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This article originially appeared in The Declaration on 1 February 2002.

As we all know, the Nineties were a time when conspiracy theorists flourished. They ran trashy websites that got unjustifiable hit counts. They showed up on those Sunday morning news programs that no one outside of Washington watches. They created a show about FBI agents that was uncool, then cool, then uncool, and now cool again. They were married to the leaders of our nation, and then ended up in the Senate. The conspiracies that they concocted ranged from hidden mind probes that turned the Buffalo Bills into spastics each Super Bowl to Hillary Clinton’s "Vast Right Wing Conspiracy" — from Roswell to Whitewater, from crack in the ghetto to the pronunciation of ghetto as "get-TOE." Even the most intrepid nut had trouble keeping track of which theories were hot and which were colder than the Army’s secret genetics research base in Antarctica. Thus, to help these poor, lost souls, I present the Top Five Conspiracies of 2000:

5. "The Vast Left-Wing Conspiracy" — Theorized by the "Political Right"

The late 1990s were rough years for the political Right. They knew that something was going on in the White House, but there was no way to prove it. That whole impeachment thing sort of backfired, the Vince Foster thing was getting passé, and no one believed Buddy the dog was actually an alien like that pug in Men In Black (an accusation that, to be fair, Marion Barry made up in a crack-fueled rage). Thus, in 2000, they flocked to the idea that the Clintons were responsible for the death of JFK, Jr.

Far from being the New York Democratic Committee’s favorite choice to succeed Patrick "Big Irish" Moynihan, Hillary Clinton took a backseat to John F. Kennedy, Jr. You see, John-John wanted to run and reestablish the political power of his family. The Clintons didn’t like that, so they decided to dispose of him. It wasn’t easy, but the Commander-in-Cheat ended up utilizing the same plan that he used on Payne Stewart: take a few parts out of a plane, switch the oxygen tanks with nitrous oxide, and get the hell out of there.

4. "Survivor" — Theorized by APeWWBI (the Association of People Who Watch Bravo Incessantly)

Contrary to popular belief, the contestants on last summer’s most popular television show were not the greedy, demoralized, pathetic humans you made them out to be. Rather, CBS and Mark Burnett walked the highways of America, hijacking cars and taking the potential stars of that show hostage, along with their families. After painstaking demographic analysis and multiple focus groups, CBS finally decided on the sixteen contestants we would soon meet, quickly "eliminating" the remaining potential players and their loved ones. The chosen sixteen then faced the most difficult choice of their lives: Go on national television and become despicable, bottom-feeding cockroaches, or watch their significant others turn into blabbering idiots who loved "Big Brother."

3. "The Honor Committee" — Theorized by The Honor Committee

Although the Honor Committee at the University of Virginia is purported to be fair, troubling statistics were reported that the group seemed more likely to recommend expulsion when the defendents were minorities or athletes. There were also rumors going around that Honor judges occasionally took revenge on some members of the student body and kicked them out of the university in spite. However, the truth is far more insidious. A group of students, faculty and alumni, known only as "The Shadow Committee," carried out these acts, booting students that encroached upon or abused their power. The original report on the Honor Committee uncovered these actions, and it had to be delayed — ostensibly for "legal reasons" — while "The Shadow Committee" edited out revealing passages. Meanwhile, thanks to the heroic efforts of the J.A.D.E. task force, the original authors were quickly eliminated.

2. "Y2K" — Theorized by The Readers of Slashdot.org

Back in the golden age of Sunday comics, the early