Category Archives: American Madness
Tea’s Weird Week: Freak Out Your Next Zoom Call with These Conspiracy Inspired Backgrounds
The stay at home order has been lifted in many places, and businesses are slowly opening, however, Zoom is going to be the preferred method of meeting for some time to come. At your next conference call why not give your colleagues…something to think about with these Zoom backgrounds I’ve created for you. Impress your friends, give your enemies a shiver of paranoia.
Most of these classic conspiracy spots are places I explore in my upcoming book (more info and a book trailer at the bottom of this post) American Madness. Now you can enter these mysterious locales from the safety of your couch. Tell ’em the Illuminati Tea Krulos sent ya!
Here’s a photo of the Bohemian Grove, a secret society retreat deep in the redwood forest in northern California. It’s owned by the Bohemian Club, it’s members a who’s who of the world’s most powerful men. To the left, you’ll see a crude statue of an owl, where a strange ritual called the “Cremation of Care” is performed. The first chapter of American Madness explores the grove– it’s history, membership, and strange secrets. A Zoom background is much safer than trying to visit in person– you’ll be quickly arrested for trespassing.
Hello, I’m calling you from outside the Skull and Bones “Tomb.” This is a legendary Yale University fraternity that has existed since 1832. It’s like the junior version of the Bohemian Grove and it’s members have including several presidents, corporate leaders, members of the CIA, and other powerful people. There was a spotlight on the institution in 2004 when former “Bonesmen” George W. Bush and John Kerry ran against each other, guaranteeing a Bonesman would become president.
Skull & Bones has an kooky ooky initiation ritual inside this windowless building, located on the Yale campus. Sure, you could use a color photo of this place, but it looks better in black and white.
This anxiety-inducing background is the antenna array of the High-frequency Active Auroral Research Program (HAARP), located up in the wilds of Alaska. It was started in the 1990s as a joint effort by the military and the University of Alaska to study the ionosphere. Because of the military’s involvement, conspiracy theories quickly spun that they were weaponizing weather or attempting mass mind control.
Here’s the front gates of Area 51, one of the world’s most famous conspiracy sites (I visited– well, I saw the outside of it, while working on American Madness). It’s where the government has supposedly stashed UFOs and extra-terrestrial bodies and got a lot of attention last year with a viral “Raid Area 51–They Can’t Stop Us All” Facebook page.
Here’s a background of a more contemprary conspiracy, a scene from a “lockdown protest” where people think COVID-19 is “fake news.” But uh-oh, what’s that protester pointing at?
My upcoming book American Madness features a journey through conspiracy culture. It’s out August 25, 2020 from Feral House. To pre-order: Bookshop.org: CLICK HERE Amazon:CLICK HERE
It’s on Goodreads here: https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/52486773-american-madness
“Tea Krulos has forged a fascinating collection of work by immersing himself in various sub-cultures that exist on the fringes of society.” —Cult of Weird
American Madness: The Story of the Phantom Patriot and How Conspiracy Theories Hijacked American Consciousness by Tea Krulos from Feral House on Vimeo.
Tea’s Weird Week: Trump’s Joe Scarborough Conspiracy Obsession
Memorial Day weekend— a chance to enjoy relaxation, grill out, and remember those who have sacrificed their lives fighting for our country. Or if you’re President Trump, a time to spend golfing and then spiraling into a tweetrage hurling insults, threats, and conspiracy theories. Can you imagine Obama or Bush acting like this? They’d be led out of the White House in a straitjacket, but we’re so used to this that it’s just another crazy day, another Trump meltdown.
Trump has been trying to push three big conspiracies this month of May– he’s continued to spin his mail-in ballot fraud theory (which this week prompted Twitter to finally slap warnings on his tweets), as well as continuing to tweet about “Obamagate,” a theory so convoluted that even Trump can’t explain it. Here’s an exchange between him and a reporter after he he went on a tweetfit about it on Mother’s Day (maybe it’s just holidays that get his conspiracy hype pumped up). After a reporter from the Washington Post asked him to explain what “Obamagate” was, Trump responded:
Uh, Obamagate. It’s been going on for a long time. It’s been going on from before I even got elected, and it’s a disgrace that it happened, and if you look at what’s gone on, and if you look at now, all this information that’s being released — and from what I understand, that’s only the beginning — some terrible things happened, and it should never be allowed to happen in our country again.
Uh, ok, thanks for the clear answer on that. When the reporter tried to follow up and asked again what exactly the crime was that he was referring to, Trump snapped:
You know what the crime is. The crime is very obvious to everybody. All you have to do is read the newspapers, except yours.
And then there is the “Joe Scarborough Cold Case” conspiracy.
Trump hates Joe Scarborough, the former Florida Republican Congressman turned talk show host (Trump calls him “Psycho Joe”), his wife and co-host Mika Brezinzski, and their show Morning Joe (MSNBC).
Ooh, does he hate them! They show clips of him doing and saying stupid things…They say he isn’t doing a good job responding to this damn pandemic where 100,000 people have died…Fake news! He’s tried bashing their ratings and calling them crazy and making some shitty comment about Mika bleeding from a facelift, but it isn’t enough– he wants to burn them, badly, his heart overflowing with hate.
Then Trump remembers something dirty and disgusting– wasn’t there a conspiracy theory from the early 2000s, something about Scarborough murdering an intern and then resigning? There was (and I’m sad to say it was liberals who originally pushed it). Scarborough had an employee (not an intern) named Lori Klausutis, 28, a constituent services coordinator who worked in Scarborough’s office. In 2001, she was found dead on the floor, near a desk.
But it isn’t, as Trump insists, a “cold case.”
AP Fact Check reports:
An autopsy revealed that Klausutis had an undiagnosed heart condition and a coroner concluded she passed out and hit her head as she fell. The coroner said the head injury caused the death, but she wasn’t struck by another person. The death occurred a month after Scarborough announced he was leaving office. Scarborough was in Washington when Klausutis died.
Source: AP Fact Check: Scarborough staffer death not a “mystery”
Like any conspiracy that grows legs, there are some straws to grasp at. Scarborough was getting a divorce and people whispered that he must have been having an affair with Klausutis (there’s no evidence or even allegations of this) and murdered her (though he was in DC at the time, not Florida, so he would have needed to hire a hit).
Then there was the medical examiner, Michael Berkland. He added fuel to the conspiracy story in 2012 when he stopped paying for a storage facility and a creepy scene at Uncle Bob’s Storage was revealed:
Lungs, hearts, tissue samples and 10 brains were found Aug. 22 in a storage container at Uncle Bob’s Storage that Berkland was renting, according to Pensacola police. There were body parts from more than 100 people found in the air conditioned unit.
They were stored in formaldehyde in plastic containers, specimen cups, trash bags and one part even in a 32-ounce Styrofoam cup from a convenience store, according to police. Some of the containers were cracked and leaking.
Source: “Man Charged After More Than 100 Body Parts Found in Storage Container,” ABC News, 2012.
