Conspiracy and the Corporate State

Bernard Lown, MD

I never cottoned to conspiracy theories of history. Yet throughout my long life I was nearly overwhelmed by their seduction, by their connecting of puzzling dots in the flow of political events, by their seeming logic in accounting for the inexplicable and by their simplicity in forging through the quagmire of life’s complexity. In short, conspiracy made sense. Following Einstein’s dictum that “Explanations should be as simple as possible, but no simpler,” conspiracies glowed with a sheen of simplicity.

Not infrequently, I was momentarily swayed. The problem is that these theories bludgeon one into submission to accept the existing political order. They reduce history to farce with the major players plotting in dark retreats to manipulate us, the marionettes. Conspiracy is umbilically tied to the millennia long reigning sway of religion, with its forces of good and evil. Such ethereal forces can not be appealed to by reason or changed by reasonable action, they can only be appeased by prayer. Identity of the conspirators and their machinations hidden from public view affords no ready target for mobilizing people. These beliefs breed pessimism, cynicism, inaction and ultimately divert from political action for democratic change.

After 9/11 there was much talk circulating that the twin towers collapse was an inside job. Presumably burning airplane fuel was insufficient to melt massive steel girders and have skyscrapers crumble like matchsticks. Witnesses were presented who heard explosions coming from within the buildings seconds before their collapse.

These theories defy reason. They imply that the suicide high-jackers acted in concert with some US governmental agencies. To ferry dynamite clandestinely into the twin towers would have required hundreds of American co-conspirators. Babbling and bragging is a national past-time. It evades common sense, that not a single one of the many involved would have remained silent with friends, family or confidants.

Yet some form of conspiracy can not be so readily dismissed when considering how the US is governed.