DES MOINES' OWN JONI ERNST CHALLENGED

Another Tea Party loser

Des Moines' major newspaper, the Des Moines Register, endorsed Bruce Braley to fill Tom Harkin's Senate seat over Tea Party extremist, Joni Ernst. You remember this fruitcake, raving over the ages old Agenda 21 Conspiracy and most recently deciding to take up arms against the government. Having lived in Des Moines, I know this paper as excellent journalism, one you can depend on for the facts, unlike Fox News. Hopefully most of the population of Des Moines hasn't yet succumbed to this Tea Party trash and will elect Braley to the Senate.

MORE TEA PARTY STUPIDITY

Teapublican Texas State Senator, Charles Perry from Lubbock, Texas, drew a bizarre correlation that American Christians are treated the same as Jews in Nazi Germany. Where in the world do these people come up with these deviant ideas and who are the idiots that elect them? It almost seems today that the right to vote should be reserved only for those who can prove that they have all their marbles. It is obvious to me that this would eliminate a majority of the Tea Party.

EBOLA AND ANIMALS

One animal was put to death in Spain because the dog was the pet of an Ebola patient. Completely unnecessary. This kind of desperation illustrates the level of unpreparedness in the world over how to deal with the virus. Fortunately in Dallas, infected nurse Nina Pham's dog, Bentley, was placed in quarantine. Dr. William Schaffner, chair of preventative medicine at Vanderbilt University, says we do not have to worry about most animals catching Ebola. I talked to our veterinarian this morning and she said maybe, just maybe, the monkey family might but not dogs and cats. However, if a person with the Ebola virus sneezed on the fur of a dog and he walked right over to another person who rubbed his fur, they could possibly pick up the virus on their hand.

IS IT TIME TO BAN CERTAIN KINDS OF GUNS?

Another shooting with two deaths and injuries and...at a school again. Sounds like it was a handgun but we still don't know how the kid got it. Makes no difference. He did get it and he used it to kill someone. I know some of you gun nuts out there love your weapons more than the life of the innocent kid that was shot in Seattle, but it's time to do something. Place a ban on civilians owning handguns unless there are extenuating circumstances and ban assault rifles, period.

MORE JONI ERNST TEA PARTY STUPIDITY

I feel sorry for my family who lives in Iowa and the Iowans I know who are straight forward, common sense people. JONI ERNST has already given Iowa a black eye with her insane rantings over the Agenda 21 non-conspiracy. Now she is espousing taking up arms against the federal government if they do something she doesn't like. Ernst is crazier than past TP loonies like Christine O'Donnell from Delaware and Sharron Angle from Nevada running for office. They lost!

MORE...TEA PARTY STUPIDITY

In recent confrontations with people on Facebook--I wouldn't call them friends, more like conservative extremist wonks--that, like most of these insecure Teapublicans, love to press progressives for exactly what we disagree with them about. What this dull bunch doesn't seem to understand is that we disagree with them about everything their ideology stands for. But if they didn't use this strategy, they would have to explain their beliefs to us and some are so bizarre they are too embarrassed to reveal them. Here's the latest Tea Party stupidity...

Joni Ernst, running for a Senate seat in Iowa says "...the federal government is partnering with the United Nations to force Iowans off their land and into urban cores as part of a conspiracy called Agenda 21. She also wants to shut down the U.S. Department of Education.

Need I say more TPers?

YOUR PERSONAL DATA WILL BE HACKED! NOW LISTEN

I am a former data broker that spent 35 years manipulating and selling your personal data to junk mail companies. When I finally realized that the companies storing your private information and those using it were not listening to pleas for more security, I decided to get out of the business and write about it. I started The Dunning Letter in April of 2005 and blogged on privacy until December of 2010. In The Dunning Letter you will find a collection of useful information that will help you in protecting your data. Just do a "search" on your particular topic.

Identity theft, even in 2010, although causing million$ of losses then, has progressed today into a full-fledged business run by extremely well organized groups that have the best possible technology available behind them. Thus, the warning that you will be hacked. The culprits no longer concentrate on the source of your personal data--the warehouses of names and private information--but rather the companies this data is out-sourced to like Target, Home Depot and your financial institutions. It is there where additional info is added that makes your personal records valuable and marketable.

Once hijacked, it is on the black market in less than 24 hours. Overnight your credit card or debit card could be compromised without you knowing it. Unless your bank or credit card issuer is on the ball and stops the transaction. Or you keep daily track of the activity. Of course your liability is limited here but the hassle of issuing new cards is a real pain and is very time consuming. It is no longer a question of if, only a question of when. And please don't be one of those, "It probably won't happen to me." It will.

Here's what I do regularly:

• Check our bank accounts for any illegal debit charges or other strange activity
• At least once weekly check credit card accounts for abnormal activity
• Three times each year run a credit report with each credit bureau to insure there are no new accounts added in your name or other strange transactions

In the first two you can usually head off any serious credit repair by being vigilant. In the last, it will take some doing to get a malicious account off your records but either of the two organizations below will help you through the arduous process.

For the best information available on how to prevent identity theft and what to do if it happens, go to these two sites: Privacy Rights Clearinghouse and Identity Theft Resource Center.

Good luck!