Good for you John Mackey and a pox on those who would seek to deny you and your company the right to be heard on any issue.

I shopped at WF once several years ago at the invitation of a friend who worked at your Pasadena CA market. I was impressed and bought some hair care products -thought you needed a small junk food selection though- and I was pleased with the experience. However I never began to shop there: 1) tight budget 2) not big on the importance of the “Organic” thing 3) a convenient Vons with a banking outlet.

After hearing your WSJ OP-Ed piece discussed on talk radio and then reading it on line (as if I ever cared to wonder about the WF CEO’s personal opinion of Pelosi-Reid-Obama-Care) I learned that my assumptions would have been wrong!

I was impressed with your description of how “big-corporate” WF offers Health Care choice to your employees, and even more with your courage to speak out at a pivotal moment for the future of the US of America. I don’t want your corporate OPTIONS (or mine) to be levered away from your employees by the wrongheaded actions of an increasingly intrusive federal government -with the hubris to think that a collection of Policy makers (most with a Law Degree to their credit) and the ensuing huge tangle of faceless bureaucrats, who tend think that they know what’s best for everyone in every situation.

Thank you for entering the fray and speaking out on this important matter. I will be countering the attempts to boycott WF by sending a few shopping dollars your way and by voicing my support for you, for any who have ears to hear and eyes to see.

Stand firm; you did the right thing in this case. There are real problems with the “health care system” that need to be addressed. You make several points that I think both Left & Right can agree on, and that would go along way towards improving the current troubled parts of the status-quo.

However do not miss one of the underlying meanings of this debate; the struggle between the Left and the Right forces of our time. In my opinion, it is largely between the “Collective Statist’s” –whom mostly have right-hearted motives, and the “Liberty-Free Marketers” –whom often need a high profile example (like WF and others), demonstrating how the better can be accomplished when the “Head” has a “Heart” but is not ruled by it. Good intentions (i.e. bringing peace and “Utopia” to mankind in our time) have regularly led to increased human misery. While not perfect, Capitalism -sometimes with a code of ethics and morality in practice- has done massive good for the human condition.

Why do many Europeans clamor for the simple things like Whole Foods, and why are most European governments and Canada moving away from Socialized Healthcare and towards increased individual choice? Profit motivated corporate innovation in the Health Care arena alone, has demonstratively produced truly amazing results of improved living standards (things that my grandparents would have never dreamed possible). The socialist leaning democracies and countless others all over the world benefit from (and even feed off of) free market “profit motivated” innovation… and we should move in a direction that many of those who have tested the theory are now abandoning? Moreover, where it is being tried in the States it’s found wanting and in need of major revamping, or even abandoning. That’s silly –even arrogant.

In the vein of Austin Powers, “Yeah ‘compassionate’ capitalism.” Yeah Whole Foods!

My Gratitude,
M.S.

I appreciate business owners who are fair to their workers, and to their customers. To have such good ethics, AND clear thinking give me cause to patrionize your establishment. I’ve checked out the Whole Foods closest to my home, and intend to shop their tomorrow.

Continue to use the forum afforded you by virtue of your position to give voice to those of us who share your sentiments. Thanks!

I am a weekly customer of Whole Foods in MInneapolis and will not be patronizing the store any longer.