Sure, that’s what “They” want you to believe.

oh dear….

here they come

DUCK AND COVER!

INCOMING!!!!

You people are brave!

False Flag!

I saw them live back in the early 80’s…

Well, you know, it’s just that it makes perfect sense for an administration that has fucked up 99.999% of everything they’ve tried to be able to keep a conspiracy as big as crashing three planes into buildings a perfect, unassailable secret for six years.

Here’s a summary I like quite a bit about how the conspiracy theories tend to fail.

The conspiracy theorists are onto something, but they draw the incorrect conclusions –

They know the government lied to us. On that point, they are correct. But they are incorrect on how deep the lies go. Just because some people benefitted from 9/11 (Bush, Cheney, Wolfowitz) does not mean they were involved in staging the attack. They were clever in using the attack to futher their agenda (Wofie and Cheney in particular). And they, in turn, have lied in order to justify their policies (“They hate us for our freedom”).

Read The Shock Doctrine by Naomi Klein. It is one more nail in the 9/11 conspiracy coffin. But it also explains how the most successful capitalists turn crises into opportunities. Her thesis is that our modern global economy relies on shock and catastrophie to maintain order and enrich the elite. It is far better than any conspiracy theory.

http://www.amazon.com/Shock-Doctrine-Rise-Disaster-Capitalism/dp/0805079831/

I like to imagine a new reality show ‘Conspiracy Island’ where you gather all types of nut jobs and get to enjoy the tortured interpersonal skills as they ultimately distrust everyone and try to out nim-wit each other ala Survivor.

Of course my money would always be on the JFK nj but, the Apollo Moon Landing nj would have mad reasoning skills that can’t be ignored and the Paul is Dead guy would sport a nice haircut. The 9-11 nj would, of course, be a blabbering idiot.

W. W. up there mentions the three planes. If it was a conspiracy, why didn’t United 93 (or the hologram of it, or whatever) hit the Whie House or Capitol? That would’ve really ticked people off.

Oh, no, wait, it was for the “heroic Americans” story, “Let’s Roll” & all that. And the fact that Solicitor General Ted Olson’s wife Barbara was on the plane that hit the Pentagon was cover, she’s been hiding in Cheney’s undisclosed location all this time preparing the final takeover (October Surprise II) just before the election.

Never mind.

Listen, I’m not a believer in the September 11 conspiracy theories, but I’m here to assail the logic of those who assail the conspiracy theories.

Something that I’ve heard roughly one gajillion times in various guises is this:

Well, you know, it’s just that it makes perfect sense for an administration that has fucked up 99.999% of everything they’ve tried to be able to keep a conspiracy as big as crashing three planes into buildings a perfect, unassailable secret for six years.

The reason that this whol line of reasoning falls apart is that people have been amassing “evidence” of the supposed 9/11 conspiracy since practically day one.. There is, in fact, a whole friggin’ industry of compiling 9/11 evidence.

When people attack the conspiracy theories, they need to do it from a different direction.

Two lil’ questions for the conspiracy theorists:

1) If the towers were brought down by controlled demolitions, how did the conspiracy install the explosives without anyone noticing?

and

2) If the Pentagon was hit by a missle and not by a plane, what did happen to the plane and all those passengers?

There are some interesting questions (What’s the deal with the puts on the airlines and what was on the FAA interview tape the FAA supervisor destroyed – probably evidence of monumental ineptitude), but the consipiracy theorists are only getting in the way, putting up endless bizzaro-world interpretations that prevent the actual investigations of just how far the Republicans had their head up their asses that day.

The nutjobs are actually helping the Republicans. Bad nutjob, bad, bad!

Doc Washboard, it comes down to what you mean by the word, ‘evidence’.

Specifically with regards to the big conspiracy angle, we aren’t talking about the speed of top floors falling, whether a jet plane burns hot enough to melt steel girders, or anything like that.

Simply, the number of people involved in a conspiracy like this would be large. Where are they? How come not one of them, or their brother in law, or bitter ex-wife, has come forward?

I don’t believe 9/11 conspiracy theories because the evidence doesn’t support the conclusion.

That said, I find it completely plausible that Dick Cheney and his minions would stage such a thing, if they had the imagination and the means.

You just can’t keep something like that bottled up. As much as I imagine there is intelligent life somewhere out there (though based on this planet, maybe not, or it always destroys itself before it can successfully leave its planet) I can’t believe that in the 60 yrs. since Roswell, if the gov’t. actually has recovered anything, or is in contact w/ aliens (other than Cheney, of course) someone wouldn’t have come forward w/ solid physical evidence of alien bodies, technology, or whatever. Just out of ego, or belief that people should know, if nothing else.

Maybe it’s a factor of having just read Ken MacLeod’s new book The Execution Channel (which I highly recommend, BTW), but I can’t help but wonder if maybe, just maybe, a good portion of these 9/11 truther clowns are actually working for the CIA or some such – dirtying the waters, as it were, so those of us who question such things as the malign neglect with which Bush treated the Aug. 6th PDB look like nothing more than “Loose Change”-ers who think the planes that hit the towers were remotely controlled by Mossad agents.

(And another question – if there were controlled demolitions, why have the planes crash anyway? Couldn’t it have been portrayed as a van bombing like happened in ’93? Why complicate things?)

I find it completely plausible that Dick Cheney and his minions would stage such a thing, if they had the imagination and the means.

Well, when the Republicans try it, I’m expecting it to be really obvious.

“My fellow Americans, I’ve scheduled this prime time address to talk to you about this horrible attack on American soil.”

