The angry public

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The news that Bank of America retreated from its plan to charge $5 a month for debit card transactions is another example of the public’s anger at the status quo.

The bank’s CEO Brian Moynihan thought he knew his customers and believed they would accept the new fee.  He was wrong, and he represents an attitude among the rich, power elite that is way out of touch with the everyday American.

Some point to the Tea Party activists as the first example of such grassroots furor.  They certainly were mad and angry, but their uprising was directed more at what former New York Times Columnist Frank Rich described as a great shift in power from the familiar, ruling white culture to something else.

Multicultural President Obama was and is anathema to these anti-government activists.  They have been co-opted and now give their energy to the Republican right-wing.

The Occupy Wall Street movement is more afraid of Wall Street and its bankers who have done extremely well while the rest of the country—the 99 percent—suffer and struggle to stay employed with declining incomes.  This inchoate anti-Wall Street gathering is equally angry at the government’s inaction to spur the economy.

The frustration now has spread to customers of big corporations such as Bank of America.  There is a similar uprising against Duke Energy’s ambitious rate increase of 18 percent.    Earlier, the movie rental company Netflix tried to increase dramatically its fees, and after a customer revolt, retreated and groveled asking for forgiveness.

Businesses must raise their fees, rates, and prices as the market demands, but Americans rightly see a basic unfairness in today’s economic system.

How fair is it that Wall Street bankers and brokers pushed the economy into a panic in 2008 and then the Great Recession, all the while receiving billions in bailout money?  These “smartest guys in the room” clearly were not following sound banking practices, the kind that most of our community banks must follow.

News reports say the big bonuses have returned to Wall Street and so has the wheeling-dealing.  The American people see this and are outraged.  They’re equally angry at big corporations’ increased fees and rates and obscenely big salaries of those at the top.

Like the movie character in Network, the public is mad as hell and they’re not going to take it anymore.  The political party that is willing to listen to these shouts and cries and “do something” about it will turn this anger into votes in 2012.