Abejundio blog

Justice for Betty Dukes and the Women of Wal-Mart?

We, the women of Wal-Mart, will have our day in court,” Betty Dukes told me almost seven years ago, declaiming from a park bench near her lawyer’s office in Berkeley, California. “[Wal-Mart] will answer our charges—that they have treated us unfairly and we deserved better.”

Dukes, who still works at Wal-Mart, is the lead plaintiff in Betty Dukes vs. Wal-Mart Stores, the largest civil rights class action suit in history, which accuses the retail giant of sex discrimination in pay, promotions and hiring. The potential class has at times included more than a million women (recently, though, estimates have run closer to the hundreds of thousands). Dukes and her colleagues have yet to have their day in court, all these years later, and if an army of right-wing opponents has its way, they never will. 

The Supreme Court heard arguments yesterday on the certification of Dukes v. Wal-Mart. That means the justices must now decide, not whether Betty Dukes and her co-workers experienced discrimination—that crucial question may be left forever undecided by our legal system—but whether their case should move forward as a class action suit.

At issue is whether it is possible to make any legal claims at all about institutional discrimination at a large company, as Wal-Mart argues that the class is too large and that plaintiffs’ description of its practices not credible: How could so many women encounter sexism from so many managers? Yet female employees at Wal-Mart have been paid less than men in nearly every job category, and promoted less often, despite lower turnover rates and better job performance ratings.

Though legal arguments were made yesterday, a look at the authors of the amicus briefs on both sides shows that the certification of Dukes is really an economic and ideological battle. On Betty’s side, liberal groups like Consumers Union, the United Food and Commercial Workers and Public Citizen—anyone who believes that citizens should be able to use the legal system to wrest systemic change from large corporations—have weighed in.

On behalf of Wal-Mart, much fatter cats have rallied, including the US Chamber of Commerce, the Securities Industry and Financial Markets Association, Intel, Altria, Bank of America, Del Monte Foods, Fedex, Microsoft, Costco and many more. In addition to these corporate interests, conservative champions of an even more libertarian order—the Washington Legal Foundation, Atlantic Legal Foundation, New England Legal Foundation—are also lending Wal-Mart their support. Dukes v. Wal-Mart’s opponents are united in their desire to suppress the ability of workers and consumers to sue large companies.

The Supreme Court itself may have an ideological agenda here too. As Jeffrey Toobin and other observers have pointed out, it’s unlikely that the Court would have agreed to hear Dukes unless the justices wanted to strike it down. After all, class action suits have been such beloved bugbears of the right, and some of the justices are fierce warriors for conservative causes.

No decision is expected on Dukes for at least a month, and possibly not until the end of June. If the certification is struck down, it will be a triumph for the right, making class action lawsuits even more difficult to litigate and win.

To be sure, the plaintiffs have already enjoyed some victories. The case has exposed Wal-Mart’s employment practices to the public, and everyday sexism in its stores no longer goes completely unchallenged. Betty Dukes says the lawsuit has changed Wal-Mart. It is now easier for women to learn about open positions and to enter the ranks of management. “I have personally been thanked by women who have been promoted,” Dukes said today, speaking hoarsely, as she has been talking about her case nonstop these last few days.

But even if the Court upholds certification of Dukes and the women do get their day in court, we have to ask why we have become so dependent on such an inefficient means of justice. Betty Dukes brought her case ten years ago, and courts have still not even begun to debate its merits. With stronger unions, more aggressive government enforcement and better-organized social movements, class action suits like Dukes probably wouldn’t even be needed.

Yet the Supreme Court challenge—and ferocious lineup of briefs—is a testament to the tenacity of the corporate elite and of the right. The class action may be a feeble instrument of justice, but it’s one of the few we have left, and that’s why they’re so eager to take it away. 

