Monday, June 25, 2007

You Decide: The Best Con Artist Is . . .

An amateur or garden-variety fraud or con is when you find out too late that the fraudster emptied your bank account or stole your investment and disappeared. This is sloppy for the fraudster because now he/she is "wanted" by the law.

The "best" con artist is the worst for everyone else's safety.

The "best" con artist is the one who cons you so well that you do not realize that you have been conned, you profusely thank him/her, you eagerly return to be conned again an again, and you enthusiastically recruit your friends as new victims.

Millionaire Artist wrote:

“Girl power”, my [a@@]. I couldn’t decide what was more disturbing. Was it the fact that these women each paid $5K to join a pseudo-sorority for adults? That they felt a need to pay for friends? That they felt a need to pay for compliments? That what they “bought” boiled down to “self-esteem packaged for the idiotic”? And, oh lord, how self-congratulatory they were! They really thought they were doing something to improve themselves and the lot of women. “Your successes are successes for women everywhere,” said the Guru . . . .

What is the best con or who is the best con artist?

Remember that the best con will be very popular in a Gallup poll.

You decide: Is it a government program? "education"? real estate? cars? clothing?

(Uncivil comments are not welcome but "unpopular" comments might be necessary.)

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

Thanks for the quote! To answer your question, I think the "best" (or perhaps "worst") con is the one that looks like the following:

Here is how you do something. But, remember, you're entirely at fault if it doesn't work. I can show you, but if you can't do it, its your fault, not mine. Why is it your fault? Because you don't want it.

While I like the idea of "the Secret", I think its a perfect example of a methodology to blame the buyer, not the provider for lack of results.

J at IHB and HFF said...

It is true a good con artist should appear blameless if anyone notices failure. That is why "con artist" is short for "confidence artist."

You are welcome for the quote. Thank you for the comment.