Times are changing. There was a time when looking for Apple news in Asia meant deciding which of 10 articles a day to choose from to cover. Today, news on Apple in Asia is thinning out to no more than 4 to 6 articles a week if lucky. With 22 Wall Street firms having AAPL on "hold," it's easy to see that the stock market and the market in general aren't that excited about Apple as they once were. Apple just isn't the news story that it once was globally.

While the current trend of Apple losing influence in tech media, it could turn on a dime with a fresh and exciting round of hot new products. But for now the trend is what it is. Yet it's kind of an odd time for a Democratic presidential candidate to come out swinging at Silicon Valley giants and especially Apple at this weekend's SXSW Conference.

While it's now common to hear the EU bash and attack American tech companies at every possible opportunity, it was rather odd to hear negativity targeting Silicon Valley by a U.S. presidential candidate.

With Silicon Valley CEO's including Apple's Tim Cook supporting a plethora of Democratic causes loudly and openly, it was surprising to hear from Democrat Elizabeth Warren wanting to break up Silicon Valley tech companies. With Silicon Valley's massive fan base, I think that Warren just shot herself in the head, let alone her foot.

According to Warren, any company that runs a marketplace and makes more than $25 billion a year in revenue as a 'platform utility' and prohibit those companies from using those platforms from selling their own products," reports Nilay Patel for The Verge.

Patel had a chance to speak to Senator Warren after she appeared on stage at SXSW in Austin, Texas yesterday, and she told him explicitly that she thinks Apple should be broken apart too — specifically, that it should not get to both run the App Store and distribute apps in it. "It’s got to be one or the other," she said. "Either they run the platform or they play in the store. They don’t get to do both at the same time."

You could read Patel's full interview with Elizabeth Warren here.

Bloomberg reported on Warren's commentary on breaking up Silicon Valley giants as well by adding that "The industry isn’t happy about it. The Information Technology and Innovation Foundation, a research group that has received funding from several large tech companies and other industry groups, said on Friday that Warren’s proposal reflects a 'big is bad, small is beautiful' ideology run amok.

ITIF President Rob Atkinson added that "The proposal ignores the fact that many of the services big tech companies now provide free used to cost consumers money. Breaking up large internet companies just because they are large won’t help consumers. It will hurt them by reducing convenience, reducing quality of service and innovation, and in some cases leading to the introduction of priced services." You could read more about their report here.

Today, the loudest voices in the Democratic Party that are getting the most press these days are those promoting socialistic programs and policies. Warren's latest position against California's tech giants will make the left of the left politically happy but die on the vine with moderates that are needed to win any U.S. election.

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