Demagogue

When the giant retailer Wal-Mart recently announced it was pulling out of Germany, the New York Times published this article about Wal-Mart's experiences overseas. A few amusing snippets:

In Germany, Wal-Mart stopped requiring sales clerks to smile at customers — a practice that some male shoppers interpreted as flirting — and scrapped the morning Wal-Mart chant by staff members.

Can you imagine the reaction this would receive in Italy?

According to the Times, another reason for the setback in Germany was that

... [Wal-Mart] never established comfortable relations with its German labor unions.

“They didn’t understand that in Germany, companies and unions are closely connected,” [a union spokesman] said. “Bentonville didn’t want to have anything to do with unions. They thought we were communists.”

Trust me — he's not exaggerating.