Conspiracy Theories, Skepticism, and Critical Thinking

We continue to grind at the appendices, reading one of the people responsible for pushing the idea that FEMA was going to throw us in camps, take away our guns, and let the UN take over the United States (chapters 5, 6). Appendix E is supposed to be about the New World Order but the document on page 459 has nothing to do with it. This is a letter titled “S_T_A_T_E_M_E_N_T” (the letter was likely written on a typewriter, and this was the attempt at underlining). The author of the letter claims that between 1972-74, when Nixon was in trouble, a directive came through that messages from the White House were to be reported to the base commander. That’s it. This is the salient point in the signed letter [it looks like the person’s first name is either David or Daniel E. but I can’t be sure]. The writer refers to an article that he read saying, “ I recall that reason this article was so interesting was that some of us were trying to determine whether we believed that President Nixon would re

 We’ve left the HIV/AIDS conspiracy and now we’ve moved on to the New World Order. You know, the thing that the entire book has allegedly been about, so we’re back to this topic. I know I sound like I’m beating a dead horse’s drum here, but the only justification for this appendix is that Cooper thinks that he needs one. He doesn’t understand what they are for but the “smart books” have them. Is this going to be evidence or different conspiracy theories that are supposed to prove his point. The first document is a scanned version of the front page of John Robison’s “Proofs of a Conspiracy Against All the Religions and Governments of Europe, Carried on In the Secret Meetings of Free Masons, Illuminati, and Reading Societies (Collected From Good Authorities).” It’s literally just the front page of the book. I spent a good year or so reading this book ; and it’s not the proof of anything. It’s just Robison complaining that Masonry in Europe isn’t how he remembered it, the Illuminati weren