Conspiracy Clearinghouse

EPISODE 173 | Nazca Blasta: Peruvian Mysteries Cloud Country, the Land of Two Seas, the Land of the Incas, Peru - a fascinating country with a rich heritage, and also lots of mysteries. Like Machu Picchu, the Nazca Lines, Sacsayhuamán, mummies, the Band of Holes, Caral-Supe, lost gold, strange skulls, and even some truly out there Covid-19 stuff. You can also SUBSCRIBE to this podcast. Review us h...

EPISODE 172 | Monster Mash: Mummies Mummies are a long-standing presence in pop culture, but what, exactly, are they, why did people make them, and can they really wander around strangling people?  You can also SUBSCRIBE to this podcast. Review us here or on  IMDb ! SECTIONS Pyramid Song - Mummy basics, the how and the why, natural mummies, Hedviga Golik  Walk Like an Egyptian - More mummies, Eva...

EPISODE 171 | A Thousand Universes: Public Transportation Weirdness Even in the urban transportation space, usually reserved for city dwellers, NUMTOTs, NUMTOAs, and other transit geeks, conspiracy and weirdness manage to infiltrate. There’s the GM Streetcar Conspiracy, which might explain why the US has crap public transport. There’s the story of the Tucker 48, an innovative car that got shut dow...

EPISODE 170 | Loose Screws: 9/11 Conspiracy Theories A little under two weeks ago was the 25th anniversary of the attacks in New York City and at the Pentagon on September 11, 2001. So perhaps it is now time to take a quick look at some of the chatter that has gone on about those events. Review us here or on  IMDb. And seriously, subscribe, will ya? Like, just do it.  SECTIONS 01:16 - That Day - T...

EPISODE 169 | Harping on about HAARP, 5G & More Radio waves are invisible and yet somehow carry sound and signal. They are used for transmitting messages, codes, news, and music. They enable us to speak to one another using small portable devices, and even access the internet. They are used to help us know our position on the ground with pretty darn good accuracy, and they allow us to study th...

EPISODE 168 | Eating the Onion: War of the Worlds & Other Scares In an environment of experimental fiction, metanarratives, postmodern satire, disinformation, deep fakes, and fake news, a sizeable portion of the content gobbling audience takes things that are not true as being actually true. Online, this happens with alarming regularity with articles published by satirical news site The Onion;...

EPISODE 167 | American Trickster: The Cults of Carlos Castaneda Guest: Ru Marshall, American writer and artist Carlos Castaneda made a big splash with his books about the Yaqui shaman Don Juan, but there was a lot more happening than just those increasingly fantastical tales. A LOT more. Author and artist Ru Marshall spent more than 20 years looking into what was really going on with the man who w...

EPISODE 166 | Sassy Squatches: Chupacabra, Bigfoot & Yeti Some of the most famous cryptids are the bloodsucking Chupacabra (which is of fairly recent invention) and the always popular Bigfoot and their higher latitude cousins, the Abominable Snowman. Is there any truth at all to stories of these creatures, or is it all misunderstandings, misapprehensions, misidentifications, and tomfoolery? Th...

EPISODE 165 | MAHA Mia: The Misconceptions of RFK Jr Guest: Evan Nadler, pediatric surgeon and researcher, pioneer in childhood obesity The conspirasphere has been weaponized so much that actual conspiracy theorists now hold important and influential positions in the US government. Perhaps the most egregious example of this is Robert F. Kennedy Jr. as the Secretary of Health and Human Services. Wh...

EPISODE 164 | Walk Like a Panther: The Palantir 22-Point Manifesto A company many have heard mentioned but don’t know much about caused a stir in the interwebs when its CEO dropped a 22-point manifesto of sorts. Many felt the whole thing smacked of some sort of comic book supervillain’s shopping list, while others nodded their heads at the sage wisdom of the post of X (formerly Twitter). Palantir...

EPISODE 163 | Vanishing Point: Missing Scientists & the Erosion of Certainty Someone recently wrote that, these days, a conspiracy theory is sort of a political position. It sure does seem that way sometimes, and new conspiracy theories continue to evolve in this disinfo-rich soil we’ve scattered about the internet like so much incontinence. Plus, those in power seem to have figure out that th...

EPISODE 162 | In Pursuit of D.B. Cooper One of the great unsolved cases in FBI history is the tale of D.B. Cooper, who hijacked a commercial jet and then jumped out the door with a parachute and a bag full of cash. The story has been written about, films have been made, numerous “Mysteries of…” shows have had episodes about it, and there even a few songs that reference the famous gentleman thief o...

