Brain Power

My purpose of writing this piece is two-fold. On one hand i'm giving a shout-out to Karl Albrecht, the well-accomplished author of a book i've been reading called Brain Power: Learn to Improve Your Thinking Skills which I find to be very educational and thought-provoking. I also want to give power to a concept prominent in his book called 'crap detecting,' which is simply the ability to separate the meaningless from meaningful, mostly in communication.

I came across an editorial in The Washington Post this morning with the headline "Concerned that government is rigged in favor of the rich? End this tax credit," by George Will. I did a broader search on this article and came up with a couple things that activated my 'crap detector.' I pulled up one site where there was an image of a toilet bowl full of dollar bills, and didn't understand the connection to a rigged government, favoring the rich, or ending a tax credit. By the way what kind of "government" are we talking here - Local? State? County? Federal? That's the thing with crap detecting - ask questions and don't be afraid to do so, regardless of what the answers are. Then I take notice of the suggestion to end the federal electric vehicle tax credit. You don't have to be "rich" to either invest in electric vehicles or get the tax advantage. Even if he were to be right, my point is you will help yourself immensely by activating your 'crap detector' and not being afraid to second-guess what's being communicated to you.

Another article I came across was headlined "The Financial System Is Rigged in Favor of the Rich." Here we have a picture showing men and women of color holding up signs saying "MAKE BANKS PAY" among other things. Are they trying to imply it's people of color against the "rich?" Furthermore, to me "MAKE BANKS PAY" and the headline of the article are saying two completely different things. I'm not so sure the "rich" generally speaking are in anyway all connected to banks; some use brokerage firms and wealth managers, others have assets sitting in gold or silver; there's more to it than just "banks" and speaking of which, there are many different "banks" in the world - community banks, city banks, national corporate banks, federal and regional credit unions; it all varies.

Once again for all I know the authors of these pieces may be on to something, but the point is to not just simply take everything at face value; put your curiosity to work. Avoid the attempted manipulation on your mind and give yourself the opportunity to learn something new, and one good way to start? Crap detecting.

Find out more about Karl Albrecht and his work at his website. The other articles referenced in this piece can be found at this site about tax incentives;  site about the government concerned for the rich; the Fiscal Times' article on how the Financial System is rigged in favor of the rich.

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