Pale Horse Rider: William Cooper, the Rise of Conspiracy, and the Fall of Trust in America

by Mark Jacobson

A legendary journalist explores the cult of conspiracy perpetrated by Milton William Cooper, and how it has contributed to the malignant threat of American paranoia.

Genres: Nonfiction, Biography, History, Conspiracy Theories, Politics, Sociology, Audiobook

384 pages, Hardcover

First published September 4, 2018

Reviews

[Lilly · Rating 2 out of 5]

There's a lot of good and bad about this book. It's really a mixed bag for me. The good things are that it's well written, well researched, and quotes Bill Cooper a lot throughout the book. The bad parts are that the author does not acknowledge Cooper's work and research or their significance hardly at all and seems to suggest that his personal problems, his experience in Vietman and problems after that are what led him to his research and conclusions and that's simply not true. Or if it's true it's only partially true and there's obviously a lot of objective research involved which many others have also done and come to the same or similar conclusions. But not according to the author.

The author also has an extreme focus on his family problems and failed marriages, at the same time not giving him hardly any credit for his work. He believes it is mostly just "nutty." He does give some acknowledgement and credit but nowhere near enough as he should. He really missed the mark with that and it's a shame. The author at times takes a derogatory tone and that really bothered me also.

This book could just have been so, so much better and truly fantastic minus the derogatory tone and if the author had given more acknowledgment to Cooper's research and conclusions instead of calling them nutty and being dismissive. It was spoken truly like a mainstream journalist fighting for the status quo and dismissing and mocking all matters of truth without doing the proper research of course. I still enjoyed reading it but these parts really bothered me.

[David · Rating 4 out of 5]

I’ve had an oblique fascination with what I’ve heard about Behold a Pale Horse for years but I don’t think I could bring myself to actually submit to its paranoiac right-wing insanity by actually reading it. This book is the perfect ten-foot pole for this dilemma. An objective view of William Cooper, his life and influence on American culture. I found it absolutely fascinating.

[Cwl · Rating 4 out of 5]

This gave me nostalgic feelings of the sort I imagine other people have about church camp or skating rinks. I read William Cooper's Behold a Pale Horse in eighth grade, the perfect time of life to learn about how the government traitorously consorted with aliens and all that. The thing about conspiracy stuff is that it's hyper-rational in a very narrow way: it does not allow for the possibility of accident, everything has a (very threatening) explanation, very similar to hyper-fundamentalist religion. This bio mirrors that approach, painting Cooper's harried life in Vietnam and multiple attempts at a family as causes that drove his evolving thoughts, from "aliens did it" to "no, it was the Illuminati!" and beyond. It's ultimately a tragic tale, of course, but I'm glad that Bill Cooper is still being discussed and remembered long after he got killed by the government. I obviously find some of his conclusions a little suspect now, but it's hard to deny that he was a fascinating figure and I still think we all benefit from Cooper-style skeptics crying loudly in the wilderness. PS Alex Jones is still a fat narc.

[Aaron · Rating 5 out of 5]

A must read for anyone interested in or fascinated by the conspiracy culture of the 90s. Jacobson takes an in-depth look at one of the most divisive, angry, passionate, and fascinating characters on the entire 90s scene. Jacobson’s connections between Cooper’s teachings and the hip-hop culture of the 90s is one of the highlights of the book and one of the aspects of that era that most often gets overlooked by scholars. His extensive interviews with Cooper’s family and friends are also a welcome addition to our overall knowledge about Cooper and his career. I can’t recommend this book highly enough!

[Andrew Chandler · Rating 3 out of 5]

Biography of William Cooper, conspiracy theorist beloved by the far right, rappers, and inmates- basically anybody who feels that they are a pawn of the white elite. I was unfamiliar with Cooper so this book was an eye-opener. Its seems to be an unbiased representation of the man, but not enough questions were asked by the author. Cooper's paranoia, and paranoia and conspiracies in general, are never really investigated. Was Cooper driven by fame and power like people who filled his shoes like Alex Jones, or were his concerns genuine? Worth reading to understand why his message resonated with both gun nuts living in compounds and African Americans who feel that the government was designed to keep them down. But I was left with many questions unanswered.

[Sean Owen · Rating 4 out of 5]

As a college student in the late 90s I had been cornered on more than one occasion by someone who wanted to convince me to read "Behold a Pale Horse" so I could learn the truth. The people pushing these books were typically pretty far out on the nutty/druggy spectrum so it was easy to brush off their suggestions. At one point I did end up trying to read the book, but it was so totally nuts I couldn't make it more than a chapter in. Who was reading this seriously? The world is run by the Illuminati? Aliens are here and working in league with the government? These were plots for episodes of the X-Files, not reality. Today crackpot theories aren't just coming from the craziest guy in the room. We have people doubting Sandy Hook and 9-11 getting a hearing in respectable media and even holding government office. "Pale Horse Rider" does a great job filling in William Cooper's backstory and the conspiracy theory underground that gained the mainstream in the wake of Ruby Ridge, Waco and Oklahoma City.

