A federal jury in Oregon has found Wal Mart guilty of cheating its employees on overtime. I know a lot of folks believe it’s unpatriotic to hold a grudge against Wal Mart, because there’s nothing Americans admire more than success, but you know what? I’m glad those dirtbags were called to account for what they did. Call me Joe Hill, but I think it’s too easy for those of us on the Right to forget why unions were, and still are in many cases, necessary. This story reminds me of one of my male relatives, a hard-working blue-collar guy, votes Republican, loves Rush, etc. For years he worked at a paper mill, and would come home at the end of the work day with a headache and a nosebleed. There was supposedly some kind of toxic, odorless gas in the air. The EPA had made the plant put an electronic monitor in the work area, but it kept going off so often that the foreman simply stuffed a sock in it to shut the device up. True story. My relative said the workers had to live with it because their union was weak, and management had made it clear that if they complained too much, they might shut the plant down and move it to Mexico, thanks to NAFTA. All these working men were trapped, basically, because jobs aren’t plentiful in this area, and they had to feed their families. It wasn’t right, and it isn’t right.