That’s the only conclusion you can draw from the latest Scripps Howard News Service poll:
Nearly two-thirds of Americans think it is possible that some federal officials had specific warnings of the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks on New York and Washington, but chose to ignore those warnings, according to a Scripps Howard News Service/Ohio University poll.
A national survey of 811 adult residents of the United States conducted by Scripps and Ohio University found that more than a third believe in a broad smorgasbord of conspiracy theories including the attacks, international plots to rig oil prices, the plot to assassinate President John F. Kennedy in 1963 and the government’s knowledge of intelligent life from other worlds.
The high percentage is a manifestation, some say, of an American public that increasingly distrusts the federal government.
As someone whose distrust the government has been ingrained in them since I picked up Milton Friedman and Ayn Rand when I was a freshman in college, I’ve got to disagree. Believing in insane conspiracy theories isn’t about distrusting the government. it’s about being, well, insane.
November 26th, 2007 at 6:12 am
Two-thirds of Americans take the results of opinion polls as gospel.