One malicious side effect of Americans’ bootstrap ethos (itself just a massive grift to empower the snickering rich) is that it conditions people to cheer at deregulation, to beg and plead for the removal of consumer protections. We are literally asking to be conned; we are a smorgasbord for the most unscrupulous and the least deserving. Being a giant fucking sucker is as American as school shootings.