[c · Rating 3 out of 5]

That was some weird ass shit.

[Brenden Gallagher · Rating 4 out of 5]

As my friend Dave Weigel pointed out in his review of this book, there are a lot of digressions as the book tries to both serve as a biography of conspiracy theorist Bill Cooper and as a recent history of the modern conspiracy landscape. However, the authoritative and entertaining style in which it is written makes the digressions forgivable. It’s almost as if the author is channeling the spirit of a conspiracy jockey as he tells his own story. Entertaining and illuminating look at the rise of the modern conspiracy world and a man who allowed conspiracy to poison himself. Well done.

[Jake · Rating 5 out of 5]

A few weeks after the, shall we say, contentious 2016 primary, a former friend who I still somewhat interacted with on Facebook (and who was and maybe still is a dyed-in-the-wool Way Too Online Libertarian) started blasting me in the comment section of some post I made. He accused me of supporting weird, horrific stuff that made no sense just because I voted for Hillary Clinton.

Not being a patron of the Conservative Reddit Extended Universe, I had no idea what he was referring to. Pizzagate would not yet enter the national lexicon for another month.

At the time, I had no idea who William Cooper was. I had never read Behold a Pale Horse and if I’d heard of it five years ago, it wasn’t at the forefront of my knowledge. Yet after finishing this one, I have no doubt it influenced my former friend and thousands of others.

Donald Trump’s fear mongering brought these clowns from the fringe and gave them a seat at the table. But for a long (blissful) time, conspiracy theorists were laughed at.

I don’t want to say that Mark Jacobson “humanizes” William Cooper. It’s not that kind of book. But he does draw a straight line of how a man who served his country in some trying and changing times (Vietnam, Civil Rights Movement, Watergate) could come out on the other side irreparably damaged. His pain would be channeled into explaining everything…

everything…

as a battle of good versus evil.

Things such as the Kennedy assassination, World War II, 9/11 and others were just new fronts in a war that had begun at the dawn of time. A Manichean struggle of well-connected elites in secret societies and the peons (Cooper coined the ubiquitous term “sheeple”) they tried to control.

On the one hand, you can dismiss 99% of what Cooper is saying. Jacobson talks about the evolution of American conspiracy theories in great detail (sometimes a bit too great, which is one of the few weaknesses of the book) and one would have no problem chucking UFOs, Protocols of the Elders of Zion, etc. out the window.

But Jacobson also makes it clear: Cooper’s paranoia was well founded. He served in naval intelligence where he knew that Nixon was lying about bombing Cambodia and Laos. And he knew the weaknesses of the country, particularly its racism. I’d be the last person to call Bill Cooper racially enlightened but he was loud and adamant of how the government persecuted Black and indigenous folks.

Jacobson also covers, in great and wondrous detail, the impact Behold a Pale Horse had on rap culture. It’s something I never knew about or really considered, despite having heard the lyrics. But there’s an obvious reason as to why his cache would be legit: Cooper is white, he had access to secret info on why our government was lying. As ODB said about Cooper: Someone’s always trying to f—k you. Bill Cooper told me why. That meant something to me.

It’s a well-written, easily digestible book on how we as a country got to this moment (it ends with Trump’s election 15 years after Cooper’s death) through the eyes of a man who helped get us there.

[David Weigel · Rating 4 out of 5]

Tons and tons of digressions, about half of which were super enlightening and half of which felt like road journalism for the sake of it. But it feels dangerous to head into 2022 without reading this. Incredibly insightful on the origins of the specific anti-"deep state" conspiracy theories that became the dominant strain in the 1990s.

[Adam · Rating 5 out of 5]

Fantastic book for anyone into conspiracy theories! It has a great storyline that kept me interested throughout.

[Steven H · Rating 5 out of 5]

AN EXCELLENT ACCOUNT OF THE LIFE AND IDEAS OF WILLIAM COOPER

Journalist Mark Jacobson wrote in the first chapter of this 2018 book, “Reputed instances of Cooper’s prescience are legion… These included the disclosure that ‘the CIA and the military are bringing drugs into the United States to finance their black projects.’ … The current monetary structure, Cooper said, ‘will be replaced by a cashless system that will allow the government to monitor our every action by computer…’ … ‘The sharp increase of prescriptions of psychoactive drugs like Prozac and Ritalin to younger and younger children will inevitably lead to a rash of horrific school shootings.’ These incidents, he said, ‘will be used … as an excuse to infringe upon the citizenry’s Second Amendment rights.’” (Pg. 4-5)

