A Lexington man is accused trying to use a fake $1 million bill to pay for his purchases at a Walmart.

Michael Anthony Fuller, 53, of 3 Parker St., walked into the Walmart on Lowes Boulevard in Lexington on Nov. 17. He shopped for a while, picking up a vacuum cleaner, a microwave oven and other merchandise, totaling $476, an arrest warrant says.

Fuller was later charged with attempting to obtain property by false pretense and uttering a forged instrument, both felonies, court records show. A warrant says of the fake million-dollar bill: “There is no such thing.” The largest bill in circulation is a $100 bill.

Lexington police Sgt. Shannon Sharpe said the case is unusual. “It is kind of strange,” Sharpe said.

Photo: Tawheed Manzoor (CC)

Vandana Shiva on Al Jazeera English explains how, as mega-chains venture into industrial farming, they have created an epidemic of hunger- and generated billions in profit.

New Delhi, India – In November 2011, when the UPA government announced that it had cleared the entry of big retail chains such as Walmart and Tesco into India through 51 per cent Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) in multi-brand retail, it justified the decision saying that FDI in retail would boost food security and benefit farmers’ livelihoods.

But the assurance that FDI in retail would ease inflation did not resolve the political crisis the government was facing; it deepened it. Parliament was stalled for several days of the Winter Session, after which the government was forced to withdraw its decision.

The story of FDI in retail goes back to 2005, when Prime Minister Manmohan Singh signed an agriculture agreement with the US, along with the nuclear agreement. On the board of the US-India Knowledge Initiative in Agriculture, as it is called, sit Monsanto (the world’s leading producer of GM seeds), ConAgra (among the world’s biggest agribusinesses, along with Cargill) and Walmart (the world’s largest retail giant).

Protests had prevented Walmart’s entry into retail, but, in 2007, it did get a backdoor entry through a joint-venture with Bharti (their stores go by the names of Easyday and Best Price Modern Wholesale). No back-end infrastructure has been built so far, one of the other claims of the government about why we need retail giants.

Farmers’ suicides spike in India

The way the UPA government tried to ram through the decision on FDI in retail – without consulting the opposition parties, or even its allies – was clearly undemocratic. But the decision itself was also flawed. It illustrated a disconnect between an ideology based on market fundamentalism – which is the leaning of the present government – and the Indian reality of small farms and small retail…

Read the rest on Al Jazeera English

Tulsa Police say a woman tried to make a meth lab inside a south Tulsa Walmart.

According to police, Alisha Halfmoon, 45, began taking items used to make meth off of shelves at the Walmart located at 81st and Lewis in south Tulsa. She then began trying to make the drug while still inside the store.

When officers took the items outside the store, some spilled. One officer suffered a minor burn to his hand. No customers were injured.

Photo: Joey Caputo (CC)

Is Wal-Mart too big to sue? How will this and previous law suits against Wal-Mart effect the future of how other businesses deal with discrimination? Via MSNBC:

If you’re part of a group of employees working for a major U.S. corporation with a gripe about unfair treatment, your collective voices were potentially muffled Monday.

A key attempt to tackle inequality in the U.S. workforce suffered a major blow when the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that Wal-Mart — with its thousands of stores and millions of employment decisions — was too massive for a group of employees to sue for discrimination using class-action status.

Wal-Mart, according to a 5-4 decision by the high court, is just too big to sue. The court’s decision is a direct hit to women seeking parity in particular. Women now make up about half the U.S. workforce and that means no other minority group seeking a class action would likely constitute such a big block of employees at any one employer.

“When you get a company that’s as huge as Wal-Mart and then try to get an all-encompassing class-action suit, it’s not going to go,” said Robert Langran, a Supreme Court expert and a Villanova University political science professor. “But it raises the question: What is too big? Where do you draw the line?”

[Continues at MSNBC]

Asda customers may be able to find love among the cabbages. According to Asda, the novel idea came about after a survey conducted on 10,000 of their shoppers showed that 71 percent of men and 64 percent of women look for a possible match in their local supermarket. And 41 percent said they viewed contents of fellow shoppers baskets to try and gauge whether they were single. Asda has decided to give the lonely hearts of our nation a helping hand!

