The power of the consumer

Over the last few weeks, banks have slowly backed off their plans to charge fees for debit cards (I expected this. See here for my prediction) The consumer has the power to effect change.

The first time I saw a change like this was back in the mid 1980's. At that time, the country of South Africa was under increased scrutiny due to Apartheid (see details here). It was discovered that many business interacted with South Africa and a large movement was made to force these businesses to stop. One bank, which has since been merged into other banks, was heavily involved and did not change their policies.

After several months of trying to get the bank to change, a group emerged that petitioned the bank for policy changes. The group said that if the bank did not change, the signees of the petition would open an account at the bank and then close it the next day. And there were a lot of signees.

The day after this information came out, the bank "clarified" their position on Apartheid. They explained that they made loans to businesses in South Africa and not to the government. Their loans were actually helping the people of that country and would give them a chance to change the government.

The petitioners were unimpressed. Even with the "clarified" position, they vowed to go on with their opening and closing of accounts. They responded publicly to the bank and planned to start the following week. Before they started, the bank announced a change in policy and stopped making loans to businesses in South Africa. The consumer had voted and US businesses (largely) stopped supporting Apartheid.

By 1994, South Africa had elected it's first non-white president. There are a lot of side-stories that come out of this incident, but the story relevant here is that consumers have the power to change a nation. Without violence, threats or even name calling, consumers can vote with their wallets. Individuals can change too. You have the right to decide what services you want from a bank (or any company) and evaluate the cost. If it's too much, you have the right to change providers.

Shooting in Arizona

Yesterday, I was studying with the television on when the news station broke into regularly scheduled news with news about the shooting in Arizona. For over 3 hours, the news program did not break for a commercial, but gave out the news as it came in.

They did some verification of the information, probably as best they could. Other news stations were quicker to give out information (they quoted NPR a couple of times and were wrong almost every time they did).

I've already seen some information from both sides showing how the shooting was the other sides' fault. At this point, it looks to me like the fault lies with one very deranged individual.

My immediate concern is for the families of those involved in the shooting. Rep Giffords and her family, Judge Roll's family and the family of Christina-Taylor Green, the nine year old girl who was killed.

Longer term, I am concerned about our American Democracy. Rep. Giffords was meeting her constituents when she was targeted. In the last election, a lot of congressmen and congresswomen had their town hall meetings broken up by people who wanted to make their points and ignored the other people in the room.

But I'm also concerned that we have come to the point where we are afraid to speak our minds for fear that some deranged individual will go off shooting at people.

Pray for the families involved and pray for our country.

Does the truth make a difference?

I'm reading a political book recommended by a friend. The book describes several candidates for president as they worked their way up to the 2008 election. I was thinking that one (or more) of the candidates lied about so many things and would say anything to get elected.

Then it hit me, that most (all?) candidates lie and will say anything to get elected. So, my question is, does the truth make a difference? If all candidates lie, which lies do we believe? Or do we just discount it all?

I'm interested in your opinion.

Rep. Joe Wilson

Wow, a lot has happened this week. I intended to post an entry about President Obama's speech to school children and his speech to congress. This week was also the anniversary of 9/11. But with all that, I want to take an opportunity to speak about a House Representative from my own state (but not my district), Representative Joe Wilson.

I found an article in the NY Times that I thought gave a good review. It says that we in SC are "famous for both [our] gentility and [our] rebelliousness..." I like the way that sounds. I was born in Charleston and lived in SC until I was 24. I moved just across the state line to NC for 13 years. Finally got back here 11 years ago and never leaving.

But as proud as I am about my state, I'm not too proud of Rep. Wilson. Whether he was right or wrong, I think it's bad taste to publicly call the president a liar. I also think it's bad taste to publicly "boo" the president. Rep. Wilson has admitted he was wrong and offered and apology to Pres. Obama, the president has graciously accepted. That should be the end of the story.

Instead, some people want to draw it out. Reported this morning, House officials want him to apologize on the floor under threat of reprimand (somehow an apology under threat never seems genuine). In order for this to happen, I think we should start a parade of public officials who have booed or hissed the last few presidents.

Pres. Obama isn't the first president to have this experience. President Bush was booed during his State of the Union speech in 2005. I haven't looked, but I could probably find instances where this happened to Pres. Clinton.

I think it's time for ALL politicians to start respecting the president. In my opinion, this lack of respect started during the Reagan regime, when the response to presidential speeches started. I think this would be an excellent time for these to end. (I've spoken against this policy here and here). It's also time for the president to stop calling other politicians and private citizens names. It serves no purpose, only invigorates others and is childish.

It's also time for all of us to start listening to our president and politicians, whether we agree with them or not. That includes school kids. The president's speech should have been seen by all school children. If we as parents agreed or disagreed with the president, we could explain that without name calling (sometimes difficult for me personally).

This change needs to start with a leader. Know any good leaders who can start it?

Contest for comments (If you bribe them, will they come?)

This thought has been on my mind a lot recently and I want involvement from others. Several of my readers are apolitical - it's not that they don't have political ideas, they just don't want to share them. So I'm going to entice them a little bit, I'm going to have a contest. The winner will get their choice of a $10 iTunes certificate (assuming I can figure out how to get one) or a $10 Amazon certificate.

