Thirty years ago, a fiery federal raid on a doomsday sect turned the city into a symbol of government overreach. Donald Trump will speak there on Saturday, and some supporters — and critics — say it’s no accident.
Tag Archives: conspiracy theories
Antisemitic Incidents Reach New High in U.S., Anti-Defamation League Says
The report from the advocacy group included online harassment and speech as well as physical attacks, and mirrored similar data from the federal government and another study.
Missouri House advances bill to limit nonexistent vaccine microchips—just in case
Enlarge / A person wearing a tinfoil hat on September 20, 2019. (credit: Getty | Bridget Bennett)
In the latest efforts by Republican lawmakers to enshrine into law Americans’ right to freely spread deadly infectious diseases to each other, the Missouri House this week advanced a bill that would bar governments, schools, and employers from mandating certain vaccines—as well as things like vaccine microchips, which do not exist.
The bill, HB 700 (PDF), was sponsored by Rep. Bill Hardwick, a Republican from Waynesville. Hardwick told the St. Louis Post-Dispatch that he believed people “lost their minds” during the COVID-19 pandemic, and that legally barring officials and employers from requiring life-saving vaccination, even among health care workers, feels “like it’s the right thing to do.”
The bill specifically bars requirements for people to receive COVID-19 vaccines. But it doesn’t stop there. It also bars any requirements for people to receive “a dose of messenger ribonucleic acid (mRNA),” thus barring requirements for any future mRNA-based vaccines, should they be needed in upcoming pandemics or outbreaks. It also bars requirements for “any treatment or procedure intended or designed to edit or alter human deoxyribonucleic acid (DNA) or the human genome,” and “any mechanical or electronic device” that would be placed “under the skin.”
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City Life, Culture Wars and Conspiracy Theories
When walkability meets grievance and paranoia.
Conservative Media Pay Little Attention to Revelations About Fox News
Even in today’s highly partisan media world, experts said, the lack of coverage about the private comments of Fox’s top executives and hosts stands out.
G.O.P. Witnesses, Paid by Trump Ally, Embraced Jan. 6 Conspiracy Theories
Democrats said a trio of witnesses billed as “whistle-blowers” provided no evidence of wrongdoing, espoused false claims about the Capitol riot and were compensated by an ally of former President Donald J. Trump.
Donald Trump Is Trapped by His Own Strategy. That Doesn’t Mean It Won’t Work.
And the former president’s “electoral competitors recognize this to be the case.”
We’ve Been Talking About the Lab-Leak Hypothesis All Wrong
When are we going to get more serious about the highest-security labs?
Conspiracy Theorizing Goes Off the Rails
Did woke progressives cause the East Palestine disaster?
The return of Flat Earth, the grandfather of conspiracy theories
Enlarge (credit: Martin Wimmer)
Off the Edge is not a book about conspiracy theories, exactly. It does get there, but really it is a book about the history of the Flat Earth movement as the sort of original conspiracy theory. It is the second such book, in fact; Christine Garwood wrote Flat Earth: The History of an Infamous Idea in 2007. But it is a whole different world now, conspiracy-theory-wise, so Kelly Weill thought an update was in order.
Weill covers extremism, disinformation, and the Internet for The Daily Beast, a website whose tagline is “a smart, speedy take on news from around the world.” (A previous editor-in-chief described it as a “high-end tabloid.”) Like the site, the book is well-researched and makes for quick and entertaining, if disturbing, reading.
The pull of conspiracy
Weill started Off the Edge when she noticed Flat Earthers repeatedly cropping up in the far and alt-right chat groups and websites she was covering. She said that she initially thought they were a joke because “how could anyone really believe anything so ludicrous?” To find out, she entered their world; the book is in first-person, with Weill frequently recounting her misadventures meeting Flat Earthers and attending their conferences.
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Politics Invade the East Palestine, Ohio, Train Crisis
The train derailment in Eastern Ohio has spawned conspiracy theories and contradictory narratives, with politicians from both parties parading through town to further their agendas.
