One conspiracy duped millions on the left and right, crafted over decades, nurtured carefully for when it would eventually provide a coup de grâce of epic proportions. This is the piece of the puzzle I have yet to see in the media: The Bernie bros and others on the left who refused to vote for Hillary, and even those on the right who hated Trump but voted for him rather than Hillary? They fell for an actual conspiracy. A real life, carefully orchestrated conspiracy snagged them hook, line, and sinker. And it continues, which may be why nobody is even attempting to assemble the pieces.

“If a lie is only printed often enough, it becomes a quasi-truth, and if such a truth is repeated often enough, it becomes an article of belief, a dogma, and men will die for it” (Blagden, 1869, p. 155).

Often misquoted as “a lie told often enough becomes the truth,” and usually attributed to Goebels or Lenin, the line above was penned by a Victorian woman named Ira Blagden in Volume III of The Crown of a Life, a novel published in 1869. To last and spread effectively, the lie really needs to be enhanced by a few elements. It must be plausible, or nearly so, but it absolutely must be captivating, and finally, the target must have a flaw or weakness to make them vulnerable.

Hillary’s conspirators exploited all three elements. The conspiracy began when Bill was elected, and the Right Wing knew Hillary would be trouble. She was smart, liberated, and politically savvy. In short, she was everything the Right hated and the Left would want. The Republicans began crafting countermeasures immediately, in a multi-pronged assault over decades.

Fairy tales live on because of the mixture of reality and fantasy, a dose of reality mixed with what are called minimally counterintuitive ideas. Girls taking a forbidden shortcut through the woods may indeed encounter trouble, especially if they meet a lusty male, but the tale survives because lust and disobedience are disguised as a talking wolf who dresses up as Grandma.

The Clinton tale had a lusty wolf named Bill, but really? He is an amateur compared to the pussy-grabbing, minor-raping exploits of Trump. The Clintons helped blow down the fortunes of some little piggies in Whitewater, but nothing remotely close to Trump’s level of lupine real estate grift. Those were the factual parts. They were laid to rest when Bill survived impeachment. They arose as zombies in a larger narrative, and it was the fictionalized Hillary that formed the fatal lie for which environmentalism is being laid waste, and yes, for which impoverished Republicans robbed of their healthcare will die.

The counterintuitive parts of this story are several. Piles of bodies are supposed to exist somewhere, primarily from assassinations Putin would envy. Some people did die oddly, but the image is of piles created by Hillary, truth blended with fiction. A particularly damaging piece of information came in October 2016, when Assange claimed that leaked emails proved Clinton was a warmonger who had sold weapons to ISIS. No such emails have ever appeared. But people believed in droves.

Added to the salacious mix of facts and fancy is Hillary herself. Her public persona is forceful and shrill, making her an inherently unlikable violator of feminine norms. Public displays of unwomanly strength supported accusations of warmongering. Indeed, she was willing to endorse military actions, which the Republicans should have loved, but not from a woman. Her style of pulling back and hiding when a wrong was exposed certainly did not help: Trump practically crowed about his, and by embracing them, the scandals lost power. Hillary prevaricated on Whitewater, providing the juju to revive that zombie as evidence that she lies. Unfortunately, she does lie and exaggerate, but has been documented by Politifact and others as lying far less than most (including Bernie). Trump is probably a pathological liar, given his bizarre need to spin stories about huge inauguration crowds and Electoral College margins. She is far less flawed than Trump, but the actual flaws were woven into a story where she plays the evil witch.

Bernie Sanders had never been a member of the Democratic party, actually being a for-real Socialist. Socialism is not a bad word in most of the world, but it has long been vilified in America. He broke with Democrats legislatively on a range of issues including gun control. He was never known as anyone who could get a bill passed. He shared none of his campaign funds with other Democrats and campaigned for no down-ticket candidates, yet used the Democratic machine in a crass display of opportunism. But, supported by the legend of Hillary’s ruthlessness, he was somehow unfairly denied the Democratic nomination.

Putin provided the plot twist, certainly helping Trump, as a growing list of associates who met with Russians shows. That Republicans seem to have welcomed assistance from their cold-war foe shows their commitment to this defeat. Evidence of the decades of smear Hillary endured is now widely known. Trump unquestionably committed some horrific acts, in business, in his family life, to women he abused and assaulted, and he committed treason by colluding with a foreign power. But somehow, Hillary is still worse in many people’s minds. Ask a Bernie bro if he regrets not voting, and he will still vociferously denounce anyone who did vote for her.

The facts did not help Hillary, but other elements sealed this fate. This was a long-range con, a true conspiracy, supported in part by a master of propaganda from the Soviet days, Putin himself. Comey provided the last push to pop the festering Hillary pimple, his conscience supposedly driving him to reveal a possible wrinkle that could put her under investigation without a mention that Trump already was. We know all of this, but people cling to false beliefs like life-preservers. Hillary is probably fading from political aspirations, but the machine is in place.

Our gullibility bought us Trump, and if the Bernie bros and Hillary haters cannot even bring themselves to recognize that they fell victim to a conspiracy, it will work over and over. The country is now run by an inept authoritarian fiddling like Nero as the world burns. Decades of progress on human rights, women’s rights, racial equality, environmental protection, and international nuclear proliferation have been cast aside, not to mention healthcare. As easily as people were manipulated into voting against their interest by a clever narrative, America will probably be played like a fiddle again.

Since posting this, I have been chided for posting something without new information and offering no solutions. I suspect the response was from an unrepentant Bernie bro, or at least someone who abstained from voting, but ok. Perhaps I did not make it clear, but I admit that I myself bought into some of the anti-Hillary propaganda now disproved. We were played, big-time. I offer this course of action.

The remedy begins with a simple admission:

“Hi, I’m _____ and I fell for a Right Wing conspiracy.” Then go forth and never say it is better not to vote, because if Trump has accomplished anything in his first hundred days, it is providing compelling evidence that not voting has proven truly awful.