A constant theme of the SportsGematria YouTube channel’s videos is that Hubbard, despite talking big and congratulating the winners who took his advice, never seems to provide any solid evidence that he actually places bets himself. You don’t acquire a perfect nickname like “After the Fact Zach” without relying heavily on waiting until the game is over. Exuding confidence and actually being confident are entirely different things. It’s so much easier to come across as exuding confidence when the question is difficult, but you have a cheat sheet you reference instead of your own brain power.
From the way a lot of people act they have gone through decades of life never realizing that the con in “con artist” means confidence. TLDR. If you’re decent in the critical thinking skills department you have a leg up on the competition. First you’re willing to admit your own brain does stupid things at times, some people are smarter than you or a specialist with knowledge you don’t possess and can use, and someone exhibiting confidence without the right information to back up that confidence is really fucking dangerous. The con artist is an expert; an artist. Gaining your confidence through manipulation of emotion.
People would have money than be right about things.
Short term contact long enough to get you to bite at the bait, then goodbye.
I am 100% confident I’ve talked about projection on this blog in the past. For a period of some months I had a special post dedicated to the best projection of the month. Willful deception be it positively projecting your a Good Samaritan while actually stealing behind the scenes, or the ever popular, “I’m a bad ass, you’re a loser troll”.
But considering what’s going on with the Epstein files now let’s turn to a more personalized story. My first encounter with a malignant narcissist long term. And what a learning experience it was that I was able to utilize going forward.
My first college roommate was a high school friend, maybe the only nerdier person than me. His first girlfriend, (GF from here on) was a real piece of work. I already knew about willfully deceptive tactics in dating. For instance, the handsome guy who eventually uses his skills to make sure he leaves the bar with a different conquest each trip. Over time I realized GF had elevated projection to an art form because she actually believed she was the smartest, prettiest, most perfect person in the world. GF was physically attractive, she was certainly bright enough although never managed to show exceptional intellectual skills. And something was always off about her constant need to get attention. Everyone in the guys dorm fawned over GF was so special and how out of her league rookie was.
Except me. I wanted nothing to do with her. And that was why she deliberately went out of her way to interrupt me as much as possible. Constantly being in my dorm room, even pretending to sleep while roomie was away at class. Trying to conquer the one hold out that wouldn’t accept the goddess in his midst. Of course roomie was enthralled and wouldn’t accept even the slightest infraction on common decency as a problem, much last the major infractions on my college life. I’ll spare you more details.
Armed with this knowledge, this first hand experience with narcissism elevated to Narcissistic Personality Disorder, I landed a job with GF model 2.0. A generation X’er who believed her own hype without any real talent to back it up. When confronted with some pretty obvious facts about the 25 hour work week (on a good week), management’s best defense they could muster.
“She’s extremely confident.”
Shortly thereafter, Model 2.0 knowing I was on to her doubled down. My lack of interest in anything to do with her combined with being promised an executive position from the date of hire made her determined to break me. I discovered for myself what later became to be openly known as quiet quitting, unwilling to work 60 hours a week just to keep up with the psychological and direct job related sabotage. And let me throw in the only time that I confronted her on her faults (only about direct job related performance), in the heat of the moment she actually told me I was the most condescending person ever. That just confirmed what I already knew, a very NPD type of thing to say.
I had my escape plan prepared and left just before the Trump political era. And it’s totally unsurprising that this company’s management team had grown accustomed to the right wing propaganda machine and now they have to deal with lack of results from unjustified overconfidence on top of a government that is making it tough on businesses everywhere. Because, yes, Trump exhibits the same baseless overconfidence that GF and Model 2.0 had shown. And if you think skill in detecting NPD is marketable for employment, well………no.
The same way Model 2.0 desired competent people to do her work while reaping the unwarranted financial rewards - that’s the same way some of the most openly not competent way this administration has become infested with boot licking loyalists. Model 2.0’s management team didn’t care. GF was never given any negative feedback. And I defy you if you want to insist that anyone in Trump’s second term regime has shown consistent positive results. That type of person was from the first term, and they’ve been forced out and the actual swamp has been projected away as FAKE NEWS!! and WITCH HUNT, while the actual stories coming out in the Epstein files and real affordability problems are increasingly hard to defend. Projecting overconfidence when the actual swamp was hiding in plain sight.
Because people don’t like to admit the tiniest bit of being wrong about anything. Not about losing a couple hundred dollars about a sports betting scam. Certainly not admitting to supporting the election of a true monster. The doubling and tripling down sounds less sincere every day. Grasping for straws. Desperately trying to deflect away from how Oz is hiding behind a curtain.
To quote a Triumph song from the GF era -
You say you’re something special.
Well you talk a real good game.
But now the party’s over,
And you just don’t sound, you just don’t sound the same.
Overconfidence. The most dangerous cognitive bias according to the Veritasium video. A video that starts with a parade of really smart, yet humble, people willing to admit that there’s more nuance than the black and white projection offered by propaganda.
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