Kryztian
29th October 2016, 05:25
We Avalonians are no stranger to the idea of conspiracy, but in “polite society”, it is just plain rude to doubt what the nice people on the television are so generously giving us as “information.”
Even if we are aware that some of them are CIA members or secretly attend Bilderberg and Bohemian Grove meetings, you must know it’s because they love and care about us, the world’s sheeople, truly, madly and deeply.
And yet, it’s now 2016, and you can not, not if you don’t care about this election and now something about current U.S. events, I repeat, YOU CAN NOT, fail to be a conspiracy theorist. You have to believe that something is going on behind the scenes. The question is, which kind of conspiracy theorist are you? So, here’s a list of the different possible conspiracy camps:
1) We may have forgotten who the mother of all political conspiracy theorists is: on January 27, 1998, then First Lady Hillary Clinton went on the “Today Show” and told interviewer Matt Lauer:
This is—the great story here for anybody willing to find it and write about it and explain it is this vast right-wing conspiracy that has been conspiring against my husband since the day he announced for president.
She was expressing a sentiment many of her supporters believed. That conservative U.S. politicians were imaging and creating fictitious crimes and mis representing them in the media. Since Hillary (and often Bill) was investigated for the death of Vince Foster, Travelgate, White Water, Benghazi, e-mail gate, etcetera, etcetera, etcetera, and was never convicted, this clearly demonstrates her lily white innocence and the fact the right wing is out to get her by fabricating everything it can.
This was held to be a Gospel truth in 1998 and is believe even more fervently now as her supporters cling to her in the fear of what would be a Trump presidency.
2) Then there is the vast neo-liberal conspiracy enacted by the DNC along with the media on behalf of Hillary Clinton and against Donald Trump. While this idea is many months old, Trump himself finally embraced it in his speech of October 13th in Palm Beach:
The Clinton Machine is ... closely and irrevocably tied to media organizations ... the reporters collaborate and conspire directly with the Clinton Campaign on helping her win the election ...
The most powerful weapon deployed by the Clintons is the corporate media. And their agenda is to elect the Clintons at any cost, at any price, no matter how many lives they destroy.
Full Speech transcript at https://www.donaldjtrump.com/press-releases/remarks-on-the-clinton-campaign-of-destruction
This version of the conspiracy is embraced much more warmly here on Avalon and is more fresh in everyone’s memory so I will say no more about it.
3) Then there is the conspiracy that Trump is part of a plan to get Clinton elected. That he would first knock any Republican who was a serious challenge to Clinton out of the primary race and then turn the election into a side show carnival devoid of real issues. I first heard this theory in the early Fall of 2015, when the candidates started their first Republican debates, Trump seemed to receive a disproportionate amount of media attention.
https://pbs.twimg.com/media/CqVa7TAUkAI-Ccy.jpg
In the last few months, the hostility between both parties seems so real and intense that the idea they could be working together seems to have vanished. Also, Trump has raised some real issues, however, from the vantage point of most moderate to liberal Americans getting there news from main stream media, a few of Trump’s recent off key remarks combined with old dirt that has been dredged up on him, the media really has turned his message into a unabashed freak show. The Trump / Clinton drama now seems to be too intense for anyone to believe that they are secretly friends, just as spectator’s at the Andre the Giant versus Hulk Hogan wrestling match knew by overwhelming emotion at the event, that Worldwide Wrestling Federation could not possibly produce fixed events.
Can we really know what is genuine and sincere, and what is artifice in manipulation, behind the curtain of this multi billion dollar election spectacular?
4) Then there is that idea that the object of “the grand conspiracy” isn’t to get any particular candidate elected, but instead, that the process of an election will do real deep damage to the fabric of American society; that it will divide the American people into factions that are deeply resentful and hateful towards the other factions; that it will keep them from discussing the important issues that are most in their interest, and that it will keep them from evaluating the situation in a way that is rational and evidenced based, and instead, lead people to make simple but highly emotional judgements about what is good and evil, instead of looking at the complexity of all the issues that need to be addressed.
Take for instance the issue of Hillary Clinton’s e-mail. Most people have very firmly held convictions about her innocence and guilt, while they only know just a few fact to support their view. When the FBI announced that they were reopening the case, some instantly concluded that this would be her demise and her guilt would be revealed, while others had the automatic conviction that this was more evidence of the “vast right wing conspiracy” against her. How many people actually stopped to ask what the new evidence was and thought it could be evaluated in an open ended way, without a foregone conclusion about her guilt or innocence? We have been seriously dumbed down.
If Trump or Clinton is elected in two weeks, they are going to be the most hated President ever. And that is not two years into their term, that is at the outset. The United States of America is going to be the most angry and irritable (at least at a political level) nation in the world.
* * * * * *
I think all of the four ideas of conspiracy have a certain traction and truth to them, even if they do seem to contradict one another. I am not saying that any one is more right or wrong that the other, just noting how complex the idea of “conspiracy” is, and how it is part of everyone’s thinking, and necessarily so.
On the other hand, we really don’t know what goes on in closed door meetings and we don’t know how sincere the political statements we hear really are. We see the two dimensional figure of the politician projected onto screens and in newsprint and we think we know who they really are: their real motives and motivations, their real skills and their real thoughts. But we don’t, even though there is a real human being behind the projected two dimensional image. And yet we find our selves loving and hating them, of project more love and hatred toward them then anyone we know and interact with daily in our real lives.