Yikes! But that doesn’t mean that Berkland’s autopsy report was untrue. The investigation found no reason to dispute it.
Trump can’t pass up an opportunity to smear an enemy, as he has many times before (I write about this in a chapter of my upcoming book American Madness) so he takes this half baked theory and shoots it out via Twitter. A recent article in The Atlantic summed it up well:
When someone holds him accountable—when someone calls him out for his incompetence and ethical wrongdoing—conspiracy theories often become his weapon of choice. At such moments, conspiracy theories are fine, but conspiracy theories with the added element of cruelty are even better.
–Peter Wehner, “The Malignant Cruelty of Donald Trump,” The Atlantic
This is what the real “Trump Derangement Syndrome” is. He tweeted about the conspiracy six different days this month (so far):
May 4:“Concast” should open up a long overdue Florida Cold Case against Psycho Joe Scarborough. I know him and Crazy Mika well, used them beautifully in the last Election, dumped them nicely, and will state on the record that he is “nuts”. Besides, bad ratings! #OPENJOECOLDCASE
May 12: When will they open a Cold Case on the Psycho Joe Scarborough matter in Florida. Did he get away with murder? Some people think so. Why did he leave Congress so quietly and quickly? Isn’t it obvious? What’s happening now? A total nut job!
May 23: A blow to her head? Body found under his desk? Left Congress suddenly? Big topic of discussion in Florida…and, he’s a Nut Job (with bad ratings). Keep digging, use forensic geniuses!
May 24: A lot of interest in this story about Psycho Joe Scarborough. So a young marathon runner just happened to faint in his office, hit her head on his desk, & die? I would think there is a lot more to this story than that? An affair? What about the so-called investigator? Read story!
May 26: The opening of a Cold Case against Psycho Joe Scarborough was not a Donald Trump original thought, this has been going on for years, long before I joined the chorus. In 2016 when Joe & his wacky future ex-wife, Mika, would endlessly interview me, I would always be thinking…
…about whether or not Joe could have done such a horrible thing? Maybe or maybe not, but I find Joe to be a total Nut Job, and I knew him well, far better than most. So many unanswered & obvious questions, but I won’t bring them up now! Law enforcement eventually will?May 27: Psycho Joe Scarborough is rattled, not only by his bad ratings but all of the things and facts that are coming out on the internet about opening a Cold Case. He knows what is happening!
This is all especially cruel because Lori Klausutis was a real person, with a family. Her husband, Timothy Klausutis, wrote a heartbreaking letter to Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey. It reads, in part:
I have mourned my wife every day since her passing. I have tried to honor her memory and our marriage. As her husband, I feel that one of my marital obligations is to protect her memory as I would have protected her in life. There has been a constant barrage of falsehoods, half-truths, innuendo and conspiracy theories since the day she died. I realize that may sound like an exaggeration, unfortunately it is the verifiable truth. Because of this, I have struggled to move forward with my life.
You can read the entire letter here: https://www.nytimes.com/2020/05/26/business/letter-to-twitter-ceo.html
Twitter had a generic response, but they did for the first time flag two of Trump’s tweets (untrue statements about voter fraud). Trump, of course, had a melt down about this and today is signing an executive order against social media companies.
Meanwhile, during all this, thousands more people have died from COVID-19. This is why having a Conspiracy Theorist-in-Chief is dangerous: he will ignore everything else to bring you down. If you criticize him, he will label you an “enemy of the people” and spread any lie he can find to try to smear you. These are dark times.
SEE ALSO: My first column of the year, which was about the Kevin Spacey murder conspiracy; also my column from a couple weeks ago about candidates playing the Trump conspiracy playbook to run for office.
Project COUCHSURF: Last week I wrote about my new hobby of spending a couple hours a week in the CIA Virtual Reading Room. This week I read some interesting files on a wave of UFO sightings in Europe and Africa in 1952 (same year as a well known UFO sighting in Washington DC). They were in the CIA’s UFOS: Fact or Fiction? collection.
#TrumpConspiracyCounter: As you can see from this column, May has been a thick month of Trump spreading conspiracy. I’m working on updating the #TrumpConspiracyCounter for this month and will have a report out next week. Needless to say, the number has seen a huge jump.
My upcoming book American Madness features a journey through conspiracy culture. It’s out August 25, 2020 from Feral House. To pre-order: Bookshop.org: CLICK HERE Amazon:CLICK HERE
It’s on Goodreads here: https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/52486773-american-madness
“Tea Krulos has forged a fascinating collection of work by immersing himself in various sub-cultures that exist on the fringes of society.” —Cult of Weird
American Madness: The Story of the Phantom Patriot and How Conspiracy Theories Hijacked American Consciousness by Tea Krulos from Feral House on Vimeo.
Tea’s Weird Week: Project COUCHSURF, my New Hobby of Hanging Out in the CIA Virtual Reading Room
Quarantine continues! What have I been doing with all this spare time? I’m enjoying catching up on some reading. I’m working on some writing projects. I’m continuing to write in my quarantine journal every day. I’m watching shit tons of sci-fi movies and shows. I’m getting pissed off watching the news. I’m getting excited about my new book American Madness. I’m occasionally trying to be helpful around the house. I’m having good days and bad days.
I also picked up a new hobby. Every Sunday morning/early afternoon, I spend an hour or three drinking coffee and hanging out in the CIA’s Virtual Reading Room, reading declassified documents. In 2017, the famous clandestine organization uploaded about 13 million documents to their online reading room. I’ve wanted to take a look at these ever since, but didn’t have the time. Well, now I do– but I’m carefully limiting this to 2-3 hours a week on Sunday. This is to prevent me from falling down a stark raving mad rabbit hole. I’m prone to do that sometimes, so this is a preventive measure so I keep working on other projects. But still, if I read 10-20 documents every Sunday, that’s 500-1,000 files a year. Not close to 13 million, but I’m searching for some specific things. I’m calling this Project COUCHSURF.
What I’m looking for– files related to UFOs, conspiracy classics, programs related to mind control like MK/Ultra, weird ideas like their remote viewing program (more on that in a minute), and their many failed attempts to assassinate Fidel Castro (for more on that, I recommend the documentary 638 Ways to Kill Castro).
What will I find? Who knows, that’s the exciting part! I’ll be posting here in future columns, probably as a short blurb at the end of the column, or, if I’m onto something good, future columns might be based on Project COUCHSURF research. We’ll see.
The first files I dug into were ones related to Project STARGATE (sadly not related to finding portals to other worlds like in the movie/ TV shows). The program included other projects over the years (GRILL FLAME, GONDOLA WISH, CENTER LANE, STAR STREAK) but was consolidated into STARGATE. I’ve been interested in this since reading an entertaining account of the program in Jon Ronson’s book The Men Who Stare at Goats.
One of the main focuses of the program was to test the possible effectiveness of “remote viewers,” which are people that claim the ability to see things at a far away distance. They have a sort of out-of-body experience with psychic flashes that give them a vision of past, present, and future events unfolding across the globe. You can see why the military would love to have this ability– the program was used to try to peek on potential terrorists, espionage agents, and drug smugglers. There is, however, no indication that any part of the program was successful.
