally crap from a hostile mafia control union. You either submit and become unionized or they will slash you. Then, ignorant people believe those lies - people with little or no skills that think if they get a union job their lives will suddenly be wonderful.

Just ask anyone in Detroit about union jobs and what great things unions can do.

regarding "justadog's" comment.

your comment regarding "having kids" or "pumping out kids" is ludicrous. i'm a father and I have three kids, they are the most wonderful thing in the world. and if you think you'll ever be in a "financially secure" situation to have them your fooling yourself. you have them because you want them, and if you didn't plan on having them, then you'll soon understand that you want them. they bring something to your life that is completely indescribable. anybody who complains about other people having kids just don't understand their value. they will be in control of things when the parents get older, and if you treat them right they will take care of the parents when the parents can't take care of themselves. this society is getting self centered and self serving each passing year. it's getting unaffordable to even live, but I would work 24 hours a day 7 days a week to provide for my children and I wouldn't even think twice, because at least they are given the opportunity to do better with each generation and experience some of the nicer things in this world, like a local super market or hardware store that you can actually find stuff in that supports the community in more ways than just peddling goods.

I would just like to open this dead link because I found something out. I wouldn't mind so much people being "against Walmart" if I didn't find out that they own as few as two to as many as 8 properties in Bend, and that some of them have properties that are directly affected by the proposed Walmart. It isn't the regular person who chooses to stand on principle and not shop there... it's the guy who bought the $825,000 LOT (not home,.... LOT) in pronghorn in 9/2005 who complains about Walmart that annoys me. I'm quite sure that "saving a buck" isn't on his radar. Especially when their property address in 2004 still showed a Los Angeles address. That's what annoys me.

OK... enuf dead link stuff. Sorry.

Gee - i really wish people would do away with their cloak of posting as "anonymous" while throwing such precise and accusatory information out there like the last poster here did...

It's just cowardly.

You have something to say, and somebody to accuse - name names, and put your own at the bottom.

And btw: it takes a pretty OCD personality to go digging around in somebody else's life like that - down to their freaking address in another state! - without having an alterior motive to drive them.

So what's your deal, exactly?

[And in case anybody is wondering - no, it's not ME the anonymous poster above is ranting about. I don't own property in Pronghorn, nor did I ever live in the pit that is L.A. I don't know who he/she is even talking about (although I'm semi-curious).

I don't have any monetarily-related reasons for opposing Walmart - only idealistic and societal reasons.]