“Sir? What attack?”

“Oh, wait, that’s not set ’til tomorrow, is it? Heh, never mind, gonna go clear some brush, see y’all tomorrow night!”

And the fact that Solicitor General Ted Olson’s wife Barbara was on the plane that hit the Pentagon was cover, she’s been hiding in Cheney’s undisclosed location all this time preparing the final takeover (October Surprise II) just before the election.

Really. If this was planned in advance, why weren’t there more Republican wives on these planes?

If it was a conspiracy, W clearly was not in on it, ’cause he was wet-yer-pants flabbergasted when they told him as he sat in that tiny chair in that kindergarten.

I worked in an engineering firm at the time, and I watched the news with a bunch of engineers, who were instantly and unanimously convinced that the buildings were coming down. Each time a new engineer walked in the room, he or she would say, “ooh–those buildings are coming down,” and everybody else would nod. When they fell, nobody said “bullshit! there had to be demo charges!’ or any such nonsense.

The problem with conspiracy theories?
Two (2) people can’t keep a secret.

“When the President said, ‘horrible attack on American soil,’ he misspoke. He meant to say ‘Saddam has stolen America’s oil.’

I like to imagine a new reality show ‘Conspiracy Island’

Brought to you by Reynolds Wrap!

I would totally watch “Conspiracy Island.” That would be teh awesome!!

Here’s a question for the conspiracy people–do you believe in Santa Clause? Or did that global conspiracy of parents sort of break down when you were about seven or so?

Are the 9/11 conspiracy people the same as the moonlanding people? Are they like the nephews and nieces of the moonlanding people? How does that work?

Two (2) people can’t keep a secret

You are apparently unfamiliar with the Bush Department f Justice.

It occurs to me that you don’t have to have a fully-fleshed-out “conspiracy theory” in order to question some of the basic conclusions of the 9/11 Commission. Actually, you don’t have to have any kind of theory at all. I’m not a “truther,” but one or two logically poked holes in the official story seems sufficient to engage discussion without either side calling the other crazy.

Also, the same thought re: Barbara Olson crossed my mind. I’m just glad Righteous Bubba said it so I didn’t have to.

@g said
Actually- Soylent Green Cracker Barrel would be my choice with a product placement in the food rewards challenge.

The fact is, liberals try to tell us that Saddam Hussein had nothing to do with 9-11, however, it is all connected. He was one of the responsible parties, along with the liberal left lunatics here at home. Working together to try and destroy America. Here in the heartland, however, we know that this will not work. We are fighting back, not “submitting” to become dhimmis as the eleite liberal consencus would have us do.

Working together to try and destroy America.

What a great slogan!

The truthers are just the same as anyone else who believes fervently in an unfalsifiable, predetermined, erroneous conclusion.

The mindset is no different from Moon landing hoaxers, UFO abductees, people who believe in psychics or claim to be healed by crystals (and most of the crystal-wielders and firtune-tellers), Holocaust deniers, water dowsers, JFK conspiracists, Trilateral Illuminati New World Orderists, Loch Ness Monster hunters and the like.

While these examples range from near-harmless silliness to downright perniciousness, they all share the same patterns of thought when exposed to evidence. Denial, redirection, ad hominem attacks, invocation of vast conspiracies (the very lack of evidence for which magically becomes evidence FOR them), feelings of persecution, claims that all your sources of information are biased, comparing themselves to Galileo or Einstein, etc. At root, it’s about choosing their particular article of faith as the ultimate truth; evidence to contrary must, therefore, be wrong.

That’s why one gets an odd feeling of deja vu when reading about such diverse groups as quacks (excellent capitalists, BTW), psychics, cultists, Holocaust deniers and modern Republicans. They’re not part of the reality-based community; they’re faith-based, and pretend to use fact and evidence when it suits their purposes. They don’t tend to realize this about themselves because they mistake faith for reality. Some true believers actually may think they’re proving their case, though the ones you really have to watch out for are the frauds (like the Repubs and Gavin’s pundits).

Working together to try and destroy America, and so are we.

Sounds like a quote from one of Bush’s addresses to the nation.

I had a fun time arguing with a moon-landing hoax believing co-worker one time. Man, he had all the talking points DOWN, too. He was really on top of all the minutia. I listened politely, then I asked him, “were all the moon shots faked, or just the first one?” He stared at me. “There was only one moon landing!” he said. When he found out there were multiple moon landings, he freaked out.

Now I think he thinks the Twin Towers plane crashes were real, but the Pentagon one was fake because there wasn’t enough debris field. Why “they” had to hastily fake one on the day of the real one was never entirely clear to me. His 9/11 explanations were less lucid than the eloquent moon landing ones.

Xenos,
You example proves the point. The corruption of the Bush Dept. of Justice has been exposed.
It took some time, and the full extent is not yet known, but it continues to dribble out.

Wally Whatley: Love the link.

About the furthest I’ll go into conspiracy theory is that the Bush Administration knew the attack was coming and simply did nothing to prevent it. But even then, There’s holes in that thought. Like, why would Bush pressure the CIA after the fact to find a link between 9/11 and Iraq instead of making sure their yes-men were in place to begin with? To me, that’s more a sign that they were taking advantage of the situation rather than moving smoothly after they’d brought it about.

That ang given the level of absolute incompetance on every level of administration, I think it’s incredibly likely that the Republicans did what Republicans do: Ignored or undermined good government in favor of cronyism and graft, then cynically used the disaster caused by their lack of care to advance their agenda.

“Let’s spend Social Security money. HOLY SHIT; SOCIAL SECURITY IS IN DANGER! We’ll have to privatize it to keep it going!”