Here’s a few files I found that were of interest. I linked to the files on the report dates, so you can check them out if you want.
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Project 8122: Sept.3-8, 1981 remote viewers described a “jeep like vehicle” that arrived at a bunker somewhere in Stuttgart and stole explosives. The vehicle had a tag on it with the number “862 or 863” The file reads: “source reported possible future use of explosives in ‘some kind of raid on airbase,;” scheduled “for the period 1-5 May 1982.”
The report goes on to give vague details on where the suspects work and live, and the remote viewers determined that the stolen explosives were hidden in the basement of one of the suspect’s house, which had a red tile roof and “was marked 718 or 719,” with this sketch included in the report:
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A report on a Project SUN STREAK remote viewing session with Remote Viewer 095 from June 26, 1989 describes how they were trying to zero in on a drug boat with a cargo of contraband in waterproof containers in the hold. Viewer 095 was able to see the boat’s journey from Tobago to the Dominican Republic and looking to the future could see that “the final destination of the vessel is a long (N-S orientated) island due east of Lake Okeechobee. A weaker feel was a location on the coast of Florida directly south of Tallahassee.”
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In another SUN STREAK session we find that Remote Viewer 032 visualized a UFO on September 13, 1989. One thing I love are seeing handwritten notes and parts deemed important circled or underlined:
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Viewer 032 turns out to be quite a character, I’d love to find out who it was and interview them. Just over a week after the UFO remote viewing, we get another report from Viewer 032 on September 22, 1989. This one reads like a sexy spy adventure.
I was able to access this woman almost directly. She was in a place on the coastline. It was a village that had small shops and residences lining streets that were narrow. I was drawn to the many canopies that covered each of the openings of the dwellings. The woman had been here many times.
This village is somewhere along the Mediterranean coastline. I watched the sun rise to my left as I faced the sea. For this reason I sense that the village is on the northern shore.
There was a man– who was very handsome. This man is much younger than the woman. Look for a man with dark skin, hair and eyes. He combs his hair straight back and it is groomed close to his head.
The man works for someone and listens to the woman routinely. I think that this woman is married but frequents this place under the guise of work and meets this man. She has been many other places with him also all over Europe. There have also been other men before this one. I don’t know what she tells him but it is with reluctance that she does. She feels bad most of the time– other times she doesn’t even realize [rest of sentence obscured by CIA approval stamp.]
It’s hard to put out an APB on a “man with dark skin, hair and eyes” who works for “someone” located “somewhere along the Mediterranean coastline,” which shows the problem with the whole program. Even if the remote viewer’s skills were legit, would any of their information be useful?
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In addition to notes on the remote viewing sessions, there are several reports that SRI International (a scientific research institute in Menlo Park, CA) was paid to research on remote viewing. “An Effort to Improve Remote Viewing Quality Using Hypnosis,” October 1989 was a 17-page report where they describe an experiment where remote viewers were hypnotized and then asked to describe pictures cut from magazines hidden in envelopes (“in summary, hypnosis does not appear to be an effective way to enhance remote viewing quality.”) Other reports by SRI include “A Remote Action Experiment with a Piezoelectric Transducer,” December 1987 and “A Remote Action Investigation with Marine Animals,” also from December 1987.
I look forward to bringing you more reports from Project COUCHSURF in the future!
American Madness: The Story of the Phantom Patriot and How Conspiracy Theories Hijacked American Consciousness by Tea Krulos from Feral House on Vimeo.
My upcoming book American Madness features a journey through conspiracy culture. It’s out August 25, 2020 from Feral House. To pre-order: CLICK HERE
It’s on Goodreads here: https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/52486773-american-madness
“Tea Krulos has forged a fascinating collection of work by immersing himself in various sub-cultures that exist on the fringes of society.” —Cult of Weird
Tea’s Weird Week: American Madness Book Trailer!
Today is the premiere of a book trailer for my upcoming book American Madness: The Story of the Phantom Patriot and How Conspiracy Theories Hijacked American Consciousness (out August 25 from Feral House). This writing has been quite a fascinating and crazy journey for me. It started with my interest in documenting the life story of an eccentric individual named Richard McCaslin, whose life was a winding path through comic book superheroes, conspiracy theory, and the pursuit of a skewed American dream. The story evolved into something much bigger and now, in this insane year 2020, I can’t help but think the publication date is perfect timing.
Many of the people I wrote about in American Madness— Alex Jones, David Icke, QAnon, Anti-vaxxers, Roger Stone, and, of course, the “InfoWars President” himself, Donald Trump (and his Obama conspiracy obsession)– have all been in the news this year.
Here’s a quick peek at the world I entered:
American Madness: The Story of the Phantom Patriot and How Conspiracy Theories Hijacked American Consciousness by Tea Krulos from Feral House on Vimeo.Big thanks to all involved in helping me create the video! Lyle Blackburn lent his voice to narrate the trailer. Lyle is an all around cool guy– he narrates the Small Town Monsters documentary series, is in a cool band called Ghoultown, and has written several books on Southern cryptozoology case studies, his latest being the upcoming Sinister Swamps: Monsters and Mysteries from the Mire.
Android138 provided music for the soundtrack, I knew his creeping horror style, which he calls “#DoomBap” would be perfect– listen to more to his tracks and slip into a paranoid conspiracy world of your own on his Soundcloud page. Stephen Vincent Anderson is my wonderfully creative friend who it all together, check out SVA Photo & Video on Facebook and Vimeo.
Thanks to my publisher Feral House and to Milwaukee Record and Cult of Weird for sharing the video.
Here’s 4 ways you can help me make this book a success:
-Pre-order the book. My preferred pre-order link for you is: https://bookshop.org/books/american-madness-the-story-of-the-phantom-patriot-and-how-conspiracy-theories-hijacked-american-consciousness/9781627310963 (you can also pre-order from Boswell Book Company and on Indiebound, Amazon, Barnes & Noble, and other sites)
-Add the book to your shelf on Goodreads.
-Share the book trailer, pre-order link, or this blog post on social media. “Word of mouth” is helpful.
-Most libraries are receptive to suggestions on new books and many have a “material request form” on their website.
Here’s more book info:
American Madness: The Story of The Phantom Patriot and How Conspiracy Theories Hijacked American Consciousness will be out August 25, 2020 from Feral House.
The mainstream news media struggles to understand the power of social media while conspiracy advocates, malicious political movements, and even foreign governments have long understood how to harness the power of fear and the fear of power into lucrative outlets for outrage and money. But what happens when the harbingers of “inside knowledge” go too far?
Author Tea Krulos tells the story of one man, Richard McCaslin, who’s fractured thinking made him the ideal consumer of even the most arcane of conspiracy theories. Acting on the daily rants of Alex Jones and his ilk, McCaslin takes matters into his own hands to stop the unseen powers behind the world’s disasters who congregate at conspiracy world’s Mecca- The Bohemian Grove. It all goes wrong with terrible consequences for the man who styled himself-The Phantom Patriot.
