Not all creatures of habit are cons, but all cons are creatures of habit. That's why they do the same thing, run the same scam, over and over again. Also, being creatures of habit, they recognize the behavior in others and take advantage of it. Creatures of habit are easy prey because their behavior is easy to predict.
Another way to say it is that creatures of habit are instinct-driven. That is, their behavior is invariable, not just because habits are hard to break, but because instincts are not necessarily connected to the cognitive brain where experience has an effect.
In most people, cognition or thought serves as an over-ride, but apparently not in the instinct-driven. So, they don't learn from their mistakes and do the same thing over and over again, making failure their familiar.
They can call it creative destruction. Indeed, they can call it anything they want. They can even come up with a rationale for why "failure by design" is a good thing (shores up the bottom line), but in the great scheme of things, the economy as a whole, these behaviors are ultimately disastrous. Things wear out, but when they are designed to fail, they perpetrate a fraud and fraud undermines exchange and trade.
When economic analysts refer to the importance of confidence in making an economy run smoothly, they've got a valid point. What seems to be missed at the current time is that a horde of middlemen has managed to destroy confidence at all levels. There's an irony there that con men destroy what they count on to thrive.
Calling conservatives cons is appropriate because their stock in trade is basically deception. Deception, as we know from observing other creatures, such as the killdeer or even the pitcher plant, is a matter of instinct and very basic. All it involves is doing the opposite of the normal response to a prompt. Fear seems to trigger it. So, instead of heading for the nest, the perception of threat will prompt a bird to fly in the opposite direction.
Humans, having been gifted with speech, simply prevaricate and say the opposite of what is real. And then, if they happen to be creatures of habit, lying becomes the norm.
"Once a liar, always a liar." But, that's probably only true of the instinct-driven, creature of habit.
How can one tell? I suspect that self-defeating lies are a clue. We assume that the lie is self-protective, so a self-defeating or deprecating story must be true, but that's not necessarily so. If the deception is instinctive and instinct misinterprets information, then it's not a matter of truth, but of instinct not having served the individual well. The basic instincts, relying on the primary senses (sight, sound, smell, taste and touch) are easily dulled and deceived. Things "look" good, for example, but often turn out to be poison -- i.e. the instinct to touch poison ivy has to be restrained.
That liars tell stories that put themselves into an unfavorable light is probably one of the hardest things to comprehend. Willard's Seamus story is probably a good example. Why does he tell it over and over again? Because it gets him credibility for his other lies.
The instinct-driven are very good at sussing out other people's weaknesses, including their adherence to the truth. Think about it. An habitual liar considers truth-telling a weakness in that it leaves people vulnerable to being attacked. Which is why Dubya's people honed in on John Kerry's medals for bravery under fire. The truth was that Kerry felt those medals had not been properly earned because the military action was not proper/moral to begin with. So, the liars attacked him for his truth-telling.
That's abusive and hard to defend against. That's why other people have to step up and call out the liars.
What's the point of the Obama ate dog story? It's my guess they're expecting him to come out and say that, yes, he did it, but it was disgusting. And that, of course, would mean they'd tricked him into insulting people who served him strange food, thereby turning his strength (being adaptable) into a weakness. Adaptability is, of course, perceived as a weakness by the instinct-driven creatures of habit.