On his radio show, Cooper said, “You must not believe anything you hear on this show… or Larry King Live, Dan Rather, George Bush, Bill Clinton, or anyone else in this entire world… Listen to everyone, read everything, believe NOTHING until you, yourself, can prove it with your own research… Only free-thinking, intelligent people who are prepared to root through all the cr-p and get at the truth should be listening to this show. Everyone else should just turn off their radio. We don’t even want you to listen.” (Pg. 6)

It was soon after the 9/11 attacks that Cooper’s final prediction came true. “‘They’re going to kill me, ladies and gentlemen… They’re going to come up here in the middle of the night, and shoot me dead, right on my doorstep.’ And, around midnight on November 5, 2001, less than two months after the 9/11 attacks, that’s exactly what happened.” (Pg. 10)

Of Cooper’s theory of the JFK assassination, he recounts, “The driver did it… The limo driver, William Greer, a … Secret Service agent … killed the president. As the motorcade turned, Greer stopped the limo, turned from the steering wheel, and shot the president square in the forehead… Yet somehow no one noticed this… There could be no doubt that Greer slowed down the vehicle prior to the shooting. The brake lights came on. Sunlight glints off what appears to be a gun in Greer’s hand… killjoys suggested that ‘the gun’ was actually the sun’s reflection off the Brylcreemed hair of Roy Kellerman, the Secret Service man riding in the passenger seat. But [this] was not what a nation starved for the Truth needed to see…” (Pg. 15-16)

He recounts, “As a boy, Cooper grew up reading UFO magazines. Among his favorites were back issues of ‘Fate,’ edited by Ramond Palmer… Palmer is without doubt one of the great unsung architects of the American pulp mentality that came to dominate the overheated thought processes of people like Bill Cooper.” (Pg. 68)

He reports, “When the story of the MJ-12 papers appeared… Cooper later told his audience… he already knew all about MJ-12. He knew about the EBEs, how the National Security Agency had been formed… primarily, he said, ‘to decipher the alien communication and language, and to establish a dialogue with the extraterrestrials.’ Cooper said he knew all this because he’d already read these documents and many, many more while in Naval Intelligence. For sixteen years, Cooper had not revealed what he’d seen while poking through Admiral Clarey’s cabinet… Knowing what he wasn’t supposed to know turned his life into a living hell, made him drink, sent him into rages…. It was the reason his marriages failed. For so long he’d kept quiet. But now, armed with what he knew, Cooper ‘decided to enter the arena.’” (Pg. 73-74)

Cooper said that while on board a Navy submarine, he saw a UFO: “It was a metal craft… It had the shape and form of a saucer with a bowl inverted in the saucer and it was huge…” After he told his commanding officer of this, “the commander begins to ‘visibly shake and he screamed obscenities,’ threatening to put Cooper in the brig for the rest of his life… ‘Let’s start all over again,’ the commander says. ‘What did you see out there?’ ‘Nothing, sir,’ Cooper answers… ‘You’re a good man, Cooper,’ the commander says… ‘The Navy needs men like you.’” (Pg. 75-76)


Jacobson explains the ideas of John Lear: “The Lear Hypothesis … was that ‘the United States Government has been in business with little gray extraterrestrials for about 20 years.’ … When the Hypothesis came out, everyone said I was crazy,’ Lear told me… ‘They said I’d become addicted to LSD. That was one of the main drawbacks of the UFO field and kind of why I’ve withdrawn from it over the years. Too many literalists. I told everyone, ‘I never said it was true. I said it was a hypothesis. A hypothesis is something that MIGHT be true.’ … The US government’s obsessive need to possess such fearsome, magical technology became the cornerstone of John Lear’s Roswell narrative… the REAL story of the nation’s most famous UFO incident came down to a deal, a negotiation between species.” (Pg. 77-79)

He records, “Lear and Cooper spent a lot of time together from 1988 through 1990. ‘I liked him from the beginning,’ Lear recalled. ‘He was smart, had… an amazing memory. He could also drink me under the table, which wasn’t so easy to do back then. When I saw him put away a fifth of scotch before lunchtime, I knew he was my kind of guy. We’d stay up nights, get into these deep conversations…’ … Cooper took Lear’s ‘human souls for alien tech’ narrative as the linchpin of his own reworking of the story. The Cooper version was full of new, bristling detail, ostensibly gleaned from the top secret papers in Admiral Cleary’s files… Cooper’s rewrite of Lear’s Hypothesis added new items like a ‘particle beam weapon’ and ‘machinery for cloning and synthetic genetic duplication of humans.’” (Pg. 81-83)

