Yet for others, the John Birch Society is urgently relevant to the matters of today, in its support of secure borders and limited government, its distrust of the Federal Reserve and the United Nations, and its belief in a conspiracy to merge Mexico, Canada and the United States.

This so-called North American Union, it asserts, is part of a larger plot by an amorphous, amoral group of powerful elite — including but not limited to the Council on Foreign Relations, the Trilateral Commission and the Rockefellers — to take over planet Earth. Call it the New World Order.

Some of these theories may sound like cable television chatter, or the synopsis of a Dan Brown bestseller. But Birch leaders say this plot is real, with roots going back more than 200 years to a secret, insidious brotherhood called the Illuminati, and with most American presidents among its many dupes and abettors.

“We’ve always referred to it as a Satanic conspiracy,” said Arthur Thompson, the society’s chief executive, sitting beside an American flag.

But dressed now in his preferred attire of dark blazer and red tie, he spoke earnestly of wanting to thwart the “insiders,” as he calls them. “It’s a war between good and evil,” he said. “And sometimes it takes a strange twist.”

The society is familiar with strange twists. In late 2005, for example, Mr. Thompson became chief executive after staging a coup with the help of John McManus, the society’s most prominent member, its longtime president and an ultraconservative Roman Catholic. This prompted some ousted Birchers to disseminate recorded snippets of Mr. McManus lecturing to Catholic groups that Judaism became a dead and deadly religion after the establishment of the Catholic Church.

Mr. McManus is also heard to say that militant Jews have influenced the Freemasons, who are “Satan’s agents,” “the enemies of Christ Church” — and, in the view of the John Birch Society, part of the Illuminati conspiracy to cause world upheaval.

The Times‘ Dan Barry could just as easily be describing the world of Alex Jones, Glenn Beck, and Orly Taitz. And in fact Mr. Barry is talking about the Tancredos and Palins of the world. Consider Sarah’s obsession with secrecy and security; the Birchers organize in a conscious imitation of classical lefty subversives — small cells of eight or more people.

Barry relates the story of

Mr. Shibler, the shipping and maintenance manager, said he joined the society as a teenager in the 1970s after attending one of its summer camps, where educational sessions were mixed with fun activities like fishing and swimming. Those camps are no more; among other reasons, it became easier to reach young people on the Web.

The wingnutosphere was in development long before the internet, but it has thrived in the age of unfiltered information. Which brings us to Barry’s diverse selection of quotes:

Chris Nowak, 24, a substitute math teacher who said he joined after his father, a longtime Bircher, re-educated him about American history; for example, he now understood that the United Nations was founded by President Harry S. Truman “and other communists.”

“Re-education” is a term used by commies in cultural revolution. But Harry Truman, for whom the doctrine of Soviet containment was named, was a “communist”? Let us hope Mr. Nowak never teaches history.

With Mr. Nowak were Ray Tisch, 37, an electrical engineer, and Matthew Yamakaitis, 49, a warehouse worker, who said they had joined the John Birch Society within the last two years because they shared its concerns about the North American Union, the mainstream media and the conspiracy of elite insiders.

“At the highest levels there are controls in place,” Mr. Tisch said. Mr. Yamakaitis agreed, saying that if the insiders succeed in creating a new world order, “It basically means less power for us.”

“And more for the elite,” said Mr. Tisch.

“The Rockefellers, the Morgans, the Rothschilds,” said Mr. Nowak.

Occam’s Razor never applies in this mindset. Nothing about the JBS has changed. Consider the history:

The Republican party of Eisenhower in 1956 had a platform of environmentalism and anti-trust enforcement. It was pro-labor and based its foreign policy on support of the United Nations and international cooperation. Eisenhower called Americans to civil service and built the nation’s infrastructure to spur economic development. Today, a new president has a platform of environmentalism and anti-trust enforcement, is pro-labor and bases his foreign policy on support of the United Nations and international cooperation. He calls Americans to civil service and builds the nation’s infrastructure to spur economic development.

