What's the worst thing that a con man can have said about him/her?

I've explained in the past how the herd latches on to figure heads / "leaders" and I have given my view that it is a form of data compression.  Basically, we have to trust the views of others in certain fields that we just don't have the bandwidth and capacity to understand for ourselves.  Einstein was a leader in physics. He earned credibility by predicting many things that were later proved when we had the technology to test them.  After that, everything he said was thought to be true no matter what field it covered.

Being a leader is not normally easy.  It is not supposed to be.  If the entire herd is vetting the leaders in real time because real time prosperity depends on it then, under normal conditions, you end up with very strong leaders and the herd gets by nicely.  However, when prosperity flows too easily to too many for too long not because of hard work and smart thinking but rather because of an expanding money supply, people stop vetting the leaders and in fact turn a blind eye to bad stuff that they know the leaders are doing in the name of "don't rock the boat", "go along to get along", etc.

However, when the easy money begins to slow down (it certainly is on a global scale as seen by the plight in Euroland) the whole George Carlin "but nobody seems to notice, nobody seems to care" thing begins to fade and pretty soon it reverse into "everyone suddenly cares about everything".  As part of this new caring, the vetting process begins to occur again.


If you want to attack a leader or keep someone out of leadership, the first thing to do is to attack their credibility.  If the herd learns not to trust someone then that person cannot be used as a truth distiller and thus is no good to the herd as a data compression mechanism.  I mean, if you hear things from people that are sometimes true and sometimes false then you cannot simply assume that the person is truthful.  Thus you have to scrutinize everything they say and that is just too much trouble.

So the concept of "leader" in a herd is basically a faith based title and the person in question loses face (in any way) then people simply will not use them as a truth distiller.  If that happens, the leader in question rapidly loses relevance and fades from view.  You don't have to be a bad person for the herd to not pick you!  The herd is not always wise in its choices, especially in times of plenty when making a mistake doesn't result in great damage or complete destruction of the herd.  For example, the greatest complaints that I have heard about Ron Paul were:

• Squeaky voice
• Not charismatic enough
• Suits don't fit right
• "Too gloomy"

During the artificially good times, people needed Hollywood good looks, a strong speaking voice and of course promises upon unkeepable promises.

• Note  I want to be on the record as saying that Ron Paul's popularity will increase in inverse proportion to the money supply.  As the bad debt is recognized and written off it will cause the money supply to fall and the deflationary crash will wipe the smug liberal smiles off of all the faces of those who value flash and spin over common sense, honesty, sound money and plain talk.  I don't think this is coming, I know it is.  It is completely obvious to me.  He might have to die of old age before it actually occurs but they will be putting his statues up in the future.  The new conservative mood ensures it will happen.

So now the current "leaders" are being subjected to the revived vetting process and they are now taking all kinds of flak (just as I predicted it would happen when the Ponzi was on its final legs).  The blind eye is no more; it is now a hawk eye in which no little transgression goes unnoticed and all of the past ones are spilling out.  The signals are being sent out which undermine confidence in these faith based leaders.  They are being laughed at in print and their credibility is being eroded on all fronts such that the herd finds it more and more difficult to use them as a truth distillation source going forward.  Such pokes in jest are not good for politicians but there is another even more damaging kind of attack on one's credibility and that is to feel sorry for them.

And so today's ongoing evidence that I was right in my early observations that Hillary was  coming under attack comes from "Morning Joe" Scarborough who said "I was embarrassed for them" while referring to Hillary's spokespeople.  This is one of the most damning things that people can be told about someone who would hold him/herself up to be a faith based leader.  If the people share this feeling (and they probably do given that Joe decided to say it in plain talk on the air), they cannot possibly back Hillary and will begin to distance themselves from her even faster going forward.  Time will tell but I stand behind my recent call that Hillary is done.