Wal-Mart y nosotros. Flash fiction contest. Cars, cards n carbines.

Wal-Mart on Santa's naughtiest list and on the Toltecs'

W-M protesting Santa worker arrested

Wal-Mart started Xmas before Pavo Day this year on Wheel of Fortune. So I was reminded earlier than usual of the place I most hate shopping at. I almost never do. Maybe five times in as many years. Por qué?

I feel it is unconscionable for me to help make the 10th-of-1% even richer, just so I can save a little money, while Wal-Mart workers suffer. There's more than a U.S. latino connection; there's also a Mexican-Toltec connection explained below.

On their website, Wal-Mart brags: "Our U.S. workforce is about 1.3 million associates. 37% of our associates in the U.S. are minority, including more than 169,000 Hispanic associates." What they don't brag about, are facts like these:

Wal-Mart workers associating

"Wal-Mart, the nation’s largest private sector employer, is also the biggest consumer of taxpayer supported aid, along with McDonald's. In many states, Wal-Mart employees are the largest group of Medicaid recipients.

"They are also the single biggest group of food stamp recipients. Wal-Mart’s associates are paid so little that they receive $1,000 on average in public assistance."

You can Google Wal-Mart employees & welfare, food stamps, losing Americans jobs, cutting workers' health insurance, undermining public education, and funding right-wing agendas. Or read about workers marching yesterday in front of the store, chanting in English and Spanish and carrying signs with messages like “Livable Wages Over Greed.”

The information and evidence seems endless. Goes on for pages and pages of reasons for Hispanics, Chicanos, mexicanos and others to drive twice as far to another store, rather than contribute to this company's cash flow. Read the entire NYTimes piece here.

Now, for some of the money you spend at Wal-Mart that goes for bribes. As was done in Mexico City in the sacrilege that follows.

Teotihuacán & Wal-Mart

In an article a year ago entitled "The Bribery Aisle: How Wal-Mart Got Its Way
in Mexico", The New York Times uncovered that Wal-Mart's more accurate slogan should be: Save Money for bribes; Live Better on welfare. First for the, on Welfare:

"Wal-Mart de Mexico was an aggressive and creative corrupter, offering large payoffs to get what the law otherwise prohibited, an examination by The New York Times found.

"Wal-Mart de Mexico arranged to bribe an official to change the map before it was sent to the newspaper, records and interviews show. When the map was published, the zoning was redrawn to allow Wal-Mart’s store.

"The NYTimes traveled to dozens of towns and cities in Mexico, gathered tens of thousands of documents related to Wal-Mart de Mexico permits, and interviewed scores of government officials and Wal-Mart employees, including hours of interviews with lawyers.

"The Times’s examination reveals that Wal-Mart de Mexico was not the reluctant victim of a corrupt culture that insisted on bribes as the cost of doing business. Nor did it pay bribes merely to speed up routine approvals. Rather, Wal-Mart de Mexico was an aggressive and creative corrupter, offering large payoffs to get what the law otherwise prohibited. It used bribes to subvert democratic governance — public votes, open debates, transparent procedures. It used bribes to circumvent regulatory safeguards that protect Mexican citizens from unsafe construction. It used bribes to outflank rivals.

"Through confidential Wal-Mart documents, The Times identified 19 store sites across Mexico that were the target of Wal-Mart de Mexico’s bribes. The Times then matched information about specific bribes against permit records for each site. Clear patterns emerged. Over and over, for example, the dates of bribe payments coincided with dates when critical permits were issued.

"Thanks to eight bribe payments totaling $341,000, Wal-Mart built a Sam’s Club in one of Mexico City’s most densely populated neighborhoods, near the Basílica de Guadalupe, without a construction license, or an environmental permit, or an urban impact assessment, or even a traffic permit.

"But there is no better example of Wal-Mart de Mexico’s methods than its conquest of field in view of the Pyramid of the Sun in Teotihuacán, a UNESCO World Heritage Site. The Times found that Wal-Mart de Mexico executives approved at least four different bribe payments — more than $200,000 in all — to build just a medium-size supermarket. Without those payoffs, records and interviews show, Wal-Mart almost surely would not have been allowed to build."

