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**DoYouKubuntu** · Feb 09, 2012, 04:19 PM

Woody, you know I'm not doubting you, but if I read this exact same post as one of those endlessly forwarded e-mails that people enjoy sending, my bull$hit detector would IMMEDIATELY go off. I'd head to Snopes ASAP to verify that my gut instinct was correct. So I'm kind of scratching my head here...I don't NOT believe what you saw, but it just smacks of nonsense. For example, with the economy in the toilet, WHERE is the funding coming from to provide these free cell phones? and 1000 minutes/month? How many of these are being given away? Who's paying for it? Yep, I'm baffled.

**woodsmoke** · Feb 09, 2012, 04:38 PM

I'm going to try to get a picture.

I asked if he had taken a picture and he replied that if he did, since he is also a part time officer that he might get blow back on harrassment.

Another instance of "stuff appearing out of nowhere" was during the big ice storm of 05? was it?

The better part of our state was without power for several days and our area was without power for 9 days, at another forum I posted pictures of the "flood" caused by the ice melting that flooded the basement.

At five places in the city five semi-truck appeared at "intersections" that had "empty lots". The two guys in each truck started selling gasoline powered generators for like a coupla hundred bucks. I bought one after I heard about it from a friend. While I was in line, in the dark almost, a local t.v. station van showed up with a reporter and a shoulder cam and wanted to know who they were and one of the guys "bulled up on her" and said it was private, get out, or he would stomp her camera and almost did. They high tailed it and there was no reportage on the radio, the televisions weren't working. Radio was on their back up generators.

But, I'm going to the other town in a while and will report back, he gave me the address.

woodsmoke

**SteveRiley** · Feb 09, 2012, 07:05 PM

Indeed, Snopes has something to say about this. October 2009, BTW.

FactCheck also weighs in with a similar debunking. And note that the program is funded by carriers, not the government.

Furthermore, the program has a history that essentially excludes any Obama involvement:

The president has no direct impact on the program, and one could hardly call these devices "Obama Phones," as the e-mail author does. This specific program, SafeLink, started under President George Bush, with grants from an independent company created under President Bill Clinton, which was a legacy of an act passed under President Franklin Roosevelt, which was influenced by an agreement reached between telecommunications companies and the administration of President Woodrow Wilson.

**DoYouKubuntu** · Feb 09, 2012, 09:07 PM

See, that's just it, SR--Woody saw this security guard going ballistic over having [supposedly?] seen this actually happen. But, still, my BS detector went into overdrive because it just reeks of Snopes-type nonsense.

**woodsmoke** · Feb 10, 2012, 12:37 AM

Ok, im an idiot....not....

Here is what happened since I last posted, and folks can believe it or not.

The fellow had actually stated the address, in another town.

I drove there and saw nothing at the intersection.

So, there was an established company on what would have been the opposite side of the corner with company trucks parked outside and I figured that an "established business" would probably know something.

So I went to it and black windows....BLACK WINDOWS.... and steel bars inside the windows. Nobody home. Ok, across the street from where the thing would have occured was a "low income grocery store". Not a "quick stop" with a gas station, but a low income "grocery store". I walked across the street, while two policemen cruised by in a car and eyed me. There was a man leaning against a car in the very small parking lot talking to someone in the car, and I very brashly just walked up and asked if anyone knew about free cell phones.

The guy replied yes, they were over there on the opposite, diagonal, corner just an hour or so ago. The woman in the car said she had one of the phones, put down her ciggy and got it out of her purse and showed it to me. The guy got one out of his pocket. They were the same.

I asked how much they cost. The both said fifteen dollars.

I asked about 'a thousand minutes". They both said, yes a thousand minutes and you pay in the store after you get the phone and a piece of paper.

They asked why I was asking, and I said a friend of mine had told me about it.

I asked again how they got the phone.

The man said something to the effect of. "You show them a receipt for your last months rent, they give you the phone and a piece of paper with a number on it. You take it in the store and pay them fifteen dollars they give you a number to call and the phone works.

He then volunteered the information that there was "probably" another similar operation at another location.

I asked why they weren't there now.

He said something to the effect of..."They just show up every once in a while. You never know when they will show up. They set up one of those tent things and put out a sign for free phones. People start showing up with a rent receipt and they give the phones away.

I asked something like do they verify the rent receipt. The guy said no, you just show them a receipt. And then something like, "It's always the same people getting the phones."

And then he again said that it is just random when they show up, and they just appear for an hour or so and then just disappear.

I then asked if I could take a picture of the phone and assured them that I would not take a picture of their face and she gave him hers and he held it while looking at my Android to see that I just took a picture of the phone. They did not ask why I was taking the picture.

I asked how long the phones had been given away like this and the guy said something to the effect of: "Oh about two years or so."

