Da Hawg Frog Blog

Martin Schur was a World War II veteran, widowed and living alone in Bay City, Michigan. He fell behind in his utility payments so the Bay City Electric Company placed a “limiter” on his electric service. The World War II Combat Medic froze to death as a result.

The World War II veteran’s frozen body was found in his home January 17, just four days after a device that regulates how much power he uses — installed because of failure to pay — shut off his power. A medical examiner said the temperature was 32 degrees in the house when Schur’s body was found.

The medical examiner told The Bay City Times that Schur died a “slow, painful death.” “It’s not easy to die from hypothermia without first realizing your fingers and toes feel like they’re burning,” Dr. Kanu Virani told the paper. (Source: CNN)

Nobody deserves to be treated like Mr. Schur was. Those responsible should be held accountable. Since his death the Bay City Electric Company has quit the practice of placing “limiters” on those delenquent in their payments.

Unlike private utilities regulated by the state, Bay City runs and oversees its own utilities and therefore doesn’t fall under Michigan’s public service commission. By law, Michigan requires private companies to prohibit cutting off service to senior citizens between November and April. Seniors must register for the program.

The city has begun questioning whether its rules and procedures for limiting or cutting off power need a major overhaul. The utility has stopped its practice of cutting power to customers who don’t pay their bills.

The utility also has removed all “limiters” on homes. (Source: CNN)

This veteran deserved the respect he earned by not only his service to his country, but also his frugal lifestyle. In his will he left his estate to the local hospital. All $600,000 dollars of it. Shame on Bay City for not looking after this elderly veteran. Someone should be charged with murder, because that is what it was, plain and simple.

Bay City Electric Light & Power put a “limiter” on Marvin Schur’s home because he hadn’t paid his bill but never spoke to him face to face about it. Instead they put a notice on his door, which the old man either didn’t see or didn’t understand. When the limiter popped his breaker, his furnace apparently went out and Schur died a slow, painful death.

As one Bay Cityian put it: “This man served his country and he survived Hitler, but he couldn’t survive Bay City (Electric) Light & Power.”

As much as I agree with that sentiment and as outraged as I am, we ought to hold back our anger just a little. The city says Schur had a gas furnace, not an electric one, and it may have malfunctioned. An investigation is ongoing. (Source: The Flint Journal)

Lets see what the investigation uncovers. This is not over yet.

In a bold move today President Obama took steps to limit the salaries of top executives who receive taxpayer bailout money. He is suggesting a cap of $500,000. The decision is a result of the obviously out of control executives who have been issuing bonus and other perks to their failing businesses and partners. Of course the neanderthals of the Republican side of the aisles are protesting this action. They want us to stay out of business, unless it is to bail out their criminally stupid cronies in the banking industry.

A lot of us working stiffs out here are glad to see it. The obscene amounts of money these people made for wrecking our economy and stealing our retirements is sickening. While we, the working taxpayers work our asses off to straighten out the mess they’ve gotten us into the banking executives have taken our money and had one big party. We should not only cap their salaries, we should recoup the losses these companies have experienced from the pockets of these malfeasance’s who have run them into the ground. Then lock the bastards up for being criminally stupid.

Last year’s “shameful” handout of $18 billion in Wall Street bonuses “is exactly the kind of disregard for the costs and consequences of their actions that brought about this crisis: a culture of narrow self-interest and short-term gain at the expense of everything else,” Obama said to reporters at the White House.

“For top executives to award themselves these kinds of compensation packages in the midst of this economic crisis isn’t just bad taste — it’s a bad strategy — and I will not tolerate it. We’re going to be demanding some restraint in exchange for federal aid — so that when firms seek new federal dollars, we won’t find them up to the same old tricks,” the president added.

Under Obama’s plan, companies that want to pay their executives more than $500,000 will have to do so through stocks that cannot be sold until the companies pay back the money they borrow from the government. (Source: CNN)

Of course the Grand Obstructionists Partyers are saying, “but all the good talent will go elsewhere if they don’t get their benefits and perks!” If they were any good at their jobs then these companies wouldn’t have failed in the first place. The CEOs and CFOs are all a bunch of greedy crooks who killed, plucked and ate the golden goose. We should outsource their jobs to some $5.00 a day laborer in India and recoup the losses we’ve been paying. The day laborer couldn’t possibly do any worse.

Campbell Brown over at CNN had some good suggestions. Starting with something as simple as accountability of the taxpayers funds these miscreants are spending.

All the books must be opened and any company taking another penny must consent to an audit, waiving any legal right to block the government from stepping in.

We have the right to know what they are doing and how to keep all this from happening again.

And what about penalties going forward, real penalties for some of the outrageous behavior we’ve seen?

Misuse of bailout money must be punished if executives decide it’s more important to, say, redecorate their offices or give each other bonuses or go on some boondoggle junket, than to truly try and keep their companies afloat.

The bailout conditions must be unconditional, zero-tolerance, real accountability this time. That’s what we hope to hear from the president tomorrow. (Source: CNN)

These failing banks should have never been bailed out. They wanted a free market and they had one. But as soon as their bad investments caught up with them they whinned for help. Well a free market also allows bad businesses and stupid managers the right to fail. We should have let them go under. The results could not have been any worse than they are now. At least we wouldn’t have thrown away our money so these bastards could go on junkets to Las Vegas and given themselves huge bonuses of taxpayer’s dollars.