But there is nothing to be done and all resistance is futile.
The con-man now is in a haste to maximize his hard earned profits and exit the scene, on his way to another realm of guile and naivet.
XLVIX. The Eureka Connection
How East and Central Europeans Defraud the Gullible West
A common, guttural cry of "Eureka" echoed as the peoples of East Europe and the Balkan emerged from the Communist steam bath. It was at once an expression of joy and disbelief. That the West should be willing to bankroll the unravelling of a failed social experiment, freely entered into, exceeded the wildest imaginings. That it would do so indefinitely and with no strings attached was a downright outlandish fortuity.
Transition in the post communist countries was coupled with a hubristic and haughty conviction in the transforming powers of the Western values, Western technology, and Western economics. The natives - awe struck and grateful - were supposed to assimilate these endowments and thus become honorary Westerners ("white men"). Where osmosis and immitation failed - bayonets and bombs were called upon. These were later replaced by soft credits and economic micromanagement by a host of multilateral institutions.
Accustomed to Pavolvian interactions, adept at manipulating "the system", experts in all manner of make belief - the shrewd denizens of the East exercised the reflexive levers of the Great Democracies. They adopted stratagems whose sole purpose was to extract additional aid, to foster a dependency of giving, to emotionally extort. In one sentence: they learned how to corrupt the donors.
The most obvious subterfuge involved the mindless repetition of imported mantras. Possessed of the same glazed eyes and furled lips, the loyal members of a perfidious nomenklatura uttered with the same seemingly perfervid conviction the catechism of a new religion.
Yesterday communism - today capitalism, unblushingly, unhesitatingly, cynically. Yesterday, a recondite dictatorship of the proletariat or, more often, a personality cult - today "democracy". Yesterday - brotherhood and unity, today - genocidal "self determination". Yesterday - genocidal inclinations, today - a "growth and stability pact". If required to bark in the nude in order to secure the flow of unsupervised funding (mainly to their pockets), these besuited "gentlemen" would have done so with self- sacrificial ardour, no doubt.