Aurora: Time to move on

Lizard, a bright young man of considerable depth, wrote a chancy post yesterday regarding the possibility that James Holmes, the accused shooter in the Aurora tragedy, might have been heavily drugged, and might not have been the only shooter. This sort of speculation usually brings out those of opaque mind frame who cannot embrace the thought of conspiracy. The others that usually chime in – those who automatically resort to ridicule, are absent in the comment thread under this post.

Conspiracies abound in this country, and it is not hard to understand why. The old chestnut says it best: If you like sausage, don’t ask how it is made. Americans are deeply indoctrinated in American exceptionalism. They will readily believe conspiracy theories about others* – a Soviet plot to kill the pope, 19 Arabs performing high-skill maneuvers in 757’s after learning to fly Cessna’s – but immediately cringe at the notion of Americans doing such deeds. That’s the mindset that Lizard entered. But I’m impressed with the bulk of the comment thread.

We know nothing of the events of that evening beyond what has filtered through the media, and a judge has sealed access to anything more. Some of it is suspicious – Holmes’ apparent drug-altered state at his first court appearance, and a package sent to a psychiatrist containing deeply incriminating evidence (not unlike the appearance of a hijacker’s passport in the rubble to the World Trade Center). Such information fans the flames of suspicion, but speculation at this point is useless. We know nothing.

Knowing nothing does not mean we must accept official truth. It only means that we must observe with incredulity and refrain from drawing conclusions until shown hard evidence.** Yes, that will happen someday.

Lizard goes on to talk about MKULTRA, a government-sponsored mind control project in the 1950’s and 60’s, supposedly terminated after failure. Why do we even know about it? The answer is stunningly simple – someone investigated. That has only happened one time – the Church Committee in the 1970’s. Senator Frank Church died at a young age of a heart attack – here’s some fuel – the CIA has drugs that can induce a heart attack and then vanish. Ahr ahr.

There’s been no other real investigations into government perfidy in noxious and ugly events like JFK, RFK and MLK. In more recent memory there is Waco and OKC and 911. It all goes on without serous investigation. People who are suspicious of official truth and get too close to power often die. Smarter people STFU. It is said that government cannot keep secrets. Oh but it can and does – forget about murdering whistleblowers. Usually they are demoted, transferred, fired, and lose there pensions. That’s enough. (Obama has been manic in his pursuit of leakers.)

I was deeply curious about the JFK hit for many years. I thought I was smart enough to solve the crime, but was not. But I did come away with an understanding that the man was no saint, no liberal, no idealist. He was a cold warrior; he abused his wife and family. But he did nothing out of the ordinary as president. He was after Castro and planned to invade Cuba and started the Vietnam invasion … business as usual. Why kill him? It remained a mystery until I read Lamar Waldron’s book in which he pieced together a different scene, a perfect storm of events resulting in a Mafia hit that took everyone by surprise. The coverup was seen as essential to prevent war between the Soviets and the US.

Then it all made sense. We’ll never know for sure, of course, but that explanation satisfies the most variables. And it explains why Lee Harvey Oswald, though innocent, was not mind-addled in the manner of another patsy, Sirhan Sirhan. He was coherent throughout – “I’m just a patsy,” “Don’t believe their so-called evidence.” He had to be dispatched, and quickly. Jack Ruby is another story worthy of books and movies.

There were reasons for killing JFK, RFK and MLK. 911, as ugly as it is, was the bottle of champagne that launched a thousand wars, all seen as necessary. Waco seems just a case of pissed-off cops, and OKC is a mired mess yet unexplained, at least as to motive. (The supposed master-mind, Timothy McVeigh, was yet another patsy, and remained quiet until his execution. That is a dog that did not bark!) But the events, insane on the surface, have logic underneath. The sausage makers need public support to achieve their ends.

If Aurora is going to fall into these parameters, there has to be a larger objective. Right away the right-wing is thinking that it’s part of an attempt to take away our guns. That satisfies Alex Jones. But gun control is, in my view, nothing more than wedge politics and, like abortion, not something anyone in power cares about. Armed rebellion in the land of the oblivious is about as likely as a coup d’état in the Vatican. That notion can be easily dismissed.

If not that, then it could be that a dozen were sacrificed to kill one, but none of the victims were important people. Perhaps it is a stage-setter, as OKC appears to have been – justification for onerous legislation – but with USAPATRIOT, that job is pretty well done. Perhaps it is just to instill fear, an ongoing light show involving such numb-nutted “terrorists” as underpants-man and shoe-bomber.

Or perhaps, as Lizard seems to suggest, it’s an escaped guinea pig, a young man with a history of research into mind control who got out of the asylum. He claims not to remember his actions that night, ala Sirhan. In this country, the home of crazy, crazy is not a crazy thought.

But we know nothing beyond this: The massacre seems random and doesn’t fall into any purposely subversive category. No new country will be invaded or powerful people murdered, new laws passed or guns confiscated. The judge sealing access seems to indicate that there is some sausage being made, but not of the variety we are used to tasting.

At this point in time, the only reasons for speculative curiosity are Holmes’ high intelligence, past academic pursuits, lack of aberrant behavior, glassy eyes and now, sequestration. What it all means? As George Carlin said to some 911 Truthers, it is fun to speculate, but power never investigates power.

We’ll never know. Time to move on.
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*The Atlantic Monthly, favored among liberal intelligentsia, ran – I say ran! – to publish speculation about how Castro was behind the JFK assassination. There are no roadblocks or filtering in the path of publicity about conspiracies by official enemies.
** The government is yet to offer hard evidence on the supposed killing of Osama bin Laden. They are, to this point, completely reliant on credulity in the media, authority figures and group consensus to pass that turd through the opening.