Asdadating.com is the ‘perfect matchmaking option,’ explains a Asda spokesperson, ‘you can chat to fellow shoppers you like the look of whilst getting your weekly shop done.’

Asda’s dating website matches potential partners based on their shopping habits. AsdaDating.com is run in association with dating agency UKDating.

“You can get your weekly shop done while chatting to fellow Asda shoppers who take your fancy. With over 18 million shoppers visiting Asda each week we realised this is an unmissable opportunity to help set up a few dates.

“Who knows, maybe we’ll see another in-store marriage.”

Fortune 500

Rank      Company                      Revenues               Profits
1               Wal-Mart Stores        378,799.0               12,731.0
2               Exxon Mobil              372,824.0               40,610.0
3               Chevron                      210,783.0               18,688.0
4               General Motors         182,347.0               -38,732.0
5               ConocoPhillips          178,558.0               11,891.0
6               General Electric        176,656.0               11,891.0
7               Ford Motor                 172,468.0               -2,723.0
8               Citigroup                     159,229.0               3,617.0
9               Bank of America       119,190.0               14,982.0
10               AT&T                        118,928.0               11,951.0

MUNDELEIN, Ill.—Robert Brownson long believed that his proposed development here, with its 200,000-square-foot Wal-Mart Supercenter, was being held hostage by nearby homeowners.

He had seen them protesting at city hall, and they had filed a lawsuit to stop the project.

What he didn’t know was that the locals were getting a lot of help. A grocery chain with nine stores in the area had hired Saint Consulting Group to secretly run the antidevelopment campaign. Saint is a specialist at fighting proposed Wal-Marts, and it uses tactics it describes as “black arts.”

As Wal-Mart Stores Inc. has grown into the largest grocery seller in the U.S., similar battles have played out in hundreds of towns like Mundelein. Local activists and union groups have been the public face of much of the resistance. But in scores of cases, large supermarket chains including Supervalu Inc., Safeway Inc. and Ahold NV have retained Saint Consulting to block Wal-Mart, according to hundreds of pages of Saint documents reviewed by The Wall Street Journal and interviews with former employees.

Saint has jokingly called its staff the “Wal-Mart killers.” P. Michael Saint, the company’s founder, declines to discuss specific clients or campaigns. When read a partial list of the company’s supermarket clients, he responds that “if those names are true, I would say I was proud that some of the largest, most sophisticated companies were so pleased with our success and discretion that they hired us over the years.”

Supermarkets that have funded campaigns to stop Wal-Mart are concerned about having to match the retailing giant’s low prices lest they lose market share. Although they have managed to stop some projects, they haven’t put much of a dent in Wal-Mart’s growth in the U.S., where it has more than 2,700 supercenters—large stores that sell groceries and general merchandise. Last year, 51% of Wal-Mart’s $258 billion in U.S. revenue came from grocery sales.

In many cases, the pitched battles have more than doubled the amount of time it takes Wal-Mart to open a store…

[continues in the Wall Street Journal]

Stephen Wilkes took a photo every 10 seconds of the day for a time-lapse video inside Walmart for Fortune magazine. All in all, 8,640 frames were taken (1,800 that are actually used) and the entire 24 hours is compressed into two minutes. The shoot took place on April 6, 2010 in New Brunswick, New Jersey from 9:14 am [sic] to 9:14pm. Says Photo Editor Lauren Winfield, “The inspiration was to show that Walmart never sleeps… open 24 hours with no real daylight, you have no sense of what time of day it is. We wanted to see what the traffic flow of people coming in and out of the store looks like as a day in the life.”

Despite medical marijuana being legal in Michigan, WalMart has fired a cancer patient and former employee of the year who tested positive for the drug, which was recommended by his doctor.

“I was terminated because I failed a drug screening,” ex-WalMart employee Joseph Casias told WZZM-13.

In 2008, Casias was Associate of the Year at the WalMart store in Battle Creek, Mich., despite suffering from sinus cancer and an inoperable brain tumor. ​At his doctor’s recommendation, Casias legally uses medical marijuana to ease his pain.

