NEW MOSCOW, Dec. 16—Breakthroughs in RNA recombinational therapy, brain tissue culture, symbiotic fat-melting fungal injections, and weather-resistant epidermal exoskin (“gift-wrapping”) have made the technocratic elite virtually immortal. But are they what they used to be?

A new study conducted by the Foundation for the Understanding of the Ruling Technocrats (FURT) suggests that the technocrats, many of whom have opted out of terrestrial life to exist in paradisiac satellites, have been reduced to an invertebrate state.

“They don’t even rule anymore,” says FURT chairwoman Wendy Tripper. “They just float around on drugs getting blown.”

Conspiracy theorists worldwide, who four decades ago were applauded for having always been right, are now faced with the even more terrifying notion that no one is left to control them.