Monday, July 31st, 2006...11:56 am
Plus, I Know That Leal Prefers Sushi to Hummus Any Day of the Week
Steve Leal, that Steve Leal. He’s just like the Hezbollah, you know?
Well, that’s the impression one would get from a series of “Something to Consider…” ads being run by local developer Bruce Ash. The ad tries to draw comparisons between innocents being killed in Middle East violence to the good people of Tucson being denied the right to work for low wages and no benefits at Wal-Mart.
Yeah, I don’t quite get the comparison either.
What’s worse, in an interview, Ash took things further by saying that just as Hezbollah is a proxy for Iranian Mullahs, Leal is a proxy for the UFCW. Nice to know that Ash has such a high opinion of unionized clerks and stockers. He’d better look for non-union stores from now on if he wants to avoid dirty looks at the checkout lanes.
This isn’t the first pro-Wal-Mart ad campaign that drew such offensive paralells. Some of us remember the campaign up in Flagstaff, where Wal-Mart compared the UFCW and neighborhood activists to Nazis.
By far the silliest aspect of this whole thing is the portrayal of Wal-Mart, a company that makes billions of dollars and is a world-wide player, as some sort of defenseless victim of the big bad unions. Give me a break.
Ash had a similar negative campaign (run through a committee called “Independent People Like You”) in the 2003 elections against former Mayor Tom Volgy, who was making a bid for his old seat, and Councilmember José Ibarra. The business community wanted Mayor Bob Walkup to win re-election, which narrowly happened, but some openly wonder if Ash’s negative campaign is what kept Walkup under 50% of the vote. Some of them are concerned that tactics such as this will make it harder to find compromises on projects in the future, especially given the more liberal direction of the present council.
In his ad, by the way, Ash asks people to call Leal’s office to tell him to “stand-up to the unions.” Leal’s office number is 791-4231, and his e-mail is steve.leal@tucsonaz.gov. Call him or e-mail him to tell him to keep up the good work and stand with working people.
NB – If you want to hear the ad, the Arizona Daily Star has it here.
3 Comments
July 31st, 2006 at 3:51 pm
One of the biggest scandals is how low Wal-Mart pays its employees, and then charges such high premiums for medical coverage that even where there is supposedly coverage, there isn’t because the employees opt out.
I really admired what the Chicago city council did last week and ignored the threats that Wal-Mart would leave Chicago if they had to pay a living wage (hopefully Mayor Daley will sign it). Considering how hard it is to keep Wal-Mart out of some communities, maybe that will be the best way to do it– let them come, but pass Chicago-style living wage ordinances.
Of course, if Mr. Ash is so much comparing Wal-Mart with the Lebanese, perhaps someone should ask him if they have any contracts to buy clothes from sweatshops in Lebanon.
August 1st, 2006 at 12:01 am
Another scandal is how Ash treats tenants at his three Section 8 buildings in Tucson. (Shadow Pines, Menlo Park and Mayfair Manor)
He has gotten his hand slapped a couple of times for ripping them off with illegal late fees and telling tenants they use the stove or shower too much and charging them to make capital repairs to the units.
June 8th, 2007 at 6:22 am
[...] voters, this guy may be the wrong choice. Last year, for example, he used a radio commentary to compare opponents of a South Side shopping mall development to Hezbollah. He also ran a group called “Independent People Like You,” which ran a series of ads [...]