The Birchers call it “socialism” and “communism” because they always have, no matter who is in charge. The president’s newness and strange name are just icing on the nutcake of paranoid delusion. The original Birchers were inspired by Joe McCarthy, who asked:

How can we account for our present situation unless we believe that men high in this government are concerting to deliver us to disaster? This must be the product of a great conspiracy on a scale so immense as to dwarf any previous such venture in the history of man.

Since its beginnings, the JBS has been a primary propagator of Teh Evil Plan™ — a vast conspiracy to run the world, serve the devil, and take away all our freedoms in the process. It’s a Manichean view of the world; and in fact it comes from Dark Age cosmology. St. Basil in the 4th Century:

Of what importance is it to know whether the Earth is a sphere, a cylinder, a disc or a concave surface? What is important is to know how I should conduct myself towards myself, towards my fellow man and towards God.

Shortly after this, there was no Western empire of Rome anymore. A lot of knowledge disappeared as monks re-used old parchment to make copies of the Bible. During these cold and ignorant centuries, the consensus was that sinister forces held free reign over Earth because humans had fallen from God. That sort of pessimism is natural in a world with marauding vikings.

Which brings us back to

John McManus, the society’s most prominent member, its longtime president and an ultraconservative Roman Catholic.

In a strange twist, a kind of militantly dark-age Catholicism has taken over an organization that is an intellectual descendant of anti-Catholic paranoia from the 19th and early 20th Centuries. History has its ironies; also among the latter is the odd fact that McManus is a character straight out of a Dan Brown plot.

Which brings me to this video of Alex Jones agreeing to disagree with David Icke about whether lizard-people are part of Teh Evil Plan™, too:

I’ve been accused of conspiracy-mongering, but the wingnutosphere isn’t a conspiracy; it isn’t even a coalition. It is a world-view with very old roots that propagates itself through media. I wouldn’t call it so much a “conspiracy” as a neurosis of western civilization. You will find all variety of wingnuts in the wingnutosphere, but they all hold a common set of paranoias.

They reject an empirical, fact-based universe for an imaginary one that is very simple:

THEY ARE OUT TO GET YOU

THEY CONTROL THE WORLD

THEY ARE ALL IN IT TOGETHER

Birds of a feather flock together, or so they say, and these particular neurotics are multiplying via the ‘tubes. They actually come from every religious background, even atheist Objectivists.

And they are actually competing for leadership of an asylum called the Republican Party.

I make no diagnosis here. The bizarre, Rube-Goldberg cosmology of the paranoid universe offers a mystery couched in familiar scare-words. This projector shines brightly on the ceiling of Plato’s cave; the inmates gaze at the shadows, and like dreamers, construct a fable from chaos. Occasionally, they argue about an elephant. Teh Evil Plan™ is not an ancient conspiracy; the paranoid have simply always been with us.

I kid, I kid…Just demonstrating the Samsara of Wacky, ya’ll. In fact, the conspiracy would have to involve his wife and the dispatcher who took this call:

I’ve adapted this checklist by Janja Lalich, Ph.D. & Michael D. Langone, Ph.D which is used by evangelical organizations to identify cults. The contrasted quotes come straight from the study’s findings. All emphasis is mine.

1) A cult of personality

The group displays excessively zealous and unquestioning commitment to its leader and (whether he is alive or dead) regards his belief system, ideology, and practices as the Truth, as law.

While they continue to defend George W. Bush personally, his presidency is an embarrassment to them and represents the culmination of a creeping betrayal of conservative values that started with the election of his father more than 20 years ago. The lionization of Ronald Reagan in these groups was as strong as we have seen for any political figure, as was the desperate desire for a new Reaganesque figure to lead them out of their current wilderness.

[...]

Glenn Beck, however, received nothing short of adulation from these voters, particularly the women. They believe he embodies the best of conservative media – determination to unearth the stories the liberal media tries to bury, love of country, and refusal to be intimidated, even as the liberal media unleashes waves of attacks on his past and his credibility.

