The Rockdale News Rockdale News Digital Edition, May 6, 2015 | Page 14

Perspectives
Wednesday, May 6, 2015

Consciously sidelining ourselves
Eric
Erickson
Columnist

T

hough Wal-Mart remains fixed in the
American conscience as Sam Walton’s
business, it is less and less that. Walton
was folksy and relatable to the Americans who
shopped at Wal-Mart. Everyone could imagine
Sam Walton shopping there, too. But over the
years, Wal-Mart’s management has passed out
of the direct hands of Walton’s family.
A few of the Walton clan remain on the
Wal-Mart board of directors, but now its board
also includes Marissa Mayer, the CEO of Yahoo!, and Kevin Systrom, the CEO of Instagram. One would be hard pressed to imagine
either as regular shoppers at Wal-Mart. For
that matter, former counselor to President
George W. Bush, Dan Bartlett, is now the
executive vice president of corporate affairs for
Wal-Mart. It may be hard to imagine many
of Wal-Mart’s executive leaders being regular
shoppers at Wal-Mart.

“The Religious Freedom
Restoration Act has the support
of a majority of Americans.
In Arkansas, it was backed
overwhelmingly by the public.
But Wal-Mart has hitched
its wagon to a left-leaning
social agenda and intervened
in Arkansas to try to kill its
religious liberty legislation.”

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