WADE RATHKE is the founder of ACORN, Chief Organizer at ACORN International, and Author of "Citizen Wealth", "Global Grassroots", and "The Battle for the 9th Ward".
Pearl River The second leg of the stool was building a community-based organization in order to block Wal-Mart from building new supercenters. To engage that fight, we build WARN, Wal-Mart Alliance for Reform Now, as a broad coalition of unions, community and civil rights organizations (including ACORN chapters obviously), environmental groups, and civic associations in …
Pearl River In 2005, I left the SEIU International board to run an organizing project directed at establishing whether we could successfully organize Wal-Mart workers on a number of fronts. This was a joint project involving ACORN, SEIU, AFL-CIO, and UFCW. SEIU was developing the Wal-Mart Watch effort based in Washington, DC, and our effort …
New Orleans Opinions are divided on the New Orleans so-called recovery after Hurricane Katrina, and it is more than a glass half-full, half-empty situation. Talking to Vanessa Gueringer on Wade’s World, her articulate anger still rages, and listening to her describe how her community in the lower 9th ward has had to fight to win …
New Orleans The war room in Bentonville must be on 24 hour Def-con 4 alert these days, given the steady back and forth of advances, feints, and setbacks due to its “profits first, workers last” mantra that is a foundation of its standard operating procedures. The National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) after waiting for …
New Orleans We are now several weeks past Black Friday, the annual shopping extravaganza that seems to defy logic, but one hardcore, working mother desperate for Christmas bargains defined it as her annual “Super Bowl of shopping.” Walmart company representatives have described this year’s day after Thanksgiving shopping blowout as their best ever. OUR …