Ex-Attorney General in Arizona Buried Report Refuting Voter Fraud Claims
Under Mark Brnovich, a Republican who left office in January, a 10,000-hour review did not see the light of day. His Democratic successor, Kris Mayes, released investigators’ findings.
Michigan G.O.P. Leadership Race Fixates on Election Deniers
Matthew DePerno and Kristina Karamo, both Trump loyalists who resoundingly lost their midterm races, are the front-runners to lead the state party.
A Timeline of Nicola Bulley’s Disappearance
Nicola Bulley, a 45-year-old mother, was last seen on Jan. 27 outside a village in northwestern England. Her disappearance has led to national headlines and rampant speculation on social media.
Combating Disinformation Wanes at Social Media Giants
As the companies have shed jobs recently, many teams assigned to combat false and misleading information have taken a hit.
Steve Bannon’s Podcast Is Top Misinformation Spreader, Study Says
A large podcast study found that Mr. Bannon’s “War Room” had more falsehoods and unsubstantiated claims than other political talk shows.
Disinformation Researchers Raise Alarms About A.I. Chatbots
Researchers used ChatGPT to produce clean, convincing text that repeated conspiracy theories and misleading narratives.
Donald Trump Isn’t the Only One to Blame for the Capitol Riot. I’d Know.
Only by understanding how the rioters lost faith in government can we figure out how to protect our democracy from future attacks.
Trump’s Evolution on Truth Social: More QAnon, More Extremes
The former president, now free to post again on Facebook and Twitter, has increasingly amplified far-right accounts on Truth Social. Experts on extremism worry that he will bring this approach to a far wider audience.
Voter Fraud Unit in Arizona Will Shift Focus to Voter Rights
Kris Mayes, the state’s new Democratic attorney general, is shifting gears on election issues in an office her Republican predecessor created.
How Kevin McCarthy Forged a Bond With Marjorie Taylor Greene
The close alliance that has developed between the speaker and the hard-right Georgia Republican explains his rise, how he might govern and the heavy influence of the extremes on the new House G.O.P. majority.
How Covid Played a Role in Jacinda Ardern’s Resignation
In a part of the world where coronavirus restrictions lingered, Jacinda Ardern struggled to get beyond her association with pandemic policy.
In Pennsylvania, the 2020 Election Still Stirs Fury. And a Recount.
Election deniers in Lycoming County convinced officials to conduct a 2020 recount, a three-day undertaking that showed almost no change, but left skeptics just as skeptical.
Report Categorizes Many UFO Sightings as Drones, Trash or Birds
But a large number of incidents remain unexplained in the new report from the Office of the Director of National Intelligence, potentially fueling further speculation.
The Fraudulence of Investigating the Investigators
This new committee is no Church Committee; it’s a coven of conspiracy theorists.
Arizona Judge Rejects Kari Lake’s Effort to Overturn Her Election Loss
Kari Lake, a Republican who was defeated by Katie Hobbs in the Arizona governor’s race, had made false election claims the centerpiece of her campaign.
Musk Lifted Bans for Thousands on Twitter. Here’s What They’re Tweeting.
Many reinstated users are tweeting about topics that got them barred in the first place: Covid-19 skepticism, election denialism and QAnon.
Hannity and Other Fox Employees Said They Doubted Trump’s Fraud Claims
On Wednesday, lawyers for Dominion Voting Systems shared some of the strongest evidence yet that some Fox employees knew what they broadcast about the claims was false.
In the U.S., His Site Has Been Linked to Massacres. In Japan, He’s a Star.
Hiroyuki Nishimura has become a famous voice for disenchanted young Japanese. What he talks much less about is his ownership of the notorious website 4chan.
Will 2024 Be a Vaccine Election?
Ron DeSantis is setting himself up as anti-vaxxer in chief.
John F. Kennedy Assassination: US Releases Trove of Related Documents
Researchers said they were just beginning to comb through the 13,173 documents, hoping they might shed further light on the government’s actions before and after Nov. 22, 1963.
Video Footage Reveals New Details of Paul Pelosi Attack During SF Hearing
David DePape, the man accused of bludgeoning the husband of Nancy Pelosi, told the police that he also had Gavin Newsom and Tom Hanks on his target list.
