I am no fan of Cass Sunstein, but when I read (via a link from M. Simon) that he advocates a government ban on conspiracy theories, I nearly blew a gasket. After all, the man is often said to be a serious contender for nomination to the Supreme Court.

Here is what Sunstein is reported as having said:

In a lengthy academic paper, President Obama's regulatory czar, Cass Sunstein, argued the U.S. government should ban "conspiracy theorizing."

Among the beliefs Sunstein would ban is advocating that the theory of global warming is a deliberate fraud.

Sunstein also recommended the government send agents to infiltrate "extremists who supply conspiracy theories" to disrupt the efforts of the "extremists" to propagate their theories.

The relevant text reads as follows:

The most direct response to a dangerous conspiracy theories is censorship. That response is unavailable in an open society, because it is inconsistent with principles of freedom of expression. We could imagine circumstances in which a conspiracy theory became so pervasive, and so dangerous, that censorship would be thinkable. But in an open society, the need for censorship would be correspondingly reduced. In any case censorship may well turn out to be self-defeating. The effort to censor the theory might well be taken as evidence that the theory is true, and censorship of speech is notoriously difficult.

Sorry, but I'm just not seeing a call for censorship there.

While I have never liked Sunstein's condescending attitude (his proposal for "cognitive infiltration of extremist groups" strikes me as problematic at best), once again WND has tortured the facts, and has come up with a brand new truth, which will no doubt be what its readers want to hear.

I realize it's not exciting to say that Sunstein didn't really call for censorship, and now I'm worried that some WND readers might see me as his apologist -- which I don't mean to be.

To all who are offended by any appearance I might have conveyed of being a Sunstein apologist, I offer my deepest apologies.

MORE: Reason's Jesse Walker critiques what Cass Sunstein actually advocated. Glenn Reynolds characterizes the plan as "CONSPIRE AGAINST THE CONSPIRACY THEORISTS!"

As I'm already knee-deep in conspiring against the conspiracy theory conspiracy theory, I guess it would behoove me to conspire against those who conspire against the conspiracy theorists, but hey, I didn't start this and I don't see why I have to engage in counter-counter-conspiracy-theory theorizing.

I think Cass Sunstein would have done well to leave this whole thing alone. People who want to believe things are going to go looking for what they want to believe, and the people who give them what they want to believe are going to keep right on giving.

Hmmm...

I realize it will sound like another conspiracy theory, but in my darker moments, I often suspect that many so-called "conspiracy theories" are deliberately manufactured by relatively intelligent troll types to entertain or mislead dumber or more gullible audiences.