Today is the last day of the St. Croix County Fair in Glenwood City, Wisconsin. They’ve had some traditional carnival attractions, such as livestock competitions, a tractor pull, and rides.

One particular aspect of the St. Croix County fair this year has not been very traditional, and it’s been rather negative in tone, too. It’s a booth purchased in order to post political messages against President Barack Obama.

If you were to wander around the St. Croix County Fairgrounds and come across this anti-Obama booth, you might think that it was created with the efforts of local folks from the area around Glenwood City. You’d be wrong about that, though.

That anti-Obama booth at the St. Croix County Fair wasn’t paid for with local funds. It was rented out by a huge national political organization, and the money to paid for it came from that organization’s national headquarters, not from Wisconsin.

That organization: The National Rifle Association.

Why would the NRA be spending money to oppose the re-election of Barack Obama?

There are conspiracy theorists who say that Barack Obama has a secret plan to take away Americans’ guns. But then, the conspiracy theorists started saying that way back in 2008. If Barack Obama was made President, they said, jack-booted thugs from the federal government would soon be coming into Americans’ homes to take away all their firearms.

There’s just one problem with this conspiracy theory: Barack Obama has been President for almost four years now, and he hasn’t taken away Americans’ guns. It’s just never happened.

There is no reason for the National Rifle Association to oppose the re-election of Barack Obama as President… at least not on the basis of gun rights.

The National Rifle Association is opposing the re-election of Barack Obama because the NRA has been taken over by right wing extremists who are motivated by a constellation of conspiracy theories about global governments, and satanic cults, immigration, neo-confederate solidarity and monetary policy. The NRA isn’t really about gun rights any more. It’s about paranoia. The people at the NRA conclude, against all evidence to the contrary, that Barack Obama is going to take away their guns because they believe that Obama is part of secret plan to destroy America.

A bit of fear on a thrill ride is fine, but I don’t think that that paranoid fantasies about black helicopters are what ppeople are looking for when they visit the county fair.