That sounds totally wrong. I'm an employee at a store in WA and I'd be pretty surprised to hear this was true. I know some stores that have run into legal issues and require thumbprints or Best Buy receipts, but haven't heard of any cancelling their program. In fact company wide we've rolled out...
There's a bunch of sales today, but I imagine there's another thread listing them all. I work at a Best Buy and just got done putting out 600+ new gaming price tags (about half are expired sales/games that are becoming end of life). I picked up Pokemon Heart Gold for $20 myself.
The force unleashed shirts should be free if you buy the game though. I really wanted one, but even with employee discount the shirts were still like $25 wtf.