Banks Folding on Fees

Birmingham based Regions and others join the crowd and gives up on the debit card fees.

[UPDATE: Bank of America drops it's fee too. Debit card fees are the New Coke of 2011.]

MMMM # 170 -- Reporters as experts

     Let's face it. Most reporters (including this one) aren't experts in any particular field. We have just, in theory, learned how to ask the right questions of people in any field, to produce answers that the general public will understand.
     So, when it comes to global warming, what do I know? Not much. My science grades were only marginally better than my miserable math grades.   
     Some meteorologists on TV have taken very public stands against it. That's a popular position in The South, not so much elsewhere.
    A former physicist will be presenting three papers in New Mexico today that he says moved him from the skeptic to the believer side of the never-ending global warming argument.
    Will it change any global warming opinions--which among the general public are mostly political, after all, and not scientific--?
    I doubt it.
   We live in a time when we are all right. We listen closely to those who back us up, and ignore those who are on the other side. That's why FOX and CNN have vastly different audiences.
    When it comes to scientific controversies, reporters have to do what they are trained to do: listen to both sides, and report them, hoping their stories will be clear enough for readers/viewers/listeners to make up their own minds.

[The Monday Morning Media Memo is a regular feature of this blog.]

The Damage Continues

The AP's Phil Rawls has a comprehensive update on the damage the immigration bill is doing to Alabama, including the fact that a group from Wisconsin....

....Charles Manser and 11 of his buddies have canceled a 10-day golfing vacation to Alabama.

     Manser said one friend was born in Puerto Rico and another is a British citizen. They were concerned about being hassled over their legal status.
     "Whether it's legitimate or not, that's the message seen by people who might come to Alabama," he said.

  I wonder what Robert Trent Golf Trail founder David Bronner thinks about all this?

Meanwhile, California columnist Byron Williams is also picking up on Alabama's reputation as Ground-Zero for the Civil Rights movement to comment on the Immigration law. His column is titled "Once again, Alabama has become a national embarrassment."

Yes, somebody heard it!

     A 300-foot tall, 1,500 year old Sequoia has fallen, crushing a small pedestrian bridge and leaving U.S. Forrest Service officials in a quandry. What to do?

Bank Scams

     I'm a fairly astute consumer.
     I can usually spot scams and ignore the lure. Yet a text message this week almost led me to become victim of a scam that apparently has been around a long time.
     The text claimed to be from a bank I have dealings with, and it said my account had been "frozen". The message instructed me to call a number beginning with 866.
     Fortunately I was driving, so I didn't try to make the call immediately. As my mind went into consumer scam alert mode, I realized this was the first time I had ever received a text from that bank, and the alarms bells finally went off.      
     I Googled the number and found numerous warnings about it being a scam.
     What I don't understand is why banking and securities officials have not stopped it. I mean, they have their phone number, no? 

Bank Failure

One of the big banks has surrendered in the debit card war, canceling plans to charge three dollars a month to its customers, who clearly told the bank what they thought.

Wells Fargo and Co. said Friday it is cancelling its planned five-state pilot of a monthly $3 fee for users of its debit cards as a response to customer feedback the bank has received. Washington was among the five states, which also included Oregon, Nevada, New Mexico and Georgia. "As we adjust to changes in our business, we will continue to stay attuned to what our customers want," a bank spokesman said in a statement.

     Now customers of other banks need to do the same, tell their banks in clear, unequivocal language, they will move their accounts the day a debit card fee shows up.
     Debit cards saved the banks a fortune in check processing costs, and gives them almost instant access to customer's money. Don't let 'em claim they need the fee to pay for the card system. 

My number is.....

2,419,516,602

     A population-consciousness website lets you insert your birhdate and get your "number"...where you fit into the about-to-be seven billion people on the planet.

     That seven-billionth person is supposed to be born on October 31st.
     Where the child is born and into what circumstances will largly determine a lot about him or her.

• It will likely be an Asian child, since China alone has a quarter of the population.
• It will likely be poor, since most of the world is.
• It is more likely to be female, since the majority of new children are.
• ?????

What would you add to the list?

Occupy Your Capitol

Another "Occupy" event is set for the steps of the state Capitol tomorrow--Saturday--at Noon.
It is part of a national effort for people to gather at their respective State Capitols.

The Annual Halloween Roundup

     A South Alabama County is requiring all registered sex offenders to report for a mandatory meeting...on Halloween Night.