The Moon landing was faked, and wind farms are bad
(credit: NSF)
Germany ranks third in the world for installed wind power capacity. In 2020, almost a quarter of the country’s energy came from wind, and the government has pledged to double that by 2030, designating 2 percent of Germany’s landmass to become wind farms.
Switching away from fossil fuels to cleaner energy sources like wind is essential if we want to try to mitigate some of the worst consequences of the climate change we’ve started, but this switch is extraordinarily difficult for many reasons. Watching how this switch plays out in early adopters of wind power like Germany may help inform how the rest of us decarbonize.
People are generally keen on wind power in the abstract, but a huge NIMBY (not in my backyard) factor comes into play when wind farms have to actually get built in communities. Researchers in Germany wondered what it was, exactly, that made people vote against local wind farms. They found that a tendency toward conspiratorial thinking helped explain a lot of the resistance.
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Prince Heinrich XIII and the Plot to Overthrow Germany’s Government
Prince Heinrich XIII was arrested this week as the suspected ringleader of a plan to overthrow the German government. Nostalgic for an imperial past, he embraced far-right conspiracy theories.
Donald Trump Is Weak. And Powerful. Now What?
Donald Trump can be both weakening as a political force and extremely influential.
German Plotters, Long Dismissed as Fringe, Got a Lift From QAnon
Reichsbürger, the movement behind a plan to overthrow Germany’s government, gained momentum from conspiracy theories that grew during the pandemic, turning it into a potent new threat.
What Do We Know About Prince Heinrich XIII of Reuss?
Descended from an ancient aristocratic family, Heinrich now stands accused of being a leader of a far-right plot to overthrow the German government.
Who Is Prince Heinrich XIII, a Man Accused of Trying to Overthrow Germany’s Government?
Descended from an ancient aristocratic family, Heinrich now stands accused of being a leader of a far-right plot to overthrow the German government.
Trump Embraces Extremism as He Seeks to Reclaim Presidency
As he gets his presidential campaign underway, Donald J. Trump has aligned himself with forces that used to be outside the mainstream of American politics.
The Table for Trump’s Antisemitic Banquet Was Set Long Ago
Republicans have accepted his “textbook racism” for years.
Sympathy, and Job Offers, for Twitter’s Misinformation Experts
Seeing false and toxic information as a potentially expensive liability, companies in and outside the tech industry are angling to hire people who can keep it in check.
How the Pelosi Attack Suspect Plunged Into Online Hatred
David DePape’s life was unstable when he embraced Gamergate and far-right conspiracy theories. He is now accused of breaking into Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s home and assaulting her husband.
Voters Reject Election Deniers Running to Take Over Elections
With Jim Marchant’s defeat by Cisco Aguilar in Nevada’s secretary of state race, all but one of the “America First” slate of candidates who espoused conspiracy theories about the 2020 election were defeated.
What’s Next for Kyrie Irving’s Career?
Irving’s antisemitic movie post is his biggest controversy yet. But the potential fallout could affect not just his basketball career but the N.B.A. itself.
Election Officials Say Efforts to Bolster the Voting System Worked
Officials were braced for partisan poll monitors convinced of fraud to disrupt voting in the midterm elections. While there were scattered episodes, the vote went smoothly.
Election Workers Have to Keep Volunteering to Do This
Elections are staffed by real people, with real lives, who opt into this system. That could make you nervous — or deeply reassure you.
GOP Begins Ballot Watching Push Ahead of Election Day
Tedium and suspicion mix as skeptical observers monitor the largely monotonous work at a sprawling elections office near Las Vegas.
On Social Media, Hunting for Voter Fraud Becomes a Game
Players who post about irregularities are awarded points or titles, leading participants to question the legitimacy of elections.
Debunking Voting Misinformation About the Midterm Elections
Here are some of the main falsehoods and rumors that have spread on social media in the lead-up to Election Day.
How the Right Became the Left and the Left Became the Right
A pair of prominent headlines highlight the reversals.