“Levees? Screw it, New Orleans hasn’t been hit yet. Oh, there’s a hurricane? Ah well, we’ll throw all the black folks into trailers and rezone their homes out of their price range.”

The fact is, liberals try to tell us that Saddam Hussein had nothing to do with 9-11, however, it is all connected. He was one of the responsible parties, along with the liberal left lunatics here at home.

Christ, didn’t you get the memo?

Michael Ledeen nows says Iran was behind 9/11:

And Al Qaeda is a mirage too, a mere front for the regime in Tehran. “When you hear ‘Al Qaeda,’ ” Ledeen writes, “it’s probably wise to think ‘Iran.’ ” Not surprisingly, he thinks the mullahs were probably behind 9/11.

Thinker and friends may not understand Brad’s post. They don’t speak Brevity.

OT, but hooray for rule of law: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/20999950/

Judge rules part of Patriot Act unconstitutional
Provisions allow search warrants issued without probable cause, she says

Portland attorney Brandon Mayfield sought the ruling in a lawsuit against the federal government after he was mistakenly linked by the FBI to the Madrid train bombings that killed 191 people in 2004. …

Soooo…I guess what you’re saying is that since the Bush Administration has such an unblemished record of absolute veracity and sterling credibility (ya know, about stuff like Saddam’s WMDs being hidden in Syria, Bush’s tax cuts benefitting the working classes, Jessica Lynch and all), that anyone who dares raise any pesky questions about BushCo’s explanations for anything must be relegated to the tinfoil nutpile. Right?

Off topic if this is not an open thread, but Mark Steyn is angry that G.I. Joe is being pussified:

http://tinyurl.com/2gvdkf

” Like, why would Bush pressure the CIA after the fact to find a link between 9/11 and Iraq instead of making sure their yes-men were in place to begin with?”

Two possibilities:

1) They thought the Iraq link was going to be blatantly obvious, thanks in large part to AEI loons like Laurie Mylroie, so didn’t think they’d need to stock the CIA with toadies, and were surprised when the CIA didn’t concur.

or

2) Being accustomed to dealing with spineless GOP toadies, they expected the CIA to just play along, and were surprised when CIA analysts showed spine.

2) If the Pentagon was hit by a missle and not by a plane, what did happen to the plane and all those passengers?

Duh. Watch ABC on Wednesdays. It’s not fiction.

btw, looks like the “JFK conspiracy njs” were onto something after all:

http://www.prisonplanet.com/articles/april2007/300407deathbedconfession.htm

“that anyone who dares raise any pesky questions about BushCo’s explanations for anything must be relegated to the tinfoil nutpile. Right?”

Only if their questions are based on the assumption that BushCo is competent.

IMHO, the most likely explanation is that BushCo knew something would happen, and intended to take advantage of it, but what happened was far worse than they expected. In other words, as in so many of their projects, their unfounded certainty led to a massive fuckup.

But planting charges to bring down the WTC? Crashing four planes? No freaking way.

joannegm said,

Soooo…I guess what you’re saying is that since the Bush Administration has such an unblemished record of absolute veracity and sterling credibility (ya know, about stuff like Saddam’s WMDs being hidden in Syria, Bush’s tax cuts benefitting the working classes, Jessica Lynch and all), that anyone who dares raise any pesky questions about BushCo’s explanations for anything must be relegated to the tinfoil nutpile. Right?

Your false dichotomy is showing!

It’s not an either/or situation. We think you’re both full of shit.

Try reading the last two threads. We’re not going to rehash it all just for you.

(Is it getting full of pie in here, or is it just me?)

I have to confess a fondness for conspiracy theories.

But it should be pointed out that discrepancies in the official version of events are not, in and of themselves, proof of a conspiracy. In regard to 9/11, we just haven’t done a lot of real-world experimenting with hi-rise structures collapsing. In a catastrophic failure of a structure strange things happen.

That said, how many people here think JFK was killed by a lone gunman? How many think Arlen Spector’s single-bullet theory holds water?

The telltale sign that anyone has lost an argument, MCH, is the immediate reversion to personal invective.

I accept your defeat gracefully.

Soooo…I guess what you’re saying is that since the Bush Administration has such an unblemished record of absolute veracity and sterling credibility (ya know, about stuff like Saddam’s WMDs being hidden in Syria, Bush’s tax cuts benefitting the working classes, Jessica Lynch and all), that anyone who dares raise any pesky questions about BushCo’s explanations for anything must be relegated to the tinfoil nutpile. Right?

That’s not how I read it at all.

There’s a difference between legitimate questions and crackpot tinfoil hattery. When you’re dealing with a gang of proven incompetents like the Bush Misadminstration, you’ve simply got to give that possible explanation a lot of weight, even if you don’t like it.

to jon H;

Actually, from their own perspective the BushCo has been wildly competent. the myth of “Bush’s incompetence” has concealed a great deal of nefarious culpability, in my opinion.

What’s so “incompetent” about laying the foundation to launch an endless war in the mideast, guaranteeing huge raving fortunes for all their friends in the arms and oil services business (as well as mercenary firms such as Blackwater)? Did you not know that almost all the members of the BushCo have their fingers in these various pies? If you view the Iraq invasion/occupation as a hopeless bungle, you’re simply seeing it from the wrong perspective.

And did they really “bungle” the horrible response to Katrina? A bunch of drowned and evacuated poor African-Americans simply cleared the decks for profiteering by rich white developers and their clients, (btw who tend to vote, uh REPUBLICAN, in case you didn’t notice). Oh, but there I go—-“conspiracizing” again! Silly me. It was all just God giving them a lucky break.

