{"id":175,"date":"2006-08-04T06:25:29","date_gmt":"2006-08-04T10:25:29","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/oddempire.org\/weblog\/?p=175"},"modified":"2017-11-28T13:53:16","modified_gmt":"2017-11-28T17:53:16","slug":"paranoid-views","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/oddempire.com\/weblog\/2006\/08\/04\/paranoid-views\/","title":{"rendered":"Paranoid Views"},"content":{"rendered":"

<\/span><\/p>\n

One hopes that a new Scripps Howard\/Ohio University poll is wrong because, if it isn’t, a third of the nation seems to be slipping into La-La Land.<\/span><\/p>\n

The poll claims that a third of Americans suspect that federal officials assisted in the 9-11 terrorist attacks or took no action to stop them so the United States could go to war in the Middle East.<\/p>\n

Besides a lack of critical thinking, that is obviously not being taught in the nation’s schools and colleges, what could possibly explain this departure from reality?<\/p>\n

Years before 9-11, Osama bin Laden declared war on the United States and, after the attacks that killed more than 3,000 people, took credit and praised the hijackers as martyrs, and promised eternal jihad against Americans.<\/p>\n

It’\u00a2s true that conspiracy theories have run wild on the Internet and, for that matter, on a few college campuses. (The University of Wisconsin has a professor who claims 9-11 was an inside job, and that the CIA was also involved in the Bali bombing, in addition to having a hand in the terrorist acts in Madrid and London.) However, normal folks with minds not in limbo were hoping the UW professor was a fluke, not the norm.<\/p>\n

Paranoid fantasies about the government or UFO alien abduction tales often have an amusing aspect, but the nutty conspiracy theories inevitably become anti-Semitic conspiracy theories, with adherents claiming Jews are the source of all the evil in the world.<\/p>\n

Some 50 years ago, historian Richard Hofstadter published his classic “The Paranoid Style in American Politics.” However, at that time, the goofy paranoid theories were mostly rightwing. Now, it is leftwing believers who are swallowing hook, line and sinker the conspiracy theories du jour.<\/p>\n

George Orwell once said, “To see what is in front of one’s nose takes a constant struggle.”<\/p>\n

Alas, if this poll is right, a third of Americans have lost the struggle. They cannot see what is in front of their noses.<\/p>\n

From……<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

One hopes that a new Scripps Howard\/Ohio University poll is wrong because, if it isn’t, a third of the nation seems to be slipping into La-La Land. The poll claims that a third of Americans suspect that federal officials assisted … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"nf_dc_page":"","WB4WB4WP_MODE":"","WB4WP_PAGE_SCRIPTS":"","WB4WP_PAGE_STYLES":"","WB4WP_PAGE_FONTS":"","WB4WP_PAGE_HEADER":"","WB4WP_PAGE_FOOTER":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-175","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/oddempire.com\/weblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/175","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/oddempire.com\/weblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/oddempire.com\/weblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/oddempire.com\/weblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/oddempire.com\/weblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=175"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/oddempire.com\/weblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/175\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3111,"href":"https:\/\/oddempire.com\/weblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/175\/revisions\/3111"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/oddempire.com\/weblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=175"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/oddempire.com\/weblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=175"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/oddempire.com\/weblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=175"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}