Shame on Wisconsinites!

Scott Walker won the governorship of Wisconsin in 2010 with about a quarter of the eligible voters in a light turnout.  Then in February 2011 there were big demonstrations against some of Walker's anti-union legislation.  See "The "people" are speaking, but a bit late".

Then this year many started a petition to recall Gov. Walker.  They collected 900,939 signatures.  That is about 40 percent of the 3,285,704 registered voters (July 2010).  These figures are from the Wisconsin Government Accountability Board.

So what happened on primary day on May 8, 2012?  Did 900,939 voters vote for any of the Democrats?  Right, and we will have 100% turnout in the Presidential elections this fall!  The five Democratic candidates received 665,928 votes together.  Where were the other 25 percent of the petition signers?  And it is probably worse than that because many who showed up to vote didn't sign a recall petition. (Election results from the Green Bay Press Gazette.)

Demonstrations take a lot more effort than voting.  But it seems many people would rather demonstrate than vote.  See "Which is better, civil disobedience or voting?"

Remember, "The 1% may have the money, but the 99% have the votes", but your vote doesn't count if you don't show up!

Banks, what efficiencies of size?

Many say that mergers and acquisitions provide greater efficiencies in operations. Then how do you explain:

"Moebs Services Inc., a research firm in Lake Bluff, Ill., estimates that it costs the giant banks about $350 to $450 per year to maintain a checking account. In contrast, smaller banks incur costs of $175 to $250 a year per checking account." - "Credit Unions Poach Clients", Suzanne Kapner, Wall Street Journal, 2011-11-07 via Yahoo! Finance.

Maybe it's because bigger companies have more levels of management, and the guys at the top "have to" get bigger bucks than the guys at the top of smaller companies.