Conspiracy Theories Versus Real Conspiracies

A real tragedy happened today; but, I wont get into the specifics of today. Suffice it to say that the shooter appeared to believe Jews are taking over the world. The media on the left blamed Trump, of course, and the media on the right blamed the media on the left. Neither is accurate.

I grew up in a well to do area that had many Jews. I went to school with them and played with them and worked with them on theater projects. Few of the Jews I knew were devout and many celebrated Christmas because it was a fun holiday. I didn't really know any anti-Semites, if I did, they didn't talk about it. I knew a couple of people who disliked blacks because we were one of the first schools to accept bussing from the inner city. We pretty much squashed those opinions. At that time there was the beginning of radical extremist white nationalists, primarily in the Midwest. Because my father  worked in law enforcement, I knew that most of those groups were monitored and infiltrated. Groups are easier to deal with than are lone fanatics.

As my readers know I read as much as I can on the left and the right; but, I don't really read the extremists on either side very much. Still, it is hard to avoid seeing it if you read enough. Up until I was 13, I was raised as a good Irish Catholic; but, I became an agnostic and remained so for another 12 years or so and then became a Protestant, no denomination. When I became a Protestant I found many Christians who believed the Catholics had all sorts of crazy beliefs, beliefs that were never taught in the Catholic churches that I attended.

When the internet came out the fringe could be seen. I found that there are people who believe the Jesuits rule the world in secret or that the Jews rule the world in secret. On the left I discovered many who believe that Israel should be abolished and many on the right who believe the same. For my part, I have always defended Israel's right to exist. I have never understood why people like to blame the Jews for everything other than the fact that they probably don't know many Jews. The fact is no religion rules the world and the vast majority of people who identify as Muslim, Jew or Christian are so in name and tradition only. Most people just want to have a decent job, come home to their family and relax.

There are real conspiracies. The rigging of markets such as LIBOR was real and it was done by the banks, not by Jews; but, by banks. The rigging of the elections is done by the wealthy, not by Jews, by the establishment. As I have said before, it wasn't the Muslims, illegal aliens, Jews, Jesuits, gays, blacks, racists, Communists, the homeless that caused the housing crisis or the market crashes, they were caused by the "establishment". The simple fact is that the people who own the world and have power want to consolidate power and not be subject to democratic control or the will of the majority. The reason banks rig markets is simple, it is for power and money. Greedy and selfish people gravitate to where the money is, what a shock. Pedophiles try to get jobs working with kids. Same logic.

I am anti-globalism for good reasons. Globalism means that companies are not tied to any one country and as a consequence they are allowed to avoid taxes to nations and avoid environmental and other laws. I am for controlled borders because open borders drive down wages for the working and middle class. While many seek to focus on Hispanic illegal immigration, if you follow the news you will find that the big tech firms are more focused on taking the best in tech from other countries and driving down the cost of programmers and others. There are real conspiracies and those are ignored while random extremists are used to prop up the narrative that distrust of globalism is racist or xenophobic. I should point out that it was young people on the left who protested globalism in Seattle that I first noticed raising these issues.

After my divorce, the first woman I dated was a Ukrainian Jew, she was a professional, very pretty and very intelligent. One day after a date she asked me if I believed America had a free market economy. I laughed and told her that I could not comprehend how the biggest economy in the world would not have the wealthy trying to control it. If you had a few billion dollars, wouldn't you try and influence the laws? Have people forgotten why the original Progressive movement was created? In the late 1800s the industrial revolution brought amazing wealth to a few and left workers living in ghettos while working at the factories for pennies. Sort of sounds like China and India today.

Today we are told that the biggest threat to humans is "climate change". In fact, the latest United Nations report says if we don't begin reducing CO2 emissions in the west by 2020, we will be guaranteed to begin dying off by 2030. That sounds pretty serious. Each year a group known as Bilderberg meets in one of the western countries where they say, "The meeting is a forum for informal discussions about megatrends and major issues facing the world". The attendees are from business, academia, the media and politicians. The meetings are held in private and attendees are not allowed to discuss what was said. This year the agenda was:

Populism in Europe
The Inequality Challenge
The future of work
Artificial Intelligence
The US before midterms
Free trade
US world leadership
Russia
Quantum computing
Saudi Arabia and Iran
The "post truth" world
Current events.

Not one mention of climate change. In fact, they haven't had climate change on their agenda in over a decade and then it was the last item. If you wish you can follow the link provided and see their agendas and a list of attendees.

Another group called the Trilateral Commission has members from Europe, Asia and the United States. Their website says, "The Commission offers a global platform for open dialogue, reaching out to those with different views and engaging with decision makers from around the world with the aim of finding solutions to the great geopolitical, economic and social challenges of our time. A copy of their agenda for this year. Agenda. You know what was not on the agenda, you guessed it, climate change. In fact, they spent most of their time talking about how power and money are shifting to the east.

While many have heard about the "Bohemian Grove", it really is just a collection of the rich and powerful getting drunk and partying. Their motto is, "Weaving spiders come not hear". In other words, this is for fun not business. While their rituals may seem slightly creepy, it is not a deliberative body. It is a social bonding party for the rich and powerful.

If the greatest threat to humanity is climate change then why are our leaders in business and politics more concerned over populism? Because they are afraid of losing power. It is that simple. If they are so concerned about climate change caused by CO2 then why did the Paris Climate Accord call for the west to cap the CO2 emissions and allow China (already the biggest producer of CO2) to double the number of coal burning plants and not have any restrictions until after 2030?