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STOCK SCAMS A GROWING THREAT


Here we are, well on our way into the 21st century. The human race has been around for at least 5,767 years as of last weekend (the Jewish New Year), and we've been working with e-mail, Internet and spam for over a decade already. With those credentials, you'd think people would know better.


Well, we do know better - but some people never learn. The proof? Many people are following the advice offered in the flood of stock-scam spam that has hit the Internet in recent months, leaving virtually no computer immune.

I'm sure that some To The Pointers are among them.

According to a recent study by Internet researchers at Harvard and Purdue Universities, the prices of "penny stocks" being touted in mass mailings to suckers actually rose significantly after a batch of messages were sent - as if recipients were rushing to their online brokers to buy the likes of Cyberhand Tech and ThermaFreeze Products in the hope that they could double their money.

Well, the come-ons are certainly appealing, but it's a scam, of course; all part of "pump and dump" schemes, where scammers buy stock in companies that exist mainly on paper and are traded on unsupervised exchanges, and then dump the shares on those who respond to their spam.

It must be working, because in the past few months stock spam has begun edging out fat pills and Viagra messages in my inbox!

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Chapter Twenty Four: THE JADE STEPS

The Jade Steps

Chapter Twenty Four:  The Jade Steps

When the food arrived, turkeys and maize cakes in great abundance, Malinali ate quickly.  She had no time for conversation with Bernal, eager to talk about the wonders of the palace.  She cast a knowing glance at Cortez and fled from the room.  She returned within the hour, Cortez inviting her to join the group of officers with whom he was conferring.  Everyone looked at her expectantly.

"I heard no talk around this palace or out on the plaza of any trap.  I overheard talk between guards, nobles, priests, and common people.  They all talk of you using the word teotl (tay-ottle), which means wonder, awesome, terrifying power.  They talk of how the strangers are men from another more powerful world, men they have never seen before.  Montezuma, it seems, can talk of nothing else.  There is no anger in what I heard, only teotl."

The men started to express their relief and appreciation to her when there was a commotion.  Several jaguar warriors had entered, followed by a procession of grandly cloaked and feathered nobles, perhaps as many as a hundred.  In their center was Montezuma.

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A LETTER FROM A YOUNG ADVENTURER

Dear Dr. Wheeler,

I am a 16 year old Boy Scout from Kansas and I recently read your book "The Adventurers Guide". I wholeheartedly agree with your opinion about adventure, but the only roadblock that seems to get in my way is lack of money. I would appreciate it a lot if you could give me some insight on how you dealt with this problem, and how I might overcome it. Also, I have read on various web sites that you still lead 2-3 expeditions per year, and I was wondering where they would be to and the age limit, cost, and other requirements.

Sincerely,

Nathan Montgomery


Dear Nathan --

It means a lot to me that you were able to gain some value out of a book I wrote so many years ago. And all during those years I have been trying to figure out the answer to your question. Basically it is a choice: discover some way to make money doing adventurous things, or have a business that makes enough money that you can do adventurous things in your spare time.

Both are not easy.

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BRITAIN’S ELECTION AND EUROPE’S FATE


Chanceries, political elites and business federations across Europe, regardless of whether they are on the Left or the Right, are hoping the Conservative Party loses today's (5/07) general election.

All the better if a motley Labor government is strapped to a bloc of triumphant Scottish Nationalists, guaranteeing a double-lock against any further flirtations with Brexit (Britain's exit from the European Union). Or so goes the argument.

They should be careful what they wish for.

A Labor-SNP arrangement would be inherently weak and unstable, like the string of Gladstone governments dependent on the swing vote of the Irish Home Rule movement in the late 19th century.

A Tory defeat would flush out the last EU dreamers and leave a post-Cameron party with even less tolerance for the posturing of Commission chief Jean-Claude Juncker, who this week accused the Anglo-Saxon world of trying to destroy the euro and vowed to stop Britain imposing its "exclusive agenda on all the other member states of Europe."

In other words, Brexit and the doom of the EU is either on the horizon or just beyond it.

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PROOF IN PERU THAT MORE FREEDOM PROVIDES MORE PROSPERITY


Lima, Peru.  When someone mentions Peru to you, what is the first visual image that pops into your head?

Inca Indians with their llamas in the Andes Mountains, looking at the some of the stone ruins of their ancient civilization? Yes, Peru still does have some of that, but most Peruvians are now employed in an increasingly rapid-growing and diverse economy.

In 1985, Peru was very poor with almost the lowest level of economic freedom in the world. In the early 1990s, former President Alberto Fujimori began major economic reforms. These reforms have continued through a series of administrations, including that of the current president, Ollanta Humala.