McCaslin is not alone, as conspiracy-driven political action has bubbled its way up from the margins of society to the White House. It’s no longer a lone deranged kook convinced of getting secret messages from a cereal box, now its slick videos and well-funded outrage campaigns ready to peddle the latest innuendos and lies in hopes of harnessing the chaos for political gain. What is the long term effect on people who believe these barely believable stories? Who benefits, and who pays the price? Krulos investigates and explains the power of conspiracy and the resulting shared madness on the American psyche.
Tea Krulos is a Milwaukee-based writer who documents the underground world of fringe sub-cultures. His previous books, Apocalypse Any Day Now: Deep Underground with America’s Doomsday Preppers and Heroes in the Night: Inside the Real Life Super Hero Movement explored the driving beliefs and lives of the people who choose to reject accepted reality and substitute their own.
Tea’s Weird Week: Ask Tea Anything (Pandemic Edition)
Tea’s Weird Week started as an outlet to write about whatever I wanted to once a week, engage readers, and promote stuff I’m working on– books, articles, events. In this year of crazy 2020, I’ve mostly been writing about “conspiracy theories in the news.” I have a book out in August titled American Madness: The Story of the Phantom Patriot and How Conspiracy Theories Hijacked American Consciousness and quite a few people I wrote about have big in 2020: Alex Jones (most recently for leading an anti-quarantine protest in Austin), David Icke (“5G is Coronavirus”), Roger Stone (“Bill Gates is Coronavirus”), QAnon, and Anti-vaxxers have all been in the news this month.
There are new conspiracy stories in the news every day, but I thought I would take a break from analyzing them this week and answer my friend’s questions, solicited through social media. Here’s answers about anti-quarantine protests, doomsday bunkers, cryptozoology, and more.
Real talk. I know you’re all about the absurd and crazy shit. I just gotta know because I care about you- are you planning on going to one of these wingnut anti-stay-at-home/ pro-plague rallies to document? Because, if so, please be safe friend. This is obviously not an encouragement to go be a journalist at one of those. I’m just saying, if you do, be safe as fuck. Also please live long enough to get your own Netflix special because I know you’re capable of that.–Concerned
First, thanks for caring about me. Your message has reminded me that I should be spending some of my spare time messaging people to check in.
Here’s the thing– I really enjoy writing about things that I am enjoy and am genuinely interested in. I have become friends with a lot of people I write about. But sometimes I like getting out of my comfort zone and want to observe something I don’t understand up close. Some examples of this would be attending one of Bob Larson’s “exorcism seminars” for my book Monster Hunters, attending an anti-vaxxer rally and flat earth conference for my book American Madness and most recently, attending a Trump rally (in January, I wrote it up for the Shepherd Express.)
I’m going to sit this one out. I’m processing enough crazy stuff as it is. Watching a bunch of MAGA-hat wearin,’ Gadsen flag wavin’, 2A militia types, anti-vaxxers, etc. shouting about how they demand haircuts just ain’t doing it for me. As far as a Netflix special– as long as I don’t end up getting eaten by a tiger, I’m in!
Joshua A. Bickel took this iconic photo, which is sure to be used in future texts about this era.
Any thoughts on those fallout type shelters/bunkers at the moment? Or if you know if people are using theirs in the face of pandemic? Just curious and interested in what qualifies those who own space in one to activate its use. –Aims
I think Aims is referring to the Survival Condos, which I toured with my friend Paul while working on a chapter (“Doomsday Bunkers of the Rich and Famous”) for my book Apocalypse Any Day Now. Built into an old Atlas missile silo in Kansas (with more being developed), the building featured several condo units (all sold) and recreation levels.
One thing we were told is that the condo owners had access whenever they wanted. There had recently been a football watching party, and owners would sometimes “vacation” there. As such, it’s possible that the owners could ride out the entire pandemic there if they wanted, and it certainly would be the ultimate quarantine.
Tea at the Luxury Survival Condos in Kansas.
What’s one conspiracy that most others find false; but, you kinda believe in?— Mando
I’m skeptical about most conspiracies, but I think it’s worth noting that some stuff that seems like conspiracy later turns out to be true. I talk about a few of those in American Madness, the CIA’s Project MK-ultra (a mind control program) being one one quick example. The most believable conspiracy to me is that there has been some kind of UFO cover-up. I don’t mean necessarily extra-terrestrial, but some secret program. There’s just so many compelling UFO cases, I think something is going on. The truth is out there (winking emoticon).
What was really normal, too normal, about one of your subjects that you researched?–Addo
I really love those moments. In my book Heroes in the Night I shared a funny story about how me and Real Life Superhero The Watchman got lost and couldn’t find his car in a parking garage. It was humorously mundane. A lot of Real Life Superheroes were pretty normal outside of their secret lifestyle, as were a lot of paranormal investigators.
One of the major stories I tell in American Madness is that of conspiracist Richard McCaslin. He told me some of the most wild ideas I’ve ever heard– Reptilian aliens secretly controlling our world, Satanists eating babies, all sorts of crazy and terrible things.
Meeting him in person several times, I found I got along with him pretty well and he was friendly and could be oddly normal. I visited him at his house and I remember walking into his kitchen to find him drinking orange juice and laughing as he watched some baby jackrabbits chase each other around his yard in what seemed like a game of tag. It was the first time he said “you gotta see this!” and wasn’t referring to some Illuminati code he had cracked.
Do you have a favorite cryptid?— Matt …and have you ever had a personal experience with one or saw one?— Lynn
If you don’t know, cryptids are creatures studied in cryptozoology. I’ve not had a cryptid encounter myself, but while working on Monster Hunters, I did go on expeditions looking for Sasquatch, a Lake Monster (“Champ” of Lake Champlain), a Skunk Ape, went to the Mothman Festival, and took a ride down Bray Road looking for the Beast. It was all really fun and interesting, I love cryptozoology. I’m working on a writing project about Mothman. I love ’em all, but because of this project, I’m going to declare Mothman as my favorite cryptid, a close second would be Chupacabras.
Me and Jim Sherman of Bigfoot Field Researchers Organization out in the woods of Michigan on the trail of the Sasquatch.
Would you want to have a really scary experience (alien abduction, possession, angry ghost) just to prove to yourself that it was real? What, if any, would be “too much”?— Judy
When faced with a tough question like this, I try to break it down. On the one hand, it would be pretty intensely transformative to have an experience like that, to witness a deep mystery of the universe. On the other hand, most people wouldn’t believe me anyway, and I know of several cases where people experienced stuff like this (or thought they did) and it damaged them forever. Final conclusion: I’d rather keep it a mystery. I enjoy not knowing.
