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THE JACKSON HERALD
WEDNESDAY, JUNE 13, 2018
Opinions
“Private opinion is weak, but public opinion is almost omnipotent. ”
- Henry Ward Beecher ~
Mike Buffington, editor • Email: Mike@mainstreetnews.com
With friends like us, who needs enemies?
Don’t fall for a scam
BY BLAIR BESS
During WWII, when the communist government of Joseph Stalin
joined the United States and Great Britain in their battle against Nazi
Germany, British Prime Minister Winston Churchill observed, “The
enemy of my enemy is my friend.”
Somehow the interpretation of this message has been lost in
translation for President Tmmp. He’s turned friends into enemies
and enemies into friends. The gnawing question continues to be
why?
The Russians meddled into our elections. Our intelligence agen
cies have made this abundantly clear. They present ever-increasing
evidence that the Putin regime did so to favor one candidate over
another. This does not mean, however, the Russian government
alone was responsible for President Tmmp’s victory over Hillary
Clinton.
The former Secretary of State blew her chances of occupying the
White House in any number of ways. A President Clinton II would,
by now, most likely have been juggling more china-laden plates
than even President Tmmp and, under this Republican Congress,
might well be on her way to impeachment proceedings.
Vladimir Putin and his regime are the beneficiaries of a type of
turmoil that would have occurred regardless of who had won the
2016 presidential election. Since then, disagreements and differ
ences of opinion have devolved into a national sickness, viciously
pitting those with one set of political beliefs against those with
another.
The Russians have fomented a level of chaos and distrust that
has opened the door for the desecration of civil American society;
a democracy that, until now, has been a form of government that
has been more successful than any other in history and the envy
of all. All except Vladimir Putin, who now watches with glee as the
alliances of which the U.S. has long been a leader develop fissures
so deep it will take decades to mend.
And yet, the president - on impulse, though he says it’s strategy
- is willing to embrace the leader of an oppressive regime and
suggest he and his corrupt government be brought back from the
economic dead and invited to rejoin the G7 nations (or the G6+1;
or, quite possibly, just the G6 the way things are going).
This is not strategy. This is ignorance of the very reason why Putin
was absent during the summit held in Canada this past weekend
and from previous meetings: a response to Russia’s aggression
against Ukraine and annexation of Crimea in 2014.
This ignorance of history should come as no surprise. During
the presidential campaign, candidate Trump displayed a total lack
of knowledge regarding Putin’s invasion of Crimea. In an interview
with George Stephanopoulos of ABC News, he said he might recog
nize Russia’s claim to land that was an undisputed part of Ukraine,
a sovereign nation. Tmmp said “the people of Crimea, from what
I’ve heard, would rather be with Russia than where they are.”
That wasn’t exactly true. While some people of Russian heritage
living in Crimea may have welcomed the candidate’s remarks as
much as they did Russia’s invasion, most Ukrainians did not.
Tmmp’s opinions would be tantamount to saying that some
Americans would rather be with Russia than where they are. Most
likely Americans whose ancestral home may once have been
Smolensk. Or those who favor foods like borscht, caviar, kotlety,
and Beef Stroganoff.
Or Americans like President Tmmp for that matter.
The president appears to enjoy spending quality time with
Vladimir Putin more so than Canadian Prime Minister Justin
Tmdeau, Prime Minister Angela Merkel of Germany Prime Minister
Theresa May of the U.K., French President Emmanuel Macron,
Italy’s new Prime Minister Giuseppe Conti; as well as his favorite
golfing buddy, Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe. You know,
those G7 members who counted on us and we counted on as allies.
But hey, let’s be fair. The president had a lot on his plate this past
weekend, so he decided to skip dinner and get out of Dodge — or
Quebec — as quickly as he could. Before the G7 summit ended.
Trade wars be damned.
The president had more important things to do, places to go,
people to see. Like North Korean Dictator and fratricidal crown
prince Kim Jong Un, whose reputation for dispatching political
rivals and relatives (some, one and the same) is known the world
over. But, like Vladimir Putin, Kim Jong Un is, in the president’s
words, “very honorable.”
And while the president has yet to look into “Little Rocket Man’s”
eyes to get a sense of his soul, he’ll probably appreciate what he
sees; perhaps a mirror-reflection of himself.
Blair Bess is a Los Angeles-based television writer, producer, and
columnist. He edits the online blog Soaggragated.com, and can be
reached at BBess.soaggragated@gmail.com.
The Jackson Herald
Founded 1875
Merged with The Commerce News 2017
The Official Legal Organ of Jackson County, Ga.
Herman Buffington, Publisher 1965-2005
Mike Buffington Co-Publisher & Editor
Scott Buffington Co-Publisher & Advertising Manager
Angela Gary Associate Editor Features
Alex Pace Braselton News Editor
Ron Bridgeman Reporter
Ben Munro Sports Editor
Charles Phelps Sports Reporter
Wesleigh Sagon Photographer/Features
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Why do so many people fall for scams?