Peru is now listed as the 20th most-free economy in the world, according to the Economic Freedom of the World 2014 Annual Report.

As a result of the economic liberalization and increase in economic freedom...

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WHY IS OBAMA WAGING WAR ON OUR ALLIES AND NOT OUR ENEMIES?


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The Obama Administration's actions towards Israel become more intolerable each day, carrying with their insults deeply damaging national security implications for our country.


Just last week, Americans opened the newspapers to discover that the Obama campaign team has deployed operatives, including 2012 Field Director Jeremy Bird, to Tel Aviv to try to unseat Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu through an organization that receives taxpayer grants from the U.S. Department of State.

All of this is even more perilous given the imminent threat posed by Iran's active effort to acquire nuclear weapons capability.

For as things stand now, if the nuclear negotiations continue on the path they are on, they could prove to be the worst negotiations in our nation's history.

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IT’S GOTTA BE A GUV


Last Saturday (1/24) in Des Moines, 23 of the most prominent conservatives in the country spoke at the Iowa Freedom Summit, organized by Congressman Steve King (R-IA) and Citizens United.

Was the next President of the United States among them?  Let's hope so - albeit the no-shows were Jindal, Paul, Rubio, and Jitt Rombush (or is it Meb Bushney?).  It's vastly too early to predict who that will be, but we can start winnowing the field.

Let's first eliminate those who are ridiculously tiresome old news.  That would be Rick Santorum, Mike Huckabee, and Donald Trump.  Go away and goodnight.

Next, there are those for whom the spotlight has moved on... Then there are the long-shot dark horse non-politicians.  We move on to Senators who should stay where they are, and stop believing - as almost all Senators do, Dem or Pub - that they would be God's gift to the presidency.

With all that said, we come to the presidential timber bottom line:  It's gotta be a guv.  A governor who's a proven success at applying conservative principles in his (or her) state.  Who could that be?

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HOW TO PROTECT YOURSELF FROM EBOLA


Americans are living in Panic City over Ebola thanks to the now-lethal incompetence of Obola Obama.

He has allowed his fascist political ideology to become homicidally criminal.  He refuses to close our southern border from illegal invasion causing epidemics and to bar entry to anyone from Ebola-stricken countries as that would be the failure of his Amnesty goal of millions of new Democrat voters.

Hundreds of children in 46 states have been infected with Enterovirus D-68, with seven deaths reported by the CDC as of 10/15.  As Jack Kelly notes today (10/16): 

"There are more than 100 enteroviruses, ranging from the common cold to polio. EV D-68 has been very rare here. (But) EV D-68 is common in Central America, from whence came the flood of illegal immigrant children. The outbreak was first reported in communities to which they were sent.  CDC refuses to connect the dots.  Why won't it?"

Now add the Ebola Panic to this.  Ebola is being called Obama's Katrina for good reason.  The frightening incompetence of Obama's CDC should terrify anyone actually sentient regarding Obamacare's government seizure of America's entire health care system.

Let's take a break from Ebola politics and talk about how to actually protect yourself from it - from Ebola specifically and from any other viral contagion.

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HAPPINESS AND BEING A GREAT TEAMMATE


I've played water polo for most of my life, and still do. I've had the privilege of playing on some truly excellent teams, and I've also played on some, well... not so excellent teams.

I've also been involved with groups of psychologists who thought they knew how to be part of a team or build teams. I was always surprised at the lack of understanding among them.

Today I want to talk about some of the things I've found over the years that make for an excellent team... and a not so excellent team, whether it's for work, play, or marriage.

This is by no means exhaustive. There is so much that goes into team building that I can't put it all in one article. But I want to focus mostly on doing away with one great big flawed cliché: "There is no I in ‘team'."

The truth is, an excellent team has excellent players, each one of whom is there for his personal achievement and for the team's collective achievement. There is no contradiction between the two.

When either of these two elements is missing, the magic just won't happen.  A perfect example of this happened at the World Cup on Tuesday (7/01).

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HAS ANYBODY NOTICED THAT WE MIGHT BE WINNING?


It's all about winning and losing, but the best man doesn't always win, and outcomes frequently have more to do with luck than with merit.  Brilliant strategies fail, and fools stumble into glorious victories.  Napoleon preferred a lucky general to a brilliant one.

Which brings us to today.  The headlines are grim, the pictures from Syria, Venezuela and Ukraine are blood-chilling, executions and demonstrations are mounting in Iran, and Obama doesn't know what to do about anything.  So he doesn't do anything; he and his strategists just dither.  And yet...

