Who/what are “truthers”? Simply put, they are those tinfoil-hatted, whack-jobs moonbats out in academia and beyond who truly believe that the 9/11 attacks were all faked – that the Twin Towers were not brought down by planes, but by a government-planned, controlled demolition, that the Pentagon was actually hit by a missile, and that Flight 93 really didn’t crash in Shanksville, PA but landed safely somewhere in Ohio.

I kid you not – there are people who truly believe such things. But that shouldn’t be surprising- after all, there are people who truly believe Elvis had killed JFK killed for making goo-goo eyes at Priscilla, the the moon landing was filmed in a cream cheese factory, and the Freemasons run the Roman Catholic Church, right? And let’s not forget Area 51…

I suppose one could joke about it and pass off these loons as just another group of misguided people missing a shingle or two, but in this case, there’s something unsettling about the way the whole 9/11 conspiracy thing has gradually worked its way above ground and into the popular culture to the point where a venerable church publishing house releases a book by a theologian on the matter and at least one Democratic candidate for Congress (in Florida’s 15th Congressional District) believes this stuff warrants serious consideration.

How these folks can be so void of common sense and removed from reality is beyond me, but Mary Katherine Ham over at Townhall.com helps explore this phenomena and the people behind it. And, if you really want your head to spin, check out the comments that follow. In some ways, it’s laughable, in some ways it’s sad and pathetic. (Hat tip: Ace of Spades)

And Charles at Little Green Footballs has more – in this case, the counter-demonstration by a bunch of so-called “truthers” at Ground Zero during the 9/11 observances there yesterday. (Warning: If you choose to click the comments, the outpourings of ridicule, while entertaining, contain very strong language – I don’t condone, but certainly understand!)

I think what bothers me most about this phenomenon is that there can be so much mistrust in our government and elected officials that something as blatantly obvious as what happened on 9/11 could be reduced to some far-fetched conspiracy theory, then taken seriously by so-called “educated people” to the point where others start taking it seriously. What’s scary about all this is that, if these people are willing to go so far as to believe this kind of nonsense, it makes you wonder what lengths they might be willing to go to act upon their paranoia.

Of course we’ve seen all this before with the Lyndon LaRouche gang and such, so maybe it’s not such a big deal. One can only hope in this case it’s just people with a little too much time on their hands and not enough daylight in their lives.