[...]

Two aspects of the discussion on Beck among conservative Republicans were particularly noteworthy. One was a common fear among the women for his personal safety, a belief that his willingness to stand up to powerful liberal interests was putting his life, as well as the lives of those working with him, in danger. Of course, his willingness to face this danger head on only adds to his legend.

The other is the commitment these voters have made to Beck and his show. More than half of the respondents in our conservative Republicans groups indicated that they try to watch or listen to Beck on a daily basis, with some going to great lengths to ensure they (and their families) do not miss a thing.

2) Information filtering and special knowledge

Questioning, doubt, and dissent are discouraged or even punished. ‪Mind-altering practices are used in excess and serve to suppress doubts about the group and its leader(s). Members are expected to devote inordinate amounts of time to the group and group-related activities.

A central part of the collective identity built by conservative Republicans in the current political environment is their belief that they possess knowledge and insight that the majority of Americans – whether too lazy or too misguided to find it for themselves – do not possess. A combination of conservative media outlets are the means by which they have gained this knowledge, led by FOX News (“the truth tellers“), and to a lesser degree conservative talk radio. Their antipathy and distrust toward the mainstream media could not be stronger, and they fiercely defend FOX as the only truly objective news outlet.

Several of the women particularly talked about becoming a sort of truth police, spending a great deal of their personal time and energy watching FOX to get the real stories, then turning to CNN, MSNBC, and the networks to document their failure to cover the “real truth.” It was unclear what they did with this information once gathered, other than share it with others within this group.

3) Skewed normative psychology

The leadership dictates, sometimes in great detail, how members should think, act, and feel (for example, members must get permission to date, change jobs, marry—or leaders prescribe what types of clothes to wear, where to live, whether or not to have children, how to discipline children, and so forth).

Conservative Republicans passionately believe that they represent a group of people who have been targeted by a popular culture and set of liberal elites – embodied in the liberal mainstream media – that mock their values and are actively working to advance the downfall of the things that matter most to them in their lives – their faith, their families, their country, and their freedom.

[...]

The religious undertones to this language – planting a seed, a people awakening – are unmistakable and speak to the fervor of these partisans. This is about an attack on their most closely held beliefs and values, and they will not simply turn the other cheek. They passionately believe that, through their hard work and determination, Obama and his agenda will ultimately be defeated. They celebrated the tea parties as early signs of this movement coming together, talking about the tea parties in first person despite not having attended any events themselves.

[...]

Not surprisingly given our previous research into the centrality of faith to the politics of conservative Republicans, there are clear religious overtones to this nostalgia for the founding fathers. With little specificity to their history or its implications for today, they express an unshakable belief that our country was founded on Judeo-Christian values and must return to those values to get back on the right track.

‪ 4) A sense of mission

The group is elitist, claiming a special, exalted status for itself, its leader(s) and members (for example, the leader is considered the Messiah, a special being, an avatar—or the group and/or the leader is on a special mission to save humanity). ‪ The group has a polarized us-versus-them mentality, which may cause conflict with the wider society... The group is preoccupied with bringing in new members.

In our focus group discussions, we quickly noted how they routinely used plural first person pronouns to describe a group of individuals (including all those in the room but extending far beyond those walls) who share a set of beliefs, knowledge, and commitment to oppose Obama that sets them apart from the majority of the country. Democrats may joke that Republicans seem to live on a different planet sometimes, but in some important ways, these Republicans would happily agree.

[...]

There is no doubt in their minds that the ultimate goal of this strategy is to change our country to a socialist nation. In their minds, this is the key to truly understanding the Obama presidency and what is happening in our country today. Everything goes back to government control and Obama (aided by Democrats in Congress and the liberal media) seeking to systematically strip away individual rights and insert government into every aspect of our daily lives.

[...]

