Sunday, October 30, 2011

Democrazy !

Whether it's Bank Of America announcing it's going to charge a $5 debit card fee to all of its customers or Netflix doubling their prices over night, the average middle-income American has been feeling the crunch placed upon them by corporate America - and they're sick of it.

Since the announcement of their price hike, it's not clear what was more jaw-dropping, the nearly 1 million customers that have fled Netflix or the Twitter eruption that served essentially as a cyber protest of the corporations greed.


Netflix stock was at its highest point ever when the price hike was announced. Now it's down 75%.
Down from $305 a share to $80.

In a country where #OCCUPYWALLSTREET protests are taking place, protesting the tactics of corporate America and where we have Presidential candidates saying "Corporations are people too my friend" - it's nice to see that democracy still exists.

Sunday, October 16, 2011

The Rich Feel The Itch

The top 1% income earners in the United States own 42% of the wealth while the bottom 99% own 94.7% of the debt. 27 million Americans are unemployed. People are angry, and no, it's not just the Tea Party.

 The "We are the 99%" posters began springing up in New York's financial district under the credo of "Occupy Wall Street" - an instant Twitter phenomenon. However, the protests have grown in unprecedented proportions, while the political pundits on the right have dubbed the protesters "bizzare anti-American freaks", the protests have spread far beyond America's borders to over 17 nations around the world including countries in Europe and Asia.

The question has been raised over-and-over again on the News Networks: What do these people want?

I have the answer... [drum-roll]... they want acknowledgement from the top 1% that their actions have negatively impacted the bottom 99% and they want change.

Basically:



Sunday, October 9, 2011

IN MY OPINION: #OCCUPYWALLSTREET

Although the recent protests taking place around the country that originated in New York's financial district lack a clear message accompanied by specific demands, I still understand the message and I still understand their demands.

They're not very well organized and they don't have any symbolic hats like the Tea-party, but it's clear that these people are upset about the way their country is going.

So what do they do?
 They go to the scene of the crime.

The protests began with a few hundred people in New York organizing via social networking sites, but the movement didn't garner national attention until the "#occupywallstreet" hashtag became a trending topic on Twitter. From entertainers to political junkies, tweets accompanied by the trending hashtag were being shared on a global scale. As of Saturday morning, a Facebook page for the protests had 50,000 "likes".

Of course, the support of the protests is split upon party-lines. On Fox News' "THE FIVE" talk-show, 4 out of 5 of their hosts referred to "everyone" involved in these protests as "socialists, marxists and communists". A sentiment I couldn't disagree with more. Interesting though, how when the left-wing media generalizes about the Tea-party protests, calling them all racists, Fox News goes up-in-arms about not generalizing on an entire protest movement because of a few hundred signs depicting the President as Hitler - irony.



Sunday, October 2, 2011

Banking And Taxing

Bank of America, the largest bank in the country, announced earlier in the week that beginning in January of next year they will be charging customers a $5 fee once a month if they swipe their debit card.

Doesn't matter if you swipe your debit card once or fifty times, you're still getting hit with the fee.
According to CNNMONEY, the bank is charging the fee to offset the loss in revenue as a result of the new banking regulations that go into effect in the beginning of next year.

On the same blog, CNNMONEY reports on some of the other new fees the bank will charge including $5 for replacing a new debit card and an $8.99 fee for speaking to a human teller if you're enrolled in online banking - seriously.

All this comes in the backdrop of the debate of whether or not corporations such as Bank Of America should have their taxes raised as a way for the government to increase revenue. Considering that corporate tax rates are at their lowest point in the last 60 years, those in the political left are in favor of raising taxes on the top 1% and on corporations to the levels of the Clinton era.