Inside the Mind of the Conspiracy Theorist

A look back at ‘The Paranoid Style in American Politics’

Tim Wu

--

Credit: Ann Althouse

It is hard to write stuff that stays fresh, and that’s what makes Richard Hofstalder’s The Paranoid Style in American Politics, written in 1964, so impressive. We live, as everyone knows, in what feels like a high point of mainstream conspiracy theory in the United States. There’s nothing you can…

--

--

Tim Wu

Professor at Columbia University; author of “The Curse of Bigness,” “The Attention Merchants,” and “The Master Switch;” veteran of Silicon Valley & Obama Admin.