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I've been doing a lot thinking lately about Cesar Millan and what makes him so popular. And I think I've got it. As a way of manipulating people it's brilliant, and it's been used for literally thousands of years by many different people. (Obviously, not just for dog training!).

Step One: If you're Cesar Millan the first step is to understand your market. The world is filled with really "good", naturally calm dogs. Think about it, most people put in only a minimum of effort with their dogs, and that actually works out pretty well for them. Most dogs are good at adjusting and just end up fitting into their environment whether that means hiding away most of the time or just laying on the couch.

Step Two: Now, because we can't speak doggy language without some work, a whole bunch of these people with good dogs are going to have small issues. Find those people and get them on camera! All their dog needs is basically some structure and attention in it's life, and it will be a perfect dog. You come in, wave your magic wand, (and tell them the dog needs structure and attention), the dog is "cured" and you are hailed as a genius! Even better, all those people tell their friends you are a genius.

Step Three: Those people don't have the money or power to make you a national figure, you need celebrities to do that. You'll notice that Cesar drops celebrity names like crazy in his books. He's especially fond of Oprah, the most powerful woman in the world who, with a mere mention, can cause books to fly off the shelves. Luckily celebrities often have these dogs as well, so you do the same for them, but you do a lot more. First of all, you know that all celebrities really feel kind of guilty about their wealth and power. They secretly think they don't deserve it, and really, they don't deserve all the money they have, even if they are good at what they do. So you fix their dog, but then you say something like this, "Hey, Will Smith, it's been great working with you to fix your dog. But I can tell, you're a natural, you've always been the pack leader in life and you get it. I'm sure that's why you've had all the success you have, because you're a naturally strong person. But isn't it sad about the people who don't have as much success as us? I wish there were some way we could work together to get the message out to the others who are struggling so much. Hey, how about if I wrote a book and mentioned you and you came on my TV show? What a great chance for you to use your celebrity to save the world!"

Celebrities eat this stuff up. They are all alone in the world with almost nobody who can truly relate to them. They feed off of people who either tell them how normal they are, or people who tell them they just naturally deserve what they have and wouldn't it be great to "help the others". If you do this enough times you'll be nationally known.

Step four: try to remain somewhat credible. To stay at the top you're going to have to show yourself saving some hopeless cases. So what you do is invent a term like "red zone" dogs. You find dogs that appear to be "red zone" (but really aren't) and then you cure them (isn't video editing wonderful!) If you accidentally choose the wrong dogs, you just take them away to your "Dog Psychology Center" where, by the way, no actual psychology takes place. So nobody will ever see your failure again.

Step five: rake in the money. You've got a TV show where you do the same thing every week. You've got a canned spiel that will work for newspapers and talk shows. You've got books to sell by the millions. And here's the best most important part:

You've got a whole set of people out there that had great dogs and didn't know it. You've convinced them that they are the pack leader. These people, and celebrities, when seeing other people with "bad" dogs, will judge them. They will say, "That person is not the pack leader. They need Cesar's books and DVDs." (Which by the way, they've never read or watched because, frankly, they didn't need to.) There's no real way of measuring "pack learderness", so they can never be proven wrong.

Cesar has built this whole mega business without helping anyone who actually needs help. He helps only those that think they need help, but really don't (or need just a little help), and they never know the difference. There are still half the dogs out there that need basic or extensive training, and they will never be helped by Cesar, his TV show, his books, his celebrity minions, or anyone who has a naturally good dog. He has actually made it worse by dividing the groups, but he's made millions doing that, and that's what's important to him.

Still skeptical?

Let's talk briefly about breast cancer, since breast cancer awareness month is almost over. Statistically some people with breast cancer die, and some people go into remission. I don't know what the exact percentages are, but it doesn't matter for this discussion, so let's say it's 50/50. Knowing this, I tell everyone that "thinking positively" will cure breast cancer. The half that live don't know why, and they're look for a reason because it would be so unfair if it was just random. They're so emotional, they'll sing my praises to the highest mountain. The half that die, well, they don't live to tell anyone my methods don't work. It's painful to talk or think about them, so people don't. Kind of evil, huh? That's both literally and figuratively The Secret.

Cesar Millan is The Secret for dogs (and a total douche.)