No. “Incompetent” is not what these people are. Pure evil is what they are. There’s a difference.

I guess what you’re saying is that……. anyone who dares raise any pesky questions about BushCo’s explanations for anything must be relegated to the tinfoil nutpile. Right?

Wrong. But carry on; you’re already on a roll.

that anyone who dares raise any pesky questions about BushCo’s explanations for anything must be relegated to the tinfoil nutpile. Right?

When the questions involve secret government agents planting large amounts of explosives in a building without anyone else noticing, then hijacking a plane to crash into said building, then hijacking another plane and deciding to replace that plane with a missile for some reason, and hijacking yet another plane only to crash it for laughs, then I’d say that you’re pretty deep into Reynold’s Wrap territory.

The inconsistency of leftists on this topic never ceases to amaze me. The same people who have no trouble accepting the idea that the CIA had Salvador Allende murdered in Chile, Halevi taken out in Iran and replaced with the hand picked Shah; burned coffee plantations incessantly to destabilize the Sandinistas in Nicaragua…..suddenly become contemptous and scoff “tinfoil hat!” at the notion that JFK could be murdered or Operation Northwoods seriously considered and/or put into practice. Why the paradox? Does the CIA’s sinister nature stop at the shoreline?

The inconsistency of leftists on this topic never ceases to amaze me.

And the amazing consistency of the rehtorical styling of the conspiracy theorists never ceases to amaze me!

Please, lady, you’re sounding like the screenplay for a straight-to-video B movie.

…anyone who dares raise any pesky questions about BushCo’s explanations for anything must be relegated to the tinfoil nutpile. Right?

Wrong, joanne. Have you been here before? This is not Blogs for Bush. With so much to question and criticize the Bush administration on it’s so fucking frustrating to see wacky conspiracy theories distracting people from the incompetence of Bush, Rice, Tenet, Mueller, et al in the run up to 9/11 and the subsequent cover up of that incompetence. If you’re a “truther” you’ve earned your tinfoil dunce cap and you’re an unwitting friend to the Bush administration.

to RCP:

How is the idea of people in this country plotting something that nefarious any more “nutty” or “tinfoil hatty” than the idea of the same kind of plotting being done in a cave in Afghanistan by guys named Omar?

Is it simply easier to believe that them “furreigners” are evil than home grown government nerds?

“Why the paradox? Does the CIA’s sinister nature stop at the shoreline?”

If the CIA did it, then why didn’t they conjure up hijackers from Iraq and Iran in the first place?

Kinda silly to put all that work into faking 9/11, and then id the hijackers as being from countries you don’t actually want to invade.

to g:

I am going to cut and paste this entire thread somewhere that can be discussed intelligently. I feel I would like to discuss some interesting points and all most of you are interested in is snottiness and personal abuse. I have noticed that not one of you has advanced any coherent (I said “coherent”) explanation of why alternate explanations to the events of 9-11 and after are automatically wrong and kooky. All you do is insult the people who raise questions.

And this “incompetence” rag is a very old, broken (and incorrect) record.

“How is the idea of people in this country plotting something that nefarious any more “nutty” or “tinfoil hatty” than the idea of the same kind of plotting being done in a cave in Afghanistan by guys named Omar?”

Because the guys in the cave aren’t plotting to spend weeks drilling hundreds of holes in occupied offices in multiple buildings to plant explosives.

What Jon H. said.

It’s not a question of who’s more evil, but a question of who’s plan is not completely convoluted and would require hundreds of people pulling off extremely unlikely feats with near perfect timing.

What you call inconsistency, we call believing things which have plenty of hard evidence…for insistence, the CIA’s role in the August 1953 coup against Iranian Premier Mohammad Mossadeq.

Meanwhile, we do not believe things which call for speculation about an improbable chain of events, when there is a far simpler conclusion supported by the available evidence. This is why we leftists also call ourselves members of the reality-based community.

The simpler explanation for what happened on 9/11 is that Bush and Co. ignored the warnings they received about Al Qaeda because they were obsessed with taking out Saddam. They then used their failure on 9/11 as an excuse to lie the nation into a disaster in Iraq.

Let me hear testimony from some credible witnesses regarding their role in planting explosives in the WTC, and I would be willing to change my mind.

The inconsistency of leftists on this topic never ceases to amaze me. The same people who have no trouble accepting [a bunch of things that happened] suddenly become contemptous and scoff “tinfoil hat!” at the notion that [things that didn’t happen somehow did] Why the paradox?

No paradox. We tend to go where the evidence leads, and not where it does not. It’s that simple.

You’re VERY find of false dichotomies. Just because one conspiracy happened does not mean they all did.

I kenn haz koehearanz?

Jon, I was referring to the CIA vis a vis JFK, not 9-11. I personally do not believe the CIA was behind 9-11, but I don’t at all think it is a stretch to imagine that some people who have richly profited from the forthcoming events since then might have been somehow involved. Especially since there was a time that bin Laden (in his mujadeen years) WAS an important asset of our government, working against the Soviets in Afghanistan. He did develop quite a few connections to our own government agents, whether you know this or not. And do I have to remind you that the Bush and bin Laden families have been close for decades? (Oh, but Osama’s the “black sheep” of the family. Right, Never mind!)

And let’s not even mention the fact that the company in charge of security at the WTC in 2001 was called Stratesec and was run by a guy named….Marvin Bush. I am sure that was just a coincidence.

