From David Galland in Casey's Daily Dispatch:

Michael Boskin, who chaired President Bush the First's council of economic advisors, wrote a pretty strong opinion piece in the Wall Street Journal this week sharing his insider perspective that governments the world over regularly tamper with the numbers they don't like. You can read his opinion piece here.

That's not to say that these institutions are unable to produce useful information and data, it is just that I would never assume that the data have not been skewed to serve a specific purpose.

When Al Gore talks about global warming, for instance, it's worth noting that he has literally made hundreds of millions of dollars by hitching his star to that issue. Further, should anthropogenic global warming be decisively exposed for the unscientific blather that it is, it would do great harm to his reputation. Therefore, you can bet your bottom dollar that he approaches the subject with a huge amount of bias.

The other day, I came across a simple albeit droll dissertation on the topic of how to become a skeptic. You can watch it on YouTube by clicking on the link here.

I have to warn you, however, that the author uses certain fundamentalist religious beliefs in his examples of how science and belief systems bump up against each other. For the most part, he handles that part of his discussion diplomatically, but I suspect the deeply religious among you may take offense.

Even so, I think it's worth watching, if for no other reason than that he exposes some foundational principles related to the act of being a skeptic. Of course, it's not easy being a skeptic, because it invariably requires time and effort to ascertain provable facts and, therefore, the reality in a situation.

No one in the history of the world has ever had access to more information than you and I. Much of that information is skewed by bias or is just plain wrong. As such, learning to discern the difference between fact, fiction, and falsehoods has become a very important skill.

Crux Note: Each day in Casey's Daily Dispatch, David Galland brings you an informative and entertaining overview of the markets, the economy, and politics... all from his unique and often contrarian perspective. Casey's Daily Dispatch is absolutely FREE and comes right to your inbox, five times a week. To sign up, click here...

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