“We had
somebody get on a plane from a certain city this weekend, and in the
plane it was almost completely loaded with thugs, wearing these dark
uniforms, black uniforms, with gear and this and that … People that
you've never heard of, people that are in the dark shadows .”
– Donald
Trump in an interview with Fox News host Laura Ingraham
Donald Trump alleged in an
interview that a group of people from "the dark shadows"
are controlling Joe Biden. He then claimed the matter was “under
investigation right now.”
When interview host
Ingraham asked for more information about the flight, the president
said, "I'll tell you sometime." He then alleged the people
had been headed to Washington to disrupt the RNC.
“This was all, this was
all happening,” Trump said. Ingraham asked where they were getting
their money.
“The money is coming
from some very stupid rich people that have no idea that if their
thing ever succeeded, which it won’t, they will be thrown to the
wolves like you’ve never seen before,” Trump said.
The conspiracy theory that
President Donald Trump pushed Monday that a plane “almost
completely loaded with thugs” had been set to disrupt the
Republican National Convention was almost identical to a rumor that
went viral on Facebook three months ago.
There is no evidence of
any such flight. Symone Sanders, a senior adviser to the Biden
campaign, dismissed Trump’s allegation, telling MSNBC that she did
not know what the president was referencing. Sanders says …
“I can only attribute
it to President Trump doesn’t have a plan, he doesn’t have a
reelection strategy, and he is intent on making up things. He’s
flailing.”
(David Cohen and Quint
Forgey. “Trump alleges Biden controlled by people in ‘dark
shadows.'” Politico. August 31, 2020.)
Trump has used similarly
ominous language to describe Biden, declaring last month that the
former vice president – a devout Catholic – is “against the
Bible” and would “hurt God” if elected.
Trump has embraced
multiple conspiracy theories throughout his political career. He also
offered theories Monday about unrest in some American cities,
alleging, for instance, that “Portland has been burning for many
years, for decades it’s been burning” and repeatedly asserting
that protesters there wanted to kill Mayor Ted Wheeler.
Meanwhile, while
expressing support for police during the Fox interview, Trump
compared shootings to golf, saying, "There's a whole big thing
there, but they (officers) choke just like in a golf tournament, they
miss a 3-foot..."
A
product of tabloid culture, Trump has long trafficked in conspiracy
theories. But as chief executive, he’s used the machinery of
government to give the ones especially useful to him the stamp of
official validation.
Trump’s
mind is fertile soil for bogus ideas to take root. He often pushes
away facts and conclusions that don’t jibe with his own views, so
he hears what he wants to hear, and disregards what he doesn’t.
Peter Nicholas, staff writer at
The Atlantic, explains …
“These baseless
theories are a way for Trump to explain away his problems and
undercut opponents. Beyond that, though, they seem to serve distinct
emotional needs, feeding a narcissistic ego that cold reality won’t
satisfy. His efforts to persuade the public to go along with these
self-protective myths have already corroded democratic institutions.
The wreckage from that destructive legacy won’t be easily repaired
after he leaves the stage.”
(Peter Nicholas. “Trump
Needs Conspiracy Theories.” The Atlantic. November 29,
2019.)
Throughout his presidency,
on the campaign trail, and even in the years prior, Trump has floated
theories fueled by the conspiratorial-minded corners of supermarket
tabloids and the darkest corners of the internet.
Here are just a few of the
most notable conspiracy theories Trump has entertained over the
years:
Questions about President
Obama's birth certificate.
Questions about the
legitimacy of climate change.
Questions about the
legitimacy of the "Access Hollywood" tape.
Questions about Ted Cruz's
father's potential ties to President John F. Kennedy's assassin.
Claims that Obama had
wiretapped Trump's phone.
Claims that voter fraud in
the 2016 election cost him the popular vote.
Questions about whether
Syrian refugees are ISIS terrorists.
Questions about Supreme
Court Justice Antonin Scalia's death.
Questions about whether
childhood vaccines cause autism.
Claims 3,000 people didn't
die in Puerto Rico after Hurricane Maria and that Democrats inflated
the death toll.
Questions about whether
Muslims in New Jersey were cheering after 9/11.
Claims that windmills
cause cancer.
What is severely
disturbing is that many people believe these outlandish conspiracies
and post them on social media to stir the emotions of the populace to
take further action against Trump's opposition. They love to “stir
it up” and grant allegiance to unfounded stories.
It seems these gullible
folks will believe anything that fits their political affiliations.
Educated and not-so-educated individuals alike run with fantasy and
claim it to be fact. The meme and the tweet feed the rumor-hungry
masses. Just post it without fact checking.
Why do people believe the
outlandish theories?
University of Chicago
Political Science Professor Eric Oliver, who’s been studying
conspiracy theories for over a decade, says his research shows how
one basic tension explains both belief in conspiracy theories and our
political divide. Deeper than red or blue, liberal or conservative,
we’re actually divided by intuitionists and rationalists.
According to Oliver's
research, when people are about six or seven different conspiracy
theories, he usually find about half of the public will agree with at
least one of them. These range from what might seem really outlandish
conspiracy theories, for example, the idea that vapor trails that
follow jets are a campaign of secret government spraying to ideas
that, for example, the Food and Drug Administration is deliberately
withholding natural cures for cancer from secret pressure from the
pharmaceutical industry. Oliver claimss he usually gets about 40
percent of Americans agreeing with that idea.
Oliver says …
“What we see when we
see people engaged in conspiracy theories is that they're drawing on
their own intuitions to make sense of the world …
“And the things that
correlated most strongly with conspiracy theories were things like
believing in supernatural or paranormal phenomena … conspiracy
theory seems to be similar to these things and it's a form of magical
thinking …
“Magical thinking is
not simply that we just invoke the unobservable force, but that we
also reject an alternative explanation that is based on something
that's observable …
“Our intuitions are
based in our emotions. And, when we're feeling uncertainty about the
world, it generates a lot of anxiety. So if we're feeling anxious, we
look for an explanation that rationalizes that emotional experience …
“Then the second part
of intuitions is that intuition actually have a grammar to them …
Heuristics are these certain judgmental shortcuts that we make when
we’re trying to understand the world.”
(“The Science of
Conspiracy Theories and Political Polarization with Eric Oliver Ep.
25.” Big Brains. The University of Chicago. August 2020.)
“Anxiety and
uncertainty” – Trump uses these emotions at will to stir his base
and cover his tracks. “Shortcut” – the King of Tweets, Trump
employs brief, explosive bursts of vitriol to persuade his faithful
and denounce any suggestion of political correctness. With the help
of Oliver's research, it is easy to see the vast fertile ground for
conspiracy in 2020 America.
“Dark shadows” – who
knows what Trump truly believes and what he merely spins for personal
gain? It really doesn't matter because his narcissistic intentions
push his Deep State inventions to divide the country. He sows deceit
without care about anything but his own ego.
“Constructing
his own reality necessitates an attack on fact-finding institutions
that are central to American democracy – universities, nonpartisan
government agencies, law enforcement, the intelligence community, and
the news media. For Trump’s version of events to take hold, he
needs people to accept that the facts leaping out at them aren’t to
be believed, that institutions wedded to objective truth aren’t to
be trusted.”
– Peter
Nicholas
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