More Questions About Red Light Cameras

     The US Public Interest Research Group is out with a report suggesting safeguards to protect citizens from abuse.
     It includes several suggestions I like, including:

• Avoid direct or indirect incentives for vendors that are based on the volume of tickets or fines.

   Most of the red light camera systems in Alabama that I know of give a percentage of the fines to the vendors to provide them with a profit. In other words, the more tickets, the more profits.

Howell Raines on his home state

     The former N.Y. Times editor takes Alabama to task in an editorial on the CNN International web site, citing a previously unknown malady that seems to strike those elected to the highest office in the state.

France Bans Ketchup

     Actually they've banned it only in school lunchrooms, where kids can get a little if they are having French Freedom fries. They're trying to cut down on fat kids.
     Remember when the Reagan Administration tried to categorize ketchup as a vegetable for school lunches?
     Seem like the French should be banning the fries themselves, no? I hear their favorite condiment on fries is mayo, which is actually quite delicious (try it!)...but even more fattening, oui?
     And yet another downright anti-American thing about me: I don't do ketchup, though I love almost every other kind of tomato based product. C'est la vie!

[Merci Mssr. Jay]

Devil be GONE!

     A pastor in Georgia took members of his church to protest the devil image used as a mascot by a High School. And he was arrested for protesting without a permit.
     Really.
     He's defending himself in court.

Jobs to help save The States

     Steve Jobs told his biographer he wanted to destroy the "corrupt" $8-Billion dollar textbook business....and he specifically criticised the state level "certification" process. He said it was inefficient:

“If we can make textbooks free, and they come with the iPad, then they don't have to be certified,” he told Isaacson. “The crappy economy at the state level will last for a decade, and we can give them an opportunity to circumvent that whole process and save money.”

     So on top of Governor Bentley's comment about 2013 being a terrible year, we have Jobs predicting a decade of bad years. Oh joy!
     We'll have to see how well the textbook company lobbyists have worked the legislature. Or maybe the Governor can sign an executive order making free textbooks a felony. 

MMMM #169 -- Balanced Candidate Coverage

     One of the best things about the old FTR on APT was the visibility it gave to every candidates in a race.
     Shorty Price? He was there. Guy Hunt (before he actually won)? Him too.
     Every candidate was provided time on the show...though we fought and won a court fight to limit candidates participation in debates.
     Flash forward to now...no  more FTR, and minor candidates are lucky to get a passerby to pay attention, much less the media.
    The Pew folks did a study  to see how the media is treating the would-be presidents.
     In case you missed it, here's the CBS News report on the PEW story.
    The candidate with the least positive coverage? The incumbent:

     Does that mean there is a bias against President Obama? Supporters will say heck yea, while opponents will say it's because he's doing such a lousy job.

     At least it should discredit the "liberal media" squeals...at least for the moment.

     The study also determined that among the GOP candidates, Rick Perry is getting the most coverage overall, while Ron Paul is getting the least.

[The Monday Morning Media Memo is a regular feature of this blog.]

Confederate car tag causes controversy. In Texas.

A proposed Sons of Confederate Veterans car tag has people rilled up in Texas, which Gov. Rick Perry not to long ago suggested might secede (again).

     Alabama already has one, though interestingly, it is listed by the state under speciality plates, instead of with the military plates. I noticed a "Generic Race Plates" listing and thought...race? Like in black or white or Asian? No, it's NASCAR, of course.

Get closer.

Oh go ahead, give it 90 seconds. You KNOW you want to.

Occupy Montgomery

The "Occupy" style demonstration at the Alabama State Capitol got off to a slow start this morning. These photos are from right at Noon, the start time for the protest. I didn't stay, so perhaps the crowd grew later. The young man in the first photo said he was a 20 year old Army veteran of Iraq from Prattville, just north of Montgomery.

Bloomberg on Alabama's Immigration Law

     Here what Bloomberg.com says about Alabama's Immigration law:

"For a vision of an anti-immigrant Eden, Alabama is a good place to start."

     Again I ask: when even pro-business editorial boards are questioning the wisdom of your action, isn't it time to at least take a second look?

Citizenship For $ale

     The Wall Street Journal reports on a proposed plan to offer a Visas to foreigners who buy homes worth $5000,000  $500,000 or more in the U.S.
     It's supposed to help the home selling market.    
    That may do wonders for bringing the upper-class immigrants here.
    But will they take the agricultural field positions that their much poorer cousins abandoned in Alabama, and before all of the crops rot?

