Day: November 1, 2011

A Triumph For The “Occupy Wall Street” Movement: Bank Of America Cancels $5 Debit Card Fee

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People have speculated that the “Occupy Wall Street” movement, which has spread all over the nation and overseas, was an exercise in futility, but now those involved in drawing attention to the greed and selfishness of the top one percent, particularly in the form of banks and other financial firms, have won a major victory!

Bank of America had announced a plan for a $5 monthly debit fee on its customers, which had caused an outrage and plans for millions of Americans, in theory, to withdraw their accounts from BOA and other big banks, including Wells Fargo, JP Morgan Chase, and Citibank. The other banks had announced that they would not charge a similar fee, and now Bank of America has announced it is giving up the idea of a monthly fee.

This shows that the American people, if they organize, can have an effect, and this must be just the beginning, with the campaign for greater regulation and higher taxation of wealth the ultimate goal, and the insistence that politicians must side with the 99 percent, not the one percent which have become outrageously dominant and wealthy at the expense of the rest of the American population!

So this is a moment to applaud, but not the time to rest on laurels!

MS Magazine Hits 40! The Great Impact Of The Feminist Movement

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It is hard to believe that it has been 40 years, two generations, since MS Magazine was started by the founders of the National Organization For Women, Gloria Steinem and Betty Friedan.

How much the role and life of women has changed in those 40 years!

Not only are a majority of college students now female, but also that is true in medical and law schools and other professions.

Women have come to be an important influence in Congress, in both the House of Representatives and US Senate, and we have had women running for Vice President and President, and ending up as top presidential advisers. Also, women have occupied the governorship of many states and been major factors in state legislatures.

Women have ended up on the Supreme Court and other federal and state courts, and they have reached the pinnacle of power in many corporations as Chief Executive Officer.

Women have become a great success story in so many other ways, and the treatment of women in social situations has also undergone dramatic change.

Women have definitely been “liberated” in ways no one could have believed forty years ago, and they have become a model of what should be happening in much of Asia, Africa, the Middle East, and Latin America, where there is still much oppression of women, in some cases shockingly so!

Marriage and personal relationships have been transformed, changing the family structure, and the differences between men and women relating to what they are capable of doing and being, has been narrowed to the point that they can be seen as equally capable of just about anything except child bearing.

Not everyone likes what feminism has done, but it has, overall, improved America for the better!

The Anti Romney Campaign In The Republican Party Faltering: From Trump To Bachmann To Perry To Cain And Beyond

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It is very clear to anyone with a political sense that the Republican Party right wing does not wish to see Mitt Romney become President, anymore than they wanted John McCain in 2008.

Both McCain and Romney have been seen as “next in line”, which is exactly why the conservatives in the party hated McCain and now Romney.

The Anti Romney movement has gone from Donald Trump to Michele Bachmann to Rick Perry to Herman Cain, and all have been found wanting in their abilities, their record, and often even their sanity!

The past few days have been a great time for Mitt Romney, with the collapse of Rick Perry and Herman Cain.

Perry put on a weird performance at a speech Friday night in New Hampshire, coming across as possibly drunk or on some kind of prescription pills, but his odd way of acting will certainly harm his campaign, which already is in its death throes by any reasonable standard.

Herman Cain is having problems with financial irregularities and sexual harassment charges, and seems unable to keep a straight story, or even seem aware of anything going on in his past or in his campaign, being a very undisciplined man.

This all benefits Romney, and also allows Barack Obama’s campaign to focus on Romney and his constant changes in position on every issue imaginable. While Romney may look presidential, and on paper is much better qualified than anyone the conservatives want, he will have major trouble in the upcoming campaign because, as David Plouffe, the campaign manager for the President says, if Romney could find a way to say the grass is blue and the sky is green, he would do it!

With the reality that Romney comes across as a fake conservative, much like McCain in 2008, the odds are that many conservatives will refuse to back him if he is the nominee, and will stay home, or look for a third party vehicle. But that would only help President Obama, leading to a divided vote among Republicans.

And then, the evangelicals might not back Romney on religious grounds, as he is a Mormon, and the only other reasonable candidate, Jon Huntsman, also a Mormon, would not be able to gain their backing for the same reason, and would be seen also as insufficiently conservative.

So it is clear many mainstream Republicans see the defeat of Obama as receding every day as their party goes through the disaster of a Tea Party Movement, evangelical Christian, dominantly Southern control of their party, which guarantees its defeat in 2012!