And I will admit that until election day, I will, despite my best efforts, continue to foolishly project my emotional energy (mostly negative) into the television screen towards these two individuals thinking I know who they really are and what they are about.
Even if we are aware that some of them are CIA members or secretly attend Bilderberg and Bohemian Grove meetings, you must know it’s because they love and care about us, the world’s sheeople, truly, madly and deeply.
And yet, it’s now 2016, and you can not, not if you don’t care about this election and now something about current U.S. events, I repeat, YOU CAN NOT, fail to be a conspiracy theorist. You have to believe that something is going on behind the scenes. The question is, which kind of conspiracy theorist are you? So, here’s a list of the different possible conspiracy camps:
1) We may have forgotten who the mother of all political conspiracy theorists is: on January 27, 1998, then First Lady Hillary Clinton went on the “Today Show” and told interviewer Matt Lauer:
This is—the great story here for anybody willing to find it and write about it and explain it is this vast right-wing conspiracy that has been conspiring against my husband since the day he announced for president.
She was expressing a sentiment many of her supporters believed. That conservative U.S. politicians were imaging and creating fictitious crimes and mis representing them in the media. Since Hillary (and often Bill) was investigated for the death of Vince Foster, Travelgate, White Water, Benghazi, e-mail gate, etcetera, etcetera, etcetera, and was never convicted, this clearly demonstrates her lily white innocence and the fact the right wing is out to get her by fabricating everything it can.
This was held to be a Gospel truth in 1998 and is believe even more fervently now as her supporters cling to her in the fear of what would be a Trump presidency.
2) Then there is the vast neo-liberal conspiracy enacted by the DNC along with the media on behalf of Hillary Clinton and against Donald Trump. While this idea is many months old, Trump himself finally embraced it in his speech of October 13th in Palm Beach:
The Clinton Machine is ... closely and irrevocably tied to media organizations ... the reporters collaborate and conspire directly with the Clinton Campaign on helping her win the election ...
The most powerful weapon deployed by the Clintons is the corporate media. And their agenda is to elect the Clintons at any cost, at any price, no matter how many lives they destroy.
Full Speech transcript at https://www.donaldjtrump.com/press-releases/remarks-on-the-clinton-campaign-of-destruction
This version of the conspiracy is embraced much more warmly here on Avalon and is more fresh in everyone’s memory so I will say no more about it.
3) Then there is the conspiracy that Trump is part of a plan to get Clinton elected. That he would first knock any Republican who was a serious challenge to Clinton out of the primary race and then turn the election into a side show carnival devoid of real issues. I first heard this theory in the early Fall of 2015, when the candidates started their first Republican debates, Trump seemed to receive a disproportionate amount of media attention.
https://pbs.twimg.com/media/CqVa7TAUkAI-Ccy.jpg
In the last few months, the hostility between both parties seems so real and intense that the idea they could be working together seems to have vanished. Also, Trump has raised some real issues, however, from the vantage point of most moderate to liberal Americans getting there news from main stream media, a few of Trump’s recent off key remarks combined with old dirt that has been dredged up on him, the media really has turned his message into a unabashed freak show. The Trump / Clinton drama now seems to be too intense for anyone to believe that they are secretly friends, just as spectator’s at the Andre the Giant versus Hulk Hogan wrestling match knew by overwhelming emotion at the event, that Worldwide Wrestling Federation could not possibly produce fixed events.
Can we really know what is genuine and sincere, and what is artifice in manipulation, behind the curtain of this multi billion dollar election spectacular?
4) Then there is that idea that the object of “the grand conspiracy” isn’t to get any particular candidate elected, but instead, that the process of an election will do real deep damage to the fabric of American society; that it will divide the American people into factions that are deeply resentful and hateful towards the other factions; that it will keep them from discussing the important issues that are most in their interest, and that it will keep them from evaluating the situation in a way that is rational and evidenced based, and instead, lead people to make simple but highly emotional judgements about what is good and evil, instead of looking at the complexity of all the issues that need to be addressed.
Take for instance the issue of Hillary Clinton’s e-mail. Most people have very firmly held convictions about her innocence and guilt, while they only know just a few fact to support their view. When the FBI announced that they were reopening the case, some instantly concluded that this would be her demise and her guilt would be revealed, while others had the automatic conviction that this was more evidence of the “vast right wing conspiracy” against her. How many people actually stopped to ask what the new evidence was and thought it could be evaluated in an open ended way, without a foregone conclusion about her guilt or innocence? We have been seriously dumbed down.
If Trump or Clinton is elected in two weeks, they are going to be the most hated President ever. And that is not two years into their term, that is at the outset. The United States of America is going to be the most angry and irritable (at least at a political level) nation in the world.
* * * * * *
I think all of the four ideas of conspiracy have a certain traction and truth to them, even if they do seem to contradict one another. I am not saying that any one is more right or wrong that the other, just noting how complex the idea of “conspiracy” is, and how it is part of everyone’s thinking, and necessarily so.
On the other hand, we really don’t know what goes on in closed door meetings and we don’t know how sincere the political statements we hear really are. We see the two dimensional figure of the politician projected onto screens and in newsprint and we think we know who they really are: their real motives and motivations, their real skills and their real thoughts. But we don’t, even though there is a real human being behind the projected two dimensional image. And yet we find our selves loving and hating them, of project more love and hatred toward them then anyone we know and interact with daily in our real lives.
And I will admit that until election day, I will, despite my best efforts, continue to foolishly project my emotional energy (mostly negative) into the television screen towards these two individuals thinking I know who they really are and what they are about.