In Florida theft of $300 or more or items that are valued $300 or more is grand theft. There are exceptions such as $200 being grand theft from a religious institution more than 2000 pieces of citrus fruit, a horse or any livestock animal etc.

When I was in the police academy our law professor told us that if we ever steal 2000 oranges, eat one real quick because then it goes from a felony to a second degree misdemeanor.

That is advice we can all live by.

Home prices have of course gone up in the Tampa area as well. The was caused by speculators (I refuse to call them investors) who came in when they saw a growing area with affordable homes and bought as much as they could affecting the demand and thus pushing the price up. Now these speculators have paid to much and can't unload their property for anywhere near the astronomical artificially inflated prices they paid for them, let alone the 25% profit they hoped to make. I hope their greed puts them on the street and when I get out of the police academy and the wife gets out of nursing school we can buy one of their properties for a reasonable price from bank foreclosure.

I hope that I have not eaten anywhere that is using meat that is a year old. I don't care if it is frozen or not. :(

@SadSam:

Fees that subscribers pay have come down. You simply have to be in a bundled package to see the savings. Getting High speed internet, unlimited long distance telephone and a couple hundred channels for around 100 is a pretty substantial savings. Al a cart TV services will never go down not because cable companies are raising rates above that of inflation, but because each local municipality has its own taxation for these services that they arbritarily raise whenever they see fit. Additionally, the content providers tend to demand more and more. I use Fox News as an example, I believe they were giving away the channel to providers for quite a while just to get on the systems...then they demanded 1.00 per subscriber. ESPN by far is the most expensive. If you think that offering a menu where customers could choose only the channels they want would work think again. Content providers only provide those channels in groups. IN the case of ESPN, if systems didn't supply that channel to those who don't watch sports, all other Disney owned channels would be pulled as well. And Cable companies don't like it anymore than you do. It is a media ownership issue.

I don't work in cable anymore, and actually I have Verizon Fios (which I have mixed feelings about) but many consumers have opinions on cable companies that are generally supported by heresy and the mythical always late "cable guy" sure sometimes that happens like with anyone else, but when I showed up, or any of my other proficient, dedicated tech's showed up to troubleshoot a problem, 90% of the customers were blown away by the level of service received. I actually don't understand the animosity towards this industry.

I was a technician (not an installer) for a large cable company. Many customers complain that their bills are high and one thing they forget is the astronomical costs to maintain a cable network, especially with the free in-house support that has been given away. I would often wonder why we were replacing wiring that we did not install, and that in many cases would be damaged because of tampering by the customer.

This is not unfair at all and should be viewed as a sound business decision and nothing more. Those who would have to pay are those with wiring that they damaged, or a line that they wanted installed, which both situations require additional labor, materials and other resources that Comcast would have to expend.

The problem with many consumerist posts and comments is that they are inherently anti-corporation with no regard that sometimes the corporation isn't acting in a sinister manner towards the customer, and may simply be attempting to control costs in an increasingly competitive environment.

Expecting a cable company to perform inside work for free is the same as expecting Ford, Honda or Chevy to work on your car for free. And that doesn't make any sense either.

All I am saying is that instead of attacking the corporation apply a little bit of reason. As for Ben's snide comment at the end of the post...I for one was NEVER late and NEVER missed an appointment. The comment added nothing to the post except the extension of an unfair stereotype.

Good day.