Right Suddenly Embraces Truther King

It wasn’t long ago that the right wing hated Alex Jones. A top voice in the 9/11 Truth movement, he was repeatedly ridiculed on Fox News, and Michelle Malkin said Ron Paul’s association with him should disqualify him from the GOP primary debates. But Jones is a non-partisan paranoiac. These days he’s turned his imagination on Obama—surely the front man of the global one-world government conspiracy—and Republicans love him, writes Michelle Goldberg in the New Republic.

Jones’ influence looms large over the tea parties and Glenn Beck’s show. He even appeared on Fox News recently, touted as “The great Alex Jones!” Though sundry leftists have appeared on Jones’ radio show over the years, it’s now a destination for even mainstream Republican officeholders—one congressman recently nodded along in agreement as Jones declared that Obama wanted to put “stuff in the water to sterilize us,” and create Mao-style “youth brigades.” (More Alex Jones stories.)