THE MORNING RANT: Kooks, Fringe Ideas, and Media Misclassification of Actual Scandals as “Conspiracy Theories”

We have a problem. There are delusional people pushing preposterous stories, which we used to label “conspiracy theories.” There are also partisan journalists, joined by liberal politicians, who label inconvenient scandals that harm the left’s agenda as being “conspiracy theories.”

So, I have two theses to posit today:

1) Because of the left’s misuse of the term “conspiracy theory,” there is a need for a new term for actual kookie theories.

2) It has become difficult to dismiss actual kookie “conspiracy theories,” because the left applied that term to so many truths that it sought to delegitimize. Quite simply, it is not outrageous to assume that anything the left calls a “conspiracy theory” is actually true.

The term “conspiracy theory” has been defanged because it is as ridiculously misused and overused as “racist,” “Nazi,” “fascist,” and “white supremacist.” Just like those other terms, conservatives now joke about being a “conspiracy theorist” because so many stories in the past decade that were framed as “conspiracies” have turned out to be true. We even joke, “What is the difference between a conspiracy theory and the truth?” Answer: “About six months.”

There are abundant examples of this, including discussions about the provenance of the Covid virus. In the early 2020s, arguing that the virus originated in the nearby Wuhan Institute of Virology was a forbidden “conspiracy theory” that would get a person deplatformed from social media, but it is now accepted as the almost certain source of the virus. Similarly, arguing that Covid “vaccines” did not prevent the contraction or transmission of the virus was also a deplatformable “conspiracy theory” that proved to be true.

The New York Post was deplatformed from Twitter for its reporting on Hunter Biden’s laptop, while Facebook throttled posts that linked to that “conspiracy theory,” which of course was not a conspiracy theory at all. It was the truth, and those in government coordinating with media to bury the story knew it was true, which was an actual conspiracy.

Following Hurricane Helene’s flooding in North Carolina, there were allegations that FEMA employees in the field were withholding aid to those storm victims who were visibly Trump supporters. Government-funded PBS sought to quash those verifiably true allegations by calling them “conspiracy theories.”

“Disinformation and Conspiracy Theories Cloud Helene Recovery Efforts in Hard-hit Areas” [PBS – 10/05/2024]

The facts emerging from Hurricane Helene’s destruction are heartrending: Businesses and homes destroyed, whole communities nearly wiped out, hundreds of lives lost, hundreds of people missing. Yet this devastation and despair is not enough for the extremist groups, disinformation agents, hucksters and politicians who are exploiting the disaster to spread false claims and conspiracy theories about it and the government’s response. According to former President Donald Trump, the federal government is intentionally withholding aid to Republican disaster victims.

Now that Donald Trump is President and FEMA is answerable to him, the truth has come out. As reported by Matt Taibi at Racket News, ““Politicized distribution of hurricane aid money before the 2024 election was no ‘isolated incident,’ a Homeland Security follow-up report sadly concludes.”

But there are still fringe theories being promoted. Several conservative pundits whom I used to respect have gone off the deep end, including Candace Owens, who is now insinuating that Donald Trump was involved in the assassination of Charlie Kirk.

“Candace Owens Hits a New Low, and Accuses Trump of Assassinating Charlie Kirk” [Townhall – 10/23/2025]

Mark Pulliam of Misrule of Law shared a recent piece of his about a candidate running for Tennessee State Senate, Gary Humble, who has some rather exotic views. Mr. Humble has been quoted as saying:

Do I believe that factions of our government coordinated with other foreign entities to attack Americans on 9/11? Yes.

Do I believe the CIA was involved? Yes.

Do I believe Bush knew about 9/11 before it happened? Yes.

Do I believe that the towers coming straight down in a straight line fashion was not the work of planes crashing into the buildings but a controlled demolition? Yes.

Do I believe that building 7, just next door, also fell during a controlled demolition, while the other two buildings purportedly fell because of airliners? Yes.

I believe those things, unequivocally.

In our correspondence, I expressed to Mark my frustration that it is hard for conservatives to find the words to write about fringe candidates who promote what we used to call “conspiracy theories” because of how the left has misused that term to slander any conservative who isn’t a RINO or controlled opposition.

What are your thoughts? What term do you use?

[buck.throckmorton at protonmail dot com]

posted by Buck Throckmorton at 11:00 AM

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