if you watch a lot of cable news channels you're seeing a lot of living rooms lately because we are social distancing and until the situation stabilizes they don't want to come into the studio in washington so hello from rhode island where i live and where the astute of you are may surmise that barber shops have not been deemed essential businesses and sadly there are other businesses that right now even in this crisis are trying to rip you off we're going to hear from attorney author professor and ace scam buster steven j.j.

wiseman he'll be here in a few minutes with a scam alert you won't want to miss but 1st cabin fever setting in you're not alone how to cope let's ask the author of among other books the power of off the mindful way to stay sane and a virtual world psychotherapist nancy collier usually joins us from our studios in new york but she too is working closer to home nancy it's great to see. it continue even to be moderating it. now let's see the pictures we're seeing of new york make the city seem eerie give us some other adjectives how does it feel to be there now. you know how. hard only it quiet. and and it's also incredibly beautiful when i

walk my dog at night and i look down the avenue that's normally you know car it's everywhere and people no one is out so it has this incredible our beauty beauty and asked of family are it very odd that you see. blooming in a way that i've never seen and i've been here many years you see that nature is delighting in this film that's that's good to hear during this crisis home exile a lifestyle telemedicine has become a big deal it's something that used to seem very futuristic but it is now mainstream are you using the phone and video chat the counsel of the folks that you work with and if so is that something you've done all along. in a part of therapy long at least for the last 5 years i see people all over the

world. so that's not so new and certainly it's a wonderful resource for people to have that you can talk with your therapist you can get grounded with and no matter what's going on but that's been something that i and my colleagues our hearts for a long time because new york city is the heart spider governors daily briefings of captured the national attention and here in rhode island to ratings are through the roof for our governor jeanne are among those daily broadcast and she recently did a whole briefing answering questions e-mailed by the children of rhode island from some 13000 e-mails she got one tot asked are you going to quarantine the easter bunny. and she said i would never quarantine the

easter bunny he is essential math see how should we talk to our kids about what's happening. well the most important thing is to stay calm are sour and be age appropriate when you've got your kids they don't need the whole story that this takes a certain level of maturity that we have to hold information that we know perhaps walking. him we'll call somebody that maybe he is alone in their place and we want to empower our kids through this calm and give them only the relevant information and also. help to learn that this will pass you know human beings have been in very difficult situations and this is one of them and we will figure out. through there so there are there are citizens that we can count on and they are doing something and so we want the message to be positive it doesn't need all the

facts it doesn't need to be scary. no matter what we want to put outright and what can we do to be of service. someone i work with who has a toddler at home just brought home a puppy to keep the kiddo focused on something other than what was going on outside that seems like a good idea. well. how many is interesting in it which is a kind of parenting shouldn't police have shown up where. we're shooting ourselves to death about what parents we should be through this you know we should be teaching our kids 14 language is we should be homeschooling them at a level they've never been at we should be their best friends we say we should we should we should and

a lot of shaming ourselves for the way they were parenting we're supposed to be our children's best friends their teacher this is the time to say i'm going to do the best i can and come in imperfect parent am i a good enough parent right am i showing up for my child that it's not a time to shame ourselves you know didn't you teach your child had a you know be a sourdough bread and if you need to shout it from your child then close the bathroom door or whatever version of that is it's put your oxygen mask on 1st time to the demands on parents right now odds are in terms of the home schooling added on to everything else that babysitters don't show up right the grandparents still show up there is no relief so you can with yourself the earth there is that is profoundly important is that how you walk through this right now

is going to be a scene that you plant in your children for all time you're teaching them right now . how do we uncertainty how do we handle it and now is it pops mommy look at daddy there ok in the middle of a situation that is quite eerie. nancy i'm sure harried parents will appreciate your advice to give yourself some slack because now they've got their home schooling and they've got dad home all day and i was really appreciative of an article you recently had in psychology today about coping with cabin fever give us some of the other bullet points that you brought out in that article. well i was talking about yes not shaming for sure and doing the best that you can the 1st thing is put your own oxygen mask on and that means we have to get some time away from our children and so as much as i'm

out there talking about some of the dangers of technology now is a time where if you have to hand the device off to your child for an hour that's ok that's ok this is a time where if the babysitter is television for a little bit that's ok and this is a time good enough parent and we're not sad. because it directs. time jobs at the very same time so that's really important and also there's this idea though of who do we want to be in our lives this is profoundly important at the same time that i'm saying have yourself a break and say no to the inner critic and that or the perfect parent the competitive parent who wants to do this is pandemic perfect like. is this who i want to be as

a parent we are now given this incredible opportunity to model can i be ok in the face of uncertainty can i stay in the present moment not go out into a what if what if it catastrophically asing can i stay with we're ok right here we're working on what we need to do for a plan for the future financially but can i stay right here and show my child that you can have fear and also be ok this is a moment to plant that seed in our chat at that will last will go into their way of dealing with life. we will always remember this moment and as recently as several weeks ago even with the economy so hot we were reading that many families would be on able to confront even just a $400.00 surprise now the game is completely changed how much are you hearing the