I asked if this was an "Obama program".

He said he didn't know for sure but that the street said that it started a little while after he became President, although he didn't know, but that the street said that they are Obama phones. The woman agreed.

I asked who the minutes were from. They both did not know because they do not actually DO anything except take the paper to the store. They thought the company was something like "Lifeminutes", that the store did all the work.

I thanked them PROFUSELY and said I would go into the store and check there.

The guy said, very cryptically: "I don't know as I would do that....."

I asked why.

And he said...."People like you don't go in there."....

I said "what" or something like that because I was so....flabbergasted.

He again said something like "you're too fancy to go in there I wouldn't go.".

Note: I was wearing black slacks with black suspenders and a white striped shirt and black cowboy boots ( my normal attire for the college about once every two weeks or so because I like to "change things up" for the students instead of just always showing up in a grey suit with chalk dust on my shoulders.)

I thanked them again and started toward the store and the woman said, from the car...."You shouldn't go in there!"....

But...I went anyway....

Edit, the woman was caucasian and the man was probably "mixed".... I say this in light of the fact that the security officer is African American and the man he talked to was same.

I go in.

Nobody in the store except a caucasian at the counter and another in an "overview" "half height" office behind the counter.

I said something to the effect that I had heard about free phones being given away and was told that the minutes were sold in the store.

The fellow at the counter said "to the effect of" "Yeah they show up once in a while and give them away at the corner over there and the people bring us the phone and a sheet of paper with a number on it and we call...

WAIT a minute.....just WHO ARE YOU anyway.....you some kind of investigator or somthin'....?"

About that time the guy in the half office is out of the dutch door and down the steps and moving around the counter...

Just who the @#$% you think you are get the...@#$% outta here!

By then I was backing myself away and toward the door and turn around to open the door, which was glass, and the man and woman were standing outside, facing kind of "diagonal" smoking cigarettes with their "eyes toward the door".

I was out of the door and the guy said.."I told you to not go in there."

I said something like you were right and thanked them again for being so helpful and went back to my car and left.

Now...I know the area... I lived in an apartment about 6 blocks away some ten years ago. I do not consider it "dangerous" or "black" but it was, and is, "run down" and "old".

Ok....so I called the security guard when I was driving to the Elks and he almost fell down laughing that I had "gone there". And then seriously said that if he thought I would go there he would have not given me the address.

He followed up with conversation to the effect that it is not a "racist" thing, because, he said, basically, the midwest has moved beyond racism. But, that there are a lot of "big city" people moving into the area, and have been for several years, that are dragging the racism with them.

He didn't know about the two people in the store but did say that the whole area is known for "small change" drug use etc.

But again, and he was laughing...."Only you Mr. Woodsmoke would just go to a place like that to check out my story!" laugh laugh laugh....

Ok I am now at the elks in the bar and tell them the story and show them the picture. A city bus driver is sitting there and he turns around to me and stares at me and says...."YOU....went over THERE? People like you, and even me, don't go there. I drive a bus through there but I wouldn't GO there." and then shakes his head and laughs and goes on about how only YOU would go someplace like that to check on that etc. etc.

Everybody is shaking their heads and laughing and then one of them asked me for a donation for the Shriners.

Ok I get back to the apartment and do some checking....the people were hazy on the "name" of the entity selling the minutes.

Here is a discussion of what I think is the entity selling the phones.

http://www.freegovernmentcellphones..../life-wireless

Here is the company's website:

https://www.lifewirhttp://www.lifewi....com/about.php

Here is the holding company behind them, notice the date of incorporation: 1997.

http://www.usac.org/default.aspx

Here is the wikipedia page on the "holding company" and one should notice two dates. 1996 and 2011.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Universal_Service_Fund

Ok, it is not a picture of the popup tent.

It is a picture of the phone.

But at least it isn't a grainy picture of the Loch Ness monster or a UFO.

So....one has to ask two questions which may, or may not, be relevant.

The government money has lain dormant for quite a few years. The incorporation of the holding company coincides with the date in the Wikipedia article.

"Things were moved forward" in 2011, but no money was allocated for the actual program, according to the Wikipedia article.

The two people both agreed that the free phones showed up about "two years ago"... and after the Obama administration came into office.

And.....

Why is it that there is not an "established store front" for this operation.

Why does it "appear for an hour or so" and then "disappear".

Why is it that the people do not have to VERIFY their low income housing rent, they just "show a receipt".

Why is it that the people really do not know WHO is providing the "thousand minutes" .....they take a piece of paper across the street to a store and hand it over and are activated and do not actually know "what" is going on?

They have a phone. They have a thousand minutes to do with as they wish.

They "think" it is "an Obama phone".

Just questions for folks to ponder Snopes or no Snopes.

woodsmoke

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