And yet, our enemies may be on the verge of losing.  Big time.

The global anti-freedom alliance consists primarily of jihadis and radical leftists, the two principal forces committed to the destruction of what is sometimes known as the Western world.

That alliance is cracking, because many millions of people are fighting the anti-Western tyrants.  Here's the scorecard.

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EVERYBODY HAS SOMETHING


One of the most consistent pieces of truth that I've come to understand in the course of over three decades of working with people as a therapist and Life Coach is this: Everybody has something that they struggle with, have struggled with, or will struggle with.

We are very complex beings, all of us. The image of some kind of perfect, untroubled, constantly joyful and serene and bold and perfect life is an image from Hollywood; we are much more complex and magnificent than that.

My point is that if you are struggling with something; if you sometimes get depressed, or anxious, or obsessive, or scared, or confused, or distracted, or lazy, or feel overwhelmed... there is nothing unusual about you. These are all well within the normal range of human functioning, and they represent challenges to master, not failures to feel ashamed of.

The issues are not the issue. How you deal with them is.  Here's how to start doing so.

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HOW TO MAKE THE GOVERNMENT BEHAVE


Most people who work in government have no problem giving their real names and telling you what they do, but there are exceptions.

Those who are engaged in real undercover work for government intelligence agencies or certain law enforcement agencies have a legitimate need to keep their identities secret, but they are a tiny fraction of all the people who work for government. However, what we are seeing is that too many other people in government, notably at the IRS, use pseudonyms when dealing with the public. The claim is that they need to do this to protect themselves from irate taxpayers.

In reality, IRS personnel are no more in danger than many others in both the public and private sectors who have to deliver bad news (including economic columnists). All too often, the main reason for not giving the taxpayer a real name is for IRS officials to avoid taking responsibility and to cover for a lack of knowledge about the case and/or the tax law and regulations.

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ENHANCING AND EXTENDING YOUR LIFE WITH DURK PEARSON


A Special Announcement:  To The Point is co-sponsoring, along with Life Enhancement Magazine, a Life Enhancement Symposium with Durk Pearson & Sandy Shaw in Las Vegas, March 22-24.

Shortly after Merv Griffin, the beloved talk show host, passed away in August 2007, I penned a tribute to him in To The Point, How Merv Griffin Enhanced and Extended the Lives of Millions.

I told the story of how I introduced Merv to one of my dearest friends, Durk Pearson.  He was a completely unknown scientist with an IQ so high MIT could not measure it.  It was 1978, and Durk was dedicating his IQ to figuring out how to live healthily for a very, very long time.  What's more, Durk could explain how to do so with incredible clarity.

35 years have passed since Durk's first appearance on Merv.  The amount of anti-aging research, the number of years added and quality of life improved for so many millions of people stemming from it is incalculable.  But as Durk and his partner in science Sandy Shaw say, there is so much more to come!

The latest advancements in life extension science are astounding - but how do you learn about them?

To enable TTPers and friends of To The Point learn about where Durk & Sandy's latest research is leading, my wife Rebel and I are co-sponsoring, along with my friend Will Block, publisher of Life Enhancement Magazine, a rare public appearance of Durk & Sandy at a Life Enhancement Symposium in Las Vegas next month.

The length and quality of your life may indeed depend on what you learn at it.

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THE BULGARIAN ESCAPE HATCH


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This is the Rila Monastery, one of the several World Heritage Sites in Bulgaria.  Over a thousand years old, its breathtaking frescoes have been immaculately maintained.

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Rebel, Joel Wade, Alex Alexiev, and I had such a wonderful time with our fellow TTPers here last June that we're going there again at the end of September.

We discovered so many lucrative opportunities that we called this place The Bulgarian Escape Hatch.  As our economy is being destroyed by Zero, assisted by a wimp-out Congress, Bulgaria's is booming.  It's as business-friendly as Zero has made America business-impossible.  I'd like you to consider joining us.

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CRYPTOHIPPIE


Everyone once in a while during life you discover something new and genuine that is truly a surprise. This week was just one of those experiences and I would like to share it with you.

Amongst our TTPer midst is an entrepreneur who has an amazing company that enhances your personal safety and security. He will remain nameless unless he chooses to reveal his identity to us.

Before I tell you more, here's the background.  When you log on to the Internet, you do so via an ISP, an Internet Service Provider, whose servers monitor and record all you do - every email, chat, Web page, everything.

And if the police or Feds tell your ISP they need to see your record of your online activity, the ISP must provide it.  Nervous yet?  It gets worse.

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