Let me take the liberty of laying some thoughts on authority out. Oh, Suspicious me, I mistrust people in authority. And I am critical of claims of authority.
In order of the things I find suspicious are that they frequently:
- want power
- Influence
- money
- don’t know it all, but make like they do
- might be full of BS
- argue with each other over basic principles claiming their way is best
Perceiving the holes in the fabric woven by people claiming to have authority in any area depends on how well educated you’ve become on the subject. A ten-year-old who can manipulate a computer in a myriad of ways will seem an expert to you if you know little about computers.
These days, when people on YouTube and TikTok claim to be authorities based on clever verbiage and mismanagement of facts, your base of knowledge about the topic is especially important. Persuasion has nothing to do with fact, but a lot to do with manipulative skills and techniques. What you elide, leave out, or distort may be much more important than what you include.
Emotional manipulation, techniques of appeasement, are effective, especially if you are predisposed to believe.So the bottom line is, don’t trust, verify.
Oh, but you can trust me, your friendly blogger…don’t forget to mail the check in.
Trust me – Credo Experto!
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This morning I woke up to an email from Social Security telling me that the BBB has eliminated income tax on social security. I read a couple of articles and my taxes are going down. Great but it’s bribery. I have now landed in the “low income” category which is OK with me. I’m good enough and that’s good enough and the fact is I LIKE paying taxes to see that my neighbors — like Tater-tot’s human — have a little medical care and a roof over their head. I WANT to do that. Nobody asked me.
Paying taxes gives my neighbors a better kind of care than I can in handouts and donations. I didn’t always believe that way. At heart I’m a conservative (old school) but life has shown me how inefficient that is for actual people. My taxes go down and the upshot of THAT in a large scale is my hospital will struggle. Where is the gubmint waste? IMO in the salaries paid to legislators.
Martha I’m hoping some people actually do get help. From what I understand, there are caveats and the benefits are only temporary. It’s for 65 and older, they get an increase of $4000 (?) on their standard deduction for the next 4 years. Then it goes away. So…I guess that’s good for a while. Like you said though, taxes have a purpose. In order to pay for his cronies billionaire benefits, he’s gutting other social programs. I know you know all this….I’m just saying it partially to myself because I just can’t believe it passed.
I can’t either believe it either. I’m just really sad. I live in an impoverished region of Colorado. That we have health care at all is dependent on taxes. And the people around me voted for HWSNBN. I lived in a poor part of San Diego for 17 years. Everyone around me — and me — worked 2 or 3 jobs. We helped each other but without WIC and various other programs? I was fine, but many of my neighbors weren’t. REally, this breaks my heart.
You can trust this blogger too! The check’s in the mail 😉
Make sure it’s signed…I hate forging.
👍💙