(And thanks to Editor of all things and all digits Jay for pointing the story out!)

Spice etc....

     The Anniston Star has an interesting take on the decision by Governor Bentley to ban the sale of synthetic marijuana products like "Spice". They've looked below the surface of the story and found experts who point out drugs don't make you kill yourself.

     My other question is where the Governor gets the authority to ban anything without legislative action? (not that this legislature would object!)

    Can he ban anything he and the Department Public Health finds dangerous? If so, then why not take the logical next step and sign an executive order banning the sale of tobacco products. 

     There's real scientific proof of the danger they present, and I'm sure Dr. Williamson would agree.

    Never happen.

MMMM # 168 -- The Sometimes Silent Media

     Trying to get a comment from the media when a story involves them is frequently impossible. Ironic, of course, since the media lives on its ability to get people to talk.
     Military columnist Tom Philpott had a column this week that blasted the record of for-profit schools than have managed to attract 25% of the post- 9-11 GI Bill educational benefit money, despite a sometimes miserable dropout rate.
     And included in the column was this gem:

The eighth for-profit company among the top 10 institutions getting GI Bill payments is Kaplan, owned by the Washington Post. Its Post-9/11 GI Bill payments climbed in 12 months from $17 million to $44 million.

     I wonder how much coverage The Washington Post has given that story?*
    
     Then there was the discovery twenty years ago of a plume of toxic chemicals below 50 blocks of Downtown Montgomery...with The Montgomery Advertiser being one of the possible sources from their own old building on Washington Avenue.

    
     While the Advertiser has reported on the story, I couldn't find any mention of this past week's official notification that The State, Montgomery County and the newspaper were officially being notified of potential liability for the cleanup. What will the paper do? Claim freedom of the Press?
     The Advertiser's new building is down by The Alabama River.
     We can only hope they being more careful about where their printing and photographic chemicals are dumped now.

     An EPA Public Hearing will be held on November 3rd, and it will be interesting to see if the Advertiser has "no comment" when asked about contributing to the potentially devastating impact on downtown redevelopment efforts. And will the County sue the paper for damages from their purchase of the old building?

[*UPDATE: 10-17-11 The Post has the story this Monday morning, but no disclosure of their ownership of one of the comapnies involved.]
[UPDATE: 10-22-11 The Advertiser reports the EPA has concluded their old building is safe.]

[The Monday Morning Media Memo is a regular feature of this blog.]

Obama on King

     The President certainly could have been speaking about his own political situation, instead of MLK's, when he said about King:

"He was even attacked by his own people, by some who felt he was going to fast and those who felt he was going too slow."

     His comments came during the hurricane delayed dedication of the MLK memorial in D.C. This morning.

Cancel The Rest of The SEC Season

Well, not quite cancel. Tennessee sports writer Ron Higgins suggests it become a best of seven series for two teams; Alabama and LSU. Here's his column.
Meanwhile Auburn manages to win despite it all..though ESPN says it was an ugly victory.

Coal Ash Regulated (NOT)

     According to a Washington Post story this morning, U.S. House Republicans approved a bill yesterday allowing the states to control coal ash, that by-product of coal-burning, mostly from power plants.
     You'll remember that a huge holding pond containing tons of coal ash collapsed and flooded the land and a river in Tennessee a couple of years ago. Much of that coal ash ended up in a for-profit Perry County Alabama landfill*.

     I would ask a) how little regulation Alabama would impose on coal ash, since ADEM (and The EPA) was fine with it being shipped by train to Alabama in the first place, and b) if coal ash is not an environmental problem, whether those legislators want power plants to go back to the good old days, with no scrubbers, and the coal ash etc just flowing into the air for folks to breath in every day.

[The company that owned the Arrowhead Landfill filed for bankruptcy, though where that stands now is not clear.]

Heart Disease

     The good news is that heart disease has dropped in the U-S, and in almost every state, since 2006.
Here in Alabama it was a drop of 19.6%.
     The bad news is that the South continues to have the highest rates in the country. The highest rate was in West Virginia, the lowest in Hawaii. And I suppose if you ask yourself what you think of immediately when you consider each of those states (Coal Mining, a sedentary lifestyle, polluted air and a fatty foo diet vs Tourism, exercise galore, clean ocean air, and a fish and fruit laden diet) and you may have an answer to the "why" of the story.

