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Walmart is sueing a former empolyee for her settlemen money. Here is the meat from This Article

Debbie Shank breaks down in tears every time she's told that her 18-year-old son, Jeremy, was killed in Iraq.

Debbie Shank, 52, has severe brain damage after a traffic accident in May 2000.The 52-year-old mother of three attended her son's funeral, but she continues to ask how he's doing. When her family reminds her that he's dead, she weeps as if hearing the news for the first time.

Shank suffered severe brain damage after a traffic accident nearly eight years ago that robbed her of much of her short-term memory and left her in a wheelchair and living in a nursing home.

It was the beginning of a series of battles -- both personal and legal -- that loomed for Shank and her family. One of their biggest was with Wal-Mart's health plan.

Eight years ago, Shank was stocking shelves for the retail giant and signed up for Wal-Mart's health and benefits plan.

Two years after the accident, Shank and her husband, Jim, were awarded about $1 million in a lawsuit against the trucking company involved in the crash. After legal fees were paid, $417,000 was placed in a trust to pay for Debbie Shank's long-term care.

Wal-Mart had paid out about $470,000 for Shank's medical expenses and later sued for the same amount. However, the court ruled it can only recoup what is left in the family's trust.

I mean walmart can only become more evil her unless they sacrifice kittens to satan and put a curse on her.

The family's situation is so dire that last year Jim Shank divorced Debbie, so she could receive more money from Medicaid.

Jim Shank, 54, is recovering from prostate cancer, works two jobs and struggles to pay the bills.

"The recovery that Debbie Shank made was recovery for future lost earnings, for her pain and suffering," Graham said.

"She'll never be able to work again. Never have a relationship with her husband or children again. The damage she recovered was for much more than just medical expenses."

Graham said he believes Wal-Mart should be entitled to only about $100

I think I need to right a letter to my senator. I mean I think we need to set a hunting quota on walmart lawyers.

edit I still suck at BBcode

Yet another reason to continue my boycott of Walmart.
Even if they are trying to drive down the cost of CDs.
Strongarming the RIAA so they can make more profits doesn't make up for being utter assholes pretty much everywhere else.

bustertheclown wrote:On a sort of bright side...

bwhahahahahaha that header they had on the price sign looks exactly like the one for Big W retail here in Australia except without the walmart and slightly different colours.

This is all just a symptom; and Wal Mart is just as much a victim here, of a broken healthcare system with runaway costs. Insurance was first designed to mitigate those skyrocketing costs - now they act as a bloodsucking middleman, making the situation far worse, for both the sick and the healthy.

It's a serious drain on our entire economy, and it's not just the US that suffers from the US's crappy healthcare system.

You mention Wal Mart's use of market power to force CD prices down despite the RIAA cartel's best efforts to keep them propped up; but Wal Mart has also been doing the same thing with prescription drug prices to some extent as well. Too bad we need one "good" monopoly in order to fight against these pharmaceutical and recording industry cartels (as well as many other of the over-consolodated consumer goods channels).

If you think what is going wrong with this one couple is bad; multiply it by about 100 million uninsured Americans, (not to mention the Americans who are paying obnoxious premiums, and getting really no effective service from their HMOs). It's not Wal Marts fault. It's our runaway drug patent system. It's our over consolidated hospital cartels. It's the disgusting way the AMA artificially constrains the number of medical school graduates. It's our government's useless protectionist policies in forbidding drug reimportation by consumers. All of these factors conspire to keep prices artificially high; out of reach of the bottom 4 income quintiles. (bottom 80%) to the point where insurance is NEEDED to finance even basic healthcare needs; and since insurance is brainlessly tied to employment, there is nothing resembling a free market or competition to cause health insurance companies to serve the needs of their captive customers.

Yeah - we're fucked, and we're fucked BAD.

And after 16 years of waiting for a solution, I'm convinced that there's only one thing that will fix the problem:
Torches, pitchforks, and rioting in the streets.

Until that happens in the US, there will be no meaningful change. No matter who you vote for, no matter what megacorporation you choose to hate.

I've seen proposals floated in the last couple election cycles about allowing the American public to buy into the same socialized health care our congresscritters get (Legislative, Executive and Judicial branches get free health care provided by the taxpayers).
I say we turn the tables, make the people in Washington DC pay for their own damn health care the same way the rest of us working stiffs do.
Next time one of them gets cancer, slap them with some fat hospital bills the same way any of us would. Make W pay for his next colonoscopy out of his own damned pocket.
Oh, but first, make it illegal for lobbyists to contribute to the lawmakers health care costs.

We'd see things change pretty damned quickly.

ce6 wrote:I've seen proposals floated in the last couple election cycles about allowing the American public to buy into the same socialized health care our congresscritters get...

Personal Soap Box...

Dude... I know you're too smart and well educated to think that's socialized medicine... So, don't play into the right-wing mind games of trying to make it "unacceptable" to average Americans by making it sound bad. I hate that.

