Thanks Jay, I appreciate you taking the time to read and comment on my daily doses. My thing with this situation was two fold, or two questions if you will.
1/) Are the turtles more important in some peoples eyes?
2/) Has the media answered "yes" to question #1?

One thing my post have done pretty regularly has been getting good dialog going between readers in the comments and that is what this whole platform is about, participation.
It is funny that you used the term "scammers" , who would have ever thought that people would pull a scam that involved being homeless but they do, and I saw a report one time that was from Phoenix, it showed the "homeless" person was driving a nice newer model car and living in a nice house, the guy admitted that he makes around $45K a year standing on the corners with a sign saying "anything helps", he said 3 days a week was all he "worked' at it. The sun is to intense to do it anymore than that.
Those sleeping on sidewalks are the real deal, and there is no doubt in my mind that those individuals or not in a good frame of mind as you conclude.