This is the fountainhead of 2Oth Century American conspiracy theories. Name checks Hofstadter. Older "deep states". Repub Party barnacles and tentacles.

[David Morris]

I can see that Republicans have manufactured fantasy conspiracies for
decades, but *what makes things worse today is that none of the
conspiracies is considered fringe anymore*.  It’s a vast web of
conspiracies, all crazy, all easily disprovable, and all more or less
interchangeable and morphing into each other, and thus (though easily
disprovable) become a seething impenetrable mesh of lies that the willfully
gullible wear like a prized garment.  And for the Cheney’s to now be their
ostracized voice of reason (the GOP’s new fringe) says it all, how much
worse it really has become.

And what makes our situation desperate is that *our free press is really
afraid to point out the situation* (that the GOP isn’t “an opposing voice)
that one half of our two-party system has literally gone either
1)stark-raving mad.  2)corruptly playing to the madness of the crowd.
 3)Both 1&2.

David Morris

On Sun, Jan 9, 2022 at 12:39 PM Mark Kohut <mark.kohut at gmail.com> wrote:

> Wrong in its belief that today is worse, I did not make clear.
>
> ....yes, his case linking Welch to much of the present is strong as a
> safe.....
>
> I added the line about Perlstein because I did not want to check the name
> of the mail order guy in the book and review....Vigourie, or like that.....
> My mentioning Perlstein is just an allusion to his four-volume masterpiece
> (imho), Before the Storm, Invisible Bridge. Nixonland and the other in which
> he does a masterful job of tracing Republicanism and its conspiracy
> creations river through the decades (largely through all the campaigns from
> before they were even campaigns, four years at a time).....as one reads
> Perlstein, one can firm up the belief that Republicanism can only keep
> going on fantasy conspiracy connections....over time...
>
> On Sun, Jan 9, 2022 at 12:24 PM David Morris <fqmorris at gmail.com> wrote:
>
>> I don’t understand what you mean when you say you hope Miller’s biography
>> of Welch is wrong (I didn’t see mention of Perlstein or “mail order
>> guy.”).  I’m a bit familiar with Birchers, and think it makes perfect sense
>> that their paranoia (a discredited fringe back in the 70s) has become
>> mainstream Right today.  Q and Birchers would make perfect bed-mates.
>>
>> On Sun, Jan 9, 2022 at 11:41 AM Mark Kohut <mark.kohut at gmail.com> wrote:
>>
>>> Rick Perlstein gives a lot of spaces and history to the mail order guy's
>>> base of work, aggregatable to the present.
>>> I hope this biographer is wrong
>>>
>>> https://www.lrb.co.uk/the-paper/v44/n01/colin-kidd/big-stick-swagger?utm_campaign=20220108icymi&utm_content=20220108icymi%20CID_933d47949b4b77267ac2d8bbfaa8abcd&utm_medium=email&utm_source=LRB%20email&utm_term=Read%20more
>>
>>
>>> --
>>> Pynchon-L: https://waste.org/mailman/listinfo/pynchon-l
>>>
>>