And I just wanted to deal with one weak point made above (I forget by whom”, something about “how could a bunch of explosives be planted in a tower with no one knowing about it?” Are you SERIOUS? Most big office buildings in downtown NYC are deserted by 7:30 pm, except for the security staff, and on the weekends there is never anyone there except the security. There would have been plenty of opportunity if in fact that was done.

MCH, you are cheating and you know it.

If the first group of events is possible, you can’t turn around and say that the same motivations that made those possible are suddenly invalidated. There isn’t an intelligent person alive in this country who believes that Oswald acted alone.

“Most big office buildings in downtown NYC are deserted by 7:30 pm, except for the security staff, and on the weekends there is never anyone there except the security. There would have been plenty of opportunity if in fact that was done.”

But then they’d have to do it perfectly, hundreds and hundreds of times, with none of the thousands of people from either building noticing some new paint (which come to think of it could require a variety of colors and shades, complicating things further), or an imperfectly patched hole, or a lump of putty and some det cord, or whatever.

I don’t at all think it is a stretch to imagine that some people who have richly profited from the forthcoming events since then might have been somehow involved.

Okay then, imagine it. It does not involve proof.

OK, this is probably the wrong place to do this and I don’t want to start some sort of flame-war, but the few times I have posted on this site I have always used the names “superdude” and “DJ”. I know I don’t own those names and I’m sure other people that have used these names have never even seen my post, but don’t people want to use a unique name when voicing their opinion? What I’m most concerned with is having my name associated with a belief that is not mine. In this case I do not believe with what “superdude” has posted above and having used that name in the past people that know me will think that I am the poster of “superdude’s” comment. Like I said before I don’t own that moniker, but seriously, there is an infinite arrangement of the 26 letters in the English language how hard is it to come up with something besides “superdude”. Is a gay-ass name anyways.

joannegm: Longer posts, please. Only conspiracy theory dilettantes write comments that run under 500 words.

“If the first group of events is possible, you can’t turn around and say that the same motivations that made those possible are suddenly invalidated.”

Motivations don’t count for much, though, do they?

My motivation to date Audrey Tautou runs smack into the impervious wall of reality, and that’s as far as it goes, unless I want to get hit with a restraining order.

“Why did you CLAIM and BEHAVE as if you thought the first 767 impact was an accident after all of the briefings and warnings issued in the summer of 2001, Mr. Bush?”

That is a question I wish someone would ask George to answer publically.

So Brad, the government has gotten to you too.

Don’t listen to him people! Did you know if you add up the letters in “Sadly No” and divide it by the number you get when you add up the letters in PNAC it equals 911?

here’s a simple one. the “put” positions on Airline stocks. this really happened-it’s been verified that US Air and American had huge puts placed on their stock in the week leading up to 9/11, activity that was very unusual from the perspective of their stocks, if not unprecedented.

now the conspiracy theorists looks at this and says “AHA 9/11 IS A JOKE IN YOUR TOWN etc.”

someone with half a brain thinks “huh, osama had some really rich friends who buy and sell enormous amounts of stock. i wonder if any of them knew what osama was going to do and acted accordingly.”

that wasn’t very hard, was it?

Most big office buildings in downtown NYC are deserted by 7:30 pm, except for the security staff, and on the weekends there is never anyone there except the security. There would have been plenty of opportunity if in fact that was done.

Bullshit. Operating engineers, foreign currency traders, custodians, workaholics. In fact being a workaholic is probably the reason one of my sisters is alive today. She was in the north tower until 11:30 the night of 9/10 so she slept in the next morning. I’d call her and ask her if she heard incessant drilling and activity around the elevator shafts in the days, weeks leading up to 9/11 but she’d laugh at me and I don’t really want a tinfoil hat for Christmas.

The only real thing that makes me thing something was up – was that weird comment Rice made once the news that Bush had received more than one warning about Osama Ben Ladden – That weird parsing about how no one could know they would use the high jacked planes as weapons – now of course they were trying to cover their ass over the deaths of 3,000 people but it does argue they did know highjackings were a real treat on some level. And of course with Ashcroft deciding in July to stop taking commercial flights rings a bell or two in my mind.

However at worst I can suggest some part of the cabal hoped that the highjackings would be enough to gee up anti-Iraq sentiment – with maybe with some civilians killed but I doubt they expected the scale of the attacks made – they don’t have the brains for one.

Still there is that old saw – ‘never assume Malice with Stupidity is an adequate explanation”

Most big office buildings in downtown NYC are deserted by 7:30 pm, except for the security staff, and on the weekends there is never anyone there except the security.

So you’re an expert in how every high-rise in NYC is used at all hours of the day?

And let’s not even mention the fact that the company in charge of security at the WTC in 2001 was called Stratesec and was run by a guy named….Marvin Bush. I am sure that was just a coincidence.

In NYC, million-to-one odds happen EIGHT TIMES A DAY. True story.

How is the idea of people in this country plotting something that nefarious any more “nutty” or “tinfoil hatty” than the idea of the same kind of plotting being done in a cave in Afghanistan by guys named Omar? Is it simply easier to believe that them “furreigners” are evil than home grown government nerds?

Ah, so Semitic peoples can’t manage to plan successful operations with the acumen of white people? Is that what you’re saying?

If the first group of events is possible, you can’t turn around and say that the same motivations that made those possible are suddenly invalidated. There isn’t an intelligent person alive in this country who believes that Oswald acted alone.

Cheating? Not at all. It has nothing to do with motivation. Your post effectively claimed that solely because Conspiracies A,B, and C happened, then Conspiracies D, E, and F must have happened. That’s prima facie illogical.