“It helps tremendously,” Casias said. “I only use it to stop the pain. To make me feel more comfortable and active as a person.”

Casias said he went to work every day during his five years at WalMart. “I gave them everything,” he said. “One hundred and ten percent every day. Anything they asked me to do, I did. More than they asked me to do. Twelve to 14 hours a day.”

Then Casias sprained his knee at work last November. During the routine drug screening that follows all workplace injuries, marijuana was detected in his system. Casias showed WalMart managers his Michigan medical marijuana card, but was fired anyway.

Read More: Toke of the Town

Outside the Wal-Mart in Orland Hills, IL, by Clean Wal-Mart.

Kevin Robinson writes on Chicagoist:

As part of our on-going coverage of Wal-Mart’s attempt to break into the Chicago retail market, we take a look this week at the company’s employment practices in the Chicago metropolitan area. Chicagoist met up with three Wal-Mart employees to talk to them about their jobs, company policy, and why they work there.

Roslyn Lindfair also knows what it’s like to be hurt on the job at Wal-Mart. She worked at the Cary, Illinois store for five years as a cashier before she was fired after her arm got caught in a turnstile.

“It was maybe about 7:30, I was ringing up a customer, and she was turning the turnstile one way, and I was turning another way. And it hit me in my arm. It hurt, and I just kinda waited a while, and I noticed my arm started swelling up.

“It was about 9 o’clock, and I decided I wanted to go to the doctor. So they took me to the hospital. I came back to work, I worked the whole day. On Thursday they presented me with a five-year service award. That Friday I worked the whole day, and then at 3:30 I was getting off of work, and they called me into the office.

“And they wanted to go over the whole incident, tell them what happened. Basically they interrogated me for 30 minutes, 40 minutes. Asked me did I do it on purpose. I told them no, I know my way around. They asked me would I change anything. I told them no, I wouldn’t change anything. They kept going, asking me different questions.

“And I said ‘you can keep asking me the same question over and over again. My yes means yes and my no means no. No I did not do it on purpose. Yes I know my surroundings, and no I will not change anything.’ So they said ‘well, we’re just going to have to fire you for practicing unsafe work habits.’”

Read the full post at Chicagoist

Wal-Mart has been widely condemned for offering its employees only low-paying, dead end jobs. Even President Obama criticized Hillary Clinton during the 2008 presidential campaign for having served on Wal-Mart’s board and stated that the firm ought to pay “a living wage.”

In inner-city Detroit, however, where the unemployment rate is estimated at an astonishing 50%, the prospect of a Wal-Mart job may appear far more attractive.

Four inner-city Detroit high schools have decided that employment with Wal-Mart is an opportunity worth training their students to pursue. The schools have teamed up with the giant merchandiser to offer a for-credit class in job-readiness training that also includes entry-level after-school jobs.

Read More: RAW Story

When heading off to jail, it’s best to commit a crime that will provide you with a manly story to tell your fellow inmates, something a little more desperado-like than, say, knee-capping a rival figure skater. Working as a hired gun for the Mafia always sounds good…

Armored car heists always have a nice ring to them. And even if you’re not quite up to something this ambitious, you can still trot out the old resisting arrest.

Unfortunately, Robert T. Jenkins now sits in jail with probably the worst criminal tale ever. He was arrested at a Wal-Mart in Canton, Ohio for peeing on steaks. Yes, you heard that right.

Cops were called to the store after Jenkins simply walked up to the meat counter, pulled out his manly apparatus — which we hope isn’t capable of reproduction — and begin peeing on the steak selection.

No one seems to know why he did it, unless he was practicing a bold new form of marinating.

Read More: True Crime Report

The controversy over Wal-Mart’s attempts to break into the Chicago retail market has flared up again recently. Opponents argue that Wal-Mart drives down wages, destroys local businesses and leads to no net increase in jobs or tax revenue for the city.

