What is your take on the following conspiracies?

In My Humble Opinion
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[QUOTE=middleman]
I was reading “The Big Book of Conspiracies” at lunch and I wanted to see the Doper take on some of the bigger conspiracy theories. Some are really reasonable. Some are very odd. Some seem to believe that no celebrity ever dies. Below are some of the more entertaining ones and a synopsis of the “truth.” Put on your tin foil hats and give us your take!?

JFK Assassination
Okay, so I’m a cynic at heart; ever-suspicious. I still think conspiracy, although I don’t think “JFK” meant to lay out a specific blueprint for what happened, just theories. We’ll never know, but I just don’t think Oswald hatched all this alone.

Marilyn Monroe
Too much dope. I think she overdosed - no conspiracy there. Just sad.

RFK
I don’t think Sirhan Sirhan necessarily hatched this on his own either. I think someone was directing him - not a pro. More likely a fanatic whose group cut ties when he got pinched.

Elvis
Ack, what an unceremonious way to go if he DID fake it. Nah, his ticker stopped ticking on the potty. Poor guy.

Jim Morrison
Definitely dead. Sad about Pamela Courson dying so soon after he did; she gave it up to a heroin OD. Yikes.

Moon Landing
This one again. Nah - I say we did get there.

CIA Invented Crack to Hurt Minorities
Uh, no. But that doesn’t mean the CIA doesn’t have *other * involvements with the dope stuff.

CIA Invents AIDS
Would totally believe that it’s a bio weapon, but not that it was purposely released. It’s just nature’s way of sticking it to humanity.

The Government Killed John Lennon
No, no, no. Chapman’s obsession is well documented.

Roswell/Area 51
Sure, why not? :smiley:

UFOs
Well, they did come here but saw the “Anna Nicole” show and hoofed it back home with a note on the door saying, “Don’t call us, we’ll call you.”

The waters are too murky to make a definitive pronouncement one way or the other. Honestly don’t know.

Illuminati
I agree with the poster who said they’re not hiding - they’re right out in the open and control everything. The Stonecutters run the country :smiley:

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AIDS as a bioweapon doesn’t make sense, since it acts much too slowly to be useful in a war. If it was one, it must have been far from finished.

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The only one I’ll buy into is JFK, mainly because of Jack Ruby. Jack Ruby was mob connected. Recruiting an outside guy as your assassin and then bumping him off before he can spill any beans is a classic assassination technique. The whole thing stinks big time and always has.

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No one likes my JFK assassination theory: Kennedy was killed by a tiger.

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I like it and I’ll go one step further: JFK was killed by a tiger controlled by Hoffa!

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JFK Assassination

No second shooter. Oswald acted alone. Ruby shooting Oswald, now…not sure what that was about.

Marilyn Monroe

No opinion.

RFK

Sirhan Sirhan acted alone.

Elvis

Elvis is dead, expired, bought the farm, he’s gone tits up, has shuffled off this mortal coil. He’s an ex-Elvis.

Jim Morrison

See Elvis.

Moon Landing

We must have beat’ em good, 'cause the Russkies never even tried to fake a manned moon landing.

Several Americans have walked on the moon. One of them even swung a golf club.

CIA Invented Crack to Hurt Minorities

The CIA deals with foreign matters. Inventing drugs intended to hurt minorities is a domestic issue.

CIA Invents AIDS

Rather poorly thought out, if true. Doesn’t seem to select for sworn enemies of the US very well.

The Government Killed John Lennon

Why, when Lennon’s last couple of albums were having an equivalent effect anyway?

Roswell/Area 51

The Roswell “crash” occurred in '47, not the '50s, and was most likely an in strumented balloon package of the then-secret Project Mogul testing sensors intended to detect clandestine Russian nuclear weapons tests. The Air Force’s Groom Lake, Nevada, facility (what most people think of as “Area 51”) was indeed the base for engineering and testing of numerous then-secret military aircraft, however. A few prototypes flown from there, possibly using unconventional propulsion methods, probably have not been have not yet been revealed to the public.