Of all the people/things you interviewed or investigated was there any thing that you felt you were getting too deep into, or anything that you felt was getting too dangerous or did you fear for your life?— Gregory
The one things that stands out is the crazy night I spent on patrol with Real-Life Superhero Phoenix Jones while working on my book Heroes in the Night. He had pepper-sprayed a group of people that were fighting and they got angry and attacked us. I got punched in the face. At one point it looked like they were trying to get a gun. Then they tried to run us down with an SUV. “I hope this was worth it, cause now you’re going to get murdered,” was definitely a thought that crossed my mind as I was running from the angry, pepper-spray soaked mob. Other experiences– investigating Bobby Mackey’s, a notoriously haunted bar, and diving into some of the conspiracy stuff, has produced frightening moments, but nothing like that.
Thank you all for your questions! I’ll do another “ask me anything” to tie into the release of American Madness in late August or early September– pre-order info below!
Please Clap Dept.: I’ll leave you with some positive vibes– here’s an article I wrote for Milwaukee Magazine on a social distancing nightly dance party: “This Riverwest Neighborhood Dances Every Night at 8.”
My upcoming book American Madness features a journey through conspiracy culture. It’s out August 25, 2020 from Feral House. To pre-order: CLICK HERE
It’s on Goodreads here: https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/52486773-american-madness
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“Having just returned from the grocery store during an official pandemic, I’m reminded to highly recommend Apocalypse Any Day Now, from Tea Krulos, who went way down the doomsday prepper rabbit hole. Fun and unfortunately highly relevant. Do it.” — Brent Gohde, Cedar Block/ Science Strikes Back
Tea’s Weird Week: Dr. Fauci vs Trump’s Q Army
I wrote a column here titled “Laughing My Ass Off at These Bonkers Trump Paintings,” in which I showed some works by Jon McNaughton, a painter who depicts scenes of Dear Leader literally teaching a man to fish, literally running a football down a field, and speaking to the press who are literally clowns. I shared these and cracked a bunch of jokes. You got to understand that this was back in a simpler, carefree time….February 27.
One painting in particular had me ROFLMAO. Take a look at the people aboard the S.S. Trump in “Crossing the Swamp” and see if it jumps out at you.
That’s right, about half the crew is now gone: besides Nikki Haley and Sarah Sanders, you have 4 former administration members who were fired/ forced to resign because they butted heads with Trump. Good-bye to James “Mad Dog” Mattis, Jeff Sessions, John Bolton, and John Kelly (and take your duck hunting costumes with you).
Here’s the point– if you anger Trump by disagreeing with him, you’re gone. His ego is more important than your job. His ego is more important than your life.
Let’s talk about QAnon for a moment. If you’re not at all familiar, I’ve ended up writing about them a lot this year– too much. QAnon believes that a mystery figure known as “Q” is giving them information that President Trump has a secret plan to defeat the “Deep State” of Democrats, intelligence agencies, Hollywood, the Fake News media, etc. This cabal of evil are all participating in a satanic pedophile sex trafficking/ cannibalism ring that gets high off eating human adrenal glands. It is cult-like in it’s adoration of Trump and it’s willingness to believe crazy shit. See last week’s column for their theory that the Deep State has been keeping “mole children” hidden in tunnels underneath Central Park. No, I’m not shitting you: Click Here and Pray for the Mole Children.
When I first learned about Q, I thought it was a goofy, ridiculous thing that would burn out and disappear after their early predictions that “Crooked Hillary” and company would be rounded up and sent to Guantanamo Bay failed to pan out. Instead they’ve grown and become way more dangerous than a group of kooks on a message board.
When I started the #TrumpConspiracyCounter on January 1 (trying to catalog all times Trumps promotes or retweets a conspiracy or known conspiracy theorist) I was surprised to see how many times he retweeted a QAnon supporter. He continues to do it on a regular basis. This is the President of the United States sharing these fanatics to his audience of millions. Doesn’t he have people to advise him not to do this? But then again, we wouldn’t expect an egotist like Trump to speak against a cult that worships him, no matter how wrong they may be.
Here’s why you should be concerned about QAnon: their ideas likely inspired a man to derail a train and crash it into a hospital ship in Los Angeles; QAnon are among the conspiracists spreading theories about 5G internet that has led to cell towers being burned across the UK; and there are around two dozen Q believers running for Congress.
Trump went on a tweet binge last week, retweeting three QAnon followers (most of them tipped off they were Q-balls by having hashtags #Q and #wwg1wga which is the QAnon mantra “where we go one, we go all” right in their Twitter bio).
Then, after Dr. Fauci of his Coronavirus Task Force dared to contradict him by saying more could have be done sooner, Trump retweeted Deanne Lorraine, one of the aforementioned QAnon members who was running for Congress and a regular on InfoWars. Lorraine was running against Nancy Pelosi, but suspended her campaign after receiving less than 2% in the primary (let’s hope the rest of the campaigns fizzle out, too). Lorraine’s post, which Trump retweeted on Easter, admonished Fauci for disagreeing with Trump and included the hashtag #FireFauci. QAnon has identified Dr. Fauci as their latest enemy, someone viewed by them as trying to discredit and undermine Trump and have nicknamed him “Dr. FearPorn” as they believe he is trying to inflate the pandemic as a cover up for some nefarious scheme.
So, choose your fighter: one of the world’s leading immunologists or a group of people who believe mole children are being harvested for sex and adrenal glands under Central Park.
Is Trump going to have a tantrum and fire Dr. Fauci because the doctor speaks truth instead of Trump talking points? Right now any terrible thing is possible. Be well, people.
Please Clap Dept.: My book Apocalypse Any Day Now came out last year but is being marketed as quarantine reading. Here’s a Q and A I did about it this week: https://www.ipgbook.com/blog/publicity-spotlight-apocalypse-any-day-now/
My upcoming book American Madness features a journey through conspiracy culture. It’s out August 25, 2020 from Feral House. To pre-order: CLICK HERE
It’s on Goodreads here: https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/52486773-american-madness
Follow me on:
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“Having just returned from the grocery store during an official pandemic, I’m reminded to highly recommend Apocalypse Any Day Now, from Tea Krulos, who went way down the doomsday prepper rabbit hole. Fun and unfortunately highly relevant. Do it.” — Brent Gohde, Cedar Block/ Science Strikes Back
Every Saturday during quarantine, I’m hosting online trivia via Facebook Live:
Tea’s Weird Week: I got my own conspiracy theory, which is that the world is becoming 24 more times batshit crazy every day
OR “WEIRD DAY?” “WEIRD HOUR?” “WEIRD TIME IS AN IRRELEVANT CONSTRUCT?”
Well, my column title says it all. To support this theory, I’ll do as a conspiracist does and string some random crazy scraps together with pieces of yarn. The COVID-19 pandemic has made people snap. Yesterday we got news that a Waukesha, Wisconsin man murdered 2 family members and the family dog (and injured 2 more) back in March (the details were just made known in court) after fears of coronavirus overtook him. In Texas, a Trump supporter named Karen posted a screed dismissing the virus as a “media driven” hoax, and that:
They are leading with fear causing you to panic like sheep…you don’t need hand sanitizer, toilet paper, and Lysol. You need common sense, a sense of direction, faith, a will to fight, and of course, guns!
