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Photo by Evan Vucci / AP

When Megyn Kelly invited Jones onto her NBC show he turned out to be less than sure of his story about Sandy Hook. Faced with hard questions, in fact, he collapsed. He said he realized now that “children probably did die there.” Even so, he sees why some people still believe that it was all a scam.

Imaginary conspiracies are sometimes amusing but they are also terrifying. Adolf Hitler became a dictator by claiming persuasively that Jews were responsible for everything wrong in Germany. And in America during the early years of the Cold War Joe McCarthy cast a pall over the whole country by claiming it was infested by secret communists. They were both skilled conspiracy manipulators.

But the Jones website, Infowars.com, which brought this process forward in recent days, is a lot about nothing. It’s headed, “There’s a war on for your mind!” but after that grim warning it simply collects stories from the Mainstream Media, the dreaded MSM that everyone in the conspiracy business disdains and distrusts. “Dem losing streak continues as party becoming a joke” is one featured story. Another is “Demonstrations could turn violent in London.”

For centuries, humanity has been throwing up conspiracies that threaten to take over large sections of the world. The Illuminati (meaning “enlightened ones”) were said to be a secret society of the 18th century and for a while were blamed by conservatives for the French Revolution. The Freemasons have been accused of dominating certain professions, such as law, and, like the Illuminati, are said to hold secret power even yet. People claiming to be in touch with the Illuminati said they were planning to shut down the Internet on March 31, 2017.