Seemingly a smart chicken...:) (sm)

No 401 K here. I'm even more chicken. What money I have saved I've put in guaranteed CDs. It hasn't made much, but at least it's still there. Yeah, I'm feeling lucky.

The messages you are viewing are archived/old.
To view latest messages and participate in discussions, select the boards given in left menu

as that idea is obviously either not being taught or just doesn't work. If that were working, this wouldn't be an issue.

He has lied to Americans and to the world so many times that if he actually made a mistake and told the TRUTH, nobody would be able to recognize it.

LOL at *pro-terrorist.* Is that the *talking point* word of the day that you studied at the table while drinking your daily dose of Kool-Aid? I'm not pro terrorist by any stretch of the imagination. I'm also not gullible. As far as bizarre, I think people who can't think for themselves, see the forest from the trees and continue to defend a known manipulative, deceitful liar until the end, regardless of facts to the contrary, are beyond bizarre.

And as far as J. C. Penney bills, check the date below. As I said, this is nothing new. I doubt you need to worry about your credit card bills, though. Bush only attacks those who disagree with him or catch him in lies. Ask Valerie Plame.

PROVIDENCE, R.I. -- Walter Soehnge is a retired Texas schoolteacher who traveled north with his wife, Deana, saw summer change to fall in Rhode Island and decided this was a place to stay for a while.

So the Soehnges live in Scituate now and Walter sometimes has breakfast at the Gentleman Farmer in Scituate Village, where he has passed the test and become a regular despite an accent that is definitely not local.

And it was there, at his usual table last week, that he told me that he was madder than a panther with kerosene on his tail.

He says things like that. Texas does leave its mark on a man.

What got him so upset might seem trivial to some people who have learned to accept small infringements on their freedom as just part of the way things are in this age of terror-fed paranoia. It's that everything changed after 9/11 thing.

But not Walter.

We're a product of the '60s, he said. We believe government should be way away from us in that regard.

He was referring to the recent decision by him and his wife to be responsible, to do the kind of thing that just about anyone would say makes good, solid financial sense.

They paid down some debt. The balance on their JCPenney Platinum MasterCard had gotten to an unhealthy level. So they sent in a large payment, a check for $6,522.

And an alarm went off. A red flag went up. The Soehnges' behavior was found questionable.

And all they did was pay down their debt. They didn't call a suspected terrorist on their cell phone. They didn't try to sneak a machine gun through customs.

They just paid a hefty chunk of their credit card balance. And they learned how frighteningly wide the net of suspicion has been cast.

After sending in the check, they checked online to see if their account had been duly credited. They learned that the check had arrived, but the amount available for credit on their account hadn't changed.

So Deana Soehnge called the credit-card company. Then Walter called.

When you mess with my money, I want to know why, he said.

They both learned the same astounding piece of information about the little things that can set the threat sensors to beeping and blinking.

They were told, as they moved up the managerial ladder at the call center, that the amount they had sent in was much larger than their normal monthly payment. And if the increase hits a certain percentage higher than that normal payment, Homeland Security has to be notified. And the money doesn't move until the threat alert is lifted.

Walter called television stations, the American Civil Liberties Union and me. And he went on the Internet to see what he could learn. He learned about changes in something called the Bank Privacy Act.

The more I'm on, the scarier it gets, he said. It's scary how easily someone in Homeland Security can get permission to spy.

Eventually, his and his wife's money was freed up. The Soehnges were apparently found not to be promoting global terrorism under the guise of paying a credit-card bill. They never did learn how a large credit card payment can pose a security threat.

But the experience has been a reminder that a small piece of privacy has been surrendered. Walter Soehnge, who says he holds solid, middle-of-the-road American beliefs, worries about rights being lost.

If it can happen to me, it can happen to others, he said.

(Bob Kerr is a columnist for The Providence Journal. E-mail bkerr@projo.com.)

(Distributed by Scripps Howard News Service, www.shns.com.)

My dad worked for GM for 30+ years and retired in his 60s only because he wasn't capable of working anymore. They paid off their house. They had one credit card that they paid off every month if they used it. Dad had cash in the bank, stashed in other places, etc. Now my dad has been gone for almost 2 years now and my mom is living in her paid off house by herself. All that hard work that my father did to make sure that she would be taken care of after he was gone and now GM is doing horrible. Not sure what will happen to my mother's healthcare through GM or the pension my father worked so hard for. It is truly a shame if his blood, sweat, and tears of 30+ years didn't amount to anything.

A lot of younger people nowadays don't know what it is to work for what you have. Everyone wants things given to them now and that is a huge reason why I have a problem with welfare. It doesn't help the people who really need a hand up. All of these government assistant programs will do nothing but make people more lazy and dependent on others to give to them. I'd rather work for what I have and tell the government to leave me the heck alone, but that is just me.

The average American has 10K in credit card debt and think that is just sad. My DH and I have one credit card and we pay it off every month. The only thing we owe on is our house and it sucks that I'm terrified about losing it because the economy is so bad when my DH and I have been nothing but responsible with our money. We just keep plugging along and hoping that DH's job isn't one of the ones on the chopping block. If we keeps his job, we will be okay. However, if he doesn't, especially with a new baby on the way, we are in deep sh!t!