Well, Karen is dead. She died from COVID-19. The stories are coming in so thick and fast, this column could be re-branded as “Tea’s Weird Day.” Consider, for example, these stories from the last few days:
Conspiracy Theorists Are Destroying 5G Towers Because They Believe There is a 5G/Coronavirus Connection
Over the past week, conspiracy theorists have destroyed the following: a train (see last week’s column: “Conspiracy Theory Trainwreck“), “at least twenty” 5G towers, and quite a few of my brain cells. The hottest conspiracy this week is that 5G Internet is linked to coronavirus. The theory is that “5G radiation” is either exacerbating coronavirus symptoms or that the symptoms are from 5G and the virus was invented as a cover story. The theories are being spread by a coalition of conspiracy theorists– InfoWars, QAnon, Anti-vaxxers, and David Icke.
David Icke. Yeah.While wrapping up my book American Madness (out in August) I was like gee, I hope there’s some conspiracy stuff going on in 2020 to talk about when the book comes out. Ha! Be careful what you wish for–the last couple months have been an American Madness reunion party– Alex Jones and QAnon have been in the news frequently, and now the sudden bump in interest in Icke. If you don’t know who he is, David Icke is a British conspiracy theorist who has been ranting and raving since the 90s, churning out conspiracy books and delivering lectures, which average 9-10 hours long (that’s not a typo.) He’s most infamous for his theory that a race of extra-terrestrials called the Reptilians (aka “Lizard People”) have infiltrated earth and disguised themselves as human world leaders.
Now, through a show called London Real, Icke has reached millions of viewers. The most recent Icke episode was removed by YouTube as the platform cracks down on coronavirus misinformation (as you’ll see in American Madness, YouTube is often too little, too late on these policies.) The YouTube ban has only given Icke more street cred. Across the UK about twenty 5G towers have been burned or otherwise destroyed or damaged, most recently in Belfast, Liverpool, and Birmingham. Some of the towers were actually 3 or 4G towers. There is a growing call on the Internet for people to destroy more. Tech engineers are being threatened on the street. Obviously, the spread of this idea has dangerous implications– communication systems are being targeted during a pandemic.
Burning 5G tower in Birmingham.
What’s even more disappointing is that several celebrities have helped entertain and spread the misinformation, including John Cusack, Woody Harrelson, M.I.A., and others (though some have since deleted their posts). I think this is a great place to note that we all want to envision someone spreading conspiracy as an obnoxious Alt-Right bloviating gas bag like Alex Jones, screaming and pounding his fist about chemicals in the water “turnin the frickin’ frogs gay!” or saying that Hillary Clinton is a literal demon, but that’s not always what it looks like. Sometimes it’ll be someone you admire or a friend. Just be aware of that, especially if they ask you to…
Holy Moley! Pray for the Mole Children
When I first started my book, I always thought I might find the bottom of the rabbithole, the craziest conspiracy of all. The Bohemian Grove? Reptilians? Flat Earth? Birds Aren’t Real? Nah, keep falling. But QAnon’s latest theory has got to be a contender– that coronavirus is actually a cover up to rescue the mole children. Yes, won’t someone think of the mole children?
Here’s the theory: QAnon says that there are thousands of “mole children” living in tunnels underneath Central Park. As Wonkette reports on the theory:
They have, of course, been bred for the specific purpose of being sex slaves, but also for being eaten and having their adrenal glands harvested so “elites” can get high on their adrenochrome. Which, for the 47,000th time, is not a thing anyone can get high off of.
The coronavirus emergency center set up in Central Park, they say, is to treat the mole children, some of whom are deformed or sensitive to light from living in the tunnels. Rescued children are then moved to hospital ships like the Comfort in New York and Mercy in LA (which was also the target of the guy who derailed the train there last week.)
Do people actually believe this? Yes. Are they praying for the Mole Children? You bet. Are they writing goddamn poetry about them? Hell yes. 
Read more: “QAnon Idiots Very Concerned About Mole Children Now,” wonkette.com
One of Wisconsin’s Darkest Days
On a personal note, Tuesday was an extremely fucked day in Milwaukee, the city I love. It was a batshit, terrible, dystopian day. We have a stay-at-home edict, Summerfest and the Democratic National Convention were both postponed, but the election was ordered to go on here. Not only that, but the usual 180 plus polling locations were reduced to 5 for the entire city of Milwaukee, population of about 600,000. Waukesha, a suburb of 70,000, had 1 open. Thousands of absentee ballots were requested but never arrived. Lines to vote stretched on for blocks of brave voters who had to choose– risk their health or vote. Trump’s words on the situation: “not my problem.” These games being played with people’s lives have left me sad and angry.
The next day, Bernie Sanders dropped out. Let’s ask the important questions here, like the 5 Ws (no, not the 5Gs, settle down) which are: Who, What, Where, When, and of course:
Ok! Excuse me now while I dunk my head in cold water and try to get through the rest of this week. Best wishes to all of you out there in this crazy world.
My upcoming book American Madness features a journey through conspiracy culture. It’s out August 25, 2020 from Feral House. To pre-order: CLICK HERE
It’s on Goodreads here: https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/52486773-american-madness
Follow me on:
Facebook//Twitter//Instagram//YouTube
“Having just returned from the grocery store during an official pandemic, I’m reminded to highly recommend Apocalypse Any Day Now, from Tea Krulos, who went way down the doomsday prepper rabbit hole. Fun and unfortunately highly relevant. Do it.” — Brent Gohde, Cedar Block/ Science Strikes Back
Every Saturday during quarantine, I’m hosting online trivia via Facebook Live:
Tea’s Weird Week Trivia: Round 2
The second round of Tea’s Weird Week Trivia happened this last Saturday. Congrats to Estephanie, Jessica, Tom, and Wendy who each won around.
I’ll be back this Saturday, April 11 with four more rounds– Jessica won the chance to pick a trivia topic and she chose “paranormal reality TV personalities” and other categories include some of my favorite topics– “art heists,” “music urban legends,” and “dystopian novel or 6 O’clock news?” Prizes will include books (authored by myself and others) and other weird swag. Tune in this Saturday, 5pm (central), on my Facebook page: www.facebook.com/theTeaKrulos
Here’s the questions from last week if you didn’t get a chance to play. You can get a feel for the trivia and host your own trivia session with your roommate. Answer key is way at the bottom of the post. For this week, I am encouraging that trivia players send donations to the Cream City Hostel: paypal.me/creamcityhostel
Warm up Question:
Bob Dylan released his first new song in 8 years this week. The song is almost 17 minutes long and is about which event that is a major conspiracy theory topic?
A.) 9/11
B.) The time Trump said the sound of wind turbines cause cancer
C.) the JFK assassination
D.) George Washington’s induction as a Mason
Missing Persons
1.) In 1971 this man hijacked a Boeing 727 and parachuted out of it between Washington and Oregon with a ransom of $200,000. He disappeared into the night leaving only an alias behind. What was the alias he is commonly known as and a bonus point if you name the actual alias he left.
