Don't be a moron!!

Have you seen this email yet? Check this out and see what you think...


I’m against the $85,000,000,000.00 bailout of AIG. Instead, I’m in favor of giving $85,000,000,000 to America in a ‘We Deserve It Dividend’.

To make the math simple, let’s assume there are 200,000,000 bonafide U.S. Citizens 18+. Our population is about 301,000,000 +/- counting every man, woman and child. So 200,000,000 might be a fair stab at adults 18 and up.. So divide 200 million adults 18+ into $85 billion that equals $425,000.00.

My plan is to give $425,000 to every person 18+ as a ‘We Deserve It Dividend’. Of course, it would NOT be tax free. So let’s assume a tax rate of 30%. Every individual 18+ has to pay $127,500.00 in taxes. That sends $25,500,000,000 right back to Uncle Sam.
But it means that every adult 18+ has $297,500.00 in their pocket. A husband and wife has $595,000.00.

What would you do with $297,500.00 to $595,000.00 in your family?

• Pay off your mortgage – housing crisis solved.
• Repay college loans – what a great boost to new grads
• Put away money for college – it’ll be there
• Save in a bank – create money to loan to entrepreneurs.
• Buy a new car – create jobs
• Invest in the market – capital drives growth
• Pay for your parent’s medical insurance – health care improves
• Enable Deadbeat Dads to come clean – or else

Remember this is for every adult U S Citizen 18+ including the folks who lost their jobs at Lehman Brothers and every other company that is cutting back. And of course, for those serving in our Armed Forces.

If we’re going to re-distribute wealth let’s really do it….instead of trickling out a puny $1000.00 ( ‘vote buy’ ) economic incentive that is being proposed by one of our candidates for President.

If we’re going to do an $85 billion bailout, let’s bail out every adult U S Citizen 18+!

As for AIG –

• liquidate it.
• Sell off its parts.
• Let American General go back to being American General.
• Sell off the real estate.
• Let the private sector bargain hunters cut it up and clean it up.

Here’s my rationale. We deserve it and AIG doesn’t.

Sure it’s a crazy idea that can ‘never work.’ But can you imagine the Coast-To-Coast Block Party! How do you spell Economic Boom?

I trust my fellow adult Americans know how to use the $85 billion We deserve the ‘We Deserve It Dividend’ more than the geniuses at AIG or in Washington DC.

And remember, The Family plan only really costs $59.5 billion because $25.5 billion is returned instantly in taxes to Uncle Sam.

Ahhh…I feel so much better getting that off my chest.

Ok, fabulous plan. Now, have you done any research on this information? I'm no math genius, but I have to say that when someone told me about this I had to scratch my head. 450,000 is nearly half of a million. There are only a thousand millions in a billion (two thousand half millions) and only 800 billions in 800 billion (1,600,000 half millions). So unless we are planning on only sharing this wealth with the taxpayers in Utah (total population about 2.5 million, so I'm sure maybe 1.6 million taxpayers) then this isn't going to stretch very far. I didn't know why the math didn't work off the top of my head, but it just didn't seem right to me. Then I read the email and it really didn't seem right.

$85 (updated) billion million divided among 20 million Americans would only result in a payout of $425 (before taxes), according to this analysis by the urban legend site Snopes.com.

They also point out that even giving every American a share of the (updated) $700 million billion proposed (and rejected) bailout would only come out to about $3,500 per person. Not enough to pay off many mortgages, I'm afraid.

Get familiar with Snopes.com. Feel free to verify any emails that you get before forwarding them on. Do a search in Google or something. You'd be surprised how fast these kinds of things get debunked. Every year I get the same email about the moon being closer to the earth at that time than ever in history and every year I email out everybody the Snopes link that explains where they are wrong. I'm not saying that people who forward emails are morons, but I will say that you shouldn't believe everything you read. It makes you a target for scams.

Have you ever gotten an email asking for your bank information so that the deposed king of Nigeria can move funds out of the country? In exchange for your assistance he will leave several hundred million dollars in your account after the transaction is complete. Pretty obvious scam, huh? Obvious and yet hundreds of people fall for them every single year. In 1997 the Secret Service confirmed losses to this scam at over $100 million dollars. This is the national pasttime of an entire country of fraudsters. Not everybody in Nigeria is a scammer, but not everybody in America is a baseball fan either, but what do we call our national pasttime?

A search on Google will give you many sites with information about Nigerian Scams. Here are just a few:

For a good presentation with examples and links:http://www.snopes2.com/inboxer/scams/nigeria.htm

This link gives a chilling story about one hapless victim who was kidnapped:http://www.techtv.com/cybercrime/shownotes/story/0,23008,3396765,00.html

The official 419 Coalition Site ("419": after the relevant section of the Criminal Code of Nigeria).

This site gives Five Rules to Remember and instructions on what to do:http://home.rica.net/alphae/419coal/

This site has a discussion forum and a link to post the scam email you received, as well as many other links to even more information:http://www.quatloos.com/scams/nigerian.htm

Even the United States Postal Service has a site dedicated to these scams:http://www.usps.com/websites/depart/inspect/pressrel.htm

For an email gallery with a list of the different names, and circumstances used:http://www.potifos.com/fraud

Another good site:http://www.greaterthings.com/News/NigerianScam/

Of course, The Secret Service has it's own informative site dealing with this problem. If you have been victimized, they provide an address where you can send written documentation or, if you wish, an email, at the bottom of the page. If you have not lost any money, you can fax a copy of the letter you received at the number given:http://www.secretservice.gov/alert419.shtml

The majority of people who receive this type of correspondence don't fall for the scam. But there are still enough gullible people out there who do. Recently, in the Charlotte Metro area of North Carolina (where I live) 36 people fell for this scheme. That is just in this small area of this state. Now, try to think in terms of the rest of the billions of people in the world and the fact that these scammers also use snail mail...well, I guess you get the idea.

This type of scam gives new meaning to the phrase "A fool and his money are soon parted." However, the more people are informed beforehand, the less likely these people will profit.

There is a delightful organization of people who find these scammers and then string them along for the ride. http://www.419eater.com/ You gotta love people like that! They post faithfully their experiences in leading these scammers down the road of pain and torture. Well, not really, but they certianly make them sorry for ever getting involved in this industry.

These scams don't only take place in Nigeria though. They happen all over the world and just get called 419 scams. The scam has become as generic for Nigerians as Kleenex has become for tissues and Band-Aids have become for bandages. However, here is an example of a scammer in London who really got what he deserved. Read this story (and pardon any bad language) and tell me it isn't the greatest thing you've ever read! Some scammers really get what they deserve.

This post was inspried by an email I got this morning from an eBay member saying they were waiting for my payment for a Yamaha keyboard. The link to the item was a fake login site that just harvests your username and password for some nefarious purpose. I may have been born at night, but it wasn't last night, so I sent it to eBay and reported it as phishing. Phishing is when someone is just trying to get information from you so they can get access to your accounts. People do this to eBay all the time.

Craigslist also has their fair share of scammers. People will post an item for an outstanding deal and then say that the item is out of state and blah blah blah you'll need to put the money in escrow and they will ship the item to you. Be very fearful of that escrow word when dealing with anybody online. My rule of thumb is if they won't take cash in person or credit card/PayPal then they are a scammer. You just have to keep your eyes open and not believe everything you read. Like I said before, the sucking sound of sponges are just targets for scammers. Don't be a sucker.