(The figure above is a U.S. map showing age-adjusted prevalence of coronary heart disease among adults in the United States during 2010, according to the Behavioral Risk Factor Surveillance System. By state, age-adjusted CHD prevalence in 2010 ranged from 3.7% in Hawaii and 3.8% in DC to 8.0% in West Virginia and 8.2% in Kentucky, with the greatest regional prevalences generally observed in the South.)

About Cain's 9's

     The Christian Science Monitor reports some states would have a 18% sales tax if Herman Cain's 9-9-9 economic plan were adopted.
     Tell them to come to Montgomery..it would be 19%!

What do YOU think of the Occupy Movement?

     CBS has an interesting report on what Americans think about the group, who's protests have started spreading across the country---even to Alabama.
     That's despite the utter contemp for them from, naturally, the Wall Street Investment Banker Class, and from most of The Right. Even the Tea Party folks dislike 'em. But shouldn't they be kindred spirits?

Call -1800-Report-Alabama-Violations

     The U.S. Justice Department is still battling against the Alabama Immigration Law. Now they've set up a toll-free number so folks can report civil rights violations to them.
     What will the state's reaction be? Complain that the Feds are messing with a sovereign state or something?

Back from The War

When I returned from my year serving in Vietnam, I arrived a couple of weeks earlier than expected. (Nixon was trying to reduce the number of people in-country). I knew my sister was having a birthday party for my Mom, so I had a friend pick me up at the airport and drive me there. I hid upstairs at my sister's place till the guests were all there and then just waked downstairs in uniform. It wasn't quite the same as this Sergeant surprising his daughter, but it was an emotional moment nonetheless.

Flynt On Immigration

Two quotes from retired Alabama Historian Wayne Flynt regarding the Immigration Law:

“This is the most mean-spirited, hateful thing I’ve ever read,"

and...

 "We only like immigrants if they come with car plants."

The Press-Register in Mobile has the whole story. Flynt, by the way, will be speaking at a book signing event at the Alabama Department of Archives and History today at Noon.

Finally!

     I complained for years about the LARGE TYPE name of the state's Agriculture Commissioner on the gas pump inspection stickers at gas stations. One Ag Commissioner told me on-air it was so people would know who to call in case they had a complaint!  
     I am pleased to see that the new Republican Commissioner, John McMillan, finally changed it..! The word "approved" is in the space where we used to see an ad for the next election cycle. I approve, Mr. Commissioner!

Netflix Qwikster is dead -- ALREADY!

     Here's the story.....but the price hike of 60% for some customers remains the same. And the newest move has to have people wondering how a company that seemed to have the perfect business is so Qwiksterly hurting itself and its formerly loyal customers!

MMMM # 167 --- Media-ocrity

One word: really?

Read the story of celebrity anchors, including Mr. Cooper, above, being measured for his wax statue.

And a Pew study of the media, including who the public trusts more...the media, government, Congress, or candidates:

[PLUS:  According to a post in a Washington Post blog, a"journalist" with The American Spectator says he infiltrated and urged on protestors at the Air & Space museum over the weekend.]

Fair Season

     Are there fairs in every county in America? It certainly seems so. The "Alabama National Fair"* opened last  night in Montgomery, with perfect fair weather. Lots of police everywhere, including one of those eye-in-the-sky observation platforms they use at shopping centers at Christmas.
     The crowds seemed a little smaller than I recall from previous years, thought it has been a few years since I last went.
     Lots of wide-eyes kids, men guessing weight and age and, month of birth, games that look way too easy to win-- and of course are not, and expensive food that just has to be bad for you.
     Hard times caused the Garrett Coliseum to lay off all of its employees last month, but the Kiwanis Club, which benefits from the fair, gathered up volunteers, and they seemed to have everything in control.

(*The Alabama State Fair is in Birmingham. Some years ago Montgomery and Birmingham got into a legal fight over who could call theirs The State Fair, and Montgomery lost. Thus the odd National in the title.)

This man IS an Island (owner)

     Pssst Wanna buy an island? A story about an island for sale caught my eye this past week.
    First, The New York Times had a story about Rat Island, a sliver of rock that is mostly underwater part of the time in Long Island Sound.
    You could take you boat to lower Manhattan in minutes. That is if you built a home on the island. And a sewer system. And a power Plant. And....
    Then someone did buy it...for $160,000...and CNN had it's own story about the new owner.
     That's a lot more than The Dutch supposedly paid for all of  Manhattan Island.

  
   If you're really into an island paradise, try this one in Florida. It can be yours for $10-Million. For that, you even get power.