Books
The biggest conspiracy of them all?
II to lllllll i. ll ‘i'lll"' ... ll. i,| lit“ 2 I it.. I h .l‘
.‘l llilllll.” ,ii Mal... 'tli Illll
v *3 ii:
the lot thi
CONSPIRACY THEORIES are great.
eptember l l. Mill is a date no one will forget in
a hurry. When America suffered its first terrorist
attack from a nonhomegrown source. the whole of the country seemed to be at one in seeking justice and/or vengeance upon Al ()aeda and its clients for this spectacularly choreographed atrocity. ()r was it'.’ Before we had even reached ‘)/l2. the internet was buzzing with wild rumours. fantastical gossip and conspiratorial rage. Here‘s a tiny sample: some suggested that the ease and speed with which the Twin Towers collapsed pointed to bombs exploding within the building. ()thers have insisted that the second tower was hit by a cruise missile and not l-‘light I75 from Boston to LA. liven more freakish than all that is the claitn that the image of a smirking Satan himself was seen in the smoke billowing out of the doomed building (check ottt n/ghostsco.n/IW'l‘(‘-ghosts.htm).
Quite what you make of all that is up to you. The irony is that no matter how ludicrotIs a conspiracy theory is (and boy. are there some corkers out there) the point of it all is closure. This can cover events which ‘ are either difficult to explain (alien autopsies at Roswell. cattle mutilations in Nevada). or incidents which ol‘licialdom insist all too quickly are case closed (the deaths of Princess Diana. Martin Luther King. .ll5K. RFK etc and etc). The ‘)/ll theories are borne from a lack of trust in our !eaders. a state of mind which was spawned by the Warren (‘ommission ‘investigation‘ into John F Kennedy‘s assassination and hasn't been helped by the whole WM[)s farrago. But even if you still reckon that a lone gunman carried out the slaying of a president without any assistance
34 THE LIST 1(3 .40 Mar 3006
t'._“‘ 'l .ll.‘ ‘
i “fl
' ‘Ol'l h
to... Hit A
WEIRD STUFF IS SOMETIMES JUST HARD TO IGNORE
ll
w .v n]
“ . my I. . ’il l l is) ..l U. in {‘l \llll'l'illii illillnl 5..“ ll‘ t it it ‘.:- l
"l l"' 'll 2 SUN ‘1 l" ‘ll ."ll‘ "r ~ ill leIHtl,‘ "in.
M. ‘2 .IC" l l -. INN-ii oui Itili’ll'
. 'llllf‘l ll
W ‘ . 'h . Tr" ya Mir” f” . a? :ttl’l ll. t' -. in. Li’lllt l‘_'
iott'h'Q lil‘r'fllil ‘l
l: {in lulu .. “ll.
llS
But Brian Donaldson wonders whether they’re getting in the way of the terrible things Western leaders do in our name.
whatsoever from some shady agencies. Watergate blew any seeds of doubt about our leaders' trustworthiness
from our minds. Nixon may have insisted that he was
‘not a crook'. but few were so naive as to believe that elected personnel are not immune to corrupt thoughts or deeds. But does this make them shape-shifting extra- terrestrial li/ards‘.’ No. [)avid lcke. it doesn't.
While it‘s perfectly plansible to conclude that an
incompetent Bush administration had full knowledge of
the looming carnage and was unable to stop it. can we really allow ourselves to entertain the thought that it orchestrated mass murder on its own people‘.’ (‘ould it have done this simply to ptish through restrictions on civil liberties in the States (an argument also mooted during the Clinton era after the ()klahoma bombing) and to justify the invasions of Afghanistan and lraq'.’
In the updated version of his ('(mxpiruev Theories. lidinburgh-born writer and editor of Lobster (lobster- maga/ine.co.uk) Robin Ramsay scoffs at the more Name theories posited down the years for the reason that they get in the way of our uncovering genuine abtises of power which governments are up to every day. Indeed the promotion of such extreme notions may even be the greatest conspiracy theory of them all. But sometimes. weird stuff is just hard to ignore. Type NYC or Q33NY into the Wingdings liont (created in l992) to discover why some people believe that 9/ll was a pre-determined assault on America‘s Jews . . .
. . . Scared yet'.’
Conspiracy Theories is out now published by Pocket Essentials.
llit
>l<
THE BEST BOOKS, COMICS 8 EVENTS
* Robin Ramsay Everyone loves a juicy conspiracy theory. don't they? Well. you might not. but 'they' will . . . See preview. left. Pocket Essentials.
* Lorraine Mama The troubled relationship between the USA and the Arab world is the basis for Harbor. a stirring debut novel which questions whether the ‘land of the free’ should be swiftly renamed. See review. Portobello.
* James Salter This widely respected American novelist has produced Last Night. a collection of evocative and incisive short stories about people being hurled out of their humdrum lives. See review. Picador.
* Bay Holllngawoflh It you fancy a bit of experimental doodlings this fortnight. Dirty Blond at the Cash Machine is the place to start. Odd photography and weird 909W are wrapped up in a less than easy to handle book format. See review. Kiss Production.
* Ivan Rather badly named by his Italian parentan that he's far from terrible). the Chicago- based artist chucks his latest Schizo volume our way. It's all rather up close and very personal. indeed. See review. Fantagraphics.
* Janey Oodhy The stand- up comic gives you another chance to see the rather unfunny side of her torrid upbringing as she reads from Handstands in the Dark, her all- too true tales of abuse and violence. Borders Books. Glasgow. Sat 18 Mar
3 Alan Bissau The chirpy guy (pictured) behind cult novels Boyraceis and The Incredible Adam Spark divulges the tricks of the trade with this advice shop for literary beginners and non-beginners alike. Leith