EPIPHANY OF THE DAY

 CONSPIRACIES

 When I came to the state on leave from Navy Boot Camp, I encountered the first major conspiracy theory I can recall. Yes, of course, it was that “new information” was telling us that the assassination of John F. Kennedy was a staged affair. Jack Ruby had been involved in the assignment to murder Lee Harvey Oswald and then he was somehow injected with drugs that would end his life soon from a pulmonary embolism.

It was a fairly simple conspiracy theory. Somehow “the mob” had orchestrated it by selecting the most unlikely hit man in mob history, the befuddled Oswald to carry out the complicated assignment.

Conspiracy theories evolve. From this simple offering, we now face a theory requiring more complicated interactions than nuclear physics. The array of conspirators grew from the mob to practically everyone occupying a high national government post since the act, all orchestrated by Lyndon Johnson who was a member of the motorcade himself. Oh, we must also include practically the entire public administration of Dallas, Texas along with a substantial portion of state officials. Oh, and the owners of the building from where the shots were fired. Some of shots that is. Another barrage erupted from the crowd on a nearby hill. Or so they say.

In all this time there has not appeared one verifiable—verifiable—tidbit of proof that the affair was anything more than the unfortunate act of a lunatic.

In all this time, there has not been one deathbed confession underlying the myriad theories.

In all this time there has, in fact, been no evidence to support this “Great Mother” of conspiracy theories.

That period of time is now approaching 60 years.

Putting that in perspective, let us consider a real conspiracy. Let’s take, say, the Iran-Contra Caper, a political scandal in the United States that occurred during the second term of the Reagan administration.

It consisted of a secret U.S. arms deal that traded missiles and other arms to free some Americans held hostage by terrorists in Lebanon, but also used funds from the arms deal to support armed conflict in Nicaragua.

In short, the administration was secretly selling arms to Iran (yes Iran) in order secretly finance an illegal funding of a war in Nicaragua.

The caper fell apart in less than a year. Some of its participants suffered. Some didn't. One main actor, Oliver North (of whom one writer once said that "there is a faint smell of sulfur about him") Oliver North received a lifetime sentence requiring him to be a spokesperson for the Republican Party.

In her book, The Age of Magical of Overthinking, author Amand Montell calls conspiracy theories “sense-making narratives. This is consistent with historian William Manchester’s opinion not long after the JFK conspiracy began to sprout wings. The author of “The Death of a President, once said:

“ …, in a curious way, there is an esthetic principle involved. If you take the murder of six million Jews in Europe and you put that at one end of a scale, at the other end you can put the Nazis, the greatest gang of criminals ever to seize control of a modern government. So there is a rough balance. Greatest crime, greatest criminals.

''But if you put the murder of the President of the United States at one end of the scale, and you put that waif Oswald on the other end, it just doesn't balance. And you want to put something on Oswald's side to make it balance. A conspiracy would do that beautifully.

“Unfortunately, there is no evidence whatever of that.''

But still we believe on.