A WeWork office in San Francisco. (Getty Images)
Opinion editorial by WBZ NewsRadio political analyst Jon Keller
BOSTON (WBZ NewsRadio) — One of the highlights of the end of the year is the publication of the humorist Dave Barry’s annual review of the year’s events, always larded with his appropriate skepticism and cynicism.
Reading through this year’s column, I was struck by a theme Dave didn’t highlight but surely understood – this was a banner year for scammers.
It’s been 160 years since a Chicago bar owner allegedly coined the phrase “there’s a sucker born every minute,” and it rings more true today than ever.
There are the conventional scammers, entrepreneurs like the CEO of WeWork and Travis Kalanick of Uber, who fooled gullible investors into pouring money into their mismanaged businesses.
And then there are legitimate tycoons like Jeff Bezos who gulled cities all over the country into thinking they could outbid New York and DC for the honor of showering tax breaks on Amazon, only to see New York and DC win.
But there are also political scammers, like the ones who stonewalled the Mueller investigation and are trying to do the same to the impeachment process.
Don’t forget scam candidacies like those of tyrant-loving Democrat Tulsi Gabbard and the Deval Patrick signature-gatherers who apparently falsified hundreds of nomination papers.
Other scams: lip service to gun control that yielded nothing…Columbia Gas walking away from the Merrimack Valley fiasco with a slap on the wrist…and the NFL officials who robbed New Orleans of a Super Bowl berth.
Latin may have gone out of vogue, but the phrase caveat emptor is more relevant than ever.
You can listen to Keller At Large on WBZ News Radio every weekday mornings at :55 minutes past the hour. Listen to his previous podcasts on iHeartRadio.
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