2.) In 1975 it’s believed that the mafia made union leader Jimmy Hoffa disappear. His body was never found. Who played Jimmy in the 1992 movie Hoffa and for a second point who played him in last year’s The Irishman?
3.) This rock n roll pioneer was believed to be missing or possibly dead for several days after Hurricane Katrina struck his hometown of New Orleans. He had actually been rescued by the Coast Guard and released an album the next year titled Alive and Kickin. He died in 2017.
4.) In a case that seemed to come out of their own novel, this mystery writer disappeared for about 11 days in 1926. Over ten thousand people and a team of bloodhounds searched and the writer was eventually discovered at a spa. Name the writer.
https://www.nytimes.com/2019/06/11/books/agatha-christie-vanished-11-days-1926.html
5.) In 2017 a photo emerged that allegedly shows Amelia Earhardt alive and well sitting on a dock behind a group of people. Where was the photo taken?:
A. Easter Island
B. Tristan da Cunha
C. Eroda
D. Marshall Islands
Animal King, Dumb
1. The 2005 documentary Grizzly Man tells the story of Timothy Treadwell who decides to live among grizzly bears in Alaska. Spoiler: the bears end up viciously ripping him apart. Who was the director of this award winning documentary?
2. Herman Melville’s Moby Dick or, The Whale is the classic tale of Captain Ahab hellbent on killing a great white whale. The story is 206, 052 words long. What is the first 3-word sentence of the book?
3. We all know Steve Irwin was killed by a stingray, but there are about 220 species of stingrays. Which kind was it?
A. Giant oceanic Manta ray
B. Short-tail stingray
C. Blue spotted ray
D. Thorntail stingray
4.) In 2003 Vegas magic and entertainment duo Siegfried and Roy had their act cut short when a tiger named Mantecore attacked one of them, causing a severed spine among other injuries. But who was attacked– Siegfried or Roy?
Bonus point: the owner of the Mirage (where Siegfried and Roy performed) said the tiger was triggered by what hairdo on an audience member in the front row?
5.) Myah Autry was arrested for trespassing in 2019 after video circulated of her showing inside a lion exhibit, dancing and taunting the lion. Which zoo did that happen at?
A. Bronx Zoo
B. Greater Wynnewood Exotic Animal Park
C. Detroit Zoo
D. Lincoln Park Zoo
UFO Case Files
- In 1980 in Suffolk, England, several personnel reported seeing a UFO outside the Royal Air Force Woodbridge base, which at the time was operated by the US Air Force. One serviceman even claimed he touched it. The case is usually referred to as the BLANK Forest Incident for the woods where it occurred. What’s the name of the forest?
A. Notting Wood-on-Rye
B. Sherwood
C. Rendlesham
D. Beesington
- In 1997 hundreds of people saw a strange formation of lights cruising above Arizona, Nevada, and Mexico in a V shape. What are these sightings referred to?
- This couple claimed that they were abducted by extra-terrestrials from the Zeta Reticuli system in 1961 in New Hampshire, paving the way for many people who have claimed to be abductees. Need both names.
- Starting in late 2014, researchers claimed they had discovered some Kodachrome slides in an attic in Arizona which they believed showed an extra-terrestrial body from the Roswell, New Mexico UFO crash. After much anticipation the slides were released in 2015 and the image was quickly identified as being:
A.) A rubber alien prop from a 50s sci fi movie
B.) A Mummified body of a child from a museum display
C.) A Fiji mermaid taxidermy hoax from PT Barnum’s museum
D.) A surnburnt iguana
5. The former singer of this pop punk band has turned into an advocate for UFO disclosure. One point each for the singer’s name and the band. Blink 182
Xtreme Social Distancing
1. There’s some inconsistencies to this story, but the Internet commonly reports that a Hedviga Golik died in front of her TV in Croatia and was not found for how many years?
A. 1
B. 15
C. 23
D. 42
2. Estately.com did a study to determine the best cities to be an urban hermit based on things like internet speeds, food and alcohol delivery services, affordable housing, and percentage of people who work from home. What city was number one? 1 point top 5 and 2 points if number 1.
https://www.estately.com/blog/2016/10/the-best-u-s-cities-for-todays-urban-hermits/
3. In 2018 Missionary John Chau had fishermen drop him off at the remote North Sentinel Island off the coast of India. The fisherman only went so far because they knew the tribe was known for killing any outsiders. Chau took a kayak the rest of the way. He displayed a waterproof Bible to the tribe and how did they respond?
A. Told him he was too late, Jehovah’s Witnesses had already stopped by and converted them.
B.Revealed that a CD player with the original cast recording of Jesus Christ Superstar in it had washed ashore some years ago and burst into song
C. Shot the Bible with an arrow and later shot and killed Chau
4.) Valeri Polyakov has the record for the longest single stay in space, staying aboard the Mir space station for how long?
A. 103 days
B. 365 days
C. 437 days
D. 535 days
5.) This book and film tells the story of Christopher McCandless aka Alexander Supertramp who hiked through Alaska hoping to live off the land. His dead body was found in an abandoned bus in 1992. Name of the book/movie?
ANSWERS BELOW
My upcoming book American Madness features a journey through conspiracy culture. It’s out August 25, 2020 from Feral House. To pre-order: CLICK HERE
Follow me on:
Facebook//Twitter//Instagram//YouTube
“Having just returned from the grocery store during an official pandemic, I’m reminded to highly recommend Apocalypse Any Day Now, from Tea Krulos, who went way down the doomsday prepper rabbit hole. Fun and unfortunately highly relevant. Do it.” — Brent Gohde, Cedar Block/ Science Strikes Back
Answers (click highlighted links for more reading material): Warm-up: C. JFK Assassination
Missing Persons: 1. D.B. Cooper/ Dan Cooper 2. Jack Nicholson/ Al Pacino 3. Fats Domino 4. Agatha Christie 5. D. Marshall Islands
Animal King, Dumb: 1. Werner Herzog 2. Call me Ishmael. 3. B. Short-tail stingray 4. Roy. Bonus: a beehive hairdo 5. A. Bronx Zoo
UFO Case Files: 1. C. Rendlesham 2. Phoenix Lights 3. Betty and Barney Hill 4. B. mummified child 5. Tom DeLonge, Blink-182
Xtreme Social Distancing: 1. D. 42 2. Top 5 (in order 1-5) Chicago, Austin, Washington DC, San Francisco, Denver 3.C. shot him 4. C. 437 days 5. Into the Wild
Tea’s Weird Week: Conspiracy Theory Trainwreck
Yesterday, a man named Eduardo Moreno, a locomotive engineer from San Pedro, drove a train at full speed toward the Port of Los Angeles. He was holding a safety flare in the train’s cab as the train burst through a series of barriers. Moreno was hoping for an action movie like stunt where the train would jump the rails at the end of the track and fly through the air and crash into the nearby docked USNS Mercy hospital ship, which had recently arrived to help with hospital overflow from the coronavirus pandemic.