He notes, “There have been numerous Cooper sightings in ‘The X-File’ projects over the years… Cooper was well aware of these references… he’d watched a VHS tape of ‘The X-Files: Fight the Future.’ ‘It was more than obvious to everyone present,’ Cooper wrote, ‘that a great deal of it came right out of my book, “Behold a Pale Horse.”’ (Pg. 98-99)

But later, “what finally convinced Cooper that UFOs were ‘possibly the single greatest hoax in history’ was his discovery of a 1917 speech given by … John Dewey… What struck Cooper was the opening line of Dewey’s speech. ‘Someone remarked that the best way to unite all the nations on this globe would be an attack from some other planet.’ … ‘When I read that,’ Cooper said, ‘…It hit me like a sledgehammer right between the eyes.’ Now he knew. The ‘UFO distraction’ was part of the longest-running conspiracy on Earth… The presence of UFOs on earth was one more fear tactic, a trick to get a frightened public in line behind a one-world totalitarian government… Cooper reluctantly admitted…that he had fallen for it. Now he further understood why he’d gained access to so many top secret documents while in Naval Intelligence… They’d been left especially for him, him alone… he’d misled the very people to whom he wanted to bring the truth.” (Pg. 103-105)

Jacobson says of novelist Robert Anton Wilson, “It tickled Wilson that many of the details and concepts trotted out in his ‘Illuminatus!’ books… eventually found their way into widely believed conspiracies that emerged during the 1980s and ‘90s, Bill Cooper’s work included.” (Pg. 162)

The rapper Prodigy (born Albert Johnson) admitted the influence of Cooper’s ‘Behold a Pale Horse’ on him. “‘I read it SIX times. I needed to get that sh-t right and exact before I went out there.’ … It was Prodigy who helped bring Cooper’s obsessions to a larger audience… Secret societies, Prodigy rapped, were ‘trying to keep they eye on me.’ … As many teenage hip-hop fans of the moment will attest, this was the first time they’d heard of the term ‘Illuminati’ or knew that there was such a thing as a ’secret society’ that Prodigy said kept an ‘eye on’ you… It wasn’t long before everyone was talking about the Illuminati, what it was, how it ran the world, and which rappers had been co-opted to disperse its malign symbology… A lot of that began with Cooper, Prodigy said… ‘Behold a Pale Horse was the first place I heard of the Illuminati.’ … when Prodigy was sentenced [to prison] on gun charges, he was surprised to find ‘lots of guys inside there were still reading ‘Pale Horse.’” (Pg. 187-188)

Cooper told an audience about a Christian Identity group, “[That was] the biggest bunch of hogwash I ever heard in my entire life. These people are racist, completely mental… Cooper was not racist, nor was he anti-Semitic, he told the audience… he was married ‘to a Chinese woman from Taiwan.’ His children had Native American, English, Scotch, Irish, and Chinese blood in them. These were genetics he was going to be ‘very happy to send into the future.’” (Pg. 232-233)

Jacobson recounts, “Cooper had learned of the Constitution Party a few months before when he met Aaron Russo… Cooper suggested they work together… Soon, Cooper became the shortwave voice of the Constitution Party… [But] two party platforms were already ‘creating dissension,’ Cooper said. The first was plank number five, which read: ‘Regarding abortion, the government has no right making laws dictating to a woman what to do with her body.’ … The second problematic plank pertained to ‘the right to be homosexual.’” (Pg. 238-240)

He records, “Meanwhile, Cooper had to keep making a living. Dumping money into his many projects, keeping the Constitution Party going, he’d taken advances against royalties on ‘Behold a Pale Horse.’ The book was blowing up, the Nation of Islam ordering bulk copies, but he had to get by on his weekly stipend, worked out years before with [the publisher]. Cooper was allowed to sell the book … but he had to purchase the copies … at the author’s rate. By the time the shipping and handling was done, his take was pennies.” (Pg. 241)

He states, “Whatever the truth of the OKC bombing, it resulted in a huge boost for Cooper’s standing in the patriot radio wars. Being Tim[othy] McVeigh’s favorite talk-show host had its upside… President Bill Clinton [said]: ‘Willliam Cooper is the Most Dangerous Radio host in America!’… It was a heck of a blurb, the best kind of compliment. ‘I must be doing something right,’ Cooper said.” (Pg. 261-262)

But “It was around this time that Cooper’s tax problem flared up. The IRS claimed Cooper and [wife] Annie were in arrears. This was a lie, Cooper said. He and Annie had always paid ‘all legal and required tax.’ This did not mean, Cooper said, that he was ‘a taxpayer.’ … That only happened when you signed your name on the 1040 form on the line where it said ‘taxpayer.’ That’s what cemented your contact with the bill collectors who had seized control of the government. It was a trick… he had no intention of falling for, ever again.” (Pg. 272) He adds, “It is not clear when Cooper, in his words, ‘had the guts to stop’ filing his income tax returns.” (Pg. 275)