Google Launches Disco, A Group-Texting Web and... iPhone App?

s iPhone have in common? They're three words one wouldn't normally expect to find combined together, that's for sure. They also now represent Google's latest mobile launch: a group-texting service that allows one to mass-message one's friends from a mobile phone or Web interface.

Disco, in this case, refers to the service created by Google's in-house startup Slide, which the company acquired for $182 million this past August . Slide has been allowed to operate as an independent entity within Google proper, which perhaps sheds a little more light on why the mass-texting service has made its debut as an iPhone app instead of a piece of software for Google's Android OS.

So here's how it works: When you sign up for the service via(which Google purchased for a cool $255,000 last year), you create an account based on your mobile phone number.The service verifies that you're the owner of the number by shooting you a text message to your device and, if you're good to go, it invites you to set up your first group for mass-texting.

Each group can be named whatever you want, and adding friends is as easy as typing in their mobile digits.The caveat, however, is that these numbers are instantly notified that you've placed them in a mass-texting group along with whatever name you've assigned to it—probably something to keep in mind if you're looking to create a "those jerks I work with" group chat.

Once you have your group list set up, Disco's Web interface makes correspondence look like an instant message chat. Anything you type into the chat window will be sent out to anyone in your group, and anything they respond with will near-instantly pop up in the site's chat window.If you don't have access to Disco's Web site, you can also start up (or reply to) a group conversation by texting the phone number that Disco assigns to each group you create.

The associated iPhone app basically allows you to perform the same administrative activities that you'd otherwise find on Disco's Web site.However, you can also use a Facebook integration to pull in numbers from your friends on that service.Although Google and Facebook , the fact that Slide—Disco's creator—serves as its own app shop within Google seems to make the pairing OK between both parties.

Or, at least, perhaps until Facebook launches a group-texting service of its very own, which is rumored to be in the works thanks to the company's .Is group texting shaping up to be the next big battleground between the Web's social (or search) superstars?

Amazon faces backlash over "music locker" service

A new Amazon.com Inc service that lets customers store songs and play them on a variety of phones and computers is facing a backlash from the music industry that could ignite a legal battle.

Amazon's Cloud Drive, announced on Tuesday, allows customers to store about 1,000 songs on the company's Web servers for free instead of their own hard drives and play them over an Internet connection directly from Web browsers and on phones running Google Inc's Android software.

Sony Music, home to artists such as Shakira and Kings of Leon, was upset by Amazon's decision to launch the service without new licenses for music streaming, said spokeswoman Liz Young.

"We hope that they'll reach a new license deal," Young said, "but we're keeping all of our legal options open."

Amazon beat rivals Google and Apple Inc into the market for such "music locker" services, which are meant to appeal to consumers frustrated by the complexities of storing their favorite songs at work, home and on their smartphones. Apple and Google were expected to launch their services at the end of last year.

Shares of Amazon rose 3.1 percent to close at $174.62 on Nasdaq.

Music labels were informed of the plans last week. Only later did Amazon address the issue of negotiating licenses, one source close to the discussions said.

That executive called the move "somewhat stunning" and noted that some within the media industry said the service might be illegal.

"I've never seen a company of their size make an announcement, launch a service and simultaneously say they're trying to get licenses," said the executive, who requested anonymity because the discussions were not public.

In 2007, EMI sued MP3tunes, which offered a similar service. Consumers are allowed to store music files on their own computers, but it is unclear whether they have that right when they use remote storage services offered by cloud computing.

"The labels have engaged in a legal terror campaign over the last 10 years using litigation to try and slow technology progress," MP3tunes founder Michael Robertson said of the music industry's latest reaction to Amazon's plans. MP3tunes is based in San Diego.

Amazon's service is part of its plan to be a bigger player in the digital content business and reduce its reliance on the sales of CDs and books.

"They don't have leadership in digital formats," said BGC Partners analyst Colin Gillis. "The next big race is locker services -- that's what we want."

Gillis said he expected Google to introduce a remote music storage service in May and for Apple to follow suit in June.