I call fake superdude.

Joannegm is quite correct about one thing: if you’re unimpressed by the evidence for a 9/11 conspiracy, dandy, but don’t lump that with JFK assassination conspiracy research. To believe that Lee Harvey Oswald, acting alone…hell, even Gerald Posner doesn’t buy that crap. It isn’t hard to pull off an elaborate conspiracy if you’re sufficiently ruthless; organized crime does it all the time and we accept that as normal, if illegal.

People need to get way past the idea that the government is something monolithic–like any organization, it’s composed of cliques and factions, and they pull all kinds of shit without checking in with each other. Jesus, you all act like you’ve never gotten away with anything. Have you not noticed that most people aren’t going to question little things changing around them until way too late? That’s normal behavior–the mind edits and fills in blanks.

Does that mean that WTC was brought down by controlled demolition? No. It means that throwing out the idea without consideration is as dumb as accepting it without question.

The fake moon landing stuff is pretty funny, though.

If the first group of events is possible, you can’t turn around and say that the same motivations that made those possible are suddenly invalidated.

As has been pointed out (several times), it’s a question of possibility, not motive.

For example, the Allende conspiracy:
1) Hire some guys to kill Allende.
2) Guys kill Allende.

Compare this to the 9/11 conspiracy:
1) Hire some guys to take down a building.
2) Guys do some things a dozen James Bonds couldn’t pull off.
3) Buildings collapse.

There’s a reason why one is plausible and one isn’t.

RCP:

That was not much of a post. “Guys kill Allende”? Try again.

But the CIA not have Allende murdered. Allende shot himself.

Does that mean that WTC was brought down by controlled demolition? No. It means that throwing out the idea without consideration is as dumb as accepting it without question.

I think most here have considered the idea and thought it was dumb and unsupported by evidence. Now what?

word, RCP.

Another thing I don’t get is why their crazy theories gotta be so fucking complicated.

Evidence before eyes: planes hit building, building go smashee.

Theory 1: gummint hired men to make planes hit building.

Theory 2: foam! steel don’t eat quiche! I iz an inganr!

The reason the theory has to be so ornate: it makes it easier to obsess over that shit.

Does that mean that WTC was brought down by controlled demolition? No. It means that throwing out the idea without consideration is as dumb as accepting it without question.

You’re absolutely right. That’s why so many people have been poring over the details of the event for six years.

So the question was asked and looked into and everything I’ve read leads me to believe that the demolition theory is bunkum. All the info I’ve seen leads me to tentatively conclude that 9/11 truthers are barking up a tree of the same species as the “winter in Buffalo disproves global warming!” group–a little technical knowledge coupled with a lot of ignorance and unfamiliarity with reason drives this stuff.

a little technical knowledge coupled with a lot of ignorance and unfamiliarity with reason drives this stuff

You know, I think we could probably include the transhumanists in this little cozy cubbyhole of crazy too…

“Does that mean that WTC was brought down by controlled demolition? No. It means that throwing out the idea without consideration is as dumb as accepting it without question.”

That might be reasonable if the two buildings had simply fallen for no apparent reason and it was being blamed on a freak structural fault.

Under the circumstances, though, it seems more reasonable to dispense with the controlled demoltion in favor of the giant tubes of jet fuel that rammed into the buildings and burst into flame.

Bleh, got the Allende thing from The same people who have no trouble accepting the idea that the CIA had Salvador Allende murdered in Chile by joannegm.

Replace Allende with your assassinated leader of choice.

Let’s all remember that none of the conspiracy theories mentioned so far are half as stupid as the conspiracy theories that say 9/11 happened because God lifted his shield of protection from America after we started giving gays rights, letting women get abortions, teaching evolution in schools, etc.

How is the idea of people in this country plotting something that nefarious any more “nutty” or “tinfoil hatty” than the idea of the same kind of plotting being done in a cave in Afghanistan by guys named Omar?

Here you have fallen victim to Occam’s Razor (my own favorite razor, btw). We know that 19 hijackers* were involved. To postulate added layers of complexity is totally unnecessary to explain what happened.

*funded and led by Usama bin Laden, a master engineer with unlimited financial resources, cave or not.

So it isn’t the idea of a “conspiracy” that bothers you, Notorious P.A.T.; it’s the idea that anyone IN THE US GOVERNMENT being involved in one, that bothers you. That has been my point all along. The “official conspiracy theory” pinning the whole thing on OBL is certainly acceptable and wouldn’t get you branded a kook. Just the idea that—gasp!—the plotting and planning could involve members of our own government or its various branches?

Please. Stranger things have happened.

I am going to cut and paste this entire thread somewhere that can be discussed intelligently. I feel I would like to discuss some interesting points and all most of you are interested in is snottiness and personal abuse.

joannegem, we really should apologize to you, but you DID take the bait didn’t you?

You wandered onto the set of Candid Camera, and now you’re upset that no one will let you play “The Moonlight Sonata” all the way through on the exploding piano with the piano bench that slides out from under you.

The whole point of this thread was to be snotty and personally abuse conspiracy theorists.

If you want serious discussion of this absolutely tedious topic, go to a conspiracy site instead of a humor site.

Just the idea that—gasp!—the plotting and planning could involve members of our own government or its various branches? Please. Stranger things have happened.

Stranger things have been proven. This has not. When you have something, announce it. You currently have nothing and should not be taken seriously.

Professor fate:

Condi was lying in her teeth when she said “no one could have predicted” that planes could be used as weapons of destruction.