Then, “As 1997 turned into 1998, Cooper suffered repeated financial setbacks. He complained that he was making ‘nothing’ from the ongoing sales of ‘Behold a Pale Horse.’ His dream of establishing his own satellite network was in tatters. ‘The Hour of the Time’ could still be heard over some shortwave stations… but their reach was nothing like WWCR. Outages were common, signals intermittent.” (Pg. 275) He continues, “In his early ‘Public Notices,’ Cooper had expressed hard-line defiance concerning what might happen if the FBI were to move against his family… It was one family against the world up on the hill.” (Pg. 287-288)

Of the 9/11 attacks, “Something blew up at the major structural core of the buildings down at the bottom,’ Cooper declared. ‘…I can assure you of that.’ It was NOT POSSIBLE that the impact or a 400,000 pound jumbo jet … could have caused such a catastrophic result… Supposed to be arrested that very day, Cooper made the most of his reprieve. He laid out the rudiments of what came to be called 9/11 Truth, the first great conspiracy meme of the broadband age… The fact that the first version of the documentary ‘Loose Change’ … didn’t appear until 2005---making some of the same claims Cooper did as events transpired---shows how far ahead of the curve he was, a conspiracy salesman without peer.” (Pg. 320-322)

Ultimately, Cooper was killed in a gun battle: “Deputy Goldsmith said all he wanted to do ‘was stop Cooper from shooting.’ That was what he was taught to do: When someone shoots at you, keep shooting back until the enemy falls to the ground, which is what happened when Bill Cooper fell through space and landed, as predicted, on his doorstep.” (Pg. 332)

Journalist Glenn Jacobs was interviewed on Alex Jones’ show about Cooper’s death: “I told him that in my opinion the Apache County Sheriff’s Office didn’t have much choice. Everyone knew Bill was serious about going out in a blaze of glory. If he had got back into the house, he would have had a perfect field of fire. He could have killed a lot of people. But that’s not what Mr. Jones wanted to hear. He wanted to hear that the feds had snuck up in the night and ambushed Bill, that the pressure of resisting the New World Order had gotten to him…” (Pg. 338-339)

Jacobson concludes, “If there is a reason Cooper stays relevant, why ‘Behold a Pale Horse’ keeps selling after all these years… it is this quest, this single-minded resistance to accept an imperfect world. The America Cooper wanted was one in which Lucifer could finally be tracked down by honest G-men, arrested, and brought to court, where he would… face his accusers.” (Pg. 350)

This book will be “must reading” for anyone interested in Cooper, or similar ‘conspiracy’ theorists.

[Joe Nicholl · Rating 4 out of 5]

Pale Horse Rider (2018) by Mark Jacobson is a well written book & biography of the "Father" of the Truther movement Bill Cooper. Author Jacobson was able to mix in many of the social ills during the time of Coopers life to make for an interesting read. The book shows how Coopers life was flawed but when it came to his research and analysis he was on target. Highly recommended if you have an interest in the Truther movement...-BUT...I really think this is a 5 Star book...but...Jacobson kind of blew it in the very last paragraph stating "People call Cooper "the father of the Truth Movement," which now includes nutbag stories like Pizzagate..." -????!!!!! Mr. Jacobson, Where did this come from and why would you write such a viewpoint after completing this entire book??? I've researched Pizzagate, there's a lot behind it...it only slid away from the public eye due to the bogus Russiagate...but the main point to you is why are you scoffing at the harm to children? I thought this was a great book until the very end and the inclusion of that sentence...Sorry dude but you went from an excellent writer to an idiot in a heartbeat...

[Donna · Rating 4 out of 5]

The amazing part of this book is how much Cooper got right. I believe he even got the extraterrestrial issue right, eventually concluding that the info had been purposefully fed to him in order to deceive him. And I believe that will be a future deception attempted on all humanity too. In order to try to unite us in fear & thus make us accept a one world authority. Just as we have seen the fear mongering surrounding the (false) Covid pandemic. In order to convince us to "protect" ourselves with dangerous immuno-suppressant drugs and so-called vaccinations. And to ignore safe, cheap, and effective cures and preventions. The fact is that powerful entities have announced their plans for eugenics for decades. The current plan was described by the Rockefeller Institute in 2010-11, part of a larger paper, this chapter called Operation Lockstep.

The early focus on Cooper's difficulty functioning in personal and business relationships was, I believe, an attempt by the author to discredit all facets of Coopers life & work. I have little doubt it is true that he was very difficult to deal with. But that does not make him wrong. In fact most people who come to non-popular conclusions about our world face difficulties that often sour them on mankind. If one is a certain personality type, the family suffers because of it. Some never make those around them suffer. But many do succumb to it.

