the obsession with the gold standard has been common currency of the far right since the John Birch Society. Rand Paul and the libertarians go on about it.
John Maynard Keynes, one of the most influential economists of the 20th c., argued against the gold standard and claimed it prolonged the great depression. His economic policy guided the world out of the great depression.
Milton Friedman, an acolyte of Ayn Rand, along with Hayek and Mises, became the counter argument to Keynes with the rise of the right in the U.S. in the 1970s.
Rand is big among libertarians who are also big on the gold standard.
Govt mind control is the resting place of many paranoid thinkers. The big conspiracy that undergirds it is the belief in a "New World Order" as a conspiracy theory. Pat Robertson wrote about book with this title about this conspiracy some decades ago. Until the rise of the anarchist movement in the U.S. the "New World Order" / govt mind control idea was pretty much limited to fundamentalist christians and the "patriot movement." The patriot movement was largely defined by its largest group, The John Birch Society. Fear and hatred of the United Nations has long been part of their paranoia.
The Southern Poverty Law Center, which tracks hate groups, has associated the patriot movement with the current tea party movement.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2010/mar/04/us-surge-rightwing-extremist-groups"The US is facing a surge in anti-government extremist groups and armed militias, driven by deepening hostility on the right to Barack Obama, anger over the economy, and the increasing propagation of conspiracy theories by parts of the mass media such as Fox News.
The Southern Poverty Law Centre, the US's most prominent civil rights group focused on hate organisations, said in a report that extremist "patriot" groups "came roaring back to life" last year as their number jumped nearly 250% to more than 500 with deepening ties to conservative mainstream politics.
...The report says the patriot movement has "made significant inroads into the conservative political scene" in part driven by a growing view of the US administration "as part of a plot to impose 'one-world government' on liberty-loving Americans".
"The Tea Parties and similar groups that have sprung up in recent months cannot fairly be considered extremist groups, but they are shot through with rich veins of radical ideas, conspiracy theories and racism," the report says."
Loughner's talk about grammar apparently stems from another right wing extremist, David Wynne Miller.
http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0111/47329.html"The far-right activist, David Wynn Miller, said in a telephone interview that he didn’t know Loughner, but agreed with his statement in a YouTube video that “the government is implying mind control and brainwash on the people by controlling grammar.”
“Absolutely I would agree with it,” said Miller, 62, a former tool-and-die maker from Milwaukee who claims 1 billion “students” worldwide.
But he said any suggestion that his writings influenced Loughner to go on a shooting rampage is “ridiculous.”
“I have nothing to do with anything like that,” Miller said, suggesting that Loughner might have been under the influence of government mind control.
The claim of "nihilism" is insignificant when Loughner's "philosophy" is tied to existing right wing conspiracy beliefs - not that Loughner himself was tied to any of them. But the origins of his "manifesto" are found in right wing extremists in the U.S.
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