Cynthia McKinney’s conspiracy theories strike again

It appears Cynthia McKinney will take her anti-Semitic conspiracy theories wherever she can find them. Blogger Adam Holland notes that the one-time Democratic member of Congress from Georgia and 2008 Green Party nominee for president — whose father blamed her congressional defeat in 2002 on the "J-E-W-S" is now promoting the far-right theories of Matthias Chang that a group of "Shadow Money-Lenders" is trying to destabilize the world economy and install a "one-world government":

McKinney’s column (read here) which accuses George Soros and Alan Greenspan of participating in a plot to deliberately destabilize the world economy in order to install a "one-world government", uses Chang’s term for this purported conspiracy: "the Shadow Money-Lenders" (not coincidentally, the title of Chang’s most recent book). Typical of such conspiracy theories, Chang and McKinney connect this to an ancient plot which took shape under the hidden hand of the Rothschilds. McKinney puts a somewhat confused post-colonial third-world spin on this by citing Haiti as an example of what she says is planned for the rest of the world, the apparent link being that she happens to be in Haiti at the moment. Her leftist, "shock doctrine" approach also serves to make the essentially fascist contents of her column more palatable.

An excerpt from the column:

"(a) policy of ‘controlled chaos’ will be implemented and we will witness in major cities of the USA, UK and Europe of street battles, orchestrated by the Intelligence Services, between the white folks and the immigrant population. In the USA it will be against the Latinos and then the blacks . . . In the UK and Europe, it will be against mainly immigrants from Turkey, the Northern Mediterranean states and Pakistan and they are essentially Muslims. There is therefore, the added fuel of Islamic radicalism, which in the first place, was the creation of the Western intelligence services."

Holland then notes who Chang is:

Matthias Chang is a Malaysian attorney who served as an adviser to former Prime Minister Tun Mahathir Mohamad with whom he is still closely associated. Chang’s influence was evident in Prime Minister Mahathir’s infamous speech to the 2003 Islamic Summit Conference, in which he accused the Jews of world domination and oppression of the world’s Muslims (read here). Chang was also behind a visit of a delegation of Holocaust deniers and "9/11 truth" advocates to Malaysia in 2006 (read here). The delegation was led by Michael Collins Piper, famous for his claim that Israel was behind the JFK assasination. During this tour, this delegation participated in a conference called “Islam, Humanity and World Peace” in which Yvonne Ridley also participated. This delegation was interviewed by the Malaysian media, addressed conferences at the University of Malaya and the International Islamic University, and visited with Prime Minister Mahathir. They also promoted the Malay translations of Pipers ouvre (Read here.)

Chang has made a post-politics career of writing books which expound at great length on apocalyptic conspiracies involving Jewish bankers, and has continued to advise Dr. Mahathir. Excerpts of "The Shadow Money-Lenders" posted online make the very confused argument that international bankers (read "Jews") have been both controlling and destabilizing the governments of the world’s most powerful nations, with the exception of China, which Chang claims has somehow escaped this snare (read here). Chang blames this same international bankers conspiracy for creating both capitalism and socialism, and for the Russian Revolution, Zionism and the creation of the Federal Reserve Bank, citing familiar far-right anti-Semitic propaganda as evidence. The cover of the book warns that "THERE WILL BE BLOOD ON THE STREETS", with the word "blood" written in a blood-red, dripping typeface (read here). (Editorial note: shouldn’t that be "blood in the streets"?)

While McKinney has a history of anti-Jewish and conspiracy theory beliefs, this is something new. In the past, she has blamed her political failures on a Jewish conspiracy. She has endorsed "9/11 Truth" theories [blaming Israel for the 9/11 attacks* (see correction below)] and even ran for president on a Green Party platform which included these assertions. She has supported boycotting Israel and cutting off U.S. ties. However, by promoting the neo-fascist books of Matthias Chang, she has taken a leap from the world of the left into the world of the brown-red convergence, where anti-Semites of the extremes of right and left meet.

Holland has another post recounting a bizarre radio interview McKinney recently did in which she once again championed Chang’s theories but also strangely alleges that the Anti-Defamation League had a spy in her 2002 congressional campaign and allows her interviewer to claim, without contradiction, that Benjamin Netanyahu was partly behind the Patriot Act:

Q: I called Washington the “District of Criminals,” a “viper pit.” Now, you’vesurvived, Congresswoman, six terms there. Can you give us some detail of, which is quite obvious if you look into it, you have an open-mind, that Washington is under a state, that Washington, DC, is under a state of siege by a very powerful group. You named them a pro-Israel group. Can you give me some more details about theharrassment (sic) that over your twelve years you suffered?

McKinney: Well if I were to give an accounting I would think I would use up ALL of your time that you have allotted; I think that what I’ll do is I’ll pick one story that could be illustrative of some of the things that happened. During the 2002 re-election campaign, there was a gentleman who was in my campaign headquarters, who identified himself as an observer, a political observer of our campaign, and he would sit in a rocking chair with my father at the campaign headquarters and they would share stories about the campaign, the state of politics, and that sort of thing. Thisgentelman (sic) be-friended (sic) my FATHER; well, after the election was over and all kinds of things happened, like the loss of the keys to the vans that would transport people, to the loss of the phones from the phone-banking room that was an off-site place that no one was supposed to know the location of, this particular gentleman who had identified himself as a stateless Palestinian went on the television and announced himself as the Southern Regional Buraeu (sic) Chief for one of the pro-Israel organizations. So our campaign was disrupted and TOTALLY disrupted, particularly on election day, and that was the link; we didn’t know until election but then this particular volunteer showed-up on television…

Q: Can you put a name to this guy; is this guy still around?…

McKinney: I don’t know if he’s still around, but he ended-up being a member of the Anti-Defamation League. There are MANY pro-Israel organizations that have a political impact and conduct political business, and the Anti-Defamation League is one of them, you have the American-Israeli Public Affairs Committee is another one of them, and those are among the better known politcal (sic) organizations." ….

At 56:04 of the interview, the interlocutor poses a rambling question about 9/11:

    Q: Late in the evening (of 9/11), early morning, you’re presented a 572 page document that is prepared well in advance based on certain manipulations and certain directions of Benjamin Netanyahu.  What were the congressmen saying?  They handed you a bill and said "sign this to protect ourselves" (sic) …  What happens in the few hours leading up to the passage of the Patriot Act?

McKinney’s extensive response in no way disabuses the questioner of his notion that the Patriot Act was passed within hours of the 9/11 attacks, or that it was in some way brought about by Benjamin Netanyahu.

Holland concludes:

This interview follows what has become McKinney’s usual method of endorsing outrageous anti-Semitic conspiracy theories.  She does this by allowing her interviewer or the authors of books she endorses to outline these theories for her.  Her responses are supportive of these views, but visibly so only in the context of the interview or by reference to the books she touts.  Outside of these contexts, she presents, to the inattentive, a simulacrum of political normality..