YOU CAN TAKE IT TO THE BANK

When other activities do not interfere - I love my Sunday mornings -as long as I practice the law of diminishing returns and know when to quit.

(Hey! Hey! This is a family blog. I'm talking about Sunday news shows)

I continue to enjoy NBC's Meet The Press even w/o Tim Russert.

My next TV news viewing is Howard Kurtz and his Reliable Sources. I even enjoy a little bit of Candy Crowley as a follow up on CNN.

At that point I believe I've heard every subject - covered from any angle I could possibly have imagined - and still avoided the political bias of Fox etc - but, I'm usually tapped out.

Despite that,Sunday I also added the CBS 60 minutes interview of President Obama - a fitting close to all the Osama bid Laden news.

While still having some misgivings,I was impressed with Obama's intelligence and communicative aplomb. He made it much more possible to walk away with a conclusion that you had a true feel as to what went down - and maybe even why.

I believe you can better enjoy the news when your time is spent judiciously trying to ferret out the truth - as opposed to just following party line.I try to do that both in blogs and in life.

Perhaps, an even better feeling was that, during the 60 Minutes interview I felt we were watching somebody grow up before our eyes. Only time will tell.

Every once in a while you see some subtle changes in politics that "suggest" that our struggling country may be starting to get it right. Here's one observation-as well as a suggestion:

We support various politicians despite the fact we live in a vacuum.
Remember, many of the wives of these politicians obviously didn't know what the heck was going on in their husbands mind either .

We are deluged with off-the-wall opinions. They come from so-called "experts", experienced advisors, informed insiders, highly qualified individuals, and reliable sources.Sadly, the prime reason we're hearing and seeing their opinions is so somebody can make a buck.

We find it is incredibly difficult nowadays to separate the "opinions" from the "opinionated."

And yet, we have at our disposal what so far appear to be "different" reliable sources, such as "FactsCheck", "Snopes", etc.-ready and willing to share with us "secret squirrel" stuff,
information for which they do not charge us.

There is no suggestion here that what these new sources conclude, even after actually checking the facts,is absolutely 100% correct.
But,it's a better batting average than what you've been getting in your E-mails.

My growing fear is that there are way too many of us who enjoy being fooled - whether it's in sports or the real world. We love our "close up" magic shows.

My point is, this is a great country because we are all allowed to have and voice our opinions - even when we don't have a clue what we're talking about or the reliability of the source.

Maybe,our money would be better spent in restraining our giving to politicians and churning it into making contributions to people whose specialty is not producing quarters from behind our ears.

Why not consider contributing to some of these so-called "watchdog" groups whose sources are often quoted by name in the media? There is no way you can track 535 politicians yourself.

These organizations are observing and studying the actions of Congress, the banking fraternity, the oil industry, as well as those local gadflys with their mailings begging you for your support and financial contributions.

If you're a business manager or even someone who just wants to get ahead, you know you can't possibly read all the self-help books or new management theories. So, you subscribe to a service - like those "Cliff-Notes" that got you through English Lit in college.

All of us - in business or not - but who are truly concerned - can't possibly stand in the grocery store and try to weigh all the promises on the packaging . If you do this at Publix you may be mistaken for a potted plant - and watered every third day.

There is a reason many of us subscribe to Consumer Reports, Readers Digest, or some other reliable product information source.

Why don't we do the same thing for those decisions and actions that affect our families, our grandchildren and us even more?

Never in time has it been possible to gain more meaningful information about almost anything. The trick is to find the right filter.

Why not divide and conquer the excess communication you are receiving? Might even improve your mental health.

And, if your fear is that some of those so called non-profit informational watchdogs may have their own ax to grind - there are sources to check that out as well.

I know a guy who will turn 76 soon. Each of his blogs suggests he spends a lot of time checking out his facts before his fingers hit the keyboard.

And, if he tells you something - "You Can Take It To The Bank."

(THE OLD THINKER hepie2335, BRADENTON FLORIDA.)