Editor’s Note: My wonderful friend Kim has graciously agreed to write a couple of articles for me during the next several weeks, because I have some family obligations that will keep me from the computer. Kim is a very intelligent lady and a terrific writer. Enjoy!
William of Ockham, the 14th century Franciscan friar, philosopher, and theologian, would never have dreamed that his law of economy would ever grace something like today’s internet.
His principle, commonly called “Ockham’s Razor,” is explained in part by Encyclopedia Britannica:
… explanations that posit fewer entities, or fewer kinds of entities, are to be preferred to explanations that posit more.
Britannica adds that it’s “sometimes misleadingly characterized as a general recommendation of simpler explanations over more complex ones;” however, one wonders if the good English friar would’ve added such a corollary for those who post their brain flatulence online.
These days it seems like we’re all swimming in an enormous pond into which black swans keep landing. Meanwhile, on the shore, crackpots wearing tinfoil on their noggins loudly inform us that each swan means something nefarious.
The most recent iteration of such nonsense followed Friday’s global IT crash. The World Economic Forum had plotted a global cyberattack! World War III is imminent! Meanwhile, far right loon Laura Loomer connected the crash to Barack Obama, posting at X:
Did you know that the President of CrowdStrike Services and the Chief Security Officer served as the Executive Assistant Director of the FBI under the Obama-Biden administration? …
Why is every crisis in our country somehow tied to @BarackObama?
In the end, however, CNBC reported that the cause of the crash was CrowdStrike, which did not adequately check its cybersecurity software before deploying it. Not that Loomer or her fellow cranks would accept the explanation.
Trump Assassination Attempt Launches Conspiracies
Saturday marked one week since a 20-year-old misfit and would-be assassin fired three shots at former president Trump at a rally in Butler, PA. Yet the conspiracy theorists are still piling on.
At first the speculations arose from progressives going all Alex Jones, claiming that it was a staged “false flag” event. Democratic megadonor Reid Hoffman’s political adviser Dmitri Mehlhorn sent an email to journalists in which he surmised:
I know I am prone to bias on this, but this is a classic Putin play and given the facts seems more plausible. Look at the actual shot. Look at the staging … And consider how often Putin and his allies run this play.
Mehlhorn later apologized, writing “Last night, I sent an email I now regret. It was drafted and sent without consultation from team members or allies.”
Over at MSNBC, Joy Reid smelled a rat after Trump was able to fist pump to the crowd after the attack:
Donald Trump is an elderly man who, for whatever reason, was given nine seconds to take a[n] iconic photo op during an active shooter situation. Weird situation, we’ll figure that out one day.
But Joy Reid is just asking questions.
Even Dr. Anthony Fauci got into the act. He didn’t maintain that this was a staged event, mind you. Just that Trump’s ear wound was merely “superficial.” Fauci claimed:
It seems to have been a superficial wound to the ear, and that’s all.
Fauci is echoing those old 60’s era westerns in which the hero takes a bullet wound to the arm and brushes it off with, “It’s just a flesh wound.” But even CNN’s Dr. Sanjay Gupta expressed concern that Trump may be dealing with “psychological trauma” after the event.
Trump’s White House physician Rep. Ronny Jackson (R-TX) had described the ear wound as “a 2 cm-wide wound that extended down to the cartilaginous surface of the ear.” Whereupon ex-ESPN commenter Keith Olbermann tweeted this:
In brief: Ronny Jackson isn't a doctor. Which is perfect, because Trump wasn't hit by a bullet.
Whether you like Jackson’s politics or not is immaterial: the man is a physician, having served as an emergency doctor in Iraq and under three presidents — including Barack Obama. As for Keith Olbermann — what the hell is wrong with that guy?
Cybersecurity and disinformation expert and military veteran, Ryan McBeth, analyzed the shooting on the day after, deftly quashing the claims of a fake attack.
Then There’s the Online Far Right
You think the right would be thankful that their hero Donald Trump survived a near-assassination. You’d think they’d save their powder to point fingers at the deranged progressives.
But noooo! in the words of the late great comic John Belushi.
Why, there must’ve been a monstrous government plot by Deep State actors who wanted Trump dead!
Take, for example, this picture I recently found on social media. It was the dumbest thing I saw all weekend.
I don’t care how often people like Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. or Tucker Carlson dredge up the assassination of President John Kennedy: There is no confirmed proof of Lee Harvey Oswald being part of a CIA conspiracy. Nor is there proof that assassins Sirhan Sirhan or James Earl Ray worked with government agencies to kill Robert F. Kennedy and Martin Luther King, Jr.
Besides, this is a non sequitur argument. JFK was assassinated in 1963. RFK and King were killed in 1968. The heads of any government agencies have long since passed on. None of these events relate whatsoever to the Trump attempted assassination.
Popular podcaster Joe Rogan has added to the conspiracy fever. Even though Rogan is not an ideological conservative, he counts many of the online right among his 14 million plus Spotify listeners.
Here’s some of what Rogan told his fan base on Friday:
They have organized assassinations before. And when they organize assassinations, it looks just like that. And when they organize assassinations, one of the things they like to do is have some fucking loser kill the president and then they kill the fucking loser, and that's a wrap …
They saw him on the fucking roof, and they didn't engage. They saw him on the roof with a rifle …
They let him [Crooks] get off three shots …
They had such poor security guarding him …
[They] can not get in that kid's phone when I know you read my text messages. (The FBI has access to Crooks’ phone messages.)
They definitely wanted him to kill Trump.
Mind you, Joe Rogan has no background in the military, law enforcement, or with any government agency that deals with security. His history consists of stand-up comedy and wrestling. Yet he spreads conspiracy theories to more than 14 million people.
In addition, message boards like 4Chan and Reddit are replete with posters who simply spread bald-faced lies.
Like the person at 4Chan who claimed to be the sniper who took out Thomas Crooks, insinuating that they (hint: the Deep State actors who wanted Trump dead) told him to stand down for three minutes.
Enter Ryan McBeth once again, setting the record straight. Thank God for McBeth in this age of lunacy.
I’m old enough to remember the JFK assassination and the Paul-McCartney-is-Dead conspiracy along with other screwball rumors.
For example, did you know that Jackie Kennedy married Aristotle Onassis in order to hide the braindead JFK on a secret Greek island? Or that Walt Disney was cryogenically frozen? No? Those are also complete bullshit. Just like all the conspiracies surrounding the Trump shooting event or the recent IT outage.
McBeth is absolutely correct: sometimes things happen that don’t make sense in the world. Not everything can be explained away.
It’s time to get some common sense and make Ockham’s Razor great again.