folks you counsel with and about money issues this is the big one holland this is the one that really frightens people it's very real and people don't have a backup plan we don't have a safety net and as people are saddled with debt and potentially no income for an unforeseeable future and so it's very real and what we need to do is to get whatever we can in terms of what the government can offer and also to make a plan and i encourage my my clients to ask for help you know there's so much him around and asking for his culture but i mean if. we live without a net as a and so go to relatives to to go to people who still have jobs

to rely on each other one thing that's coming clear in this is in adversity at we step up we really step up it's this serious matter now savings day now it's at the local governments and it's really the citizens that go fund me campaigns and so trust this rely on each other this is a time where we're realizing how much we do get each other's back and you may not be able to make it right now but add reach out and drop the shame it's great to see that and this is the run time to be proud it's wonderful to see people supportive of each other and that's a collyer thanks as always for joining us here on the big picture. mike caught up. the bad guys are working overtime to rip you off and we're going to give you a corona virus pandemic scam alert from stephen j. j.

wiseman when we come back this is the big picture on our t.v. america.

i don't trust medical authority at all ever and the reason for that is i had this horrible autoimmune disorder growing up and it turns out it was completely alleviated with very drastic dietary measures and i went to

a number of doctors to discuss what happened to me and i was basically laughed at like diet has nothing to do with our immune disorders so my suggestion to people who have health issues they can't figure out if they're going to see a medical professional and they've been going for 10 years and they're still in the same place they should probably take it upon themselves to start testing things out testing out diet testing out exercise and try and figure out things on their own. recently we mourn the bill withers whose voice was part of the soundtrack of the seventy's and whose words are certainly pertinent to. the show we're. going.

to. be. those singing selfies by wal-mart employees and the t.v. commercial echo sentiments we see every day perhaps you've seen the video of the new york city firefighters lined up across the street applauding health care workers leaving exhausted at the end of shift change at the hospital or new yorkers singing the national anthem in unison it's very heartwarming but while bad times can bring out the good in us the bad guys are busy and right now the wise guys are using the coronavirus pandemic to try to rip you off how let's

ask the author of a stack of books and if you can read only one make it identity theft alert 10 rules you must follow to protect yourself from america's number one crime and he's got your back with daily alerts at scam aside dot com where you will find a special page on coronavirus scams author pro fessor attorney stephen j. j. wiseman welcome back to the big picture. always good to be with you i just don't know if that extent. steve during this crisis people of goodwill who are in good shape will want to help others in any way they can and you're warning us that as they do even in normal times the wiseguys are posturing charities to rip us off how does that work. yeah you know it's a sad commentary that the the scam artists they're taking advantage so much.

coronavirus the fear is that concerns all of our emotions and one of the the worst areas deals with charities there are a lot of phony charities that will be contacting you by e-mail by text message by follow and here's one thing you know even if you're on the federal do not call list you can still be call by charities or you can also be called by scammers posing as charities so here is a key thing because as my motto is trust me you can't trust anyone whenever you get contacted on the phone text message or email you really aren't sure who is on the other side so if you are contacted about a charity or you go online and you see something about it charity that's helping people in this time of great need what you 1st do is you ignore that and go who is i call navigator or there's a great site it's free and you go there you put in the name of this charity that

you're considering giving to and charity navigator and dot org will tell you a couple things 1st of all they'll tell you if it's a legitimate charity they'll also tell you if it's a legitimate charity how you can donate to it and they'll also tell you how much of what you donate actually goes to the real charitable purposes and how much for this particular charity goes to their own these an administrative cost so you have to be careful on this we are all in this together but be careful with charities. charity navigator dot org steve the most vulnerable among us are seniors and you've told us all along that they are the most vulnerable to scams as well and now you're reporting on something you have called the coronavirus grandparents scam and old gag with a new twist correct. yet the grandparents kim has been with us for

a long time and we're all familiar with the gist of it which is the senior the grandparent gets a call very often in the middle of the night when they mean you know not be quite as alert and it's from their grandchild and they are in trouble there's a health emergency illegal emergency and they need money to be wired to them or give us give me your credit card number over the phone right away now obviously this is a scam or and what you need to do particularly because now it's taking advantage of the coronavirus i'm sick i'm in the hospital i've got some problems where i need this support right away so the thing to do is 1st of all if that happens to a senior you are learnt the senior ahead of time to be aware of this the 2nd thing is you tell them not to give in response to that kind of a phone call what you've got to do is call the child on the cell call the parents on the cell find out what the real situation is and here part of the problem you

know there was an all pogo cartoon 100 years ago that said you know we have met the enemy and he is us part of the way that the scammers get information on these grandparents is because too many of us put too much personal information on social media so you get a call grandpa and how do we know that you call grandpa because the grandson social security and social media refers to his grandpa and has other names in there so again you have to slow the process down the scammers always. want you to act quickly be aware of this never respond to that phone call without checking 1st to the cell phone of the child or the parents. this is how facebook can backfire on you with many americans now instantly impoverish uncle sam arrives to the rescue of a check is in the mail and the scammers are already working the phones on that you say oh yeah this is going to be one of the biggest and it is just hitting

