I have a neighbor who send me the latest on what the President is doing and calls to action to back him. Unfortunately, I do not want these emails and delete them unread.

Unfortunately, much of what is passed off in email frowards if bogus (either completely or partially). Some of it is decades old and repackaged.

The latest email was from a different neighbor who sent along a well-meaning email about Ben Stein who made an impassioned speech on TV. The text is well written and cause for reflection. It COULD have been written by Ben, however, much was not. Ben only wrote half of it and someone else added their 2 cents worth.

Here is a link to the Snopes explanation with the differences in what Ben Stein said and did not say.

http://www.snopes.com/politic...

A quick check would have revealed that a great part of the document is bogus and I encourage all of you to do a quich web search before forwarding an email, believing something, replying to a scam.

This time of year people prey on unsuspecting. There are people who stand beside the street asking for money. In Atlanta a woman used to show up all over town and tell stories about needing to see her children in Virginia (via train). I saw here in my town and a few weeks later at another offramp across town. She was driving 45 minutes to visit other offramps so that she could fleece others. She said she was homeless andusing the money to travel. Once when I confronted her tha tshe wads scamming people and I was going to ask IRS to investigate whether she was paying taxes, she replied that she DID pay her taxes. Hmmm, homeless people generally don't hve income so they would not need to pay taxes... Did she just admit that she is working THIS begging as a job?

This week our police suggested people be careful because there were people asking local businesses for help raising funds to fix the nearby playground. There is no fund set up and the police state fraid!

Someone else is issuing false Amber Alerts to cellphones. Who knows why.

every few years we hear about people being arrested for fraud because they bought into an idea that the Income Tax system is illegal and they don't have to pay taxes.

Others buy into scams that offer tremendous profits for an investment.

In any event, it does not hurt to be skeptical about ANYTHING you hear or read.

Here is an example of a scam. On the public side all seems great, until you know the secret.

You are contacted and told that the person has a great new system that allows you to make a killing in the stock market. They will prove it to you three times, just so that you can see tha tthey are experts. They tell you that tomorrow, the stock market will go up. The next day it does. Then they tell yo that the market the next day will again go up. It does. Then they tell you it will go down, and it does.

This is unlike betting on a race or game which has already been run and delayed. It is too easy now-a-days to fake the stock market direction.

So this person, let's say, has shown you 4 times which way the stock market will move, and he showed you in advance and you independantly determined that his information was in fact, correct. he asks for $5,000 to give you the program which you can now use to make millions in the market by knowing (in advance) which way the market will go.

SCAM! and here's how. On Day 1 the guy calls 100 people. half he tells the market will go up and the other half he tells the market will go down. When the market goes up the next day, he knows that 50 people already think he is an idiot. he does not contact them again. Of the 50 people left he again tells hal that the market will go up and the other half left are told it will go down.

When he is done, he has 25 people who think he is a genius and 75 who think he is a nut. Still, some of those 25 will give him $5,000 because from their perspective, the guy is smart and they have no idea that 75 other people KNOW he is a scammer.

So always take information with a grain of salt. Investigate and search the internet.

There are many organizations this time of year who collect funds for neady people. In some cases (and many too often), less than 10% of your money goes to the charity. There are websites to help you see which are the good charities and which are not.