Mia Masten: Wal-Mart Eastern Region Liar-in-Chief?

Have you seen this woman around? This is Mia Masten and she works for Wal-Mart. The press gives her several 'titles' but she seems to be the Eastern Region Community Relations person (at least as of 2005). Ms. Masten is a former Clinton administration staffer (her post was special assistant to the senior adviser to the president for policy development). From some of the quotes attributed to her it seems her job at Wal-Mart may be Liar-in-Chief for the East Coast. This is the 'outsider' (or someone just like her)whose job it is to convince Saranac Lakers that their future is dependent on a Wal-Mart store. I bet you anything she makes more than $10.40 an hour (the average Wal-Mart wage, how about telling us the median Wal-Mart wage?).

"I think most reasonable people would say zoning will probably be more difficult in 5 years or 10 years than it is today," he said in a presentation to analysts. "And so every store we get today over what we normally would have planned might be the store that would have really been delayed in the future as zoning got tougher and tougher." H. Lee Scott

That's right. Build now, even if the store is a business risk, because it's only going to be harder to build in the future. To get these stores built in communities that don't want them, sometimes you need to bring in the liar-in-chief, Mia Masten.

"As these big-box bills come up, all retailers will just have to be flexible," she said. "In this case, we developed a model that allowed us to reach our customers."Mia Masten, Wal-Mart Eastern Region Community Relations

This quote was in response to Wal-Mart's idea of building two 75,000 sq ft stores next to each other in Dunkirk, MD to get around zoning regulations.

Masten responded to Salzman. "We don't force people to work overtime. It's not unusual to have 1,000 people apply for 300 jobs, so we must be doing something right," she said as the room erupted with deafening cheers and applause. Masten at a Wal-Mart supporter meeting in St. Albans, VT

Of course, Wal-Mart workers in Massachusetts disagree with Ms. Masten. This is a lie from almost everything I've read. I guess we will see if the MA courts agree.

Mia Masten, a spokeswoman for Wal-Mart, told the Times that Wal-Mart often tries to work with communities and is not "just coming in and bulldozing our way in."

Here
This is just pure, unadulturated bullshit. Dare I even say a lie?

''I hope we'll be given a fair chance,'' said the Wal- Mart spokeswoman, Mia Masten, corporate affairs director for the eastern region. ''We are interested in New York City.

Yes, Wal-Mart only wants a "fair chance", you know they are a company that truly believes in fair play.

"It sounds as if we're trying to go and push our way in," Masten said. "But we are asking for and getting local input. We want a project that everyone likes at the end of the day."Here

How does Ms. Masten define "everyone"?