Wal-Mart and its allies contend that neighborhood residents deserve to have a say in what happens in their neighborhood, and people that don’t live there should stay out of the matter. The lack of good options available to people that live on the South and West sides of Chicago has been well-documented, and it’s very plausible that there is a substantial and passionate movement in those neighborhoods to bring Wal-Mart to their communities as a solution. Wal-Mart would have us believe that such a sentiment exists, but it turns out that support for their expansion into the city is being manufactured by the Chicagoland Chamber of Commerce, a local public relations powerhouse, and by Wal-Mart itself.

Read the full post at Chicagoist

A Pennsylvania Walmart Supercenter videotaped employees and customers in a unisex bathroom, several former and current Walmart employees alleged in a lawsuit filed this week.

Seven former and current employees from the Tire and Lube department at the Walmart in Easton, Pa., filed a lawsuit in county court against the Arkansas-based corporation and four local managers Dec. 21.

Several employees discovered an “off-the-shelf” video camera in a store bathroom March 31, 2008, according to the court filing. The unisex bathroom, which also served as a changing room, was used by employees and customers. Customers and employees were not notifed of the surveillance, according to the court filing.

“I am incredulous that anyone would think that it’s appropriate conduct for any reason to photograph people in a changing room and bathroom,” said Erv McLain, the plaintiffs’ attorney.

Read More: ABC News

On December 3rd, a 15 year old black girl will enter a Juvenile Courtroom in Davenport, Iowa to face charges of shoplifting $39 worth of merchandise from the Wal-Mart superstore on West Kimberly Road. Hundreds of similar incidents take place everyday in the Wal-Mart Empire, and most escape notice by the media.

Destiny Crawford, the 15 year old defendant, denies she stole anything from Wal-Mart. But the ordeal she went through after the alleged incident doesn’t fit the crime.

According to the family, on August 2, 2009, James Crawford Jr. was shopping for groceries at Wal-Mart. James’ teenage sister, Destiny, was in his care while his parents made a short trip to Chicago. Destiny was accompanied by a schoolmate on the shopping trip. While James shopped for necessities, the two teenagers wandered through the aisles, trying on shoes, and looking at trinkets. In the bakery section, the girls met up again with James, who gave them his wallet and a bag of dog food, instructing Destiny to pay for the item with cash at the self-check out and to meet him outside at the car. James waited in a longer line to pay for the groceries with his EBT card.

As the two girls left Wal-Mart, two men–who neither produced identification nor asked the two teenagers for their I.D.–stopped the girls, and accused them of shoplifting. The men physically forced the teenagers back into the store. James saw the men walking his sister and her friend to the other end of the store. He made his way over to the girls and asked the men what was taking place. He was told the teens were being taken to an interrogation room. James stated that he was his sister’s guardian and as a minor she needed to have a parent or guardian present. The Wal-Mart employees told James he wasn’t allowed in the room. A Wal-Mart manager appeared and stated that she would serve as guardian for Destiny. James refused to agree to his sister or her friend being questioned without his presence, and he tried to follow the girls into the interrogation room.

[Read more at HuffPost]

Scott Pelley reports on 60 Minutes:

Looks like that temporary Walmart in Times Square last year may have been a sign of what’s to come for the city. The Financial Times reported today that the retail giant is finally ready to muscle its way into larger cities, including New York.

“We already have in our real estate program a robust plan to go after those [urban markets],” Eduardo Castro Wright, the CEO of Wal-Mart’s U.S. stores, told analysts. While it has discount stores (which don’t sell fresh food) around Philadelphia, DC and Los Angeles, there are few of the more profitable Supercenters near those cities.

Walmart, the largest U.S. private employer, is strongly anti-union and UFCW grocery workers’ union and its political allies have done their job keeping the chain on city outskirts. However, Saint Consulting found the number of people who would oppose a new Wal-Mart in their neighborhood dropped from 68% two years ago to 56% this year. Wal-Mart has gotten a “new respect from politicians, from economists and from the media,” said a company spokesperson, and apparently the retail behemoth has also devoted charitable giving to black charities in urban areas, like Chicago, Philadelphia and NYC.

MILWAUKEE — The world’s largest retailer wants to keep its customers even after they die.

Wal-Mart has started selling caskets on its website at prices that undercut many funeral homes, long the major seller of caskets.

The move follows a similar one by discount rival Costco, which also sells caskets on its site.