An Unscientific Summary of Favorite Theories About Hidden Forces Controlling Our Lives

Almost every month on The Michael Medved Show we offer Conspiracy Day when the moon is full—opening the lines to impassioned callers who seek to expose deep secrets and hidden forces behind perplexing, painful present events. After 15 years of featuring these calls on our show, we compiled a list of the most popular conspiracy theories advocated by our national audience. In order of popularity they are:

1. A conspiracy killed John F. Kennedy and then successfully covered up the crime.

2. Powerful, shadowy bankers and business leaders–organized around the Council on Foreign Relations, the Bilderberg Group, the Trilateral Commission, Bohemian Grove, Skull and Bones Society (or all of these)–plan to impose a New World Order, suspending national sovereignty and individual liberty.

3. 9/11 was an inside job.

4. The Masons and/or the Illuminati have conspired to cause all of the world’s problems and tragedies for the last 300 years.

5. The United States moon landings were faked on a movie set in the Nevada desert.

6. A UFO crashed in Roswell, New Mexico in 1948 and the charred alien bodies are stored in the same Nevada site where they staged the moon landing.

7. The Federal Reserve System (aka – the Beast from Jekyll Island) was a diabolical plan by international bankers to assure their control of everything.

8. Fluoridation of the water supply is a secret means for poisoning Americans.

9. The US government developed the AIDS virus in a lab as a means of eliminating Africans and homosexuals.

10. The governments of the world have deliberately suppressed evidence of extra-terrestrial visitations in order to prevent public hysteria.

None of these claims are even vaguely persuasive, but they are often intriguing or at least entertaining. In any event, our callers remind us monthly why the word “lunatic” originated to describe a special sort of madness associated with the full moon.

A final note:

From time to time, people contact me on Conspiracy Day to ask about my interest in Sasquatch, or Bigfoot, the oft-sighted (and cited) bi-pedal primate reputed to stalk the forests of the Pacific Northwest. My fascination with this creature–and my frequently expressed opinion that the weight of scientific evidence suggests that it actually exists– in no way connects with a conspiracy theory. In fact, if Bigfoot didn’t exist, that would indicate the existence of a conspiracy: an enterprising and indefatigable cabal of tireless pranksters who, over the course of more than 100 years, have gone to the trouble of planting footprints, hair samples, audio recordings, and various video and photographic images in exceedingly remote locations.

Sure, there have been some goof-balls who have attempted to con the public, but they are regularly exposed as frauds by the good people at BFRO (Bigfoot Field Researchers Organization). The best book (of a half dozen) on the evidence of this beast is by my friendly acquaintance Professor Jeff Meldrum, a tenured academic at Idaho State University with impeccable credentials. His book, SASQUATCH: LEGEND MEETS SCIENCE, should at least open some minds to the possibility that we will, eventually, find definitive proof that all the tens of thousands who’ve encountered this mysterious species aren’t imagining things. In any event, such a discovery would, in F. Scott Fitzgerald’s phrase, “bring us face to face with something commensurate to our capacity for wonder.”