This letter, if it is not a prank, must have been in Dobbs' pocket when he died; there is a bullet hole in the middle of his signature.
Along with the letter is a huge report labeled, "PROJECT MELLOW-BOB". Bearing no clue to its authorship, it details a plan to kill Dobbs and place the blame on the original apostles, allowing the Church to be taken over by "Bobbies" who could then be manipulated by other powers.
These "Bobbie" dupes are to be led by a "resurrected" Dobbs imitation called "The Mellow Bob." (See exhibit F.) Whether this is a person or merely a "concept" like Big Brother is hard to determine. The notes say:
"Now that he is risen from the dead, "Bob" has gained new insights that give him a 'softer' position on "The Conspiracy." He does not condone it, but believes in peaceful coexistence. Ultimately, he says, The Conspiracy is just a metaphor for certain faults we all hold, and which we must someday come to accept as natural. Progress toward a healthier economy will bring Slack to all mankind.This can happen once the Normal population has been reduced to a manageable level. Those who bear the mark will be promised protection, of course."
Also mentioned is the Biblical passage of Revelation 13:13, in which a False Prophet calls down "fire" from the sky (UFOs?) , thereafter to "bring life to the Image of the Beast [The Antichrist]... he will suffer a head wound, and live."
The implication is that someone is staging a false Second Coming. According to the conspirators, Dobbs wasn't the Antichrist, and in fact stood in the way of any such would-be world dictators -- but in the right circumstances, someone like him could become an "Antichrist," ushering in a hideous world where Crucifixes are replaced by tiny dead "Bobs" hung from the necks of the enslaved "faithful." The report goes on, about a One World Religion that would jumble Christianity, the Occult, Communism, and the decay of the family into Inquisition-like barbarism.
Interspersed throught the manuscript are fragments of prophecy from archaic religions, and secret reports on CIA-sponsored "ritual sacrifices" in the crumbling temples of Cambodia (blamed on the Pol Pot)... certain ceremonies, "...far more sophisticated than The Philadelphia Experiment," that are to "...open the Dimensional Portals and let the Elder Gods through again."
There are veiled references to something called 'CHURCH AIR.' Dobbs' prediction for the arrival of aliens in 1998 ("X-Day") is mentioned, but there is something planned for this 'Air' just before X-Day. "Human expectations, raised to their highest among a whole population and then cruelly shattered, provides the energy of despair on which the Masters can feed. The Pinks will literally sell their souls for one last gasp of the Church Air."
Certainly, it is difficult to lend any credence to this bizarre mishmash. It may well be just an elaborate forgery by disillusioned SubGeniuses. On the other hand, evidence is overwhelming that there has been a coverup conducted by persons in high places... and no other motive for the assassination has been firmly established.
Why was "Bob" targeted? Why not Baghwan Rajneesh, or Sun Myung Moon, or Kurt Saxon? The Moonies, Scientologists and so forth all give The Establishment trouble too, and are much better organized than the SubGenius Church.
One paranoid theory holds that the Church apostles hadn't believed that "The Conspiracy" they raved about was real until Dobbs was killed... that, even though they meant to be joking, they were inadvertently blowing the cover on a real group of evil entities (the so-called "Elder Gods"). When they found out the truth, they were threatened with death unless they kept their teachings couched in an absurdist, humorous style -- which would help to discredit more serious research into the darker aspects of conspiracy theory and the paranormal.
If there really was a secret organization of freedom-fighters in America, theorists point out, wouldn't it have to start out acting like a joke, just to survive? And if there really were such things as "evil forces" trying to establish themselves on this planet, wouldn't they want to look like a joke too, at first?
Whether one gives any credence to such hypotheses or not, Dobbs' religion definitely wasn't doing what religions were supposed to do. It was something the Government couldn't keep track of. They had infiltrated the Hierarchy to the core, and all they'd found were good old boys having loud parties, more into their irresponsible idea of "Slack" than revolution or theology. "Bob" represented something that any totalitarian regime, secret or otherwise, would want to kill -- the kind of 'illumination' that the average slob on the street could understand. He had come up with the first religion that appealed to SINNERS, because he was one of them. His was a church that made it fun to be a "Good Guy". Dobbs was a "regular joe," even a bungler, as Chosen Prophets go. But he raved eloquently about the "Slack" that was daily being stolen from us all by the vast, secret, all-pervading "Conspiracy" and its "normal" dupes. As bizarre and cartoonlike as SubGenius theology was, people perversely came away from it feeling like they had a grip on things. No matter how difficult life got, they could always depend on the SubGeniuses to be even more twisted than they were. It gave its adherents a sort of perspective... and with that, a will to fight.
With this in mind, it would make sense for a "conspiracy" to either stop the SubGeniuses... or to coopt them.
Only one thing is certain. Whether this "Mr. Smith Goes to Washington" character was the only religious leader capable of saving the unsaveable, or just another huckster out to shuck the gullible, or both, he was sufficiently threatening to someone big that he was killed like a dog -- and the few people who noticed called it "art."
The remaining faithful SubGeniuses are bitter that Dobbs' enemies got away with killing him so easily. As investigator N. Phelge put it in his book, Puzzling Evidence in San Francisco, "So much of the truth remained to be told. "Bob" had barely started. And now the Conspiracy can turn it [the Church] into a collection of hateful nerdy fan-geeks, then into a fad, and then...another piece of the Con's master puzzle."
To many investigators who once thought the Church a joke, it's not so funny anymore.
But maybe the more optimistic SubGeniuses are right: that Dobbs is hiding out somewhere, enjoying a big laugh at the expense of both his enemies and his followers. If his last letter is to be believed, he knew it was all coming. It may even have been part of his plans. Perhaps Dobbs knew that having himself "slain" was the only way to bring the Church back to life. It had been mired down for a long time, spinning its wheels in a muddy limbo between poverty and celebrity; McGraw-Hill (an affiliate of The Trilateral Commission) practically yanked THE BOOK OF THE SUBGENIUS off the shelves just as it was about to turn into a bestseller. As Dobbs himself had frequently said, "Death makes the best P.R. agent."
Besides, on the off chance that "Bob" Dobbs was all that he said he was...
...for all anyone knows, he may already be World Overlord.
For more information on Dobbs and his assassination, send $1 for a large booklet, $8.50 for a 90-min. cassette tape, or $11 for THE BOOK OF THE SUBGENIUS to The SubGenius Foundation, P.O.Box 140306, Dallas, Texas 75214.
Other research by Paul Mavrides, Doug Wellman, Hal Robins, Byron Werner, Dr. Philo Drummond, William Burke, and Kerry Wendell Thornley.