[King Black Robe]

If so many others do it better, why is he the rich one? You can't blame it all on trickery.

It is irrelevant whether it is possible or not. The meaning is in the warm feeling it creates. That's real. Talk to the collectors of his art. Observe the smile on the faces of people who view his collections. Something real happens to them.

[AnAmericanMother]

I can and do blame it on trickery, and on taking advantage of naifs. Unfortunately, confidence men have been lifting substantial sums of money on the basis of making people temporarily "feel good" since the beginning of time.

Deducing merit from how people feel about something, regardless of its objective merit, is a flawed analysis. People "felt good" about Mr. Ponzi, until they realized they had been had. People also feel good about "self-esteem," New Age philosophy, mesmerism, past-life-regression, and the Democratic Party. That doesn't prove the merit of any of them.

It appears, however, from the lawsuits and the man's recent behavior, that the crash is about to come.