Conspiracy Denial in the U.S. Media Journal of （阴谋否认美国的媒体杂志）.pdfVIP

Journal of 9/11 Studies Letters, March 2013 Conspiracy Denial in the U.S. Media By Lance deHaven-Smith Many American journalists appear to be locked into a peculiar way of thinking that makes them blind to signs of political criminality in high office. This mindset is characterized by an apparent inability to differentiate groundless accusations of elite political intrigue from legitimate concerns about the integrity of U.S. political leaders and institutions. For some reason, when it comes to popular suspicions of schemes involving the nation’s political elites, many journalists in the United State make no distinctions. They categorize all such suspicions as “conspiracy theories,” which they assume are not only untrue, but wacky and paranoid. This is one of a number of cognitive distortions associated with the term “conspiracy theory” that I analyze in my new book, Conspiracy Theory in America. The book will be published on April 15 of this year by the University of Texas Press in a book series edited by Mark Crispin Miller. Conspiracy Theory in America explains that the conspiracy-theory label was popularized as a pejorative putdown by the CIA in a global propaganda program to attack critics of the Warren Commission’s conclusion that President Kennedy was assassinated by a lone gunman with no government foreknowledge or assistance. The CIA campaign called on foreign media corporations and journalists to criticize “conspiracy theorists” and raise questions about their motives and judgments. Any and all criticisms of the lone-gunman account of the assassination were lumped together as “conspiracy theories,” declared groundless and pernicious, and attributed to ulterior motives and the influence of communist propagandists. Today, the conspiracy-theory label is widely used as a verbal defense mechanism by U.S. political elites to suppress mass suspicions that inevitably arise whenever shocking