You Trust Corporations More Than Government Again Why?

Kevin Drum explains why he doesn't:

Today I stormed the halls of corporate America. And got my butt kicked.

SNIP

I actually went into the store steeling myself for the fact that my "free" phone wouldn't actually be free. There'd be a "transfer charge" or some alleged government waste disposal fee — or something — and I'd end up paying twenty or thirty bucks for one reason or another. But $240? My cynicism wasn't up to that.
So instead I got a cheap replacement phone. No new features, just a slightly different shape. A wee bit smaller and lighter. Plastic case instead of metal, so it'll probably break before long. But it works on my current plan, so it's really free.

Sort of. Actually, it cost me $50. Why? It took me a while to decipher what the clerk was telling me, but even though it's a $79 phone (regular price, not any kind of special deal) and I had a $100 credit, I was required to pay $50 at the register and then send in my receipt to get a $50 mail-in rebate. So now I have to do that.

What's really remarkable about all this is that I suspect most people don't even complain about it. It's just the way corporations treat us these days and complaining about it is useless. It's not as if any other cell phone company would have treated me any better, after all. They make their money on people who buy high-minute plans and send lots of text messages and download tunes and upgrade to email and broadband. I don't do any of that, so they don't really care about my business. And why should they?

End of rant. But since every post is required to have a political point of some kind these days, here it is for this one: there was nothing unusual about my experience. Barely even anything to get upset about, really. So if you wonder why I'm not bothered by the idea of government-funded healthcare, that's why. Frankly, my dealings with the government, on average, are better than most of my dealings with corporations. The government might sometimes provide poor customer service just because they lack the motivation to do better, but corporate America routinely provides crappy customer service as part of a deliberate and minutely planned strategy. I'll take my chances with the feds.

We've all been there. But we've all gotten so used to being fucked over by corporations we don't really notice, much less object. We're so accustomed to corporate abuse, in fact, that when we do manage to summon up outrage over the treatment, we attribute it to the government.

That's why you hear people all the time railing against government for crimes and misdemeanors committed by corporations. Crimes and misdemeanors that government is trying to stop, but can't because people blame the cops for the damage caused by the criminals.