Every week in this newspaper, we print crime
reports where people
fall for a scam, or are
the targets of a scam.
Scams aren’t
new. There’s always
been people who
scammed others. In
1821, a Scottish man
“invented” a non
existent country in
Central America and
convinced others to
invest in it. Some even
set sail for the new
homeland, which was
supposed to be rich
in minerals, only to
find out too late that it didn’t really exist. Many died
of disease in the jungle.
The term “Ponzi Scheme” comes from a 1920
scam where Charles Ponzi scammed investors out
of $20 million before he was caught.
And there have been many others, some huge.
Enron used an accounting loophole to inflate its
value, but when the real value was discovered in
2001, the company failed and its staff of 20,000
people were out of a job.
On a smaller scale, there have always been con
men, “grifters” who roamed
the streets swindling peo
ple out of their money. But
the rise of the internet has
taken the scam business
to a whole new level. One
of the most common by
phone and email is to tell
people they’ve won a bunch
of money and that they only
have to send cash or pay
ment cards to a certain
place to collect.
Another tactic is for the
con to call someone and
tell them they owe money
to the IRS or some other
official-sounding agency.
It’s amazing how many
people fall for these kinds
of things. While the scams
often target the elderly,
they also suck in people
who should know better,
but who are naive and not
very “street smart.” That is the point of the email
“Nigerian” scams that promise riches if only you
send them a few thousand dollars. Those emails
are obviously fake and they are actually designed
to sound stupid. That’s because the scammers
want to filter out all the “smart” people who might
respond to a more reasonable-sounding email
and suck in only the really naive who are potential
targets. They don’t want to waste their time with
people who doubt the scam.
Scams work for one of two reasons: Greed or
fear. Greed scams play to our ego and desire to get
rich or to get something for nothing. Fear scams
attempt to scare us — “Either pay up or you will go
to jail!”
Here’s the main rule in life, folks: If it sounds too
good to be true, it probably is. If you think you can
get something for nothing, it ain’t real.
Here’s a few of the scams going around:
• If you get an email from someone claiming
to be a government minister or prince in some
far-flung nation who needs your bank account
number to send you millions of dollars, it’s a scam.
• If you get a call from someone saying you won
a large sum of money, or a car, or something else
expensive and that you only need to send them
a few thousand dollars to collect, it’s a scam. No
legitimate “contest” will require you to pay money
to collect money.
• If you sell something online and the buyer
wants to send you more money than the item is
worth, then have you rebate the balance, it’s a
scam. Their check is fake.
• If you get a phone call from someone claiming
to be from the courts, law enforcement, the IRS
or other important sounding government agency
and they say you owe money and should go to the
store and buy gift cards to pay for it, it’s a scam. No
government agency wants to be paid by gift cards.
• If you’re in an on-line relationship with some
one you’ve never met and they need money to
come see you or to get out of jail, it’s a scam. Never
send money to someone you’ve never met in the
flesh.
• Never give out bank or credit card numbers or
PIN numbers by email or telephone. If you’re asked
for that kind of info, it’s probably a scam (online
ordering from a known company is different.)
• If someone calls to collect a “debt” and you’re
not sure you owe any money, hang up. Never give
out financial info over the
phone to a stranger.
• If someone calls and
tells you that a child, nephew,
friend, etc. is in jail or in a
hospital and needs money,
it’s a scam. Don’t be fooled
just because someone knows
the name of your grandchild
and it sounds legitimate.
• Watch out for scam let
ters in the old-fashioned mail,
too. Sometimes, you will get
what looks like a check, but
when you cash it, you’re
hooked into some kind of
costly deal. There are no free
checks.
• Ditto for all of the above
if you see it on social media.
The social media universe
is full of crap and fake stuff,
including scams.
• Never give out access
to your computer to anyone
who calls you over the phone.
• Watch out for real estate scams. Timeshares
are often used by scammers to bleach people out
of their cash.
• Be very careful about clicking on links in
emails that are not from someone you know. Don’t
even open emails from people you don’t know.
kkk
The challenge filed by incumbent Jackson
County Board of Education chairman Steve Bryant
to the May elections is very interesting. Bryant lost
that race to Don Clerici, but the names on the bal
lot were in the wrong order. Bryant should have
been first, but was listed second.
As far as we can determine, this is plowing new
legal ground in the state. Stay tuned.
Mike Buffington is co-publisher of Mainstreet
Newspapers. He can be reached at mike@main-
streetnews.com.
While the scams
often target the
elderly, they also
suck in people
who should
know better, but
who are naive
and not very
“street smart. ”