I would suggest you familiarize yourself with most of Coopers ideas before reading this. His ideas are usually presented in an offhand manner in the book. A dismissive, "isnt he crazy" manner. You can better judge for yourself if you have a better idea of what he actually said.

One big surprise to me was how important the book "Behold a Pale Horse" was to the black community. It does explain why so many blacks can easily question many things the mainstream tries to debunk.

[Regan · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book was my introduction to William Cooper, I had no previous exposure to his published books or radio program. Jacobson's narrative is interesting and flows easily through the events of Cooper's life: Vietnam, first wife Sally and child, UFOs, conspiracy theories, Second wife Annie and children, radio program, and fugitive from the Feds.
William Cooper makes an interesting subject for a book. My impressions of his early life was as a talented B.S. artist and huckster, an entertaining character an actor might enjoy depicting in a movie. I sought out Cooper on YouTube, trafficking in the UFO mythology, speaking for hours at conferences on how Eisenhower sold us out to the aliens for flying saucer technology. The man had a tremendous reserve of energy; watch him speak for eleven hours in the Porterville Presentation on the Illuminati.
Unfortunately, it was not his publishing of the secrets of the Illuminati in his book Behold a Pale Horse, nor his broadcasts about "the truth" for the Hour of the Time radio show that brought him down. It was his refusal to pay income tax.
My first impression of him as a flim-flam man became that of a paranoid with a drinking problem and a self-destructive inclination. Ultimately, this ends with his death by shooting of the local sheriff department in an extremely ill conceived attempt to capture him. By this time, Cooper had alienated his entire family with his rants. Is this a story of a con artist who drank his own Kool-Aid, or someone who maintained the act all the way to the end and just wasn't gonna pay Uncle Sam a dime? I'm not sure, but Mark Jacobson's book is very entertaining and will give you a good introduction to someone whose writing influenced both right wing militia groups and hip-hop / rap musicians.

[Byron · Rating 5 out of 5]

Bill Cooper is one of the most influential authors of our time, but he doesn't receive the credit he deserves because he's been dead since shortly after 9/11, having died in a shootout with the police in his front yard, as one does. He was the guy who wrote Behold a Pale Horse, i.e. the only book most rappers have read, and basically invented Alex Jones' entire shtick.

There's quite a bit about Cooper in this, given that he's a fairly obscure figure who died upwards of 20 years ago. I guess a lot of it was taken from early Internets message boards that some nutjob preserved for posterity. I could use more on Cooper's influence on current events and less on the author's bromance with Cooper's weed carrier, but what are you gonna do? This is still very impressive.

[Rodney · Rating 4 out of 5]

Fascinating (and depressing) biography of the conspiracy theorist and grifter who has influenced everyone and everything from The X-Files to Timothy McVeigh to the Nation of Islam to the Wu-Tang Clan.

[John Spiller · Rating 4 out of 5]

Before I picked up this book, I had never heard of Bill Cooper. Having now read Mark Jacobson's "Pale Horse Rider," I'm still grappling with my impressions of him as a person. For every preposterous idea he championed (JFK was assassinated by the driver of his Lincoln using a shellfish-toxin gun!), he exhibited some fairly keen insights into the way our government works, recognizing almost instantly that the events of 9/11 would be used to justify a retaliatory war.

Probably the most remarkable aspect of "Pale Horse Rider" is that Jacobson gives a fairly even-handed, almost sympathetic portrayal of a polarizing individual who was either venerated or ridiculed. It takes some doing to coherently explain Cooper's various conspiracy theories and how he fit in with other conspiracy mongers. Cooper's paranoid mindset had cross-cultural appeal, finding disciples among African-Americans and white supremacists. (Cooper's fandom stretched the gamut from Ol' Dirty Bastard of Wu-Tang Clan to Timothy McVeigh.)

I kept expecting Jacobson to drop asides when discussing some of Cooper's more harebrained conceptions -- income tax is voluntary because the income tax statute provides for "voluntary withholding"-- but I think he trusts the reader enough to reach their own conclusions without his guidance. Ultimately, Jacobson portrays a thoroughly contradictory individual, a family man who chased away his family, a God-fearing man who never worshiped in the conventional sense,, and a conspiracy theorist who was just as hard on other theorists as he was on the government.

[Mathew · Rating 5 out of 5]

Really enjoyable read (or, in my case, an enjoyable listen). I've always had a passing interest in Bill Cooper. I've owned "Behold a Pale Horse" for ~20 years now and was happy to pay for it with a debit card at Barnes & Noble. I still remember walking out of the bookstore and chuckling to myself that I had probably been put on a watch list because of my purchase. The reality though is that the book is less a prophetic tome and more of a curiosity; not quite entirely fiction but also not absolute fact.