The final aspect of the collective identity shared by conservative Republicans is the call to action. The attacks they suffer for their values and the special knowledge they share as a result of their devotion to conservative media and active rejection of mainstream media are ultimately meaningless if it does not help defeat Obama and his hidden agenda. This is where the sense of collective purpose is greatest. They see a nascent movement building, still not fully realized or activated but with a growing number of people watching and listening, growing increasingly frustrated, and looking for ways to stop the growing threat they perceive.

5) Special destiny

The leader is not accountable to any authorities. The group teaches or implies that its supposedly exalted ends justify whatever means it deems necessary. This may result in members’ participating in behaviors or activities they would have considered reprehensible or unethical before joining the group.
‪

This concern combines with a profound sense of collective identity. In our conversations, it was striking how these voters constantly characterized themselves as part of a group of individuals who share a set of beliefs, a unique knowledge, and a commitment of opposition to Obama that sets them apart from the majority of the country. They readily identify themselves as a minority in this country – a minority whose values are mocked and attacked by a liberal media and class of elites.

They also believe they possess a level of knowledge and understanding when it comes to politics and current events, one gained from a rejection of the mainstream media and an embrace of conservative media and pundits such as Glenn Beck and Rush Limbaugh, which sets them apart even more. Further, they believe this position leaves them with a responsibility to spread the word, to educate those who do not share their insights, and to take back the country that they love. Their faith in this country and its ideals leave them confident that their numbers will grow, and that they will ultimately defeat Barack Obama and the shadowy forces driving his hidden agenda.

Ahem.

Of course, there are some cult characteristics Lalich and Langone don’t address in their behavioral study. For instance, there is the sense of apocalyptic doom that always shows up in the most dangerous cults:

First and foremost, these conservative Republican voters believe Obama is deliberately and ruthlessly advancing a ‘secret agenda’ to bankrupt our country and dramatically expand government control over all aspects of our daily lives. They view this effort in sweeping terms, and cast a successful Obama presidency as the destruction of the United States as it was conceived by our founders and developed over the past 200 years.

And as always, this belief is fueled by paranoid conspiracy theories about a “New World Order” and “hidden hands:”

They are actively rooting for Obama to fail as president because they believe he is not acting in good faith as the leader of our country. Only 6 percent of these conservative Republican base voters say that Obama is on their side, and our groups showed that they explicitly believe he is purposely and ruthlessly executing a hidden agenda to weaken and ultimately destroy the foundations of our country.

[...]

Closely related to this well-established notion of a secret agenda is a hidden set of liberal elites or power brokers who have guided and directed Obama as a puppet, helping him to reach the highest office in the land. It is simply implausible to them that Obama has reached this position on his own without some greater force at work.

The logic is impeccably circular and immune to facts in what I have called “The Samsara of Wacky.” Of course, Beck’s “issues” are their “issues:”

Conservative Republicans do not oppose Obama’s policies simply because they think they are misguided or out of partisan fervor. Rather, they believe his policies are purposely designed to fail. When they look at the totality of his agenda, they see a deliberate effort to drive our country so deep into debt, to make the majority of Americans so dependent on the government, and to strip away so many basic constitutional rights that we are too weak to fight back and have to accept whatever solution he proposes.

Fear of government control is at the heart of virtually all of the concerns raised by these voters about Obama’s agenda, and it is literally a fear of two things – government and control. They see government as inefficient, ineffective, and corrupt and believe it preys on the middle class and ‘hard-working Americans.’

[...]

They exhaustively cite examples of this strategy at work, starting with the bank bailouts, the takeovers of Chrysler and GM, and foreclosure assistance making homeowners dependent on government for their homes. Another example repeatedly raised by conservative Republicans that undoubtedly reflects the power of FOX News and conservative commentators among these voters was their concern over President Obama’s policy ‘czars’ wielding power over every issue with no accountability.

