dpb wrote:

I don't know if he really believes all this or simply likes to pretend
there are goblins in the dark under his bed or just likes trolling.

I'm willing to bet that Joe (and about 250 million other US citizens just like
him) grew up believing that PBS televised childrens programming and unbiased
news, 60 Minutes would never rig a car test and that Walter Cronkite was about
as middle America as you could find.

The problem is that very few people understand complicated subjects, and that
schools were long ago converted into social conditioning centers instead of
places were people learned critical thinking skills. Hence they become prime
targets for the fear industry.

You get someone like Meryl Streep whipping up a phoney crisis about apples and
100M people go into cardiac arrest. As as the prime advisor to our current
president is quoted as stating "Never let a crisis go to waste."