All interested parties should comment on this post with an answer to the following question - "Who do you think is the smartest president we've had in recent history?" By recent history let's say as any president including JFK and beyond, I get hazy on who was who before that. The comment should include a brief description of why you think your choice is the best choice. I'm not going to restrict the answers by defining the word "smartest", I'll let you do that, but be sure to explain your choice.

I'd like to ask respect for all presidents, so as my daughter would say "don't be dissin' nobody." I'd also ask for respect for my readers, if you don't agree with what they have to say, please refrain from commenting on their comments, just offer your own opinion of who is best.

Rather than try to pick a winner based on content and risk showing bias, I'm going to put all of my commenters names into a hat (or bowl) and choose a winner at random. I've asked the lovely Vanna White to do the picking, but she's not available, so I'll ask my lovelier wife to do the honors. I'll post the name of the winner. Be sure to include your name in your comments.

I'm traveling a bit this week and next, so I'll close the comments on next Friday, August 21. That gives everyone a little over a week. Enjoy!

Obama's speech on racism

Warning: This entry could surprise my friends on both sides of the political aisle.

If you're like me, you heard tons about Obama's speech on racism. I've heard nothing positive about it. I listen mostly to conservative talk radio and no one expects them to say anything good about Obama. I also listen to the big networks and they had nothing positive to say either. Years ago I tried listening to liberal talk radio and I just couldn't stomach it.

In 1992, Dan Quayle made his famous Murphy Brown speech. This was when Al Gore was still inventing the internet, so I depended on the main-stream media to read the real speech. By the time it came out, most political candidates had changed their tune and were supporting Quayle's ideas, if not his speech. What a turn-around!

I learned from that experience to go to the source. So today, I took time to read Obama's speech. You can find it here. To my surprise, I found very little in Obama's words with which I disagree.

Sen. Obama's speech included lots of words about Rev. Wright, but that was no more the topic than was Quayle's speech about a TV character back in 1992 (it was about a poverty of values, including absent fathers - which Obama mentioned also). Rather, Obama was talking for the first half of the speech about racism in America. I thought he did a good job expaining the situation. Yes, he spent time defending his views on Wright, but that's not all the speech is about.

At this point, I should indentify myself as a white American. Born and raised in the south and proud of it. I have looked back for about 4 generations and all of these ancestors were raised in the south. I don't know if any ever owned slaves, but I know some fought in the civil war (and not for the north). I do know that some of my relatives have harbored racist feelings and for that I am not proud. I'll also apologize to anyone offended by the term "black". I'll use that in this entry: it's what Obama used in his speech and it's shorter than "African American". I should also point out that I will assume that his speech matches the way Obama feels. I have no doubt that he has speech writers who wrote good portions of the speech, but he gets all the credit and all the blame.

Obama's speech was very well written and shows a good bit of intelligence. Four years ago, I realized that this man was going to be somebody. Starting with a quotation from the Constitution and tracing slavery through the halls of the Philadelphia convention, Obama spoke without malice about the process and the realization that "words on a parchment would not be enough to deliver slaves from bondage."

Senator Obama gets it. Neither then, nor now, can "words on parchment" solve the problem. He also gets it that racism cuts both ways. He talks about "white racism" and "divisive comments" by Wright.

Then he transitions his speech. "Just as black anger often proved counterproductive, so have these white resentments distracted attention from the real culprits of the middle class squeeze"
In other words, both black and white racism distract us from the real problems. I agree 100%. He says that "to wish away the resentments of white Americans, to label them as misguided or even racist, without recognizing they are grounded in legitimate concerns - this too widens the racial divide, and blocks the path to understanding." In all, I think he spoke more about reverse racism (anti-white) than he did about racism (anti-black). I haven't counted words and think that that too would "block the path to understanding."

What are the real problems? Obama sites these items: 1) Big Business, 2) Washington politics and 3) economic policies that favor the few over the many.

He identifies some specific actions for blacks: 1) embracing the burdens of our past without becoming victims of our past, 2) continuing to insist on justice and 3) binding our particular grievances to the larger aspirations of all Americans. This is also where he talks about absent fathers (where's Quayle when you need him?).

He identifies some specific actions for whites: acknowledge that racism is real with both words and deeds (investing in schools and communities, enforcing civil rights laws, providing "ladders of opportunities).

Then he transitions again by asking us not to focus on racism. Instead he wants us to focus on education, on health care, jobs (and offshoring) and bringing the troops home "from a war that never should've been authorized and never should've been waged".

He also mentioned that Wright sees "the conflicts in the Middle East as rooted primarily (with) ... allies like Israel, instead of (starting with ) radical Islam."

So, that's a condensation of Obama's speech, I'll explore my comments on it in a couple of days. I'd be interested in your comments. I'd be especially interested in any comments on the comparisons between Obama and Quayle.

Ok, I'm offended

I work for a large company, one of the Fortune 500 companies. Today, I received a Holiday message from a Vice President over me. There are three levels of management between us, two between him and the Chairman, President and CEO (all one person).

The greeting said "Season's Greetings", "Happy Kwanza", "Boas Festas", "Happy Hanukkah", "Joyeuses Fetes" and "Feliz Navidad".

Where's the Merry Christmas? They can't argue that they're trying to keep the religous aspect out, Hanukkah is a religous holiday.

So why do they ignore Christmas? I'm offended.

Maybe I should send him a note back to say Merry Christmas.