Look, you called West Texas the stupidest place, not me. pic.twitter.com/pbZPODn9EU
— Bob Schooley (@Rschooley) July 15, 2015
Okay, it’s nutpicking. But on such a rich lode! From the Washington Post:
BASTROP, Texas — No citizens were rounded up and imprisoned at Wal-Mart. Tanks didn’t rumble down city streets in a declaration of martial law…
In fact, the seven-state war exercise launched in the exact manner Army officials have spent months patiently describing to conspiracy theorists: With no fanfare or cause for alarm, and almost entirely out of sight to the general public. Pops of gunfire echoed beyond the front gates of Camp Swift near Bastrop, Texas, though that hardly seemed out of the ordinary on what is a training ground for the Texas National Guard…
Bastrop Mayor Ken Kesselus has spent weeks trying to dampen impressions that his city of 8,000 people is a hive of “wackos and conspiracy theorists.”
“The last few weeks I’ve had 22 calls. One was from a guy in South Texas who thinks (President Barack) Obama is a communist, a Muslim and evil person and wanted me to warn everybody to hold onto their guns,” Kesselus said. “The other 21 calls were from press.”…
The DFHs at Talking Point Memo have thoughtfully kept us all up to date on America’s fierce protectors:
… The Houston Chronicle in a story published Friday spoke with a leader of the Texas branch of a civilian surveillance group calling itself “Counter Jade Helm.” Eric Johnston, 51, told the newspaper that he’s expected to coordinate 20 volunteers throughout the Lone Star state who will monitor incoming troops.
“If a team member sees two Humvees full of soldiers driving through town, they’re going to follow them,” Johnston told the newspaper. “And they’re going to radio back their ultimate location.” …
The organizer of “Counter Jade Helm” is a former Marine named Pete Lanteri, 44, who currently resides in Arizona. He told the Chronicle that the whole group already has 200 volunteers that include former military and law enforcement officers, with the largest contingent of volunteers based in Arizona…
Both Johnston and Lanteri told the newspaper that they do think the military is up to no good. Yet Lanteri said he’s been screening out interested volunteers who’ve wandered too deep into the “Jade Helm 15” conspiracy theory fever swamp.
“Once I saw the freaking nut-jobs coming out of the woodwork I was spending half my day discrediting what they were posting,” Lanteri told the newspaper. “No nut-jobs will be put in the field.”…
As the media joke goes: Opinions differ!
To celebrate today’s opening, TPM also did a roundup of some of the nuttier theories consuming the Wingnutosphere — from the “Druidic cremation ceremony” at Bohemian Grove, to “an EMP attack — an electromagnetic pulse generated by the detonation of a nuclear weapon in orbit — against states that resist the landmark U.S. Supreme Court ruling that legalized same-sex marriage nationwide,” to the theory that the exercise “actually may be a cover to aid Russia in seizing southern states”. Not included: my personal favorite, that the government engineered the Blue Bonnet Bell ice cream recall as a cover for brigades of “mobile morgues” servicing FEMA camps in recently shuttered WalMarts.
And the Army Times has one I hadn’t heard before: Asteroid strikes!
Open Thread: The Jade Helm-ing CommencesPost + Comments (97)