If you don't know anything about William Cooper or his radio program "The Hour of the Time" then this is a really interesting story about a really odd and interesting man.

If you're like me and you know a moderate amount about the man and what he represents in conspiracy theory circles, then there is plenty here that you probably have never heard before.

If you happen to know absolutely everything about the man and all the stories surrounding his life and death, then I think this book is a great tribute and realistic dipiction of Cooper's legacy. It's just an honest look at both man on and off air while still being respectful. I didn't know anything about his family or his children. The chapter about his older daughter in particular was pretty interesting, reminded me a bit of my father and my sister's relationship even.

Personally, I highly recommend this biography for anyone who has a tangential interest in conspiracy theories, or anyone who simply just likes reading about interesting and eccentric people.

[Grump · Rating 4 out of 5]

Utterly fascinating for me. This was the main guy to kickoff the 'everything the mainstream media tells you is a lie' movement. Seems like he was a nutbag but like the author says "even a broken clock is right two times a day." Dude called out enough stuff accurately that some of his more out there proclamations gained a sheen of "maybe". Bill Cooper is the forefather of Alex Jones and offered a viewpoint that is often effectively utilized by the current POTUS. In the end it seemed to me that he was a troubled dude with some legit concerns but his conspiracy theories ultimately became a crutch for him to deal with (as Jacobson puts it) an 'imperfect world'. Lack of transparency by the powers that be and the accepted voices of the media during the Vietnam War, Kennedy Assassination and (I guess) Roswell sowed the seeds for the general distrust in the government, media and basically anybody with power. In a vacuum of facts, conjecture and paranoia can thrive, especially when delivered by a savvy presenter. Which evidently Bill Cooper was.

This books was so far up my alley I couldn't sit down for a day and a half due to soreness. Only reason for the 4/5 was the unnecessary name-dropping of the Wu-Tang Clan and ODB. Yeah those dudes read Cooper's book but it felt superfluous and added nothing to understanding the man or his ideas.

"Read everything. Listen to everybody. Believe nothing till you can prove it with your own research."

Out,

Mitz

[Jackie · Rating 4 out of 5]

When I volunteer with my local books to prisons program, we get requests for Behold a Pale Horse and other conspiracy books pretty frequently. Shortly before the January 6 riot, we decided to reevaluate what we are willing to send in. We don't want to be censors but also can't spend time and money on sending books that will tear apart the fabric of our community. So I am doing some reading to better understand what conspiracy books might be okay and saw there was this biography of William Cooper, the author of Behold a Pale Horse.

I don't think I have a better idea of what is okay to send, but I am pretty discouraged about the state of the world after reading this book. The anti-vax, deep state, QAnon threads in our society run deep, directly traceable into the 1980s and built off of earlier conspiracies. Cooper was killed by cops coming to his house to arrest him for assault twenty years ago but some of the catchphrases he used on his radio show (do your own research, sheeple) are still parroted today by right-wingers. Sure, he had some insights and was also funny (he called Alex Jones "Jabba the fuck") but he was also a liar and self-aggrandizing. As a biography, it's a very good book to understand where we are today.

[Dylan Taylor-Lehman · Rating 4 out of 5]

Thoroughly fascinating account of the life and times of a troubled, despicable, and influential man. I'm totally disgusted by the psychology behind belief in conspiracy theories and the ways in which they infiltrated mainstream political discourse (though this isn't to say there isn't some level of collusion going on between the political, economic, and ecumenical powers-that-be) but this is an incredibly interesting read nonetheless. I got "Behold a Pale Horse" when I was in high school and thought I was really cool for possessing this secret knowledge, but then I tried to read it and didn't get very far and was essentially uninspired to look forward due to its general lack of coherence. I knew little about the guy behind it and now definitely appreciate the mythos surrounding the book (though I can't forgive or overlook Cooper being abusive and violent toward his partners and family). My only gripe, and it's a totally minor one, is the author's constant namedropping of the Wu-Tang Clan; I get the point of showing the book's reach but these parts read like an irritating Rolling Stone journalist trying to prove how cool he is.

[JP Meldrum · Rating 3 out of 5]

I have always been interested in the cult of personality, and have fallen victim (and arguably the good version of a victim sometimes) to it. Bill Cooper is a beautiful middle ground, anti-racist conspiracy theorist that predates the world of Q-Anon and Alex Jones. He is a fascinating individual, a true individual, that perhaps influenced a bizarre and negative new-thought, but himself was truly good intentioned.

He has a great story and it’s written impartially with wonderful research. The stuff about Z-List 80’s alt conspiracy paranormal names that bored me to death, but the author does a great job tiring it back together. If you are interested in forgotten weirdo and a little foundation into why the world is so distrusting of the “narrative” without being preached any real politics, proto-millennial-libertarianish, anti-authoritarian, left not right, it is a great listen, but admitted niche and occasionally a slog.

