Editor: If truth were truly valued we’d have to admit that, whatever else it might be, America is nothing if not the ultimate hustle, the Vatican of a religion whose patron saint is Phineas T. Barnum.
P.T. was that 19th century uber-hustling entrepreneur who famously fleeced ignorant rubes out of hard-earned cash by selling them little more than the illusion of their own hopes. He founded Ringling Bros. and America has been a circus ever since.
His spirit drives ads for “beauty products,” “diet” soda, erectile dysfunction drugs and special-effects commercials prescribing automobiles as a cure for male sexual inadequacy, bestowing super-organ powers at orgasmic speeds nowhere permitted on any road on the planet.
P.T.’s B.S. still works, upending countless rubes by their ankles and shaking the last piece of spare (sparce?) change from their pockets.
Nowhere is his touch more apparent than in real estate ads, whose property descriptions echo the midway barker luring the terminally credulous into The Big Tent where, “for a mere $5.00!” they can see “The Amazing Two-Headed Man Holding Cleopatra’s Asp.”
A recent ad touting a historic local property was classic P.T, worthy of a Pulitzer. Translated into the Barnumian prose of his time, it might easily have read:
“Step right up, Young People! For a mere $1.2 million You — Ordinary Mortals — can own a Piece of History! And need we note: They are NOT making History anymore! Behold the sepia-tone ghosts of your great-great-grandfather’s yesteryear seeping from every crevice of this hallowed abode to envelop your heart and, yes, your wallet, lovingly infusing each with the irresistible warmth of loving debt whose embrace will ease you gently to your own exalted place in history and the grave. Please! Ignore shallow fools hissing the Viperous Lie that, in the 21st century, this ancient abode is but a mere Shack! For, Lo, obscured by the moat in their Ungodly eye and awaiting your discovery is the Diamond of your Destiny!”
Such blarney is constitutionally protected. Our devoutly capitalist way of life depends on a bountiful harvest of suckers and, contrary to what we are told, poorly educated children are vital to our economy. By the time they are old enough to find the exit from a distracting childhood tent full of dancing bears, iPods and three-breasted cows they discover they are clutching a stuffed Frog and not a Prince, and their pockets have been turned inside-out.
Sometimes, just to maintain hope in the face of crushing realities we want, or need, to believe The Lie. At one time or another P.T.’s flim-flammery has separated us all from our cash, and sometimes our common sense. It happens right here in Sonoma, where some will surely pay $5.00 for a ticket to see the Amazing Two-Headed Couple who pays $1.2 million for that shack.
Bob Edwards
Sonoma
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