Last year, a man named Brian Chambers announced a world-changing advance: An international research organization called the Health Sciences Institute had found an incredible cure for cancer hidden in the Book of Matthew. For just $74, you, too, could discover the secret.
That was the breathless pitch emailed to hundreds of thousands of Huckabee's followers in January, beneath a "special message" from the Republican presidential candidate trumpeting "important information." Upon closer inspection, the divine remedy—eating fewer carbs—was never recommended by St. Matthew. Chambers is not a doctor, and the studies on starvation diets he cited make no mention of "cures."
The Health Sciences Institute is part of a company called NewMarket Health, which is just one asset of a Baltimore-based publishing empire named Agora Inc. Agora's subsidiaries and affiliates publish more than 40 newsletters and sell more than 300 books on a range of topics, including biblical health tips, natural-healing supplements, and "insider" investment advice—a mix of ideas the company considers the intellectual equivalent of the marketplace of ancient Athens. To find new readers for its ever-expanding catalog of publications, Agora's subsidiaries have tapped into a network of conservative heavyweights, including Huckabee, Ron Paul, and Newt Gingrich, who sell access to their massive email lists to advertise Agora's products.
Gingrich sent out more than a dozen Agora-related emails after he dropped out of the 2012 race, including one from an investment newsletter warning that Obama might seek a third term (sell, sell, sell!). In April, Paul appeared in a 51-minute video for an Agora subsidiary in which he argued that the United States was on the verge of martial law and societal collapse. The libertarian patriarch, whose own Survival Report newsletter once played to its white readers' worst fears, urged viewers to buy a newsletter subscription to find out more. Conservative outlets including National Review and Townhall have also rented their email lists to Agora subsidiaries. While it's not unusual for publications (including Mother Jones) to send sponsored messages to their subscribers, Agora's emails skirt the line between spammy and scammy. An email sent last year to followers of the popular right-wing site RedState on behalf of the Health Sciences Institute claimed that the Obama administration was blocking a miracle cure that "vaporizes cancer in six weeks."
These disingenuous endorsements for dubious products epitomize what historian Rick Perlstein has dubbed "mail-order conservatism," the monetization of right-wing paranoia that started in the 1970s and has flowered ever since a secret Muslim socialist won the White House. Glenn Beck, like many of his talk-radio colleagues, has warned of the collapse of the global financial system while shilling for gold companies. Conservative operatives have created a booming field of "scam PACs," political action committees that ostensibly raise money to help popular candidates but don't produce much more than big checks for direct-mail firms. Confronted by Politico, Erick Erickson, RedState's editor-in-chief, said, "It horrifies me that the list sometimes get[s] rented to some of these guys." And Agora has played the game of stirring up and cashing in on the conservative psyche longer and better than most of its competitors.