La Bloga encourage readers to check out the entire article. It's an incredible investigative piece of what use to be done in this country as journalism. How this company abuses its "Hispanic", and other, workers; how it degrades Mexican heritage; and how it supports causes and beliefs that are opposite those of La Bloga are sufficient reasons for me to remember Wal-Mart this holiday season. And drive right past them, wondering about bribes in the U.S.

A Merry Little Apex Christmas Flash Fiction Contest

An Apex Publications announcement about their contest:

"All entries must have to do with Christmas, but have a distinctly Apex slant – dark science fiction, fantasy, or horror.

Submit between now until December 16th.  250 word limit. Email entries to: apexwritingcontest@gmail.com with the title and author name in the subject line. Story should be in the body of the email.

"Winning story being published on the Apex blog on Dec. 23rd. Besides getting their flash fiction published on the Apex blog, the winner also receives the following fantastic prize pack: a short story (up to 5,000 words long) critiqued by Apex owner/publisher Jason Sizemore, payment of 5 cents a word, and a one year subscription to Apex Magazine.

To make sure that everyone has a merry Christmas, all entrants will receive a free issue of Apex Magazine. Just let us know in your submission email which issue you would like and we will send it. Search our back issues to see which one you’d like."

Go here for details.

Cars, Cards & Carbines anthology

La Bloga amigo, Mario Acevedo, just announced a KickStarter campaign for: A high-octane anthology of short fiction from top, genre authors.

"The goal of this campaign is to publish an anthology of new short stories by some of the best writers [including Mario] in speculative fiction. The anthology will be released as an E-book, a trade paperback, and a limited edition hardcover, available only to campaign contributors.

"Cars, Cards & Carbines grew from a desire to see more of the kind of stories that set my little writer brain on fire as a kid, merged with adult sensibilities, complex themes, and sheer literary awesomeness. We think you'll agree that the author roster is capable of pulling that off.

"This anthology was originally conceived as Mad Max meets Maverick and The Wild, Wild West, by way of Quentin Tarantino and Robert Rodriguez, but the concepts now go much farther than that. Each story will do something unique to incorporate those three themes, without restrictions on genre. The award-winning/bestselling authors have very different writing styles and work in numerous genres.

"One cool thing about putting together this kind of anthology is the way the three elements of the theme can be stretched. Cars can mean hot rods, getaway cars, train cars, mine cars, horse-drawn carriages. While originating from a Poker theme, Cards can be expanded into things like credit cards, tarot cards, programming cards, green cards, and more. And of course Carbine literally means a short-barreled rifle used generally by cavalry, but could easily reach into all sorts of firearms across almost any milieu.

"Put these three together, throw in these authors, simmer, and the possibility for action and adventure is limitless. Stories will be all over the genre map, from noir to weird western, steampunk to cyberpunk, science fiction to straight-up horror.

And let's not forget the cover artist, World Fantasy Award winner Alan M. Clark, who's set to paint a full wrap-around cover.

"The more money we raise, the more stories we can publish and the more we can pay our authors. Every dime beyond the initial goal goes into more stories and higher pay for the authors.

"We have a long list of rewards and crunchy goodies: signed books by our authors and editors, Tuckerizations (writing your name into a story), story and novel critiques for writers, and even launch parties with your favorite author/editor as the host. There's definitely more to come, with some surprises along the way. So buckle up, throttle up, and get ready for a thrill ride."

There will be no open submissions; by invitation only.

Dec. 15, 2013 – Campaign ends.

Nov. 15, 2014 - Ebooks sent to contributors.

As of today, the campaign had reached $1,835 of the $13,500. Go here for more info.

Es todo, hoy,

RudyG

Heroic maestros. Chief Theresa. A reading.

Thanks to Melinda Palacio for the following:

Hello Publishers & Writers,

This is Chiwan, from Writ Large Press, a downtown L.A. small press that’s been around for about five years. We are partnering with The Last Bookstore to run a pop-up bookstore at the new Grand Park on Saturday, March 2nd. If you haven’t been to it, it’s a park that stretches over three blocks, between the Music Center/Dorothy Chandler Pavilion to City Hall. It’s a big, beautiful space with a lot of grass, a giant fountain and a performance stage.

