When is a conspiracy theory not a theory?

We are witnessing the creation of a new conspiracy theory that, if true, is a clear and present danger to our democracy.

First, the theory goes, the ex-president of the United States who swore on a Bible and in front of the world that he would protect and defend the Constitution of the United States, last year suggested the “suspension” of that U.S. Constitution so he could be declared the winner of an election he lost. (Not to mention there is no way to suspend the Constitution to accomplish such a goal but why ruin a good theory?)

That same ex-president, who was impeached twice, has now been indicted in four cases brought separately by federal and state prosecutors.

He is poisoning jury pools by claiming that the current President of the United States “ordered” his indictment in those four different jurisdictions, some with state and some with federal officials prosecuting the cases. None of whom a President has authority over.

One of those cases is in Georgia, which is led by a Republican governor who exposed the ex-president’s nefarious attempts to overthrow the election in Georgia.

The ex-president wants the country to believe that all of these prosecutions are a complicated and nearly impossible-to-carry-out political strategy aimed at keeping him out of the Oval Office, rather than a legal reality that there is more than sufficient evidence to file charges against him and for him to be tried by juries of regular citizens. Just as…