Enemies within : the culture of conspiracy in modern America

There is a hunger for conspiracy news in America. Hundreds of Internet websites, magazines, newsletters, even entire publishing houses, disseminate information on invisible enemies and their secret activities, subversions, and coverups. Those who suspect conspiracies behind events in the news—the crash of TWA Flight 800, the death of Marilyn Monroe—join generations of Americans, from the colonial period to the present day, who have entertained visions of vast plots. In this enthralling book Robert Goldberg focuses on five major conspiracy theories of the past half-century, examining how they became widely popular in the United States and why they have remained so. In the post–World War II decades conspiracy theories have become more numerous, more commonly believed, and more deeply embedded in our culture, Goldberg contends. He investigates conspiracy theories regarding the Roswell UFO incident, the Communist threat, the rise of the Antichrist, the assassination of President John Kennedy, and the Jewish plot against black America, in each case taking historical, social, and political environments into account. Conspiracy theories are not merely the products of a lunatic fringe, the author shows. Rather, paranoid rhetoric and thinking are disturbingly central in America today. With media validation and dissemination of conspiracy ideas, and federal government behavior that damages public confidence and faith, the ground is fertile for conspiracy thinking.

What would it be like to be privy to the mind of one of the twentieth century's greatest thinkers? John Gerassi had just this opportunity; as a child, his mother and father were very close friends with Jean-Paul Sartre and Simone de Beauvoir, and the couple became for him like surrogate parents. Authorized by Sartre to write his biography, Gerassi conducted a long series of interviews between 1970 and 1974, which he has now edited to produce this revelatory and breathtaking portrait of one of the world's most famous intellectuals.

Through the interviews, with both their informalities and their tensions, Sartre’s greater complexities emerge. In particular, we see Sartre wrestling with the apparent contradiction between his views on freedom and the influence of social conditions on our choices and actions. We also gain insight into his perspectives on the Spanish Civil War, World War II, and the disintegration of colonialism.

These conversations add an intimate dimension to Sartre's more abstract ideas. With remarkable rigor and intensity, they also provide a clear lens through which to view the major conflagrations of the past century.

Contents 7 Preface 9 Chapter 1. An American Tradition 15 Chapter 2. The Master Conspiracy 36 Chapter 3. The Rise of the Antichrist 80 Chapter 4. The View from the Grassy Knoll 119 Chapter 5. Jewish Devils and the War on Black America 164 Chapter 6. The Roswell Incident 203 Chapter 7. Mainstreaming Conspiracism 246 Notes 275 Bibliography 303 Index 353 From the Roswell UFO incident to the Communist threat to the rise of the Antichrist, there has been a hunger for conspiracy in America since World War II. Goldberg focuses on five major conspiracy theories of the past half century and examines why they became so popular