Alex Jones Accuses Left of “Nut-Job” Conspiracy Theory
Alex Jones’ Infowars website has published a story entitled “Nut-Job Obama Supporters Believe Healthcare.Gov Disaster Is Part Of Right Wing Conspiracy” and suggests that tin foil hats may be in order.
Seriously folks: Alex Jones. Pot, meet kettle.
At any rate, if you’re wondering about the big conspiracy theory, it turns out columnist Steve Watson got on Twitter and found a half-dozen or so people speculating that the Koch brothers could have funded sabotage of the Obamacare website.
Given the Kochs’ shady, behind-the-scenes role in many far-right efforts, it’s perhaps not surprising that we’d see some of that. But does that really add up to what Watson calls a “vast right-wing conspiracy”? Not quite, but he also found tweets from another 8 or 9 people mentioning the GOP, Jim DeMint, the Tea Party, and corporate media. I guess that seems vast to Watson, except that the hard-core conspiracy theory is still missing.
Most of these tweets (and let’s be clear, that’s all he has to point to — no blog posts, no media appearances, no press releases — just a handful of folks yapping on Twitter) are undoubtedly tongue-in-cheek. Still others talk not about actual sabotage of the website, but about Republican efforts to sabotage the implementation of the Affordable Care Act.
This would include Republican governors and legislatures dragging their heels on whether or not to create their own exchanges, rejection of the 100%-federally financed expansion of Medicaid, legal challenges going all the way to the Supreme Court, at least 41 votes in the GOP House to repeal or derail the ACA in part or in whole, and a robust, coordinated effort of public misinformation about the program.
A sample of some of the tweets Infowars finds so troubling:
Anyone wonder about sabotage in regard to the #ACA website? The Koch Bros certainly could fund a team of inside men writing faulty code.
— stormy malone (@StormyMalone) October 19, 2013
How many trolls r the Koch bros paying 2 clog up the ACA website? Repub governors refused 2 set up exchanges 2 forcing the Feds 2 to do it
— ptm (@WazzuCoug1975) October 23, 2013
If repubs are so anxious for Sebelius to testify abt #Obamacare glitches, so to should McConnell, Koch’s & media on their sabotage attempts
— raemd95 (@raemd95) October 21, 2013
One more thing #Corp Media Ent – Are you also reporting Red state GOP sabotage of #ACA,#KOCH funding to derail #ACA, 2010-2013 #ACA success
— Special C. (@sweetangelface) October 22, 2013
ACA is working. The sabotage from the Tea Pty, koch Bros and Jim Demint is not working. They are terrorists
— airbird9 (@airbird9) October 15, 2013
If I were writing the Obamacare launch as a novel, it would turn out the Koch brothers hired someone to sabotage the ACA website #justsayin
— Jean Esselink (@Uncucumbered) October 22, 2013
And there you have it, folks, a few tweets of people getting a little nutty, and few more bringing up legitimate concerns, and a few making obvious jokes. It’s not quite Alex Jones level conspiracy, is it?
Clearly, this is an area where the right has us seriously out-gunned.
