He's Got a Jones

According to today's paper, an Obama "staffer" has been outed as not only a self-professed communist, but as an adherent to a 9/11 conspiracy theory. Well, to begin with -- a communist in the Obama administration? Gosh, sure didn't see that coming. I'd think it would be bigger news -- "man bites dog" style -- to find a _non_-communist (or at least socialist) in the administration. But in any case, that's pretty small potatoes compared to someone being accused of being a bonafide 9/11 conspiracy theorist -- in this case, of having signed a petition asking "for congressional hearings and other investigations into whether high-level government officers had allowed the attacks to occur" -- presumably in order to support some foreign-policy initiative, like... say, going to war with the Moslem world.

The first thing that strikes me about all of this is that the notion of the government -- or at least the Bush administration -- knowing something about the attacks in advance has been pretty much accepted as conventional wisdom among conspiracy theorists; in fact, it's almost the least controversial of all of their many allegations (which I'll try to expand upon in a later post). Of course, it's one thing to have a vague notion about something that might happen, and another thing to know the precise day, time, and place. And it's still another thing to know and do nothing about it. But hey -- hasn't the very same thing become, for all intents and purposes, the conventional wisdom vis-a-vis Pearl Harbor? That has even ceased to be all that controversial -- mainly since all the principals are dead. But some day the first-order conspiracy theory about 9/11 will cease to be controversial as well; I guarantee it.

But here's another thing that occurs to me. This guy -- Van Jones -- said the Rodney King case turned him into a communist. OK, fair enough -- since we know that police beatings of citizens never occur in communist countries. The article does not relate how he became part of a 9/11 conspiracy theory, and in fact he claims that he wasn't, and "doesn't understand" how his name got on the petition. (This opens a whole new realm of actions for which the excuse "I was drunk" is readily trotted out.) And in any case, he has done the right thing and apologized -- you know, in typical liberal style, for all his present and past transgressions, perceived transgressions, and things that might have been perceived as transgressions had they been perceived. So the slate is wiped clean. Case closed! And he can go on about his duties as part of the Obama transition team -- referring to the transition from democracy to com... er, I mean socialism.

But let's take a look at the bigger picture for a moment. Forget about the communist rap -- that is so old hat among liberals that it's positively boring. And yeah, I know, the U.S. is, after all, the last, best hope for communism, at least in the theoretical sense... the practical application being left to Latin America and sub-Saharan Africa. But who subscribes to 9/11 conspiracy theories, and why? I always had the image that they were the sole province of the "radical right", but Jones has given me a bit of a start. It's kind of like that old TV quiz show, "Who Do You Trust?" Now clearly, the main "players" in the 9/11 drama include the terrorists themselves, the media, the Bush administration, the Republican party, and the intelligence agencies. And that's just on the domestic side. We also have Saddam, Al-Qaeda, the Taliban, Israel (particularly its intelligence apparatus), and who knows how many others? So... if 9/11 conspiracy theorizing is based on mistrust, who is it that mistrusts any or all of the above? Well, the radical right certainly mistrusted the Bush administration and the government in general, including the intel agencies... and, by extention, the Republican party. So they have sufficient cause, right there, to be suspicious of the party line on 9/11. The radical left, on the other hand, _also_ mistrusted the Bush administration and the Republicans, although maybe not the government in general... but certainly the intel and security apparatus. Then there are the paleocons, who tend to mistrust Israel on top of everything else. So conspiracy theorizing is a natural response on the part of people at both ends of the spectrum, when you think about it... as well as libertarians, who are in synch with the paleocons part of the time but off on their own the rest of the time.

What I'm saying is that it's not as surprising as one might think to find a "9/11 conspiracy theorist" in the White House... although, in general, liberals, and even those of the far left, tend to give government a pass most of the time, except maybe in strictly military matters. (And even then, you notice how anxious Obama is to get us out of Iraq and Afghanistan, now that those are his wars.)

But here's what I don't get. Congressman Mike Pence wants Jones to resign. What's he thinking? The worst thing you can do is insist that an administration of the opposing party get rid of all its loose cannons, dolts, idiots, blockheads, and fools. Remember when Rush Limbaugh wore a black armband the day Joycelyn Elders resigned? Remember how sad the Democrats were when Reagan finally got rid of James Watt? The best thing for your team is to keep as many laughingstocks as possible on the other team; doesn't Pence realize this? Oh yeah – he's a member of “the stupid party”, I forgot.