"The time has come," the Walrus said, "to speak of many things..."

Confession: I don't like you.

That admission does not apply to all of you. Most of you are wonderful. But I can no longer pretend that I'm happy with the audience this blog has acquired, or that I get much fun out of this unpaid gig.

Why the sour 'tude? Let's start here:

The other day, I received an email message promoting the Protocols of Zion. The usual formula of rationalization applied: Even if it's not a genuine document, it describes what's going on. Sergei Nilus, the original promoter of the hoax, said pretty much the same thing nearly a hundred years ago: "Let us admit that the Protocols are false, but is it not possible that God should make use of them in order to expose the iniquity which is approaching?"

Good old Nilus. He got the concept of "truthiness."

If the folks who visit Cannonfire consider me ripe for a truthi-ful argument like that, then I've done something seriously wrong. Everyone knows that I am no friend to the Israeli government or to the concept of Zionism. But that doesn't mean you should come to my door peddling race hatred and fake documents.

The problem goes well beyond that correspondent, this blog, that ancient hoax, any other hoax, racial issues, or any specific issue. Right now I'm feeling rather disgustipated with the whole wretched human race, including them what's on my own side of the political aisle. Much as I'd like to believe that only rightists have a weakness for truthiness, 'taint so. Right, left, and off-the-map, people believe what they want to believe.

All of which is a long way of saying that I have HAD IT with the so-called 9/11 "Truth Movement."

The infuriating denizens of that growing sub-culture exemplify everything wrong with conspiracy theorists. And yet those are the very people who read my humble offerings, because I have become pegged as a conspiracy guy. Which means I've done something seriously wrong.

(To read the rest, click "Permalink" below)

Nothing is more dangerous than a conspiracy theory, for demagogues use such notions to justify political outrages. Consider, for example, the recent Lebanon debacle. How could the Israelis, most of whom are as decent as anyone else, rationalize their nation's crimes? Because they've fastened onto the idea that everyone else is out to get us -- which is, in essence, a conspiracy theory. This belief makes them deaf to the world's expressions of outrage, and to the counsel of their better angels.

The Jewish myth of anti-Semitism as an all-pervasive, quasi-preternatural force constitutes the obverse of the Nazi myth of the Jews as malign manipulators of world events.

Both theories offer "fail safe" mechanisms. If you are an Israeli and you hear someone criticize your nation's mistreatment of the Palestinians, you need merely mutter "Ah, once again we see the plague of anti-Semitism" -- and your thinking is done for the day. Conversely, if you are a Nazi sympathizer and a writer presents evidence that the holocaust was real, you need merely mutter "Of course, the Jews paid him to say that" -- and your thinking is done for the day.

Christianity, and probably every other major religion, relies on such fail-safe mechanisms. Just try telling a Left Behind fan the truth about the book of Revelation. Watch his eyes glaze over the moment you try to explain what Nero redivivus means -- that's the point when your non-listener will interrupt and ask: "Are you saved?" If you say anything other than yes, expect to confront an impenetrable expression of smugness. You are not among the elect. You speak the Devil's lies. "This is obviously one of Satan's deceptions," your fundamentalist friend will tell himself with a happy smile. He's happy because his thinking is done for the day.

Proposition 1: A conspiracy theory becomes toxic the moment a "fail safe" mechanism kicks in.

Proposition 2: A conspiracy theory becomes toxic if it fulfills an emotional need.

Proposition 3: A conspiracy theory becomes toxic when adherents arrange the facts to suit the theory instead of the other way 'round.

The 9/11 Untruth Movement is an increasingly poisonous cesspool of pseudo-science, gullibility, and deliberate deceit. In posts to come, I will do my humble part to expose those deceptions. And I fully expect to become the target for attack, because the 9/11 faithful have developed a particularly insidious Fail Safe mechanism. "The Bush forces must have paid him to say that," the unreflective capital-B Believers mutter to themselves whenever someone tells them something they don't want to hear.

Sorry. But you're going to have to do a little more thinking than that.

Let's make one thing clear: Aside from Google, whose ad program fetches me the monthly equivalent of a couple of combo plates at El Torito, nobody has ever paid me dime one for this blog. (Will anyone within the Truthiness Movement believe the previous sentence? I doubt it.)

George Bernard Shaw once noted that the American utopian communities which made few demands on their participants failed rapidly, while those utopian experiments which required much sacrifice and toil lasted much longer. Why? Because ego prevented the participants from accepting the possibility that their sacrifices were in vain. They had invested too much of themselves to give up.

Conspiracy theories, especially the ones that have turned rancid, work in a similar fashion.

Toward the end of his life, Ezra Pound -- brilliant poet, notorious racist -- broke down and admitted that the Jews did not rule the world. After decades of stumping for a Protocol-ized weltanschauung, he finally confessed that he had gotten it all wrong. How many other people have ever had the courage to re-think a long-cherished conspiracy theory? How many have the intellectual honesty to step back, to question first principles, to ask themselves "Do I really know what I think I know?"

Bloody few.

Some of my correspondents compare the 9/11 Truthiness Movement to the JFK assassination research community. Fine. Let's make that comparison.

And let's start with this question: Where are the best-known and most-respected JFK researchers? Where do they stand on 9/11? Have any of them signed up for a hitch with the "controlled demolition" brigade? Where's Peter Dale Scott? Anthony Summers? Dick Russell? Mark Lane? David Lifton? Robert Groden? Jim DiEugenio? Even the folks who congealed around conspiracy queen Mae Brussell (I'm thinking here of Dave Emory and John Judge) sneer at the bombs-in-da-buildings theory. Not too many years ago, these guys were considered unruly wild men and intellectual extremists. Today they are dismissed as fuddy-duddy middle-of-the-roaders, too dull to invite to the cool kids' party. Have they changed, or has the surrounding culture just plain gone nuts?

To my knowledge, the only well-known JFK researchers who have embraced the 9/11 Truthiness Movement are Jim Marrs and Jim Fetzer. Both are frustrating cases.

Fetzer means well, and he's no dummy. But he brought near-ruin to the JFK community by trying to call into question the Zapruder film. (Fetzer has argued that the film was manipulated in ways far beyond the capabilities of '60s-era special effects wizardry.) I stopped following JFK research the moment that zany controversy became an inescapable part of the landscape.

Jim Marrs believes in space aliens. He also accepts as genuine the fictional Iron Mountain report. He has questioned the holocaust. His best-known book, Rule by Secrecy: The Hidden History That Connects the Trilateral Commission, the Freemasons, and the Great Pyramids, manages to be even worse than the title might lead you to suspect. It is, in fact, one of the most ghastly books I've ever read.

Stand with Fetzer and Marrs if you feel so inclined. I prefer other company.

So much for my general thoughts on the 9/11 Turthiness Movement, and on conspiracy theory in general. In days to come, I'll offer a series of posts on the mythology of 9/11. I had hoped to focus my attentions elsewhere -- life is short, and the 9/11 beast requires constant attention -- but if one must, one must. When these posts appear, I won't snip comments offered by controlled-demolition enthusiasts. Bring 'em on, as a noted dunderhead once said.

This series will probably alienate readers. Doesn't matter. Better to speak honestly to an empty house than to win a crowd by giving lip service to a popular hallucination.