Off and on over the years (and recently here), I've ruminated about the "conspiracy theory" thought process and logic. Provisionally, I'd say there are three types of postures with regard to "conspiracy theory":
1) full-blown believers
2) partial, tentative believers in some conspiracies
3) skeptics/disbelievers.
(I would situate myself as uncomfortably vacillating between #2 and #3.)
Each of these three categories, we could add, in turn has subtypes & flavors.
When it comes to "the Swamp" and/or "the Deep State", it seems among the believers there are some who are #1 and some who are #2. Representatives of the #2 subtype sound more moderate and reasonable, of course; but there seems to be an interesting paradox whereby the more moderate and reasonable your approach is, the less coherent is your end product, so to say.
Today I just note (and perhaps minimally examine) some remarks made by Frank Gaffney and Diana West -- both of whom strike me as situated somewhere between #1 and #2. I'll just cherry-pick from a recent conversation they had:
At one point, Frank mentions the "enemy within phenomenon" and makes this interesting observation:
...in particular the more open, the more free the society, the more they're able to operate almost in the open…
On the face of it, he's got it exactly backwards: in fact, the more free and open the society, the more the enemy within has to hide what it's doing. What Frank may be trying to say is that the freedom and openness of a free and open society gives an enemy within certain types of opportunities to operate: However, what Frank is missing is that these opportunities are forced upon the enemy within as the best he can do under severe limitations that limit what he'd really like to do (i.e., take off the mask and wield brute totalitarian control out in the Stalinist sunshine, so to speak).
This curious misstep in Frank's thinking may provide a clue into the "conspiracy theory" thought process and logic. Rather than keep his focus on the severe limitations the non-Swamp reality imposes upon the enemy within, Frank seems to be inverting that reality and perceiving the enemy within's limitations on his power as evidence of his power. This of course is liable to the odd incoherence I palpated provisionally in my above-linked essay, whereby the conspiracy-theorist never seems to ask (and then unfold the logic of the question) why it is that the enemy within doesn't just take over, already. What's stopping them? If this frank question were pursued in good faith and rigor, it would lead the thinker to a serious reassessment of the "conspiracy" or the "Swamp" or the "Deep State" (or other symbolic equivalents).
A serious reassessment doesn't mean one has to dismiss the whole "enemy within phenomenon" Frank adduces; but it does mean one might have to figure out what the actual nature of that enemy within is. What characterizes the conspiracy theory logic the most, perhaps, is an irresponsible suspension -- if not outright avoidance -- of the question: Why is the enemy within not just liquidating all its opposition? Instead, they focus on all the nefarious things they claim the enemy within is doing -- a mishmash of
1) things they are doing;
2) things they might well be doing; and
3) things they could be doing but for which there is no evidence and only speculation.
Now, there is a problem with limiting the analysis strictly at #1 and not permitting any consideration whatsoever of #2 and #3 -- just as there is a problem with too promiscuously entertaining #3 in a way that through artful rhetoric and slippery data (if not mostly dots to be connected) irresponsibly merges speculation with fact.
The navigation of 1-2-3 needs to pay constant attention to the overall contours of the Enemy Within -- first of all, by acknowledging that we don't know what those contours are; and from there, responsibly proceeding by factoring in how the Enemy Within seems to be limited in its powers; and from there, asking why -- why in such a way that palpates those contours as much by the Enemy Within's limitations on its powers as it does by what we impute those powers to be.
I get the sense from reading and listening to Frank & Diana that, more often than not, they are not following this general rule of thumb I've outlined; and in fact, tend to indulge a speculative rhetoric indicative of a nebula of ambiguity based upon avoiding key aspects of this rule of thumb.
To be continued...
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