Watch for this trick: 'Cooling the Mark Out'. When the con-men try and

[applegrove]

get you to take ownership of something they pulled on you as a voter. It diffuses your anger. Not to be confused with taking responsibility for your own actual shit (like for me it would be being dismissive of religion when it truly is a human emotion called faith I just was not born with - or thinking that America in a HUGE CASH CRUNCH can afford luxurious social programs when it can only afford a few social programs like education & universal health care that really pay their way).

Getting Americans to feel responsible for the high cost of gas (when the world did not diversify 30 years ago) is a way to diffuse our anger and the Oil Industry and politicians in their pockets. Also known as 'Cooling the Mark Out' it is a time tradition of the Con Game.

For more information on the 'Cooling the Mark Out' con:


"On Cooling the Mark Out*
Some Aspects of Adaptation to Failure



Erving Goffman†



In cases of criminal fraud, victims find they must suddenly adapt themselves to the loss of sources of security and status which they had taken for granted. A consideration of this adaptation to loss can lead us to an understanding of some relations in our society between involvements and the selves that are involved. In the argot of the criminal world, the term "mark" refers to any individual who is a victim or prospective victim of certain forms of planned illegal exploitation. The mark is the sucker‑the person who is taken in. An instance of the operation of any particular racket, taken through the full cycle of its steps or phases, is sometimes called a play. The persons who operate the racket and "take" the mark are occasionally called operators.

The confidence game‑the con, as its practitioners call it‑is a way of obtaining money under false pretenses by the exercise of fraud and deceit. The con differs from politer forms of financial deceit in important ways. The con is practiced on private persons by talented actors who methodically and regularly build up informal social relationships just for the purpose of abusing them; white‑collar crime is practiced on organizations by persons who learn to abuse positions of trust which they once filled faithfully. The one exploits, poise; the other, position. Further, a con man is someone who accepts a social role in the underworld community; he is part of a brotherhood whose members make no pretense to one another of being "legit." A white‑collar criminal, on the other hand, has no colleagues, al*though he may have an associate with whom he plans his crime and a wife to whom he confesses it.

The con is said to be a good racket in the United States only because most Americans are willing, nay eager, to make easy money, and will engage in action that is less than legal in order to do so The typical play has typical phases. The potential sucker is first spotted and one member of the working team (called the outside man, steerer, or roper) arranges to make social contact with him. The confidence of the mark is won, and he is given an opportunity to invest his money in a gambling venture which he understands to have been fixed in his favor The venture, of course, is fixed, but not in his favor. The mark is permitted to win some money and then persuaded to invest more. There is an "accident" or "mistake," and the mark loses his total investment. The operators then depart in a ceremony that is called the blowoff or sting. They leave the mark but take his money. The mark is expected to go on his way, a little wiser and a lot poorer.

SNIP............................."

http://www.tau.ac.il/~algazi/mat/Goffman--Cooling.htm.