a high gear now here is that these stimulus checks in the programs a little complicated so sometimes people are reluctant for more information about it so you can get a e-mail from the i.r.s. explaining what it is and you click on that link you just download it mel where the i.r.s. is not contacting anyone by e-mail by text message by phone about this and here's the thing you don't have to do anything to get your check you don't pay a fee you don't and parole 'd they're going to be sending you checks and they're going to be wiring money to your bank account if you had money wired to your bank account in response to your 2018 or 200-1000 federal income tax return if you got your refund of by mail they'll be sending it to the mail you don't have to enroll you don't have to do anything so all all of these e-mail messages text messages

phone calls that appear to be coming from the i.r.s. or the treasury department about this are here is the one way that the i.r.s. is going to contact you once you do once they do send out the checks 15 days after that you will get a regular snail mail letter informing you that write a check is beneath hired or mailed and then that's the only constant contact you'll get. that is so cool that they have backstop it that way so you get that mail but you haven't got the check you know you got a problem those stimulus checks are really just one way the government is trying to help us i had to chuckle when i read your report about u s emergency grants federation tell us that one. if it's a government agency that has never had a problem because it's a government agency that does not exist so thankful it has been and other still

actual media a real place of this hackers hacked into one of your friends on facebook insulting then since you. message telling you hey there is this new government program for grants you've got to pay a small fee and then you can get and get this anywhere from 100-021-0000 extension 0 dollars that for a grant there are no such grants going out to individual people there will be government programs but you've got to be really really cheerful about when you how do you respond to notices about these government programs and none of them will require you to pay any kind of a fee to be eligible and as far as on these grants they don't exist. every time you talk to us about phony baloney you warn against clicking on links you warn against what could come by the phone but steve these jokers are actually now going door to door as well. door to door and on websites you go to without even

clicking on anything so here's the deal they're there people will show up at your door looks like halloween you're in and has met suit and they're offering free tests or sometimes they're charging you for these tests will they say that from the c.d.c. 1st of all under the federal legislation no one is going to be charged for a test so anyone there are for you a a test for a fee is scamming but the c.d.c. is also not sending anyone door to door so anyone who comes to your door are for a news services that you have to pay a fee for or provide personal information like your social security number they're bogus the other place now and this is really scary i'm sure you've seen the johns hopkins web site that is fantastic as far as showing what's going on in the world there are these web sites like this you will even get as you mentioned

a link there is an e-mail with a link to the johns hopkins website except it isn't the real john top of site it looks real you go to the website you don't even have to click on anything and you just download malware that's going to steal your information make it a victim of identity theft. we're talking with attorney author professor and scam buster stephen jay jay wiseman steve i'm down to a minute but i got to ask because states are scrambling to amp up the covert 1000 testing for several weeks here in rhode island a national guard has been manning tents and we are reading now that there are pop up test sites that are bogus some rules of the road for not getting tricked to their. yeah and it's a simple thing this started the 1st reports came out of louisville kentucky and it church was contacted by the c.d.c. about setting up mobile testing there except it wasn't the c.d.c.

contacting them to church allowed them to use their parking lots people got in and they got scammed there were no tests they were charged for tests and so here's the thing we have this. scam aside dot com the net new section on coronavirus scam so we have the real links to the c.d.c. and local health uro's which will provide you with accurate information about where you can go for 'd a real test and if you can no test will be charged. one rule of thumb that our governor here keeps reminding us is that you cannot just show up at the test site without a referral from your doctor and beginning more recently c.v.s. which is based here in rhode island says you can go to c.v.s. dot com if they're set up in your state and you can drive right up and you'll get your test results in a matter of minutes but you cannot just drive in anywhere without an appointment

and i'm glad we had the time to make that point steve shelter in place keep watching your hands and thanks so much for allowing us into your quarantine and stepping into the big picture i appreciate your time. be well and be safe. and i appreciate your time too thanks as always for watching the big picture if you have somewhere else you can find our ti america on direct t.v. channel 321 pluto t.v. app we're channel 279 and if you're feeling cabin fever crazy there are hundreds of free movies on pluto t.v. if you have the dish dish we're channel 280 there and you can see our t. america live at youtube dot com slash our america if you haven't yet you gotta gotta gotta download our new portable t.v. yeah it's in google play or the apple store it's free and it is super cool and you

can see all of our big picture episodes on demand any time anywhere youtube dot com slash the big picture r t m holland cook in rhode island happy passover happy easter and be safe. the world is driven by a dream shaped by. the

day or thinks. we hear to ask. so much but then we really don't. maybe that's what this all walk down is teaching so many millions of people but most of their lives are all wasted on stuff that's unnecessary costs play redundant and doesn't come of social good at all. this is a story of women and women with troubled histories and complex court cases you know some of us did leave. out there. who were not. the person that. the cheesiness of the day are considered the most dangerous of criminals she's in a still. well below 23 hours of the day tell me that it's long enough and it.

will give women on death row. the world looking good. today we discuss why the u.s. and iran are inching towards a military confrontation in iraq we also reveal what europe is doing to go around us sanctions to help iran fight the corona virus outbreak sit tight the show starts now. just the. one. the world according to. i am for you to fantastic.