People power

I banked with B of A for years, starting with them after they took over the bank I originally banked with in Florida. One day, poof, my bank was gone, and it was B of A. That worked until I moved to the islands, but I always kept my B of A account, because at the time you could not get a debit card at any local bank (I only keep a debit card, because credit cards are not my friends). This remained the case when I moved to Culebra, with only Bancopopular here. I remained with B of A, which was a major pain in the butt, mailing in deposits, etc.

Finally Bancopopular got debit cards here so I dropped my B of A account. And I'm so glad I did because I'd have to do all sorts of mailing and withdrawing my account and the rest of it just to protest this piggish CEO. I have never had any Merrill Lynch accounts, but hey all of you Americans who read this, DO SOMETHING! People do have the power where business is concerned. Use it! I know, personally, at least half a dozen of you have interests in both of those institutions, so unless you are willing to get active and take some sort of action, don't whine to me about greedy, corrupt fatcats or the state of the US of A.

However, if you DO choose to do something pro-active, let me know! The first three people who send something to me proving that they a)withdrew their accounts and/or b) withdrew their accounts AND campaigned for the firing of this man gets a free bottle of my home made hot sauce of their choice, Honey Heat, Manaya Heat or Culebra Pique.

Watch and bur...learn.


After I posted this I was going through my email, clicking my hungersite / breast cancer site/ childhealth /rainforest daily clicks, an auto-pilot task these days. But for some reason I actually was reading the breast cancer one as I was clicking and caught the phrase '...helping underprivileged woman get a free mammogram.' I've probably read that a 1000 times before and not had the word underprivileged really hit me before.

Because if you think about it, a privilege is a kind of unearned position or allowance in one's life; the over the top free banana split because your Dad owns the banana tree farm.

The Free Online dictionary defines it like this:

priv·i·lege (prv-lj, prvlj)n.

a. A special advantage, immunity, permission, right, or benefit granted to or enjoyed by an individual, class, or caste. See Synonyms at right.

b. Such an advantage, immunity, or right held as a prerogative of status or rank, and exercised to the exclusion or detriment of others.

Hmm. So what context is the word underprivileged usually used? Really poor people who don't have enough food to eat, or enough money to have health insurance, maybe even not having adequate housing or clothing. And those things would be a privilege, why?

Some would say that Ken Lewis is an overprivileged man, which would make sense to me. While no doubt he has worked hard to get to his current position, NO one has worked hard enough to earn (the opposite of privilege, in a sense) the money he earns or allows his slightly less elevated co-horts to earn. Hey, I'll apply that to any multi-million dollar making sports figure as well, but at least that is not being done at the expense of anyone except the fan who has to pay insane ticket prices. That goes in the category of luxary items these days. Whereas Ken Lewis is, in effect, stealing from his employers. You who bank with B of A and Merrill Lynch. You who may bank other places but to whom Mr. Lewis represents a way, an accepted way, of doing business.

Who is underprivileged now?

(adding this due to too much rumor without fact makes for craziness - here is the CDC site link for current info on the swine flu situation)

Piggish CEO's, swine flu...it's in the air, protect yourselves (I'm not talkin' pork here)