I was looking to buy some stock in a company which makes a consumer food product that must be in a greater demand today. It is owned by a coalition of Warren Buffet and a hedge fund. The product is one of many made by Kraft.

            The product was invented a century ago and is marketed for kids. I drank some of the grape flavored but the product just didn’t do it for me. Was that an omen?

            After the mass suicide in Guyana of a religious group, the product has been associated with gullible people being duped into believing the lies and deceit of a charismatic con man.

            Of course the product is Kool-Aid and last year many stores ran out of it. Because of increased need, they must have cranked up production to meet demand. I wonder if they have built more facilities to supply Kool-Aid to the millions of people who used to be sensible and logical people.

            In the future, will historians nickname this past four years as the Kool-Aid era or will it last a few more years until sensibility and truth wins out over insanity.

Many decades ago my wife and I took a trip up into Michigan and Wisconsin. As I was driving past a sign she hadn’t noticed, I asked if she knew what a tourist trap is. She said no, so I turned around and parked at “The Miracle Spot.” It was an old ramshackle cabin. There were four or five cars already there. We paid our two dollars each and joined the tour group.

The building was set up as a collection of optical illusions. Balls would roll up a ramp; a man six inches shorter than me looked to be taller than me, and other illusions. It, of course, was great fun for me watching and listening to the other people in the tour. I was surprised how many bought the story, but I think it had to do with a meteorite or some such thing upsetting the laws of physics. I do remember it was a great story once you stepped across the line from reality into fantasy.

Buying the story requires a certain amount of gullibility and a belief that science is a total fraud. I don’t know if the owners are still duping people. I image it must be easier now that we have the internet’s “facts” to believe in and conned by.

Today some spots have cost millions and charge lots of money. I think the biggest “Miracle Spot” today is near Williamstown, Kentucky. The “Ark Encounter” is based on an impossible biblical story about the Earth being covered with almost 30,000 feet of water. Where did the water come from and drain to? It was an old story about Babylon being flooded often and the people surviving on square boats. Biblical archeologists found tablets in Babylon relating the flooding and boats.

I just watched one of the greatest hoaxes or conspiracies of the twentieth century. It was a PBS documentary on the Lunar Landing. Doesn’t everybody know it was all done in a warehouse in Area 57? That’s another hoax where the Air Force says they don’t have any aliens in the freezers.

The biggest conspiracy is that FDR not only knew the Japanese would attack our base at Pearl Harbor, he knew weeks in advance. He wanted us in the war so we could fight with England so he got tough with sanctions against Japan.

Of course, the 1962 conspiracy theories were the Grassy Knoll and Cuba’s training of Oswald. The biggest ones for this century is Obama wasn’t born in America and he is a Muslim. Many hoaxes and conspiracies are put out by people who want to gain publicity for themselves or their cause.

Perhaps the greatest believer of hoaxes and promoter of his own hoaxes and conspiracy theories is Donald Trump. He still believes in the ones about Obama and has spawned hundreds of other hoaxes which his adherents believe and pass along. The media tries to show the hoaxes and conspiracies to just be more lies but Trump is leading a crusade to destroy honest media and promote dishonest media. Common sense should cause people to question some of his most outlandish statements but “The Big Lie” strategy seems to be working here as well as it did in Nazi Germany.

Oh yes, let’s not forget the Russians, Chinese, and other dominating the internet with their own strategies to divide and disrupt our country. Why are so many so gullible? P.T. Barnum couldn’t come up with what Americans believe today.