A widely read novel, “The Turner Diaries,” had proposed just such a scenario years before. And the heck with novels: at the real-life G8 conference the previous April, exactly those same security concerns were raised (i.e. that the conference could be targeted by rogue planes). Maybe Condi was busy buying shoes that day.

A widely read novel, “The Turner Diaries,”

Racist trash. “Popular novel”, my arse. You’ve just told us all anyone ever needs to know about you. Go back to Stormfront and your Prussian Blue records.

Condi was lying in her teeth when she said “no one could have predicted” that planes could be used as weapons of destruction.

Yep. Even without specific predictions there was an obvious path: suicide bombers in trucks, suicide bombers in boats…hmm, what next?

A widely read novel, “The Turner Diaries,” had proposed just such a scenario years before.

Just a hunch, but I don’t think “The Turner Diaries” are widely-read in Condi’s circles. Maybe in yours.

Just a hunch, but I don’t think “The Turner Diaries” are widely-read in Condi’s circles. Maybe in yours.

I would bet that after a certain act of home-grown terrorism a lot of people in high places picked it up to see what kind of warnings it contained. It’d be interesting to know how widely read it is outside of the circle of kooks and people who police kooks.

Can’t this post have a fun foto
operation 40

Jesus Christ. I’m going to try explaining this one more time with words before I switch to grunts and hand gestures.

Motivation = Doesn’t matter
Possibility = Matters
Actual Evidence = Matters

Gov’t did 9/11 = Nearly impossible, little to no actual evidence.

Did someone just try to use that racist garbage as a source?

Sweet…Zombie…Jesus…

*FACEPALM*

Is this loony suggesting Condi Rice is a fan of “The Turner Diaries”?

Cause that would be really funny.

Like the malkin thing, only with a respectable title.

Hee hee…

mikey

The very first thought that went through my mind when I turned on my TV and saw the first tower on fire was, “The bastards did it.”

I instantly saw that every campaign promise that Bush made would be enabled by what I was seeing.

When you don’t know who committed a crime, you blame those who would profit most from said crime.

Did they plant explosives? Probably not. But how did 4 planes get past our vast web of air defenses? How did we not shoot those planes down? Doesn’t the pantagon have missle defenses? These are the kind of questions that I believe imply complicity by our government. The conspiracies do get impossibly complex, but there are some really stark unanswered questions.

Also, have you seen the surveillance video of the plane hitting the pentagon? It has to be the smallest 767 on the planet, Spinal Tap style. There is no way what was captured on that film was a jet airliner. Absolutely no way.

If you know me, you know that I’m not afraid to look stupid (Synonymous with anything?). But please, fellow Snoers- don’t completely unanswered questions bother you? I think it is interesting that this is a subject similar to Israel. When you ask to have a rational discussion about the facts, or lack thereof, you are automatically marginalized and subject to ad hominem attacks.

I am no 9/11 conspiracy theorist. I don’t go to the events, or obsess over the internet, or even think of it much. But the inability to have a substantive discussion without Republican style attacks:

9/11 conspiracy theorists aren’t too bright.

…makes the whole thing not even worth bringing up.

MCH you’re just an asshole. I won’t waste any more keystrokes on you. (God knows you do enough stroking on yourself.)

Hey…this personal invective stuff is lotsa fun! Tahnks for teaching it to me.

For the rest of yu who are ostensibly not brain dead:

by mentioning the book “The Truner Diaries” I was not implying that i read the book or even knew anything about it, save for the fact that it did elaborate on a commercial-planes-as-weapons scenario. So that was a PARTIAL deconstruction of Condi’s claim that “no one” ever thought of it.

If any of you were literate enough to read my ENTIRE post–hell, it was only 2 paragraphs!—I also stated that the idea had been raised by a security memo regarding the G8 summit the previous spring.

Man, what is WITH you people? It is like arguing with gnats.

“Just the idea that—gasp!—the plotting and planning could involve members of our own government or its various branches?”

No Joanne, we have no problem with the idea that, say, BushCo could engage in conspiracies to prosecute Democrats on trumped-up charges, stock US Attorneys offices with political toadies, and engage in racist voting rights denial.

The problem with the elaborate 9/11 conspiracies is that they make no sense. The hijackers’ nationalities were not convenient for BushCo’s purposes. If they set it up, they would have ID’d the hijackers as Iraqi, Iranian, and Syrian. Controlled demolition would involve extensive preparation which would put evidence in front of people outside the conspiracy, and would be complex enough that it would increase the likelihood of failure r exposure.

It simply doesn’t make sense, even if 9/11 was Dick Cheney’s wet dream in 8/2001.

It’s far more realistic that they simply let it happen, but were expecting something less dramatic.

“I was not implying that i read the book or even knew anything about it, save for the fact that it did elaborate on a commercial-planes-as-weapons scenario.”

I think you just contradicted yourself there. If you haven’t read it or know anything about it, how do you know that it elaborates on the planes-as-weapons scenario?

Again…

*FACEPALM*

“Also, have you seen the surveillance video of the plane hitting the pentagon? It has to be the smallest 767 on the planet, Spinal Tap style.”

Oh jebus, do you have any clue how BIG the Pentagon is?

“Man, what is WITH you people? It is like arguing with gnats.”

Likewise, talking to you is like arguing with a tinfoil-encrusted brick wall.

But how did 4 planes get past our vast web of air defenses?

They were commercial airliners being tracked by air traffic control. They were presumed innocent, like other commercial jetliners. By the time anyone knew for sure what was going on, at least two planes had already crashed.

How did we not shoot those planes down?

