The Snake Oil Caucus

The Snake Oil Caucus

Most middle aged Americans can smell political horseshit a mile away. We grew up with men selling miracle siding out of unmarked vans, fad diets out of church basements, and late night TV hawkers screaming about Bedazzlers, Chia Pets, and Flowbees like the fate of Western civilization depended on a plastic comb with delusions of grandeur. The voice changes. The confidence spikes. The facts thin out. Same act. Different suit.

That is today’s politician.

Only now the van has a campaign logo and the bullshit comes with subtitles.

Well-dressed. Well-rehearsed. Eyes locked straight down the camera like they’re staring into the soul of a focus group in suburban Virginia. Selling salvation in clean sentences, backed by polling data, donor spreadsheets, and a consultant whispering which word tests better with “anxious independents.” No product. Plenty of promises. All of it sealed with moral certainty and a flag lapel pin.

They no longer argue policy.

They preach inevitability.

Every stump speech now sounds like prophecy. This is the last chance. This is the turning point. This is the moment history leans in, nods gravely, and waits for your credit card number. They say it slow, like scripture, letting the words sink into the crowd. Fear first. Then hope. Then applause. The holy trinity of modern governance.

The American people notice patterns. This one is ancient. When someone blusters the end is near, they usually want your coin or obedience. Sometimes both. Usually both.

The lies are not even clever anymore. They are grandiose, focus-grouped, narratively decisive click baited misrepresentations. Delivered with the calm assurance of someone who will never face the music, never stand in line at the registry, never explain a tax hike to a neighbor who plows their driveway. When proven wrong, they do not correct themselves. They pivot. When caught lying, they segue into a game of three-card monte and fill the ether with accusational smoke until the mark forgets which card was ever real.

This works because certainty is easier than honesty. Admitting complexity gets you voted out. Pretending to know everything gets you reelected, preferably by people who confuse volume with conviction and passion with proof.

So they speak in absolutes.

Good versus evil.

Light versus dark.

Us versus them.

The details are optional. The tone does the work. Always has.

What they sell is not policy. It is permission. Permission to stop thinking. Permission to hate without examining why. Permission to believe that failure belongs only to the other side and never, ever to the well-dressed lunatic currently pounding a podium like it owes him money.

That is the snake oil. Not the lie itself. The relief it offers. The sweet release of not having to wrestle with fog filled reality anymore.

American towns are built on committees, arguments, bad coffee, and meetings that never end because one person still believes the details matter. Democracy here was never elegant. It was practical. You hash it out. You compromise. You live with people you disagree with. You shovel the same sidewalks and see each other at the dump on Saturday morning.

Modern politicians despise that model. It does not trend well. It does not raise money. It does not fit into a thirty-second clip with ominous music underneath.

So instead we get performance. Hearings staged for cameras. Speeches written for social media. Crisis language used year-round because calm does not mobilize donors and panic pays better. Governance replaced by theater, and theater replaced by hysteria.

They call themselves leaders.

They behave like pitchmen.

The worst part is not the dishonesty. It is the contempt. They assume the public needs mythology instead of information. They assume voters cannot handle uncertainty or nuance, or the plain truth that most problems are boring, expensive, and thankless to fix. They assume fear is the only motivator left.

That assumption tells you everything you need to know about how they see you.

Mencken understood that democracy’s real danger was not stupidity alone, but the people clever enough to bottle it, label it, and sell it back to the public as virtue. Today’s political class has perfected the craft. They sell outrage like a tonic. Shake well. Take daily. Side effects include permanent suspicion, civic exhaustion, and the creeping sense that nothing ever actually gets fixed.

You can feel it in town halls. In diners. In the long pause after someone mentions politics and everyone silently decides whether it is worth the fight, the headache, or the ruined afternoon. That is the real damage. Not division. Fatigue.

A self-governing people cannot survive on permanent hysteria. Someone still has to balance a budget. Someone still has to fix a bridge. Someone still has to admit when a plan failed and try again without turning it into a holy war.

Snake oil does none of that.

It just keeps the customer coming back, poorer, angrier, and convinced the next bottle will finally work.

Most Americans are patient, but not foolish. We know a con when the bottle is empty and the salesman has already moved on to the next town with the same pitch and a fresh tie.

The question is not whether today’s politicians are lying.

The question is how long we keep pretending not to notice.

Because eventually the pitch runs out.

Then all that is left is the bill.

By Brian Wilson, The Bipartisan Patriot

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