Scene of the trainwreck.
The train skidded out in a gravel lot, about 250 yards from the ship. No one was injured, though there was a “substantial amount of fuel oil” that needed to be cleaned up. Moreno was immediately arrested and charged with “train-wrecking,” which has a sentence of up to 20 years.
Moreno told authorities his goal was to “wake people up,” and said “you only get this chance once. The whole world is watching. I had to. People don’t know what’s going on here. Now they will.” It’s not known yet exactly what Moreno was hoping to wake people up to, other than he believed the Mercy was part of a plot for a “government takeover.” Conspiracy theories about COVID-19 are thick and heavy and often revolve around the virus being a bio-weapon or a hoax, designed to implement a Deep State coup followed by martial law.
The Mercy in the Port of Los Angeles
This story is familiar to me. I have a new book coming out in August titled American Madness: The Story of the Phantom Patriot and How Conspiracy Theories Hijacked American Consciousness (Feral House). American Madness tells the story of a man named Richard McCaslin, who styled himself as a conspiracy commando and called himself the Phantom Patriot. Heavily influenced by Alex Jones (of InfoWars), Richard raided a secret society retreat called the Bohemian Grove in 2002, where he was arrested. He was hoping to “wake people up” to the alleged human sacrifices going on there. My book tells his story, but it also follows a pattern. Richard was the first one who took drastic action after listening to the words of Alex Jones (and others of his ilk) but not the last.
Richard McCaslin in his Phantom Patriot costume.
Some other conspiracy theorists who have snapped include Byron Williams, aka the I-580 Shooter, who had a shoot out with the California Highway Patrol after he was pulled over on his way to shoot up charities associated with liberal boogeyman George Soros in 2010. Oscar Ortega pulled up to the White House in 2011 and fired shots at it after seeing an Alex Jones documentary titled The Obama Deception. Jared and Amanda Miller, InfoWars fans, killed three people and themselves in a Las Vegas shooting spree.
In 2016, Edgar Maddison Welch, armed himself and raided a Washington DC pizzeria named Comet Ping Pong. Like McCaslin and Moreno, Welch was hoping to “wake people up” to a Democrats child sex trafficking ring being run out of the restaurant’s basement. That same year, two Georgia men named Michael Mancil and James Dryden Jr. were arrested in a plot to drive to Alaska and sabotage the HAARP facility, based on a conspiracy that says it’s a government brainwashing facility.
Was Moreno inspired to drive his crazy train by Alex Jones? We don’t know yet. But I doubt he came up with this theory out of the blue. Someone put the idea in his ear and I don’t think it was Rachel Maddow or Anderson Cooper. Like a bad penny, InfoWars is the one who usually shows up in these cases.
Source: “Man charged with intentionally derailing train near hospital ship Mercy over coronavirus concerns,” Los Angeles Times
Update, April 4: Moreno has been denied bail and will be arraigned May 7. It looks like a probable influence on him was QAnon, who have been spreading conspiracies about the Mercy. QAnon is saying the Mercy will be shipping COVID-19 patients to Guantanamo Bay as well as other theories that the disease is a bio-weapon designed by China and/or Bill Gates to discredit Trump. But they’ve also said the virus is a hoax to implement martial law. Let’s not forget that about two dozen of these people have campaigns running for Congress this year: https://teakrulos.com/2020/02/13/teas-weird-week-there-are-two-dozen-members-of-qanon-running-for-congress/
Source: “Coronavirus conspiracy theorists are too nuts even for a zombie-apocalypse movie scenario,” Daily Kos
My upcoming book American Madness features a journey through conspiracy culture, including QAnon. It’s out August 25, 2020 from Feral House. To pre-order: CLICK HERE
Follow me on:
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“Journalist Tea Krulos has made a curious and enlightening career out of examining groups of people with odd beliefs.” — Skeptical Inquirer
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Oh yeah, and don’t forget that our president is a conspiracy theorist! This week’s #TrumpConspiracyCounter 2020 (now at 177 clicks) column talks about Trump’s theory that there is a face mask black market. Read it here: https://teakrulos.com/2020/04/01/trumpconspiracycounter-april-1/
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This Saturday have some social distancing quarantine fun and play Tea’s Weird Week Trivia! You can win copies of my book, books from my library, and goofy fun prizes like bigfoot socks, shark hologram bookmarks, and more. It’s at 5pm central via Facebook Live video: www.facebook.com/theTeaKrulos
#TrumpConspiracyCounter: April 1
Unfortunately, none of the contents of today’s #TrumpConspiracyCounter are an April Fool’s Day joke. In the time of a deadly pandemic, ask yourself– do you want someone who believes, promotes, and incites conspiracy theories and gross misinformation as your leader? Trump brags that his daily coronavirus press conferences are a “ratings hit.” But is his bloviating against the “lamestream media” often dumps practical information for a “hunch” or “theory.”
Meanwhile, conspiracy continues to spread like a brush fire. Conspiracy theorists at first speculated coronavirus was a bioweapon developed by Bill Gates before settling into the idea that the virus is a hoax. The latest theory is that Dr. Anthony Fauci of the White House’s Coronavirus Task Force is a Deep State “Democrat plant” being used to discredit Trump. They’ve nicknamed him “Dr.#FearPorn.”
Source: “Right Wing Influencers Are Convinced Dr. Anthony Fauci is Working WIth Hillary Clinton to Undermine Trump,” Buzzfeed News
To be honest, I’ve not been staying on top of the conspiracy counter with everything else going on. But here’s some noteworthy recent hits:
175. March 29: At a press conference, Trump floats his theory that face masks are being sold on a black market and that’s why a huge jump in demand has happened rather than the obvious cause of a rapidly escalating pandemic:
“How do you go from 10-to-20-to-300,000…even though this is different. Something’s going on…Where are the masks going? Are they going out the back door?” And at the same press conference: “I don’t think it’s hoarding, I think it’s maybe worse than hoarding, but check it out. Check it out. I don’t know, I don’t know. I think that’s for other people to figure out.”
Source: “Trump Comments About Hospital Mask Thefts Spark Backlash From Doctors,” Newsweek
176. March 31: Bongino! Trump retweets conspiracy monger Dan Bongino.
177. March 31: Retweets Charlie Kirk of Turning Point America.
That’s all I got for this report. #TrumpConspiracyCounter will return in two weeks.
My upcoming book American Madness features a journey through conspiracy culture. It’s out August 25, 2020 from Feral House. To pre-order: CLICK HERE
Follow me on:
Facebook//Twitter//Instagram//YouTube
“Having just returned from the grocery store during an official pandemic, I’m reminded to highly recommend Apocalypse Any Day Now, from Tea Krulos, who went way down the doomsday prepper rabbit hole. Fun and unfortunately highly relevant. Do it.” — Brent Gohde, Cedar Block/ Science Strikes Back
teakrulos.com 