The final, and in many ways most important, piece of evidence they cite is the planned government takeover of health care. The notion that Obama’s health care reforms represent a government takeover of all aspects of health care is an article of faith; they reject as laughable the suggestion that it might not, pointing to his arguments to the contrary as further proof of his determination to lie and deceive to fulfill his ultimate agenda. Even after a description of the health care reform plan in our recent polling, these conservative Republican base voters reject it by a 59-point margin, with nearly two-thirds (64 percent) strongly opposed to reform (77 percent total opposed).

In the minds of the cultists, race issues have been subsumed by conspiracy theories. Racism is still alive and well, but hides in Teh Wacky™:

We find further evidence of this pattern of deception in questions they believe have not been adequately answered or investigated about Obama’s background, including his place of birth, his education, the authorship of his books, the degree of his associations with controversial figures including William Ayers and Jeremiah Wright, his work as a community organizer, his links to ACORN, and his service in the Illinois legislature. Again, they see a unique pattern of secrecy and subterfuge, abetted by either incompetence or willful neglect by the mainstream media.

As David Corn put it,

These days, explicit racism is widely regarded as unacceptable. Yet it’s quite possible that unsupported folly of this sort has become a stand-in for outright racial opposition. If a conservative can assert that the problem with Obama is that he fronts for a diabolical enemy within, is a secret Muslim, and has mounted a coverup to hide his birth in Africa, then this right-winger can tell himself (and focus group moderators) that his feelings about Obama aren’t about race. But here’s the question that needs asking: Why do conservatives — especially Southern conservatives — believe all this rot?

Relying on years of observation, I can give Corn an answer: they believe this rot because they want to believe it. The Manichean, black-and-white worldview is convenient to their frightened little minds. They choose to believe this rot for the same reason they choose to believe in creationism: because that’s how they wish the world worked.

And as we’ve seen with the Junior Bush experiment, that’s how they actually govern.

If there is a surprise conclusion to all of this, it’s that Obama has little to fear from the teabagging hooplehead cohort. Perhaps the most telling finding of the Democracy Corps study is the way these Republicans look at their own national party and conclude it has become part of Teh Evil Plan™:

And yet remarkably, these voters had virtually nothing positive to say about the Republican Party. They see their own party as weak, old, and out of touch. They feel it has lost sight of conservative values and conservative voters and is in desperate need of new leadership. They identified a clear disconnect between ‘the people’ and ‘the politicians,’ which poses a growing threat to the party’s ability to challenge Democratic control in Washington.

[...]

Conservative Republicans in our groups could not have been more negative in discussing their own party. They see the Republican Party as ineffective and rudderless, controlled by a class of political professionals who have lost touch with not only the people but the conservative values that should guide them.

The disconnect these partisans see between the party leadership and the party faithful is at the root of their discontent. They have no intention of leaving the party per se – they still believe it is the best and only means of opposing Obama and the Democratic Congress – but they also have little confidence in its current direction or leadership, and there is an emotional distance that can be damaging.

Asked what their party needs to reinvigorate itself and close the gap between its leaders and its rank and file, these conservative Republicans are almost unanimous in their solution – new leadership. And although they expressed some hope for a variety of names (Gingrich, Romney, Huckabee, Jindal), there was only one figure who truly excited them and created real passion – Sarah Palin.

Little wonder the GOP “brand” is at an all-time low. Ever since the “tea parties” began, I have been saying this would happen. The Republicans Party faces a dilemma: either pander to this new, paranoid cult, or disown its own base.

The conservative movement voter today is convinced — and cannot be un-convinced — that sinister forces of global evil put a socialist community organizer in office for the terrible purpose of destroying America. They actually believe in Teh Evil Plan™ and vote accordingly. Corn again:

GOP chairman Michael Steele, Republican congressional leaders, and the party’s 2012 presidential contenders will have a tough time remaining in the real world while courting conservatives who reside somewhere else. But if GOP leaders don’t join the underground movement hailed by these conservatives, won’t that indicate that they, too, are part of the Obama conspiracy?

To which I say:

Quod erat demonstratum!

Here’s my explosives expert:

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