EPISODE 161 | Vroom Broom: Witches & Witch Hunts Hundreds, perhaps thousands, or women were burned alive in Salem, MA, at the end of the 17th century. Their crime? Being witches. That’s what many of us think, anyway. But just how much truth is there in all that? And what, exactly, is a witch? Are there any still around today?  This episode comes in time for this year’s Walpurgis Night, which h...

EPISODE 160 | A Real Collusion Two political parties hardly seems sufficient for a nation of 342 million, and yet that's exactly the situation in the United States. How did that come to be, and why does it persist? Author Stu Strumwasser explores those ideas with his new novel A Real Collusion as well as in this conversation.  Review us here or on  IMDb. And seriously, subscribe, will ya? Like, ju...

EPISODE 159 | Maritime Mysteries It’s time to shiver yer timbers and batten down the hatches as we dive into a bucketful of mysteries at sea that have been hard to fathom in the past - the Flannan Isles Lighthouse, the Mary Celeste, and the Flying Dutchman.  Review us here or on  IMDb. And seriously, subscribe, will ya? Like, just do it.  SECTIONS 01:20 - The Flannan Isles Lighthouse - Three men v...

EPISODE 158 | Nasty NASA: The Challenger and Other Spacespiracies At 11:38 am  on January 28, 1986, the Space Shuttle Challenger lifted off from Florida’s Cape Canaveral on its 10th mission and 73 seconds later exploded, killing everyone on board. This was seen live on television by millions of people because a civilian teacher was one of the crew.  At first, it was thought an external fuel tank h...

EPISODE 157 | Bohemian Books: Gigas, Voynich & Soyga Some very old books have an air of mystery and intrigue about them. Partly, that’s because they are literally hundreds of years old, and partly because of the weird things they contain.  Today, we’ll take a look at three, all of which have a connection to the Czech Republic and Prague: the biggest book in the world, the Codex Gigas (also kno...

EPISODE 156 | The Shape of Water: Loch Ness and Other Lake Monsters People have been talking about a supposed water creature in the Scottish Highlands for at least 93 years, possible much longer. Everyone has heard of the Loch Ness Monster, and Nessie is one of the OGs of the cryptid world. But there are plenty of other, similar reports from around the world as well, like Ogopogo, Manipogo, Cressi...

EPISODE 155 | Mummy Mia: King Tut's Tomb Guest: Neil Laird, Emmy-nominated  TV producer  (Discovery, BBC, PBS, History, National Geographic), author of the  Prime Time  novel series Since its discovery in 1922, the tomb of King Tut has captivated people, with research simply leading to more questions? How did he die? Was he murdered? Was he really born in Arizona and later moved to Babylonia? And...

EPISODE 154 | Forgotten Languages (FL): The Most Interesting Site on the Web? While researching a previous episode about internet rabbit holes, I came across one that was some big, so complicated, that the entry soon grew into its very own episode. It's called Forgotten Languages, and at first it seems like it's all about ancient languages. But these turn out to be ciphers which, when decoded, rev...

EPISODE 153 | Broken Arrows and Other Nuclear Boo-Boos (World Is Weird 16) One reason conspiracy theories flourish is that sometimes there really are secrets kept back from the public, only revealed later. Take Broken Arrows - accidents involving nuclear weapons, near-misses that could have become incredibly serious but, fortunately, didn’t.  Like what we do? Then buy us a beer or three via our pa...

EPISODE 152 | Internet Rabbit Holes (1) Once in a while, someone comes across a website that creeps them out, or confuses them so much they start to ask others about it and, before you know it, an internet rabbit hole has formed.  Today, we’ll take a look at a few of these internet mysteries that sure got tongues wagging and finger flying over keyboards. Though almost always, the answer that’s fou...

EPISODE 151 | Global Warming Is Real Guest: Thomas Schueneman, environmental journalist, founder of the PlanetWatch Group, TDS Environmental Media and GlobalWarmingisReal.com A chat about some of the more pervasive and commonplace climate change skepticism claims and just some general kvetching about where we are in this conversation these days.  Like what we do? Then buy us a beer or three via ou...

EPISODE 150 | Operation Gemstone & the Gemstone File Very often sheer naked greed is hidden behind a glossy finish of virtue, something we can plainly see in the stories of two Gemstones from the conspiracy world – G. Gordon Liddy’s whacked out Operation Gemstone plans to help Richard Nixon get reelected, and the outlandish and complicated Gemstone File, which might be the very first mega-cons...

EPISODE 149 | Russian Dolls: Rasputin and Blavatsky Russians are practical, artistic and deeply mystical. And they tend to fall under the sway of strong personalities. Like two people from the past - Rasputin, the so-called Mad Monk, and Helena Blavatsky, founded of Theosophy, which itself is the very root of the modern New Age movement. Like what we do? Then buy us a beer or three via our page on...