I’ve learned alot of lessons over the years on how to spot bullshit. While reading an exerpt from the book that inspired the movie “The Sting” I saw alot of the called out. See if you can avoid thinking about Al Gore or alot of other politicians as you read them. Of course the title of this post has been specially selected considering the sub prime mortgage mess.
Big-time confidence games are in reality only carefully rehearsed plays in which every member of the cast except the mark knows his part perfectly
Stupid or “lop-eared” marks are often played; they are too dull to see their own advantage, and must be worked up to the point again and again before a ray of light filters through their thick heads. Sometimes they are difficult or impossible to beat. Always they merit the scorn and contempt of the con men. Elderly men are easy to play because age has slowed down their reactions.
Most marks come from the upper strata of society, which, in America, means that they have made, married, or inherited money.
— can you say HOLLYWOOD, Al Gore and Global Warming ? —-
it should not be assumed that the victims of confidence games are all blockheads. Very much to the contrary, the higher a mark’s intelligence, the quicker he sees through the deal directly to his own advantageÂ
The first thing a mark needs is money. But he must also have what grifters term “larceny in his veins”—in other words, he must want something for nothing or be willing to participate in an unscrupulous deal
— I figured this one out years ago. Liberals have not or do not want to. Its this that allows the politician to promise to get votes. Thus liberals may or may not be smarter than conservatives but they certainly have more larceny in their veins. —
If the mark were completely aware of this character weakness, he would not be so easy to trim. But, like almost everyone else, the mark thinks of himself as an “honest man.
The mark’s honesty is always a standing joke among grifters
Never be untidy or drink with a savage. There is nothing worse than drinking when you are trying to tie up a mark. You’ve got to have your nut about you all the time. You need what little sense you’ve got to trim him—and if you had any sense at all, you wouldn’t be a grifter
— and if our politicians had any sense they wouldn’t be grifters …I mean politicians —
In addition to grift sense, a con man must have a good deal of genuine acting ability, He must be able to make anyone like him, confide in him, trust him. He must sense immediately what aspect of his personality will be most appealing to his victimÂ
— Get more women, learn this lesson, they really have trouble with reality—
 If the insideman handles the blow-off properly, the mark hardly knows that he has been fleeced
Good insidemen are rare; they do not seem to occur so frequently as good ropers
— Can you say “Bill-Clinton” —
natural result is that the best ropers cluster about the best insidemen, forming a kind of closed corporation, or monopoly, with the control resting in the hands of the insidemen and their fixersÂ
— Can you say “Bill Clintons organization, hell for that matter any high politicians organization—
A good grifter never misses a chance to get something for nothing, which is one of the reasons why a good grifter is often also a good mark.
—Now you know why the politicians all seem to be such easy marks!—
Nothing pleases him more than to tish a lady—that is, to place a fifty-dollar bill in her stocking with the solemn assurance that if she takes it out before morning, it will turn into tissue paper. Being a woman, she removes it at the earliest opportunity, only to find that it has turned to tissue paper, often with a bit of ribald verse inscribed upon it.
—Women are greedy….no getting around it. —
The public is not only apathetic but naive toward the relationship between confidence men and the law. The man in the street sees crime something like this: if a confidence man trims someone, he should be indicted and punished; first he must be caught; then he must be tried; then, if convicted, he should be sent to prison to serve his full term. The average citizen—if we ignore his tendency to wax sentimental about all criminals—can be generally counted upon to adopt the following assumptions: that the victim of the swindle is both honest and unfortunate; that the officers of the law want to catch the con men; that the court wishes to convict the criminals; that if the court frees the con men, they are ipso facto innocent; that if they are convicted, they will be put in the penitentiary where they belong to serve out their time at hard labor. If these assumptions even approximated fact, confidence men would have long ago found it impossible to operate.
If a city provides complete and exclusive protection for one or more favored con mobs, it is known as “airtight.” This means that the fix is very strong, that the con men are quite secure, and that all competition will be discouraged by vigorous non-fixable prosecution.
—Sounds like how alot of TV / Cell phone industry is run. You can’t get in. If you run your own game you get shut down for appropriating the airwaves for yourself. Any wonder that the internets openness has lead to the conservative view being aired more often? …. The fix is no longer “air tight” !!! —
Con men universally agree that the bum raps always come from right coppers and not from wrong ones. In other words, the maxim of the big con works both ways—if you can’t cheat an honest man, neither will an honest man cheat you.
— hear that blacks? vote conservative if you TRULY want to live better—
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