Aberration in the Heartland of the Real: The Secret Lives of Timothy McVeigh

by Wendy S. Painting

Growing numbers of Americans gravitated towards conspiracy theories as a way to make sense of actual or suspected parallel, but unseen, realities and realms populated by shadowy government and institutional forces. According to commentator Peter Knight, writing in 1999, the language of conspiracy that dominated the decade and its related “canon” of conspiracy theories (common subjects of popular entertainment and historical revisionism) involved any number of federal agencies’ plots and cover-ups but of all the conspiracy theories that circulated, those about the 1960s “‘Lone nut’ assassinations were the cornerstone of skepticism toward government.” According to public opinion polls, in 1964, 87% of Americans accepted the Warren Commission’s official account of the JFK assassination. In 1993, 77-80% believed some type of government conspiracy was involved in the assassination of JFK, and in 1995, 90% rejected the notion that Oswald acted alone.