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I have spent my life navigating the quicksand of human conviction.
I was born and raised under communism, where truth was a state-managed resource, rationalized and redesigned to suit the collective.
In that world, the “snake oil” was the Five-Year Plan, a miracle cure for poverty that always seemed to require just one more sacrifice.
Later, while I was on a deadline with a rifle, the only “truth” was the person standing to your left. In the mud of war, you don’t care about a politician’s speech; you care if the man next to you will hold the line.
As I walked through the halls of diplomacy, I realized that truth is often just a decorative element, a silk tie worn to hide a hollow chest.
Business finally taught me the ultimate lesson: while you can lie to a crowd, you cannot lie to a balance sheet.
The lack of truth there leads to instant ruin.
But it wasn’t until a few days ago, walking through the incense-laden air at the Sydney Festival, that I realized how little the human psyche has changed since the days of the Wild West.
As I moved between booths offering “quantum healing,” energized crystals, and ancient frequencies, I felt a familiar sensation—one I have learned not to ignore.
It was the same feeling I had as a young man watching Communist Party officials promise a utopia that never arrived. Not because the people were foolish—but because the promise was designed to meet a need deeper than logic.
It was the scent of what we casually call “snake oil.”
We like to believe we are more sophisticated than the 19th-century crowd that gathered around a carriage to listen to a man shout about miracles.
We are not.
We have simply changed the stage.
The carriage has become a podcast.
The shouting has become an algorithm.
And the rattlesnake has been replaced with “proprietary bio-hacker mixes.”
Let me be clear.
This is not an attack on belief, spirituality, or the human search for meaning.
I have seen men survive war on belief alone. I respect it.
This is about something else entirely.
It is about those who study belief, map it, and then weaponize it for profit.
The term “snake oil” is a political insult today, thrown like mud in the 2024 US election. But to understand why it sticks, we must look at Clark Stanley, the “King of Rattlesnakes.”
Stanley was a master of “theatrical selling.”
At the Chicago World’s Fair in 1893, he would reach into a box, pull out a live rattlesnake, cut it open, and throw it into boiling water. It was instinctive. Undeniably visceral. If you see the snake, you believe the oil.
When the government seized his shipments in 1917, they found mineral oil, beef fat, red pepper, and turpentine. Not a drop of snake.
Stanley had stolen the concept from Chinese railroad workers who used real water snake oil—rich in omega-3s—and replaced the substance with a show.
In psychological warfare, we call this “The Grain of Truth.”
You take a “water snake” (a real fact) and wrap it in a “rattlesnake” (an exciting fiction). By the time the target realizes the math doesn’t add up, the King has already packed his chariots and left for the next town.
Why do intelligent people—all of us—fall for this?
It is because the “Snake Oil Salesman” doesn’t sell oil. He sells a temporary escape from the human condition.
We are currently living in a “fog of desire,” where our beliefs are hijacked by five primal drivers:
The “fog” is thickest when we are at our weakest. The salesman doesn’t create the fear; he simply maps it and charges you for the compass.
When I moved to the world of business and podcasts, I realized the most dangerous snake oil is deceptive expertise.
In the boardroom, I see “gurus” creating fake evidence through social media bots—the modern version of the “shill” (the man in the 19th-century crowd who pretended to be healed).
Today, the rattlesnake is no longer pulled from a box—it is built on social media.
Fake testimonials, bot-driven authority, rented lifestyles.
The “shill” never disappeared. He just got a verified badge.
My background in communism gave me a unique “fool detector.” When you’re raised in a world of propaganda, you learn to look at the hands, not the mouth.
You ask: Who benefits? Where is the evidence? What happens if this doesn’t work?
At the Sydney Festival, I saw people seeking healing, something I, as a veteran, deeply respect. We all carry scars.
But I’ve also seen the “Rattlesnake Kings” of 2026 advertising “Tibetan singing bowls” as medical cures for cancer.
That’s the line where “spirituality” becomes “snake oil.”
How do we protect ourselves?
In my world, whether in war, intelligence, or business, we rely on something far less glamorous than hope.
We rely on discipline of thought.
Truth is rarely loud. It doesn’t need incense, urgency, or a man holding a metaphorical rattlesnake.
It stands quietly—and it survives scrutiny.
What we need is not more information.
We need logical hygiene.
The same way you clean your body, you must learn to clean your thinking.
From experience—on the battlefield, in interrogation rooms, and across boardrooms—there are a few principles that never fail:
Ask one simple question: What happens if this fails?
In war, a bad decision costs lives. In business, it costs everything you’ve built.
If the answer is vague, emotional, or avoided—you are not being sold truth. You are being sold hope.
Clark Stanley did not sell oil. He sold a performance.
Today’s equivalent is social proof—followers, testimonials, staged success.
But in intelligence, we are trained to ignore the theatre and study behaviour.
Ask: Where is the independent evidence? Not the story—the proof.
In every operation I’ve ever been part of, one question mattered more than all others:
Who benefits?
If the person selling you certainty profits regardless of your outcome, you are not in a partnership.
You are in a transaction designed for their gain.
On the battlefield, trust is earned in small moments, not declared in big speeches.
Apply the same rule.
Before you commit money, time, or belief—test the claim in the smallest possible way.
Truth holds under pressure. Illusion collapses.
The most dangerous moment is not when you are strong.
It is when you are tired, desperate, or searching for answers.
That is when the “fog sellers” appear most convincing.
Not because they are powerful—but because you are human.
The reality is simple.
There is no miracle cure for discipline.
There is no shortcut to competence.
There is no algorithm for meaning.
Only work.
Only time.
Only truth.
I started my podcast to have real, honest conversations with people who have walked through the fire.
We live in a world comfortable with “theatrical sales.” Whether it’s a supplement or a political platform, remember the Rattlesnake King.
He didn’t care about your aching joints. He cared about the penny in your pocket.
My time in the military taught me to trust the man next to me because his actions were visible. Diplomacy taught me to read between the lines. Business taught me that value is created, not invoked.
Don’t let the smell of incense or the roar of the crowd dull your instincts.
The world is full of “water snake oil”, real, useful truths. But they’re often buried under mountains of beef tallow. The most successful people aren’t the ones who find the “miracle cure,” but the ones who do the hard, tedious work of building something real.
I’m curious,
What’s the most compelling “snake oil” you’ve almost fallen for lately?
Was it driven by a desire for power, or a fear of being left behind?
Let’s pull back the curtain together.