There are (IMHO) no alien craft (a la Bob Lazar) nor bodies of aliens stored at Groom Lake. Even if there are alien bodies stashed away somewhere, they are not at Groom Lake: it’s an aviation facility, not a biology lab.

If some some sort of practical propulsion system base on electrogravitics or other unconventional principles had ever been developed by the military as far back as the '50s, whether they were reverse-engineered from alien spacecraft or invented here, the performance advantages would be so great that military use would be widespread and impossible to keep secret.

UFOs

I presume by ‘UFO’ we mean ‘alien spacecraft’, as there are numerous possible explanations for most ‘UFO’ sightings. Subject to the ‘beer can effect’: Impossible for me to believe as being alien visitation until someone finds a discarded manufactured object of clearly non-terrestrial origin. Think of all the crap we leave behind just on a day trip to the beach.

Despite the above, hidden amongst the general background noise of the tremendous number of misidentifications, crackpots, charlatans and liars that have infested this field since its inception, there are at least a few reports that are hard to explain unless one supposes something like alien visitors. Unfortunately, transient phenomena are really hard to research, so unless a spacecraft lands on Wrigley Field someday, this question will remain open for a long time to come.

Illuminati

Maybe they do run the world, but if so they are doing such an inept, clumsy, piss-poor job of it that it doesn’t really matter.

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Conspiracies are fun to think about – people sneaking around doing nefarious deeds. Probably they even have secret codes and passwords. But the iron-clad rule of a successful conspiracy is that it is always unveiled within a very short time after it tries something (usually less than a month). Further, the likelihood of any conspiracy is inversely proportional to the number of people who would have to be involved.

So let’s look at the list:

JFK Assassination Oswald acted alone. No one has ever been able to produce solid evidence otherwise, just speculation and attacks based on thoroughly discredited sources.

BTW, Oliver Stone has to be wrong about the plot, since he’s still alive. If he were onto the truth, wouldn’t they have killed him?

Marilyn Monroe Suicide or taking too many pills by mistake.
“New evidence (came to light last week) suggests that she COULDN’T have been suicidal because of the things she told her therapist right before she died.” No it didn’t. It merely suggested she told her therapist things were going well. And of course, patients always tell their therapist the truth. :rolleyes: In addition, how she felt when she last talked to the therapist does not rule out depression afterwards.

RFK No evidence. Hypnosis? Man, they don’t even use that as an excuse in bad novels anymore.

Elvis He’s dead, Jim. And if he’s not, whose corpse did he murder to fake his death?

Jim Morrison Dead as a dodo.

Moon Landing The Ruskies had radar. They could see if we landed on the moon or not, and would have been the first to call us on it.

CIA Invented Crack to Hurt Minorities Too silly for words.

CIA Invents AIDS Even sillier.

The Government Killed John Lennon They caught the killer. And why exactly was Lennon a threat?

Roswell/Area 51 Nonsense.

UFOs Only believed by scientific illiterates.

Illuminati The was proposed in a work of fiction*. What’s next? Tristero? What a W.A.S.T.E. And if they’re that powerful, how did anyone find out about them and live?

Ultimately, there is not a single shred of actual evidence to prove any of these assertions. And merely pointing out possibilities is not evidence.

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BTW, here’s my JFK Assassination theory. It is as likely and shows as much evidence as any other.

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JFK Assassination - Oswald was the only gunman. He may have been motivated to his actions by some third party, but I think it’s unlikely.

Marilyn Monroe - I think this is possible, if not likely. I heard one theory that she could have been given the overdose with suppositories.

RFK - I see nothing wrong with the ‘Lone Nut’ hypothesis…Occams Razor.

Elvis - Silliness

Jim Morrison - More silliness

Moon Landing - So stupid that anybody who believes we didn’t really go is delusional

CIA Invented Crack to Hurt Minorities - Silliness, people had been making ‘crack’ a long time before it became well-known in the 80s.

CIA Invents AIDS - Lots of evidence to the contrary

The Government Killed John Lennon - Silliness

Roswell/Area 51 - There may still be secrets related to this, but aliens had nothing to do with it.

