Deception, Trojan Horses, and the Carrot/Stick Combo

Remember the primary way people used to sell things? Particularly the tinkers and snake-oil guys. They would try to trick you into believing what they were selling was something it wasn’t. “Buyer beware” was the motto (well, not their motto, but one nonetheless). The idea was, if you could get away with it, so be it. Getting “swindled,” “hoodwinked,” “duped,” “conned,” “bamboozled,” “fleeced,” “scammed,” or best of all, “taken for a ride,” was the name of the game. And if the tinker got you, it was your fault. The buyer had to be careful. Not too many felt sorry for their naïveté.

Then Big Brother came along. Laws were passed “protecting” the consumer. Big daddy government came to the rescue to help the poor stupid buyer who didn’t know better. Thank God.