*thread dereailment via internet meme attacku!*

In (Union of) Soviet (Socialist Republic) Russia, medicine takes YOU!! *scampers off*

I think this thread needs a link to the Wal-Mart South Park episode: http://youtube.com/watch?v=oHg5SJYRHA0

PopeMac wrote:I think this thread needs a link to the Wal-Mart South Park episode: http://youtube.com/watch?v=oHg5SJYRHA0

You mean like This.

PSA This was brought to you by the awesome south park guys who put all of southpark on the web for free

PopeMac wrote:I think this thread needs a link to the Wal-Mart South Park episode: http://youtube.com/watch?v=oHg5SJYRHA0

Sweet! My first time!

Honor wrote:

PopeMac wrote:I think this thread needs a link to the Wal-Mart South Park episode: http://youtube.com/watch?v=oHg5SJYRHA0

Sweet! My first time!

Congratulations!

Phft. You rank amateur. I'll teach you how to Rickroll.

Seth Marati wrote:Phft. You rank amateur. I'll teach you how to Rickroll.

Okay, that was epic. Anyway, seeing as this thread is now about Rickrolling, how about this? I admit that the intro kinda ruins it, but the guy in the trenchcoat more than makes up for that.

PopeMac wrote:

Seth Marati wrote:Phft. You rank amateur. I'll teach you how to Rickroll.

Okay, that was epic. Anyway, seeing as this thread is now about Rickrolling, how about this? I admit that the intro kinda ruins it, but the guy in the trenchcoat more than makes up for that.

Ive accually been in that baskeball court for( i dont know if i want to admit this) the state Science oylmpiad back in high school. In whic we filled it which was a lot more than the pathetic showing at that game.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uQzJnC9kCWk

0:32, in the news about the security leak at a Finnish bank.

PopeMac wrote:

Seth Marati wrote:Phft. You rank amateur. I'll teach you how to Rickroll.

Okay, that was epic. Anyway, seeing as this thread is now about Rickrolling, how about this? I admit that the intro kinda ruins it, but the guy in the trenchcoat more than makes up for that.

Apparently some people didn't get tipped off by the intro on that one.
Speaking of getting Rick Rolled...

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Oh, and not to change the subject or anything, but apparently even WalMart can be publicly shamed into doing the right thing, if for no other reason than they finally realized that not all publicity is good publicity.

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Honor wrote:

ce6 wrote:I've seen proposals floated in the last couple election cycles about allowing the American public to buy into the same socialized health care our congresscritters get...

Personal Soap Box...

Dude... I know you're too smart and well educated to think that's socialized medicine... So, don't play into the right-wing mind games of trying to make it "unacceptable" to average Americans by making it sound bad. I hate that.

short answer: You're right, I do know better. It's just that the Shrub and his wannabes irritate me and I'm not afraid to stoop to that level to let people know.

long answer:
Since neither the fine detailing of national health care nor political nuancing are my areas of expertise, I often lapse into the perjorative terminology I encounter tossed around by various political commentary radio and TV shows. (and yes, I am quite well aware that people with an agenda rarely use proper definitions when attempting to stigmatize a talking point)
In this instance, I am using socialized medicine in the broadest possible meaning of any government involvement whatsoever.
My intent was to imply the irony of how the negative connotation of the term being used by the politically "right" to bash any attempts to reign in the laissez-faire excessiveness now burdening the wallets of many Americans, and completely ignoring the health plans of President and Vice President, which the politically "left" shows were keen to point out as being publicly funded.
In further research I have not been able to determine exactly what our resident potted plant has for his policy, but I did find the one to which John Kerry referred during his campaign in 2004.
Seeing as how they appear to have some government backing (if not fully a government program, they at least have a .gov web address), this implies they are somehow using taxpayer money, because last time I checked, the government is still the entity which collects my taxes to spend on programs of their choosing. This can therefore, in an extremely broad interpretation, be inferred as a form of "socialized medicine."

Besides, I recently read that since the Red Scare is no longer scary, the term "socialized healthcare" doesn't carry the negative weight it did in the past. It's lost its power to get people riled, especially since such a large portion of taxpaying adults were just kids when the USSR crumbled. They don't really have Cold War memories, and so Cold War fear terminology doesn't really work on them.

Personally, I've always liked the sound of the term. Plus, if we did have a nationalized health care system, I'd be able to get some pills to treat my gout.

Well back on topic walmart decided to stop being a douche because of media pressure.
Take the hat of their ass

ce6:

You are correct, sir.

The best health plan in the world; BAR NONE, is:
1. Get elected to the US Congress or Senate.
2. Pretty much a free ride for the rest of your life.

Very bad idea in terms of any presumed "moral incentive" as a basis for Democracy.

Put all of us on that same plan, and the nation would be quickly bankrupt, of course.
Put all of THEM on OUR plan, and maybe they'd be incentivized to try to FIX our broken system.

I still say that the only thing likely to make any actual real change is torches and pitchforks.

One well-publicized case, whichever way it goes, means fuck-all for the other hundreds of millions of us who either get no care, or are paying way more than what a sane, rational, competitive market would cost.