Four For the Fourth 2019 Part WHAT THE FOURTH IS THIS SH-T!

I really don't want to go spreading wild rumors, so for starters I don't believe a word of this. However, this craziness is out there and requires an impartial and professional review.

To wit: There are a bunch of crazy-ass QAnon trumpsters who believe John-John, AKA John Kennedy Jr., the Prince That Was Promised sex symbol of the 1990s, faked his death in 1999, spent the last twenty years hiding in Pittsburgh, and has turned into an avid trump supporter who is willing to go public this 4th of July to sign up as trump's 2020 Veep running mate.

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I CANNOT MAKE THIS SHIT UP. I may write as a hobby and get a few things published here and there, but JESUS TAPDANCING CHRIST I cannot delve into this level of the absurd. Here's Rolling Stone's EJ Dickson's take on it:

On this scientific scale, John F. Kennedy Jr. falls somewhere in between Judy Garland and former Minnesota Twins center fielder Kirby Puckett; all of which is to say, he is extremely, irrefutably dead. In July 1999, the pulchritudinous son of John and Jackie Kennedy and cofounder of George magazine perished in a tragic plane crash at the age of 38, along with his wife Carolyn Bessette and his sister-in-law Lauren. At least, this is the conventional narrative perpetuated by the fake news media, according to supporters of the pro-Trump conspiracy theory QAnon. Hardcore Q believers think that JFK Jr. is not only alive and well, but also that he plans to emerge from his 20-year hiatus from public life by coming out and supporting Trump as his running mate in 2020. Moreover, they believe that a guy in Pittsburgh named Vincent Fusca is actually JFK Jr. in disguise, and they have made T-shirts promoting this belief...

The theory that JFK Jr. is alive and a Trump supporter and a hirsute former financial services professional who lives in Pittsburgh has been percolating in QAnon forums for at least the past year. But it recently made a resurgence on YouTube, where QAnon supporters are posting tutorials for how to make JFK Jr. face masks to wear to Trump’s much-hyped July 4th rally, when they believe JFK Jr. will finally emerge from hiding. The goal of the masks, according to Daily Beast reporter Will Sommer, is for believers to be able to easily identify other QAnon supporters (though, frankly, this seems unlikely, as the shock of seeing a long-dead celebrity casually walking around Washington would almost certainly inspire mass fear and panic in the streets)...

To be fair, not every Q believer buys into the idea that JFK Jr. staged his own death and is secretly posing as a Trump supporter from Pittsburgh. But the belief has gained enough traction among Q supporters that it’s worth engaging seriously with how such beliefs spread, and why they gain acceptance in some circles...

The world of a Conspiracy believer - a Truther, a Birther, any of them - from Salem Witches to Jim Crow race-baiters to Turner Diary readers is all based on a belief that the world is crap (which is half-true) but that it's crap for a reason (The conspiracies that the wingnuts KNOW exist, depending on their own racial and religious hatreds) and that the Conspiracy Theorist alone (even among the thousands of others) is the one truthteller setting the world free.

In short, ego-driven fantasies that they will rise up and the rest of us will fall or show adoration.

This is similar to those End Times believers: The innate desire to rise above the mundane world through mystery and tragedy and cosmic forces beyond our ken. They are just as disdainful of the facts and just as eager to see the world end just to prove themselves correct. It's mostly sad, except for the poor souls who drive themselves to self-harm or violence because of it.

There's entire books on how the United States is prone - and vulnerable - to wild accusations and troubling groupthink. This is just one more crazy plot line in a crazy and dark timeline our nation has to endure.

Look, I personally believe - or want to believe - that Elvis and Freddie Mercury are both alive, having achieved immortality and riding across the United States solving crimes. But that's just the whimsy in me. I know they're dead, I know this world is not fantasy, and besides I have no idea which bike either of them had a preference for (I'm thinking Triumphs, but that's actually Dylan's preferred ride).

Elvis is dead, people. John-John too. Just focus on solving the problems of the real world, okay?