Non-Critical Thinking

The horrible Boston Marathon bombing is NOT a huge conspiracy.  C'mon people! 

Here's some random clear-minded non-conspiracy thoughts:

• Read this great short article from Alex Seitz-Wald on salon.com.  Alex Jones and Infowars is crippling your ability to think straight.  And this can include some who just tend to be cynical and alarmist, like Glenn Beck (who I like otherwise).
• A few points I want to underline from the article include: Is the media part of the conspiracy or duped by the conspiracy?  Let's make up our mind here.  Or put another way, do the evil overlords control the media or do they have to fool the media?  Conspiracy theories often have it both ways at the same time.
• To what end?!  What is being accomplished here?  Did the same evil-overlords kill the gun-ban legislation in the Senate this week?  Because that's really bad timing!
• Wouldn't the current administration blame a Timothy McVeigh kind of character?  How do immigrants from Chechnya help?  Doesn't that help the anti-immigration, anti-Islam folks?
• So the Navy Seals are in on it, huh?  Do you actually know any active-duty military people?  While most of them are extraordinarily patriotic and principled (and would NEVER do anything like this), some are flaming-libs, a few are right-wing conspiracy nuts, and a lot are really young men and women who probably can't be trusted to keep a big secret for the next 50 years.  The uniforms are the same but the people in them can vary quite a bit.  So how exactly do you secretly attack your own country with those guys, and keep it secret?  It CAN'T happen on this scale.
• There is a kernel of truth in most conspiracy theories.  Are governments corrupt?  Sure.  Are all civil rights valued equally by everyone?  Of course not.  Are there elitist snobs who think they should run your life?  Yes (they're called politicians).  This doesn't mean the JOOOOOZ are able to begin wars and control nations on a whim.
• I'm convinced real conspiracies are limited in size and duration.  A few people can keep a secret for a little while.  But it will be leaked (or bragged about) eventually.  Most coups in history never got off the ground because the conspirators trusted too many people or took too long to get the ball rolling.
• So much of this is racist (but those Jews really threw us off the scent when they killed six million of their own people back in WW2 (and shut-up about the holocaust being fake; my grandfather saw the bodies with his own eyes)).
• We, as human beings, have a tendency to worship what fascinates us.  Don't get sucked in by these secret conspiracies; your curiosity will turn to fascination, your fascination will turn to obsession and your obsession will border on worship (although you'll swear you're actually against it and just want to expose it).