One of the first projects that the Park has scheduled is a day-long book and literacy festival. They have scheduled the acts for the main stage, but have asked us, along with The Last Bookstore, to set up and run a huge, about 2000 sq. ft., bookselling tent.

So, we want to sell your books. It won’t cost you any money. We’ll provide table, tent, umbrella, seats, cash register, everything. It will be a 70/30 cut of sales of your books. We just need you to respond ASAP and get the books to the park that morning. We will be setting up seats and a “stage” so writers can read from books we have available for sale.

These are the things we need:

Commitment: If you are IN, let me know ASAP, by 2/4/13, whether you will have books there. This way, Grand Park can put your names on their PR material.

Books: Tell me what titles you are bringing and the price. Make the price simple so it will be easy to sell. The books themselves should be brought to the park on the morning of the fest so we can set it up.

Readers: If your writers are in town and you can send them out to read, that will be awesome. Let me know who can be there ASAP so we can create a reading schedule.

Volunteers: Not necessary, but if you can have people out for a little time during the day, you can work the floor to hustle your own books. Feel free to pass this email along to publishers you know.

Peace,

Chiwan Choi, Writ Large Press

http://writlargepress.com/

To supporting Tejano and New Mexico music in Denver!

More on Chief Theresa's hunger strike

Following up on last Saturday's post of Chief Theresa Spence's (Chief Shining Turtle) hunger strike, go here to read her Open Letter to My Non-Aboriginal Neighbors.

You can also follow her here.

Teachers take a justifiable stand against testing

As with Chief Theresa, in recent posts I seem to have developed a "heroes" theme of people who have taken desperate or courageous action in support of their beliefs, sometimes endangering themselves or their standing in society.

As a former, tormented, bilingual teacher in the Denver area, I heartily add teachers from Garfield High School in Seattle who've refused to administer a standardized test at their school. (They've since been joined by other schools in Seattle and opposition to standardized testing is spreading. 

Here is the teachers' original statement, who're threatened with loss of pay and censure. I provide the entire piece because it is one of the clearest, most justified and alarming descriptions of why you too should support the movement to take back our schools. Below there's more about joining these heroic teachers.

"We, the Garfield teachers, respectfully decline to give the MAP test to any of our students. We have had different levels of experiences with MAP in our varied careers, have read about it, and discussed it with our colleagues. After this thorough review, we have all come to the conclusion that we cannot in good conscience subject our students to this test again. This letter is an objection to the MAP test specifically and particularly to its negative impact on our students. Here are our reasons:

*Seattle Public School staff has notified us that the test is not a valid test at the high school level. For these students, the margin of error is greater than the expected gain. We object to spending time, money, and staffing on an assessment even SPS agrees is not valid.

*We are not allowed to see the contents of the test, but an analysis of the alignment between the Common Core and MAP shows little overlap. We object to our students being tested on content we are not expected to teach.

*Ninth graders and students receiving extra support (ELL, SPED, and students in math support) are targets of the MAP test. These students are in desperate need of MORE instructional time. Instead, the MAP test subtracts many hours of class time from students’ schedules each year. If we were to participate this year, we would take 805 students out of class during 112 class periods. The amount of lost instructional time is astounding. On average students would EACH lose 320 minutes of instructional time. This is over 5 hours of CORE class time (language arts and math) that students are losing. We object to participating in stealing instructional time from the neediest students.

* In an appeal of the Board’s 2010 decision to renew the MAP contract, a parent group raised concerns about the negative impact of this test “on non-English speakers, Special Education students, and minority and low income children.” These concerns were never addressed nor were the claims refuted. Imagine a native Somali student with limited English skills, sitting in front of a computer taking an evaluative reading test that will no doubt be confusing and overwhelming to the student. The test is supposed to determine the student’s reading level, but without taking into account the student’s language challenge or the student’s limited time in the United States, which makes it almost impossible to understand the context of some passages. For these students and our students with IEPs, the test does actual harm. The students feel stupid yet are being forced to take a test that has NO benefit to them or their educational goals. We object to a test that may violate the rights of groups of students for whom schooling already constitutes an uphill battle.

