USSA-I caught this at www.michaelmoore.com today, but it's interesting. What's the least-popular industry in America today? The oil companies? Wrong. It's the cable companies! Their approval rating is at 1%. We literally--all-of-us--hate the cable companies. The article was a link to a recent Harris poll, and it was noted that HMOs and the health insurance company sector were hovering around 20%. The reason? Harris is ascribing it to Michael Moore's 'SiCKO,' but I think he really just reminded us all of how much we absolutely hate these institutions and want them ended. We're tired of being ripped-off, all Mr. Moore did was remind us of this fact, ultimately. But sometimes, we need to be reminded, and he's done a good job again.
Back to the cable companies: the programming basically sucks, right? That's due to the over-concentration of media ownership, but we all knew this. The remedies are very simple. You regulate the cable industry properly, discourage monopoly through prosecutions (thus encouraging real competition), finally force the communications industry to pay-for the national fiber-optic infrastructure that they promised to build under previous conditions of deregulation, bring back the Fairness Doctrine at the FCC making it permanent law, and a gradual nationalization of the media (particularly news & journalism, like the CBC and BBC in earlier-years, only go further).
What's a little hard to understand is that the oil companies are at 33% approval, which is strange. They're why we're in Iraq. They overcharge us daily for gasoline. What gives America? Is it acceptance? At least we put them in the "worst" category, though, so we must be learning something. The key is turning it into action, and it's time to start speaking-out and asserting our rights and our collective power. No, you cannot boycott a commodity--boycotters of Citgo found this out the hard way--but you can make the politicians who service Big Oil feel the pressure and the love. You can make them squirm. So, give you representative a call and share the love today. Make them explain themselves, but be civil and stay within the law.
The Harris poll piece: http://digital50.com/news/items/BW/2001/07/14/20070808005058/some-substantial-changes-in-how-americans-view-different-industries.html
No comments:
Post a Comment