A revived will to believe in all-powerful conspiracies spread and grew from the 1960s on, an invasive species that became a permanent feature of the American mental landscape—like a new superkudzu that thrived everywhere, not just in the Southern heat and humidity. Within a few decades, the conviction that a web of villainous elites covertly seeks to impose a malevolent global regime made its way from the lunatic right to the mainstream.