* In addition to students losing class time to take the test, our computer labs are clogged for weeks with test taking and cannot be used for other educational purposes. For example, students who have a research project no longer have access to the computers they need to further their exploration into their research topic. This especially hurts students without computers at home. We object to our educational resources being monopolized by a test we cannot support.

* We see that our students do not take the test seriously as they know that it will not directly impact their class grade or graduation status. They approach it less and less seriously the more times they take it. Therefore, we see achievement scores go down after instruction. We object to spending scarce resources on a test that is peripheral to our students’ education.

* The MAP test was originally introduced by then superintendent Maria Goodloe-Johnson while she was a board member of the Northwest Evaluation Association, the company that sells the MAP. When Dr. Goodloe-Johnson was fired, the MAP somehow survived the housecleaning. We object to having to give a test whose existence in our district is the result of scandal.

* Even the NWEA itself, the parent company to MAP, has advised districts to carefully restrict the use of the test and its results. NWEA also cautions to ensure 100% random selection of students enrolled in any course if the test is used for evaluation and to take into consideration statistical error in designing evaluation policies. NWEA says that problems become “particularly profound at the high school level.” None of these or other criteria urged by NWEA has been met. We object to being evaluated by a test whose author suggests extreme caution in its use and warns against valid legal action if the test is used in personnel decisions.

* The Seattle Education Association passed a resolution condemning the MAP test that reads, “Whereas testing is not the primary purpose of education…Whereas the MAP was brought into Seattle Schools under suspicious circumstances and conflicts of interest…Whereas the SEA has always had the position of calling for funding to go to classroom and student needs first…Be it Resolved that…the MAP test should be scrapped and/or phased out and the resources saved be returned to the classroom.” We object to having to give it after such an opinion from our collective voice has been registered.

" We are not troublemakers nor do we want to impede the high functioning of our school. We are professionals who care deeply about our students and cannot continue to participate in a practice that harms our school and our students. We want to be able to identify student growth and determine if our practice supports student learning. We wish to be evaluated in a way so that we can continue to improve our practice, and we wish for our colleagues who are struggling to be identified and either be supported or removed. The MAP test is not the way to do any of these things. We feel strongly that we must decline to give the MAP test even one more time."

You can read their story here. 

You can sign a letter in support of the Seattle teachers here.

Read here about another Seattle high school joining their Garfield colleagues.

You can watch this interview with Jesse Hagopian, Seattle high school history teacher and union rep at Garfield High School in Seattle, Wash. and Wayne Au, former high school teacher. (Also editor of Rethinking Schools and assistant professor at the U. of Wash., Bothell Campus. He is author of Unequal By Design: High-stakes Testing and the Standardization of Inequality and the co-editor of Pencils Down: Rethinking High Stakes Testing and Accountability in Public Schools.)

You can sign the National Resolution on High-Stakes Testing here.

(Modeled on the resolution passed by, as of Oct. 2, 2012, and endorsed by 819 boards representing 80% of the districts and 88% of the students.

Garcia author reading, et al, Today in Denver

I'll be giving out sets of my infamous, super-absorbant drink coasters at this reading, and you can get a copy of my debut novel at a special price. Oh, and there's others reading.

SATURDAY, FEBRUARY 2, 3:00  -- We welcome a fabulous trio of debut novelists, all of them friends, students and/or mentees of author Ed Bryant:

Sean Eads, The Survivors -- The aliens have landed, and this time they're not hostile. They're just rude. Coming in waves of rocket ships, the aliens not only refuse to acknowledge the existence of Earth's cultures, they refuse to acknowledge the existence of humanity itself. The aliens by means of their bulk block entry into cars, grocery stores, even elevators….without malice or even purpose.

Rudy Ch Garcia, The Closet of Discarded Dreams -- A young Chicano battles insanity in a surreal world where everyone endlessly relives humankind's abandoned dreams. Except for him. Will VN vet fraggers, Lenny Bruce, a Midget Godzilla, vampires, Neanderthals, a Black leper, Marilyn Monroe, Che, and Chrisie the Bruiser prove foes or allies?

