Occupy Wall Street Banned From Democratic National Convention

[glowing]

65. Wachovia was bought out by Wells Fargo.

I'm not sure how much Wells Fargo is operating? I don't think their major headquarters are actually in Charlotte. As far as a bank went, they started out ok. The started out as a smaller financial institute in NC, SC, and GA. When I moved to FL, there was barely a branch to be heard of. Then they bought out more banks in FL. I think if they had not bought up as many banks in FL as they ended up doing, they wouldn't have been as bad off when the home boom went bust. FL was and still is particularly messy and more corrupt than in other states.... and the banks, real estate, and mortgage brokers had a lot of free reign because of corrupt Republicans in the Governor's office (we had a Bush for 8 yrs menacing the state and then Charlie Christ and now that creepy SOB Scott), as well as, the state legislation being controlled by the of Republican party.

They really have done a great job in creating a poorly run state. Cronyism runs exceptionally deep. They have made as much publicly funded entities as privately hacked off schemes as they can; schools, roads, distribution of unemployment, any public works, insurance.... Dirty hands and schemes in nearly everything. The insurance and electric issues alone are enough to make one puke; add in the schools they have ruined, and its no wonder the Piggies have picked FL to highlight their model of Govt they wish to push down the throats of all Americans.

Our car insurance is really high because of the "No Fault" state. This means that the insurance rates are factored on the amount of accidents had in all of FL, amount of pay outs for car insurance due to say a natural disaster, and generalizing that over the entire state, not on one's driving history. So in 2005, there were a couple of hurricane's that passed over the bottom of the state (Miami area.. Katrina brushed by before hitting NO and such), our car insurance went up by nearly $500 for a 6 mo period (another issue, you can only get a 6 mo rated at a time because they assess the insurance rates every 6 mos). I called the insurance company and asked why in the world had our rate increased so dramatically when we had been with the company a number of years, had passed that magic 25 yr old threshold and were married. The insurance agent said that FL had been hit with Hurricane's so that the new assessment for the spring increased the rates. I was astounded, I explained that we in Tampa, had not been hit with any hurricanes. This fact did not matter. The state is a No Fault state. So the entire state is assessed with increased rates to factor into the increase of claims from the southern part of the state. I find it interesting to this day the number of left hand turns/ u-turns that people must make to drive in FL. Left hand/ left u-turns are statistically one of the highest causes of traffic accidents. There are so many instances in which a driver must make a left turn or left u-turn across 3 or 4 lanes of busy traffic to get to a business or what not without a traffic light to help direct the traffic flow from the opposite side, that it looks more or less like a purposeful design in which to increase the number of accidents on any given day; especially given the fact that we have a larger population of elderly retired persons who drive slowly and not very cautiously coupled with a large amount of tourists from around the country and world who make their way to FL to play tourist. Its a nightmare to drive down here.

The electric rates and issues actually drive me the most insane. They pay off every politician big and small, I swear. The first issue that pisses me off is that in 2004, the legislator's for the first time ever, allowed for the electric companies to bill out a flat fee charge that was not tied to the actual customer's usage. In 2004, FL had more than a few hurricane's pass over the state. It started with Charlie and I think ended with Ivan. There weren't too many areas in FL that weren't effected by wind or storm damage that year. Of course, the power went out. The electric companies had to bring in outside workers, pay for them to stay in hotels, pay per diem, and pay overtime for the workers. The bill, in my opinion, is the cost of doing business, however, in their opinion, they wanted the people who had to use them to pay for the costs. They got the legislator's to approve a fee to pay for the clean-up that year. It was supposed to be a temporary item. And anyone moving into the area anew, had to pay this fee, even though, they weren't even customers at the time. It is now 2011, the fee is still on the bill every single month. The charges for that cleanup from 2004 have probably been paid out 2 or 3 times over by now. AND anytime I have inquired about the charges or when they will be lifted, I am completely ignored by company and politician alike. Their second sketchy item that I am paying for specifically with Progress Energy, are the nuclear power plants they want to build in the future. It would cost $500 million to build a solar power plant to give off the equivalent power of the nuclear plants, but the billions of tax payer funds is much more coveted, as well as having current users pre-pay for the plants that may never actually be built... If I were to move out of the state or out of this area, I will have pre-payed for future energy that I may never actually use. The company was allowed to increase its wattage rate to pre-pay for this scheme. How is it even legal to charge customers for future energy they have yet to consume or may never consume. I also highly doubt they are setting that money aside in a general nuclear power fund for the time that they may actually build it. I'm sure its lignin the CEO's and board's pocket just nicely.

Don't even get me started on the BS of what they are doing to the public school system. Its too much for me to even deal with at the moment.