[Lauren · Rating 4 out of 5]

I wanted to read this because I caught my mom reading Behold a Pale Horse and, horrified, I decided to learn more about its author. After reading this, I can’t say I’m any less concerned. This book was interesting and well-written, but...

While I wouldn’t call it fawning by any stretch of the imagination, it gives Cooper far too much credit in my opinion. I felt that the book downplayed his kookiness too much in the name of forced neutrality, or something. Almost everything the guy wrote was complete gobbledygook. Just because an (admittedly influential) broken clock is right twice a day doesn’t mean he deserves much, if any, credit. How anyone can take Cooper seriously is beyond me. This book, interesting as it was, didn’t really help me understand why he had, and still has, so many devoted followers.

[Burt · Rating 4 out of 5]

Pale Horse Rider is an interesting - if unfocused - look at the life and influence of William Cooper. Cooper was a Vietnam veteran who became a noted radio broadcaster in the 1990s. He he had an uncanny ability to predict what would happen in the United States. Cooper was also a UFO nut and a conspiracy theorist. Predictably, Cooper ended up at odds with the U.S. government.

The book works well as a summary of Cooper’s views and as an exploration of his influence. Author Mark Jacobson deeply delves into Cooper’s surprising influence in the black community - particularly in the hip-hop subculture. But the book works less well as a biography. Large chunks of Cooper’s life are barely explained and the reader wants to know more about what made the man tick.

So, I enjoyed reading this book. But I thought that there was much room for improvement.

[Goran · Rating 5 out of 5]

As a former conspiracy theorist, this is one of the best books I’ve read because it resonates so closely with my own experiences.

I used to be an avid listener of Cooper Radio shows on YouTube, but I eventually distanced myself from conspiracy theories after conducting my own research—ironically, a step that Cooper himself recommended.

However, I discovered that Cooper was not the trustworthy figure I once believed him to be. In fact, he turned out to be a deceitful individual.

The book sheds light on William Cooper’s life, revealing aspects that conspiracy theorists often overlook. It portrays him as a paranoid man with an alcohol addiction who struggled to trust anyone but himself—a trait that ultimately contributed to his demise.

Despite my initial positive view of Cooper, this book provided a more nuanced perspective. I highly recommend it.

[Frank Giraffe · Rating 3 out of 5]

Fascinating biography of the original conspiracy radio character. Cooper coined the phrase "wake up, sheeple", and his BEHOLD A PALE HORSE is reportedly one of the most popular books in prisons.

Cooper's poisonous reach spanned from right-wing militias to popular rap music. I knew ill-informed paranoia is not a new phenomena in the US, but the book helped me understand just how deep and wide it goes. The book also got into some interesting old pulp sci-fi history (Shaver Mysteries, etc).

Ultimately it paints a picture of a sad, paranoid alcoholic. It's hard to trace what drove Cooper when so many of the facts of his life (especially his military service) are scant on details or proof.

Worth a read if any of that interests you.

[Mike Brisson · Rating 4 out of 5]

A book about a man I think I would detest, this is a wonderful look at someone that has indirectly influenced all the world of conspiracy that we live in today. I personally find these conspiracies to be dangerous and have no tolerance for them, and yet I find the people behind it all compelling.

Pale Horse Rider is the story of that man behind the movement, and it opens a window into the world of a certain kind of person from an era that is both distant, before the internet as we know it today, and close, as Cooper was shot by police 2 months after 9/11, perhaps the greatest feeding ground for conspiracies in the new millennium. I don't really know what kind of person would like this book, but I know it was for me.

[Alan Donaghey · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a tremendous read, very informative on the life and death of certain breed of American that exists more today than ever, which is the late onset schizophrenic. Any paranoid, conspiratorial thinking you encounter in other people can most likely be traced back to this guy and his book, "Behold A Pale Horse", whether it's analyzing the back of the dollar bill for signs of the illuminati, alien abductions, one-world government, and other forms of brain worms. All of it has capillaries that lead back to William Cooper. A lot of people who think Rush Limbaugh destroyed people's brains ought to check out this biography.

[Croisley · Rating 2 out of 5]

Sort of interesting but like most explorations of conspiracy theory written by those outside that sphere, and especially those written by liberals, it fails to ask the questions that seem obvious to me. If Cooper thinks the founding fathers were Masonic agents with sinister motivations then why does he also revere the Bill of Rights they composed as the greatest legal document since the Ten Commandments? Cooper had a Naval intelligence background but Jacobson never questions Cooper's motives. Parapolitics without dialectical materialism means we're accepting a certain amount of vibes-based analysis.