You just happened to be the one (and many of the long term participants of this board have been just as guilty of it) of playing nice with Tom and pointing out his good points after he had one of his more egregious posts. I don't even remember what the subject was but I remember it striking a chord with me that there was something very diabolical going on with him and that people weren't seeing it and giving him credibility not because of the truth but because of the presentation.

I picked out you because you were one of the first responders and the subject was one I remember you'd railing about in the past. It felt to me that he'd gotten to you and caused you to change your outlook on something where the ethics I'd seen and admired in you before were being laid aside for an acceptance of his very misleading charts, graphs, and "facts".

That was disturbing to me because I admired your compassion and quest to learn about complex subjects and you represented to me a microcosm of a large slice of the American public. What I see is this large bloc of people trying to fit in some political education among their busy lives but unable to truly do the research on their own. For the most part, they sit in front of their TV screens trying to combine their entertainment with that absorption of issues and end up having Fox News as their source because of its flash and glitter.

You came here and asked for knowledge but also seemed to seek community as well. That's where the danger lies. News and information, in order to be unbiased needs to be stripped of good guys and bad guys, stripped of its entertainment value. If your only source available is loaded with that entertaining side, then one must dig deep within oneself to search for motivation of the sources and strip away the extraneous desire to truly like the people delivering the data.

You said I hated Tom. That's the furthest thing from the truth. We've actually had interactions outside of here and I found him to be a nice guy. I do hate his tactics though because I feel there's too much at stake right now for the future of the human race. I have children that must live in the bizarre world he's trying to build.

Jody, you came asking for help to understand the world and that's why I'm concerned about you. That's a marvelously noble trait but at this stage of your life that indicates you were intellectually lazy prior to this. Admitting that sets you up as a mark for hustlers.

All I offer is advice. There's nothing wrong with finding admirable traits in any of us but you have to divorce that part from the information we provide. As despicable as Lee is, data he provides could be the absolute truth. As warm and fuzzy as Raoul might seem, he might be giving you a load of crap. Give the smell test to everything you hear on here. Charts, graphs, internet links, videos, personal stories, none of these things can be counted on as gospel. They're all just a piece of the puzzle and extremely biased by the motivations of the presenter. The rule of thumb I employ is to ask simple questions of the poster about the validity of the sources and watch the response. Lindy can tell you she's been the recipient many times of that tactic. There's back and forth from that point but we end up agreeing to disagree on many things, still respectful of each other's intellectual curiosity. Tom however immediately goes into attack or diversion mode. There is no compromise. (Now he is more respectful and accommodating with the women on here than with the men. I've seen Mary Anne nail him on something as hard as Bowser ever did and it's a complete turnaround on how he handles his response.)

Can you see why it concerns me when someone like you, that bills themselves as an open book and eager for knowledge, doesn't question his sources and praises him instead? Jody, I want you to ask those hard questions, not just of Tom but of all of us. You came asking to learn about the world. In my opinion you don't need to learn facts on here. They're everywhere if you know where to look. What I'd advise is to learn is how to challenge.....everything.

Art