UFOs - Highly unlikely due to lack of alien contamination (we’d certainly have at least a few germs with alien DNA floating around)

Illuminati - Please, governments can barely control anything, we’re supposed to believe a secret society could control everything?

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JFK Assassination
Killed by aliens

Marilyn Monroe
Killed by aliens

RFK
Death staged by aliens

Elvis
Kidnapped by aliens

Jim Morrison
Killed by aliens

Moon Landing
Technology provided by aliens

CIA Invented Crack to Hurt Minorities
Crack invented by aliens

CIA Invents AIDS
Accidently contracted from aliens

The Government Killed John Lennon
He was an alien

Roswell/Area 51
Landing site for aliens

UFOs
Don’t exist

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JFK Assassination
Killed by aliens

Marilyn Monroe
Empregnated by aliens

RFK
Death staged by aliens

Elvis
Kidnapped by aliens

Jim Morrison
Killed by aliens

Moon Landing
Technology provided by aliens

CIA Invented Crack to Hurt Minorities
Crack invented by aliens

CIA Invents AIDS
Accidently contracted from aliens

The Government Killed John Lennon
He was an alien

Roswell/Area 51
Landing site for aliens

UFOs
Don’t exist

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Can I throw a recent one in the pot?
I think Princess Diana was murdered. The missing car. The supposed drunkeness of the driver with a spotless service record. The way that the entire Diana Worship went from Global to ZERO in a heartbeat is just to interesting for me.

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I heard this one applied to Princess Diana soon after she died, but I’d be more inclined to believe she was murdered. What woman would fake her own death and put her children through that?

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Marilyn Monroe: Was killed by order of JFK to hide the affair they were having, after she become pregnant.

JFK Assassination: The Ghost of Marilyn Monroe possesed Oswald, and used his body to shoot JFK. She then possessed Ruby, and had him shoot Oswald, just to confuse things.

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That needs to happen before the Cubs are eliminated from contention or no one will notice. Say, mid-April.

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You’re joking, of course. Eight years on, we’re still seeing her picture in the papers. :rolleyes:

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I just want to point out that Elvis is an anagram of Lives. Elvis Lives. What more evidence do you need?

Elvis is also an anagram of Evils. He is clearly the embodiment of all that is evil in this world.

Elvis is (and this is the clincher) an anagram of Levi’s. He was created originally by the Levi Strauss corporation to promote their line of denim wear - helping them to break into the youth market.

Elvis is also an anagram of Veils. This is demonstrates the deception used by Levi’s to distance themselves from him, and also to fake his death. Such is the truth veiled from us.

Elvis is an anagram of El Vis… which must be Spanish for something, although I’m not sure what. I bet it means “the hidden, living, denim-wearing, evil one” or something.

This amount of evidence just can’t be ignored.

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The only one I think has any credence is the JFK assasination, mostly because there’s a lot of unexplained events and coincidences. Personally, I believe that Oswald acted alone but that there were other folks planning to kill Kennedy - LHO just beat them to the punch.

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Possibly even on earth, depending on how you define “intelligent”. :wink:

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JFK Assassination
”Mob Hit” Oswald was and someone else – hired guns. Jack Ruby, who I believe had cancer at the time, killed Oswald to prevent him from talking.
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Marilyn Monroe**
Accidental OD. Audiotapes recently released by her former and dead psychiatrist imply she was doing it with Bobby, but not Jack. And she is the one who wanted to break if off with Bobby, but didn’t want to confront/hurt him.
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RFK**
Lone nut. Maybe.
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Elvis**
Dead. But his spirit lives on. Like the song “Everybody’s Got A Little Elvis In Them.” Or something like that.
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Jim Morrison**
Dead

Moon Landing
We really went to the Moon. More than once.

CIA Invented Crack to Hurt Minorities
No, but there seems to be a certain let’s go hard and heavy with people using this particular drug.

CIA Invents AIDS
No.

The Government Killed John Lennon
Nonsense. Not in 1980, after all his legal troubles were long over. Lone nut.

UFOs
Yes there are things that fly in space that are unidentified. I don’t think it proves or disproves anything about the Universe.