Last night, my wife and I were watching the latest episode in the “Inspector Lynley Mysteries” on PBS. A series of seemingly related murders – extending over a twelve year period – left one police inspector to suggest any similarities to be coincidences. Inspector Lynley retorted: “I’ll take a conspiracy to coincidence any day.” Interesting: when the state is trying to unravel wrongdoing, it is eager to look for conspiracies; when the rest of us are trying to understand political wrongdoing, our search for conspiracies is regarded as evidence of paranoia.

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