What happens to a conspiracy revealed?

[Monte Davis]

Casual acceptance, hell -- rousing ovations! Check out Charlie Pierce's
coverage of star speakers at CPAC over the last few days:  Ollie North,
Scooter Libby, Bernard Kerik...

http://www.esquire.com/blogs/politics/crooks-at-cpac-2014-030714




On Mon, Mar 10, 2014 at 12:59 PM, <kelber at mindspring.com> wrote:

> What happens when a conspiracy is revealed to the public? Not much. What
> about anything has changed since Snowden's revelations? The shadowy group
> journalist Jeremy Scahill was investigating, Joint Strategic Operations
> Command - responsible for thousands of covert murders across the globe -
> was revealed and publicly lauded in the midst of Scahill's investigation.
> What happened? Nothing.
>
> Today, another conspiracy is cheerfully reported in the NY Times in the
> guise of a story about business prowess:
>
>
> http://www.nytimes.com/2014/03/10/business/staking-1-billion-that-herbalife-will-fail-then-ackman-lobbying-to-bring-it-down.html?hp&_r=0
>
> Which leads to the question: is it still a conspiracy if it's completely
> out in the open? Isn't the excitement of delving into a conspiracy the
> stray hope: "once people find out about this ..."
>
> Not sure that Pynchon answers this fully in any of his books. Sure, he
> points to a lot of tips of icebergs and facades: industry as the front for
> something much more sinister, on an almost metaphysical plane. We
> understand that his "They," while they may have specific servants, don't
> exist in any tangible form. Can't un-elect them, can't storm their
> chateaux. But the problem is, when "They" get too metaphysical, they start
> blending in with the metaphysical scenery - God, Nature, The Universe, Fate.
>
> But what would happen if the really sinister characters were revealed? If
> there was a complete analysis of Scarsdale Vibe's or Brock Vond's doings on
> the front page of the paper of record, and it was treated as a celebration
> of ingenuity, rather than an indictment or a history-changing moment? To
> me, this is scarier than any "They" in Pynchon's writings, because this is
> really happening today here in our world. Pynchon's always known about
> these people. We all have. It's the casual acceptance of them that comes as
> a shock.
>
> Laura
>
> -
> Pynchon-l / http://www.waste.org/mail/?list=pynchon-l
>
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