I agree people and especially corporations act this way. Indeed many people believe that it's a corporation's fiduciary duty to lawyer up if that's expected to be cheaper than paying up.
Here, they are looking at small amounts of money, but they close a store, which presumably involves writing down an asset and forgoing future revenue. This only gives them a small chance of avoiding payment and risks the reputation of the entire firm.
The earlier decisions all fit the narrative of coldly rational, but I find the final decision to close the store doesn't fit. It's almost impossible to imagine how it ends well for the corporation.
I agree. At face value it seems reactive and wonky.
It's just classic DARVO bullying strategies by abusers
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DARVO
It works extremely well which is why bullies and abusers use the tools they do.
Nobody wakes up as an adult and starts doing these behaviors. They have been these kind of maladjusted bullies for most likely their entire lives.
Since current US police forces are largely made up of these exact kind of people, and these people instinctively back each other up, the police also use these tactics to bully people they don't like.
It really shouldn't be a surprise that this nation loves a bully like Trump so much, we have spent decades supporting and elevating bullies to positions of power.