Tired of UFOs and vaccines? Let's give chemtrails another go.

So far, at least 12 states have banned something comically stupid that does not exist — but there's a method to their madness.

As you may know, a subculture of conspiracy theorists believe that “the gubmint” and major airlines worldwide have engaged in a decades-long campaign of visually blatantly-obvious aerial spraying of a nefarious substance. The motivation, most believe, is either some sort of weather control, or spraying drugs that dumb down the population to pacify us into acceptance of orderly disposal in mass execution camps. Or something.¹

In my neighborhood Facebook group, there is a mom who posts a picture of a contrail about every week with a comment such as “Spray-ops today. Keep your children inside.” 🙄

To think that such a thing could work, you have to be really, really ignorant of all the relevant sciences.² This requirement of profound ignorance has paved the way for everyone’s favorite crackpot, RFK Jr., to be the new cheerleader for taking on this nefarious government plot (or “crime” as he calls it):

And of course Marjorie Taylor Greene — the patron saint of anti-intellectualism — has been on this train for years now.³ You may have read in the news that at least twelve states⁴ — at last count — are now passing legislation to ban chemtrails, which do not exist, and have never existed, and anyone with a college education could probably tell you why.

The list so far includes:

• Arizona

• Florida

• Iowa

• Kentucky

• Louisiana

• Michigan

• Minnesota

• New Hampshire

• New York

• Rhode Island

• South Dakota

• Tennessee

• Texas

Now, I know it’s easy and fun to riff on this and make sport of the magnificence of the stupidity to spend legislative time banning chemtrails, leprechauns, witches, alien abductions, or unicorns — but it turns out there is indeed (probably) a coordinated reason for it. Here’s the hint:

Without exception, every one of the bills is sponsored by Republican lawmakers.

Does that mean Republican lawmakers are really that gullible, and really that susceptible to conspiracy theories? No. In fact, we know that people on the left and the right are equally susceptible to conspiracy theories.⁵ So the explanation must lie elsewhere.

And indeed, Republican strategist Steve Bannon has been telling us exactly what they’re up to for years. He calls it “Flooding the zone with shit,” spewing such a volume of bullshit that the pundits and political opponents cannot possibly respond to all of it cogently. I talked about it in detail here. Hitler called it The Big Lie and Putin’s version is called the Firehose of Falsehood. It is a deliberate political strategy employed by authoritarian regimes to help them consolidate power.

And it works. Because, look: you are I are both wasting our time reading & writing about it right now. We’ve successfully been distracted from far more important issues like the flagrantly unconstitutional Section 70302 in H.R.1. which ties the hands of the courts — even the Supreme Court — if the President or other members of the executive ignore and defy court orders.⁶ Steve Bannon sees us gnashing our teeth and rending our garments over chemtrails while they sneakily give the President unlimited power. Restricting judicial authority and weakening the judiciary's ability to hold the executive branch accountable was pretty core to all of Project 2025.

So, look away long enough to laugh at Kennedy, if you must; but remember he’s an easy target so you’re not accomplishing much. But then get back to reality because the real shit is what nonsense like this is intended to distract you from.

1. https://skeptoid.com/episodes/4027

2. https://contrailscience.com

3. https://apnews.com/article/hurricane-helene-trump-musk-conspiracy-theories-misinformation-fe81869765d778ac2ff3dc5f9ac18e10

4. https://apnews.com/article/chemtrail-louisiana-ban-conspiracy-e7562efe0251588978153cef30034e63

5. https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC9307120/

6. https://www.brennancenter.org/our-work/analysis-opinion/house-budget-bill-would-gut-federal-courts-ability-enforce-orders