Although Amazon's service lets users listen to music from most computers or phones regardless of where they bought the song, it will not work on Apple's iPhones or have an "app" on that company's devices.

Amazon said customers would initially get 5 gigabytes of free storage, enough for about 1,250 songs or 2,000 photographs. They can buy 20 gigabytes for $20 a year.

Alternatively, a customer can get an upgrade to 20 gigabytes of free storage with the purchase of any MP3 format album from Amazon. New music purchases from Amazon saved directly to the cloud service will not count against any storage quota.

Users can save music files in MP3 as well as the AAC format, which is the standard for Apple's iTunes service.

Amazon is also offering Cloud Player, which allows users to listen to music, download tracks and make playlists.

On Nasdaq, Google rose 1.1 percent to $581.73, and Apple fell 0.2 percent to $350.96.

(Additional reporting by Yinka Adegoke and Kenneth Li in New York and Sakthi Prasad in Bangalore; Editing by Gerald E. McCormick, Lisa Von Ahn and Richard Chang)

Rescued cow, 'Molly B,' arrives at new Mont. home

STEVENSVILLE, Mont. – A cow that avoided slaughter five years ago by famously jumping a slaughterhouse gate and leading officials on a chase finally has a new home in Montana.

The cow is called the "Unsinkable Molly B" because her 2006 escape included a swim in the Missouri River. She was recently rescued from an overcrowded animal sanctuary and is now at the New Dawn Montana Farm Animal Sanctuary near Stevensville.

Sanctuary officials thought they had her several weeks ago, before learning a similarly marked bovine was actually a steer named "Big Mike."

The sanctuary's Sue Eakins tells the Ravalli Republic it was a relief to have Molly B delivered safely last week. She says she and her husband had been warned about Molly's demeanor, but Eakins says Molly is a "sweetie pie."

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Information from: Ravalli Republic,

Chicago Suffers 7 Percent Population Drop as More Flock to Suburbs

CHICAGO -- The most recent census results have shownby about 200,000 people, or 6.9 percent. The sudden drop was much larger than predicted by pre-census estimates. The number of residents is what helps the city bring in money, and with such a large decrease, Chicago could see significantly less funds for a variety of different programs and projects.

The official census was released on Tuesday and revealed that the percent loss of residents declined more than the gain between 1990 and 2000, which saw a 4 percent increase—the first increase in the city's population in 50 years. The census covered racial groups and found that . Likely causes for this include reduced public housing in the city in which the Chicago Housing Authority tore down thousands of public housing complexes in the inner city. Another cause might be that middle-class African-Americans are finding more social opportunities in the south suburbs, including education for children and safer neighborhoods.

The racial makeup of the city (as designated by three major census categories) is becoming more even. The census shows that the city's population is now 33 percent African-American, 29 percent Hispanic, and 32 percent Non-Hispanic Whites.

While Chicago saw a steep drop in population,of about 18,000. Surrounding counties have seen increases in population growth as well. Kendall County's population increased by a whopping 110 percent. Even DuPage County saw a slight increase of 1.4 percent, indicating that metropolitan populations are moving away from the center and spreading out in different areas.

Former Chicago resident Meredith Schmidt commented about her decision to make the move from the city to the suburbs: "I had lived in Chicago my entire life and began working in the city. It was a good idea when I was getting my career off the ground. But then I got married and had kids. It didn't make sense to have a cramped townhouse in the city when we could live in the suburbs for the same price. I like the community more, I like the schools more, and my family is just happier. I think more people are realizing the benefits of suburban life."

Related to the most recent census information, Rockford is no longer the second largest city in Illinois. Aurora's population increased by 38 percent, pushing it past Rockford's total population, which only grew by about 2 percent. Plainfield, a southwest Suburb located in Will County, actually saw its population go up by 204 percent. Back in 2000 the town only had 13,000 residents but is now thriving with upper-middle class families.