CNN and YouTube Debates for Dems

Most of you who know me certainly know my political stances. I am not in the least apprehensive about sharing my views.

I decided to check out the YouTube Debate link and see what it was all about. As of this blog, they have the Democratic candidate debate posted, and it is well worth watching. Not because I agree with any of them, but as the saying goes, "You need to know your enemies." If you are a conservative and don't think that Joe Biden is your enemy in politics and freedom, then check out his responses to gun control and his off the cuff comment about rednecks from Tennessee in Question 22.

I will have to give credit where it is due though. That damn Barack Obama is a strong candidate. I don't agree with him either, but his charisma rivals that of Bill Clinton. His answers are generally strong and clear, and he sounds passionate. The Republicans had better come up with someone quick.

These debates posted online with video questions from the public are off the chain. This is the only way to get a good view on the candidates of both aisles. I generally can't stand CNN, but hats off to them for partnering with YouTube and Google on this! The Republican debate is scheduled for September 17th - submit your question now.

By the way, my political blog and podcast are coming soon. Stay tuned.

US Support Company - Google - My Forum/Blog

Well this should blow their skirts up out there. I was checking my stats on for rexpage.com and noticed several hits to my US Support Company forum/blog. That prompted me to Google for the term "us support company". Low and behold! My site bounces between ranking in the #1 or #2 spot!

Hopefully that will blow their skirts up a bit if they are even smart enough to think about googling their own company. Really I just hope people continue to find out about another side of that company.

Aggravating Things Part 1 - Dish Network

This blog is going to have little bits of everything in it. I may just make quick random posts, or I may go full-fledged soap-box crazy! Any of you that know me in real life, know that my soap box can get pretty dramatic. Hey - I'm usually right though.

For today's topic, I'm choosing - DishNetwork's customer service people! Why? I had to endure about 20 minutes of haggling with them in order to avoid a $149 charge to add a 3rd receiver to my account! That's right - they wanted to charge me $149.

Here's the kicker though. One of the first agents, whom I will guess was in a Pakistani or Indian call center, was going to sell me a receiver for $99. Although I still thought this was crazy, it sure beat $149. I requested a supervisor as I was threatening to cancel my account. Of course it took several minutes to get the supervisor on the line, and then he proceeded to try and sell me the receiver for $149 again denied the $99 quote even after I informed him that I was recording the call. I told him to cancel my account, and I got transferred to an account specialist.

Now this guy was cool, and he even tried to be firm on the $99 charge. In the end, I got them down to $49 for a standard receiver without any contract. I was agreeable to that.

Here is the reason for this post. Adding a receiver to your Dish account should NOT cost $149 or even $99. Really $49 is too much, but I was willing to bend a little. It should also NOT take 3 agents to get the job done either. I don't see how Dish is really competing with the cable companies with this type of customer service. Not that the cable companies are any better, but they can't be any worse. I bet Suddenlink wouldn't try to rip (rape?) me for $149 just to add another receiver or TV. I'm posting all this so that hopefully other Dish subscribers will stumble upon it and know that with a little persistence you can get a receiver much cheaper.

Louisiana happens to be a one party state for recording phone calls so I will adding the audio from the conservation pretty soon.

UPDATE 7-28-2007: I have converted the entire conversation to mp3 format. I'm editing out the hold times, etc, and then will post it on my mp3 player.