Carter Wilson, Final Crossing: A Novel of Suspense -- When the sadistic Preacherman stole the last bit of Rudiger’s already troubled childhood soul, Rudiger lost himself forever. Rudiger has committed atrocities even he cannot explain. God has told him he must crucify The One to bring about the Final Judgment. But who is The One?

Broadway Book Mall, 200 S. Broadway, Denver

303-744-BOOK (2665)

www.BroadwayBookMall.com

Raza Rocks w/Rick Garcia!

Before the Super Bowl, listen to Denver public radio KUVO 89.3 fm, or online at 1:00 pm on Sunday, Feb. 3rd. Rick Garcia will assist Pocho Joe to encourage you to support tejano / nuevomexicano music and La Raza Rocks.

Es todo, hoy,

RudyG

Re-educate [some of] the idiots, while there's still time

[Today's regular columnist Tatiana de la tierra will return after dealing with personal matters. We wish her well.]

If events depicted in the movie 2012 ever really happen, and aliens land here a thousand years from now, consider how they might analyze the constructs and actions of us norteamericanos.

What will they think of remnants of the Border Wall built to keep out southern, dark-skinned immigrants, while no such wall exists to the north where live, largely, lighter skinned neighbors? Will they wonder why Mexican illegal immigration was just called the spade that it is--an informal system of slave labor?

We seem to be more turning into a nation of idiots (with some exceptions).

the Taos village idiot

Last summer the new owner of a Taos hotel decided to forbid his Hispanic employees from speaking Spanish in his presence, and even went so far as to tell them to Anglicize their names, for the sake of customers who couldn't understand the accent. If this entrepreneur knows no German or Japanese, people from those countries can only hope he never takes over businesses there, either.

Understand: the owner is in the tourism business, planning to make money off an area that's been occupied for at least 12,000 years by indigenous Americans, for nearly 500 years by Spanish speakers, and draws tourists from throughout the world looking for New Mexican food, art, history, culture, archaeology (and, yes, beautiful sunsets).

You can go here to read about the trouble he came up against, but, hopefully, those future aliens won't find a trace of him when they arrive. After all, they might think we ceased to exist because of some genetic brain disorder that made some try to erase cultural history.

Denver cowtown idiots

Those of you in the Nebraska, Montana, Wyoming, Kansas and Denver area might want to hope the aliens don't find remnants of this billboard out front of Wolf Automotive Group in Wheat Ridge, Colo., a Denver suburb.

Perpetuating the racist propaganda of the freakish Limbaugh-types, Wolf Automotive repeats the Big Lie about President Obama's birthplace, while at the same time comparing him to Osama Bin Laden.

If the aliens find evidence of 9/11, they might well assume that the U.S. disappeared after we turned our 9/11-paranoia-hate inwards, even against our own President.

Palin, the national idiot phenomenon

And when the aliens do land, hopefully all the 1.5 million copies of the Sarah Palin book will have long since crumbled into dust. Her idiocy is not to be found only within the pages of that book. The greater idiocy is that despite seemingly having no chance of being considered a viable national candidate, even by the Republicans, her appeal to the "evangelical subculture" might influence this country's headlong rush into a 2012 of its own making.

As President Obama plods in policy directions that make his second term doubtful, consider Max Blumenthal's words:
"If [Palin] doesn't prove to be the Party's future queen, she may have positioned herself to be its future king-maker. . ."

And what kind of idiot might she pick? In a thousand years, there might only be aliens around to rue the outcome.

But in the meantime, you still have the chance to boycott some of these idiots, and others who seem to abound and multiply in concert with the unemployment and home foreclosure rates. Or, if you want to try a re-educating route, you can send E-mails to the establishments mentioned to make your views and worries known.

For the Taos idiot, go here. Indications from this article are that he'd begun to see the error of his ways, so read it before you E-mail him an opinion.

For the Denver idiots, go here.

The address for the Palin idiocy is www.saveyourbreath,don'tbother, since what holds for teaching pigs to sing, holds for this group as well.

RudyChG