Stewart wrote to thank me for observing that the decline of small towns did not begin with Wal-Mart. He described Wal-Mart as "a symptom, not a disease." The decline of my hometown actually began with the opening of the Interstate highway, which made it so much easier to get to the new "shopping centers" in nearby larger towns. I wouldn't let Wal-Mart off the hook entirely, though. To use Stewart's analogy, I'd call Wal-Mart the terminal stage of a disease.