Sad news, debit card fees, and debt crisis
The Greek debt crisis, Bank of America makes a mistake, and some sad news as GWAR guitarist Corey Smoot is found dead. This is your week in review.
Sunday
Early, like super early, Monday morning Richmond police cleared the Occupy Richmond protestors out of Kanawha Plaza. Nine arrests were made, including Ian Graham, a photographer for RVAmag. The group is currently in the process of figuring out where to occupy next.
Tuesday
Remember that time Bank of America (and others) thought it’d be a swell and acceptable idea to pass on growing costs and shrinking revenue (mandated by the government) to their consumers in the form of debit card fees? Yeah, that didn’t work out so well. If you’re looking to switch to a local bank, you aren’t alone.
Wednesday
I spent many summer days, during my formative years, on a sail boat in the middle of the Swift Creek Reservoir–not that any of us actually knew how to sail. On Wednesday a 78-year-old man crashed his small plane into the reservoir and escaped without injury. My formative self’s mind would have been blown.
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Outside of Wall Street, Occupy Oakland might be the most active Occupy movement in the United States. A couple of weeks ago a violent episode between police and protestors drew national press and sparked an outpouring of local support. This week, 7,000 people marched (pictured above) to the Port of Oakland and effectively shut it down. This is a big port (fifth busiest in the US): over 200,000 containers moved through the port this September.
- Occupy Oakland: “We shut down the port!” demonstrators say (Ongoing analysis); Oakland Local
- Occupy Oakland throng closes down port; The San Francisco Chronicle
Thursday
GWAR lead guitarist, Cory Smoot, was found dead Thursday morning. Dave Brockie, head of all things GWAR, sent MetalSucks this statement:
Cory was found deceased this morning as the band prepared for a border crossing. There is no word as to the cause of death and the members of GWAR are completely shocked and devastated that this has occurred. At this point there is no word on arrangements and the disposition of the remainder of GWAR’s current North American tour, nor are there any details regarding long term plans.
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God save the eurozone! Seriously, the eurozone is what they call the group of countries that use the Euro. Anyway, Greece! Some stuff is happening over there! The country is racked with debt and the rest of Europe is trying to figure out how best to fix the problem. There’s also a referendum involved, maybe? I dunno, it is complicated. Here read this explainer:
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Ross Catrow
Founder and publisher of RVANews.
Notice: Comments that are not conducive to an interesting and thoughtful conversation may be removed at the editor’s discretion.
This is written like Bank Of America decided to charge those fees to (some) customers out of sheer desire to gouge people and thats not accurate. I realize that the bigger corporations get, the less consumer oriented they are.. and Bank Of America is no exception (compared to Citizens and Farmers Bank). It also happens to be the 10th largest employer in our fair city and heavily involved in the community in the form of volunteer efforts. I wish more people would try to get an understanding of the other side of the argument in the name of truth. I do love your publication though!
http://seekingalpha.com/currents/post/100674
Who would have thought the real capitalists are in Sweden? Its tough-love approach – banks they determine to be insolvent are liquidated and/or sold off – has become a world model, and Barry Ritholtz describes the contrast vis-a-vis the U.S.: “When confronted with a financial collapse… we can save the system or we can save individual banks. Astonishingly, we keep choosing wrongly.”