The Reality Behind Conspiracy Theory

The Reality Behind Conspiracy Theories and Domestic Terrorism

Directed by Matthew Ehret (2022)

Film Review

The main premises Ehret presents in this short film are

1. The current oligarchy controlling the US government (and the world) came to power via a coup launched through a series of 1961-68  assassinations (Malcom X, John Kennedy, Bobby Kennedy, Martin Luther King among others).

2. All Western elected leaders support the current global oligarchy.

3. Throughout history, powerful rulers have acted to criminalize dissent. In the US, this includes individuals who disagree with the official version of the JFK assassination and 9-11, as well as the Covid narrative and the current war on the fascist leaders the CIA installed in Ukraine in 2014. In Ehret’s view, massive censorship (with government support) by Google, YouTube, Facebook and other big tech companies has essentially cancelled free speech guaranteed by the first amendment to the US Constitution.

Most of the film concerns two decades of efforts by the US oligarchy to suppress dissent by labeling it “conspiracy theory.”

It starts by exploring the work of legal scholars Cass Sunstein and Adrian Vermeule. The pair predicted the blanket censorship of dissent that has occurred in 2022 in their 2008 working paper Conspiracy Theories.

It advocated for greater government control of human behavior via the following strategies:

1. Government “cognitive infiltration” of so-called “extremist groups.”

2. A government ban on “conspiracy theories.”

3. A government tax on people who disseminate “conspiracy theories.”

4. An organized government strategy to engage in “counter speech” (contradicting “conspiracy theories”) or to pay or “encourage” private parties to engage in “counter speech.”

In other writings and speeches, Sunstein promoted the view that unlike other animals, human beings are fundamentally irrational and must be controlled by “enlightened” elites maintaining the illusion of democracy. This was also the fundamental view of George Soros’s mentor Karl Popper.

Obama’s science czar John Holdren, who supported similar views, went so far as to propose a global regime supported by a scientific priesthood with ultimate control over all global populations, resources and environmental management.

According to Ehret, the fatal flaw in the work of Sunstein, Vermeule, Popper, Holdren (and Soros) is their view of human beings as machines under the total control of their genes All five men have totally rejected the notion that human beings can be motivated by metaphysical beliefs (such as conscience, truth, intention, soul, honor, God, justice, patriotism, dignity and inequality) independent of their genes and their bodily functions. Throughout history, many dissidents strongly identified with what they view as “inalienable rights” have been willing to sacrifice popularity, physical comfort and even their lives to defend them. (Ehret gives Bobby Kennedy and Martin Luther King as examples).

Such individuals have always been extremely sensitive to false narratives presented as truth, and the example they set is always extremely contagious.

According to Ehret, modern historians tell you that history is driven by purely random events. The historical record suggests otherwise, that it is shaped by the ideas and intentions (ie conspiracies both for good and for evil) of powerful elites and the truth seekers who oppose them.

The Psychobabble Theory of Assassination

Age of Assassins: The Loners, Idealists and Fanatics Who Conspired to Change the World

Faber and Faber (2013)

Book Review

In essence this book is an encyclopedia of modern day assassinations. In addition to providing comprehensive details of more than a dozen political murders, Newton proposes a general theory of what motivates assassins. In my view, this aspect of the book is a total failure. Mainly because it largely omits compelling evidence of US intelligence/military complicity in the assassinations of Malcolm X, JFK, Martin Luther King, Bobby Kennedy and John Lennon and the attempted assassinations of Reagan, Ford, George Wallace and John Paul II.

I also have a problem with Newton’s assertion that the era of assassinations began with the Lincoln assassination. Assassination via poisoning dates back to Roman times at least.

According to Newton, the Lincoln assassination inspired the Russian Nihilist movement and their numerous assassination attempts (which were ultimately successful) against czar Alexander II.

The Nihilists, in turn, inspired the Irish nationalists and the “propaganda of the deed” (see Why Social Studies Never Made Sense in School: The History of Anarchism ) tendency of the anarchist movement. The result would be a wave of attempted and completed assassinations across Europe and in the US.

The book contains a long section on the life of US anarchist Emma Goldman and the attempted assassination oshe plotted with her lover Alexander Berkman on Henry Clay Frick (hired by Carnegie to break the steel workers union) s. Although she would later renounce violence, her huge public following (according to Newton) would inspire Leon Czolgosz to assassinate president William McKinley.

The book devotes a long chapter to the rise of Serbian nationalism, the Black Hand and the assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand of Austria, the purported cause of World War I. It devotes numerous pages to the Armenian genocide by Ottoman rulers and several assassination attempts against Roosevelt and Truman.

I found the later chapters, beginning with the assassination of John Kennedy, a big disappointment. In my view, this section of the book is pure pop psychology and psychobabble.

Newton identifies three primary motives for assassination:

1) A desire to end the suffering engendered by capitalist greed.

2) The drive for violent retribution in reaction to other killings.

3) A desire to smash the state and other authoritarian structures.

This leaves out all the lone nut assassinations – in which misfits try to murder prominent political figures for no apparent reason at all. Except for the JFK assassination (Newton acknowledges Oswald had accomplices* ). Newton seems to be a strong supporter of the lone nut theory of assassination. He blames the rise of lone nut assassins on deep seated decay and alienation in US society, which he believes is aggravated by the motion picture industry.

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*Based on an acoustical recording obtained from a Dallas police microphone, the 1978 House Committee on assassinations ascertain that Oswald had to have at least one accomplice. See  https://spartacus-educational.com/JFKassassinationsC.htm

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