The description of Michael Ruppert and others like Jeff Rense as 'right-wing' is as counterfeit as the concomitant terms like 'crank', or 'loon'. (your comrade has conceded elsewhere that the term 'right-wing' may in fact not be apt but then insists that 'these people are loons anyway' - I'm paraphrasing here). Such name calling is designed to distract from the substance of what these people have to present. Sure, if you disagree with Ruppert and April Oliver on the Tailhook story, fine, journalists disagree all the time. But attaching prejudicial characterizations seems to attempt to create an intellectual scarecrow to ward off others who might find their work persuasive absent any pre-existing prejudice.
You say: "the love for far right wing sources that are highly dubious in terms of both political *and* empirical content tells us quite a bit about the 'left wing' orientation of ostensibly left wing conspiracy theorists."
I don't understand why you use the term 'love' for right-wing sources. No such pathology exists among some progressives any more than other progressives might be said to have a 'love' for mainstream, corporate controlled news electronic and print media sources. The rest of your sentence there is simply innuendo. Michael Ruppert for example is not a right-winger, nor is April Oliver. Ruppert is an independent researcher none of whose projects can be said to have furthered any right-wing agenda. Indeed he is speaking tonight in Oakland, California on a panel with Richard Heinberg author of "The Party's Over" - on Oil Reserves and Depletion and Julian Darley of the Post Carbon Institute - on Natural Gas Reserves and Depletion. Indeed, he is a fellow traveller of many radical leftists like Dhorubha Bin Wahad, Peter Dale Scott, yours truly, and progressive Democrats like Cynthia McCkinney and Maxine Waters.
I think we really need to get away from prejudicial characterizations and let the information speak - or not for itself.
Joe W.
November 10, 2001 - President Bush Speaks to United Nations G.W. Bush: "We must speak the truth about terror. Let us never tolerate outrageous conspiracy theories concerning the attacks of September the 11th; malicious lies that attempt to shift the blame away from the terrorists, themselves, away from the guilty. To inflame ethnic hatred is to advance the cause of terror." http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2001/11/20011110-3.html
>From: Stephen E Philion <philion at hawaii.edu>
>Reply-To: lbo-talk at lbo-talk.org
>To: lbo-talk at lbo-talk.org, jlembcke at holycross.edu
>Subject: [lbo-talk] re What does Amy Goodman see in Thomas Moorer?
>Date: Tue, 28 Oct 2003 21:11:51 -0600
>
>So do you take issue with any factual inacuracies on Democracy Now and
>its coverage of the USS Liberty story - or are you only concerned with
>political correctness?
>
>--I don't know much about the USS Liberty story, I hope it has more
>substance than the silly tales that April Oliver and right wing loons
>like Moorer and Singlaub drew up for her Tailwind Tale.
>------------------------------
>
>
>One member of the audience, a Steamshovel fan of long standing,
>effectively challenged Jerry Lembcke, a panelist who wrote the book
>CNN's Tailwind Tale:
>
>--yeah, real 'effective'. he went on and on about the existence of a
>small number of conspiracy theorists who appear to be left wing. Then
>he got declared his belief that airplanes didn't take down the
>WTC...wow. Jerry was on the money about Ruppert being right wing, he
>demonstrates that clearly enough in his Tailwind book, as is
>Moorer,Singlaub, April Oliver.
>-----------------------------
>While the book has a lot to recommend it, its author often makes
>his points by receding into the vagaries of "institutional analysis",
>the facts-avoiding tactic advocated by Noam Chomsky.
>
>--I have no idea what this is supposed to mean.
>-----------------------------------
> To describe parapolitical research, Lembcke uses terms like
>"conspiracism", a word that Fletcher Prouty pointed out long
>agocontains the subtle smear of "racism" within it.
>
>---that is silly. on the other hand, maybe Prouty is nervous about the
>association of conspiracy theory and nativism?
>------------------------------------
> Lembcke also labeled Prouty "right
>wing", as he did people like Michael Ruppert and Jeff Rense.
>
>--yes, he did. and in all likelihood that's an accurate association.
>------------------------
>To my great
>pleasure, the Steamshovel reader had my co-panelist trace this line of
>reasoning to the absurd point where he actually declared Peter Dale
>Scott "right wing" as well.
>
>--actually jerry took no stance on Dale-Scott. What he did do was state
>that the theory that the CIA fed drugs to GI's and the population in
>the US was part of far right wing conspiracy theory and loopy.
>-----------------
>The search for "credibility" also haunts the opinion industry, left and
>right. Jerry Lembcke defined respected conspiracy writers as "right
>wing" not just people whom he felt had it wrong - because it gave him
>more credibility as a critic coming from the left.
>
nope, the more important point to take away is what the love for far
>right wing sources that are highly dubious in terms of both political *
>and* empirical content tells us quite a bit about the 'left wing'
>orientation of ostensibly left wing conspiracy theorists.
>--
>----------------------------
>Stauber had little to say
>about conspiracy as a broadstroke concept, even though his work studies
>it in detail, because that would tarnish its credibility.
>
>--or it might detract from the more important issue at hand, US foreign
>policy and its origins.
>
>___________________________________
>http://mailman.lbo-talk.org/mailman/listinfo/lbo-talk
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