May 14, 2005
THIS YEAR’S AWARD FOR MOST CREATIVE OBLIGATORY NAZI REFERENCE GOES TO...
Wal-Mart apologizes for newspaper ad (Jerusalem Post, May 14th, 2005)
Giant US retailer chain Wal-Mart apologized Friday for making what it called a "terrible" mistake in approving a recent newspaper advertisement that equated a proposed Arizona zoning ordinance with Nazi book-burning, the Washington Post reported.The full-page ad included the famous 1933 photograph in which people were seen throwing books into a large fire at the Opernplatz Square in Berlin.
It was part of a campaign against a local ballot proposal seeking to limit the continued growth of Wal-Mart on the expense of local grocery stores.
The accompanying text read, "Should we let government tell us what we can read? Of course not . . . So why should we allow local government to limit where we shop?"
What's with the apology? As libertarians well understand, the analogy is perfect.
Posted by Peter Burnet at May 14, 2005 7:19 AMLocal government does not have the right to tell us what we can read and should not have the right to tell us where and when to shop. There is zero social and economic utility in a free people giving up those rights.
All that being said, the ad was really poor public relations. It's much easier to use ugly old spinsters screaming 'NO' at people.
Posted by: bart at May 14, 2005 8:10 AMHey, I'm just shocked Wal-Mart actually took out a newspaper ad -- normally they stuff your mailbox with annoying circulars, and at times get other companies to put their ad leaflets inside their cirulars to the point it's like having the Sunday paper adds come flying out of your mailbox.
They would have been better orr keeping to their normal advertising strategy. That way, even if they had sent an ad with Nazi book burning to thousands of Arizona homes, 99 percent of the people would have just sent them straight from the mailbox into the garbage.
Posted by: Jolhn at May 14, 2005 8:39 AMStupid Wal-Mart! Didn't they know that only properly goodthinkful Liberals can make Nazi analogies?
Posted by: Governor Breck at May 14, 2005 9:05 AMBut it's okay, as Lileks pointed out this week, to use Mao in a cute library fundraising campaign ad.
Posted by: Raoul Ortega at May 14, 2005 1:54 PM