I am curious what comments people might have about this. I am not looking to lob insults here, but am trying to describe something that has me curious.

I used to fly hang gliders. I got one of those calls out of the blue from a guy I used to fly with 30 years ago. That got me on his email list and I quite often get 5 - 10 emails a day from him. He is retired and in his late 60s.

He is the type who has a totally impressive knowledge of cars, home construction and flying. He was always an order-of-magnitude better pilot than I was.

Now that I get emails daily, part reflect that knowledge which to me is just on a much higher plane than my knowledge and abilities. The other part get off on the political. He is very conservative and, of course, anti-Obama. One link was to a clip where Obama supposedly told a school class that he was not born in America. The clip shows Obama in a classroom of really young kids. At one point he turns his back to the camera as he is talking and at that point when you cannot see his lips the voice says that he was not born in America. My friend is pro- every conspiracy on earth. Kennedy, 9-11 and so on. One email had a link to an article about a huge top secret Chinese military base south of Mountain Home, Idaho. A couple of emails talk about all the Americans being murdered and beheaded by the wave of illegal Mexican immigrants coming across the Arizona border. Another talked about some type of a secret government program (I did not quite understgand it) which involved leaving criss-crossed jet contrails in the sky. He and his wife had noticed that one day and called in to the local talk radio station about it. The next day his wife noted an unmarked black helicopter which approached the house and hovered near it for a bit before leaving. Wife said that she was watched by guys in the helicopter wearing unmarked black uniforms. Their conclusion was that the government were monitoring calls to the radio station and wanted to scare them into submission after the callin about the crisscrossed contrails.

Now I grew up near Mountain Home, Idaho and called some friends out of interest including a pilot friend. Nobody knows anything about the Chinese Army base nor has heard any hints of restricted area, either on land or flying, that would justify that. I have worked as close as 100 feet from restricted US military land in the Mohave desert and there was absolutely no mistaking it, so I have a hard time believing the secret Chinese base story. (Mind you, I am sure the Chinese base proves that Obama is anti-American at heart). I also live in Arizona and to believe the comments about waves of murderous Mexican immigrants means believing some Republican politicians, but disbelieving almost every law officer ever asked to confirm that and believing that FOX news in Phoenix has been muffled so they cannot report all the murders. There are other ones on things I that actually touch on technical things that I know and all have some kernel from which a whole story grows.

So without saying which of our perceptions of reality is right, I have a couple of questions. Has he always had the conspiracy-etc. side to him and it is just the internet which empowered that? Or is that a development of advanced age? Strictly on the face of it, I cannot fault the latter because I certainly have different views on life now than I did 30 years ago.

Thanks.

my guess its a combination of both. So see conspiracy around every corner and the internet feeds that, add his age and yes, I can see it happening.

Delete the emails that deal with the conspiracies and enjoy your friend for himself.

River

I have an old high school friend that constantly sent or forwarded me email. Much of it was good stuff, pictures and PowerPoint picture files, but I often got the off-the-wall Obama conspiracy crap from him, too. I called him on it, and, now, I get no email from him. I'm missing the good stuff he sent, but I don't regret calling him on the crap he sent.

You have touched on a good point, Slammr. To delete is easy enough. I am not really into trying to change adults minds, so why argue? It seems to me to be a no-win. Probably more often than not you will offend them and cut the relationship.

We talked about it on the way back from a weekend trip yesterday. The end conclusion can almost be summarized as we are all average. If you have extra-ordinary abilities in one area, you are extra-ordinarily dense in other areas. Once our friend said that, I could immediately think of several great examples of folks who are sort of idiot-savants (present company exluded, of course). People who are just plain gifted in some areas, think they are absolute all around geniuses because of that specific ability and who actually are downright dumb in some things.