See above, and add that noone knew where the remaining planes were heading or definitely up to. You don’t shoot down civilian jets full of civilians based on a hunch. And from what I recall, no order to shoot them down was given.

Plus, our military is not perfect. Even they cannot leap instantly into action to thwart just-discovered threats that are already in progress.

Doesn’t the pantagon have missle defenses?

I don’t know, but I do know that you have to know something is coming to shoot at it. Just another airliner in DC airspace is not, alone, cause for alarm.

Clutch414, all the bricks are on your side.

I am the one with an open mind willing to entertain explanations besides “the official story.” You have labeled all questioners as kooks.

That means, you’ve got the bricks, baby, not I.

When you don’t know who committed a crime, you blame those who would profit most from said crime.

When you don’t know, you don’t know, and therefore you blame NOBODY.

I’ve been called an asshole by delusional racist trash!!! It’s a high honor.

*rests on laurels*

And for otherwise intelligent people like Sadly, Novians to engage in Godwinism (“She brought up the Turner Diaries! Everything she says must be wrong!”) is plain wrong. Ladies and gentlemen: Conspiracies happen every day. The 9/11 incident was a conspiracy, no matter how you look at it–whether of al-Qaeda or of the military industrial complex, it was still a conspiracy, and much of the evidence for the al-Qaeda conspiracy is junk (like a miraculously-unharmed passport sitting atop the rubble–priceless!). Perhaps more of the evidence for the military-industrial complex conpiracy is junk, and that’s a reasonable position, but let’s not mistake cant for reason.

What’s worse is the amount of rage the “there was no conspiracy” crowd works up. So you think that the Loose Change-rs are a distraction? Fine. But folks, they’re small-time. Save your rage for the times when Pelosi sells out. Save your rage for Maureen Dowd concentrating on Edwards’s hair or Gore’s beer gut. The Loose Changers are a fart in a tornado.

Clutch414, haven’t you EVER encountered a detail that was in a book without actually reading it?

If not, how did you ever make it through a high school lit class?

So that was a PARTIAL deconstruction of Condi’s claim that “no one” ever thought of it.

We’ll call it a Half Derrida. A difficult trick mastered by few.

“If any of you were literate enough to read my ENTIRE post–hell, it was only 2 paragraphs!—I also stated that the idea had been raised by a security memo regarding the G8 summit the previous spring.”

On the other hand, BushCo has a well-known tendency to ignore everything that comes from sources other than their toadies.

And, frankly, Condi really isn’t a security person in the “practical application” sense. She’s mostly an academic bureaucrat, probably most adept at University fundraising galas and recruiting lunches with prominent scholars.

Reading footnotes and memos and getting one’s hands dirty with facts and information – she has people to do that.

She frankly had no business being NSA. The only reason she was, I’m sure, is because Bush liked her and Rumsfeld and Cheney knew they could roll her easily.

Righteous Bubba–

Beginning an investigation nowhere is not likely to produce much. Perhaps the word “blame” is the problem. Nonetheless, when you don’t know who did something, you first look at who benefits. That’s pretty basic, in police work or in history.

“It has to be the smallest 767 on the planet, Spinal Tap style. There is no way what was captured on that film was a jet airliner. Absolutely no way.”

So…the multitude of people who saw the plane streaking toward the Pentagon from the highway are lying too? The thousands of pieces of plane debris found in and around the Pentagon were planted there, just for effect?

*FACEPALM*

Beginning an investigation nowhere is not likely to produce much. Perhaps the word “blame” is the problem.

Yep. But “who benefits” in a police investigation is usually a meaningful thing to apprehend. “Who benefits” in conspiracy literature is an excuse to get imbecilic. And lo and behold!

I might as well add my two cents.

I have studied this for years now, and am convinced 9/11 was an inside job– it was rigged up, false flag terrorism and all that jive.

All I ask is that people look carefully at the evidence. That is what i have done. There are hundreds of ways in which the official story is wrong.

If you want an overview of what I think happened, check out my blog.
http://covertoperations.blogspot.com
I know it is wild stuff. But the evidence is the evidence.

It is really willfully ignorant to deny that conspiracies exist and that there are very evil people out there.

Thanks.

You know, there have certainly been real conspiracies, by governments or by groups of people, which have been successful in their aims. You cannot just dismiss such theories out of hand. And it is not true that people cannot effectively keep a secret. Sometimes they can. Look at the Gulf of Tonkin “Incident”, or the Riechstag Fire.

Also, I am not entirely sure that Bush, Cheney, or someone else in this administration would not be willing to cause such an event as 9/11 to happen, or at least let it happen if they knew about it.

That said, I have not heard a theory from the “9/11 Truth” crowd which really seemed credible. I can’t prove that they are false, or totally dismiss them. But they don’t sound credible to me.

“And, frankly, Condi really isn’t a security person in the “practical application” sense. She’s mostly an academic bureaucrat, probably most adept at University fundraising galas and recruiting lunches with prominent scholars.”

Yeah, but that begs the inconvenient truth that at the time 9-11 happened she WAS, uh……National Security Advisor. And she blatantly misstated the shock value of the planes.

DocAmazing, thanks for your comments, Surely some of the twits on here could learn from you. The point in mentioning the book was only to discount Condi’s claim that what had happened had been heretofore unfathomable.

Also, I find the twin notions that “BushCo are incompetent and 9-11 conspiracy people are witless kooks” to be an ironic juxtaposition. After all, there is as much (or more) evidence of explosives in the WTC towards as there was of Saddam’s WMDs. yet the latter, as a justification for an invasion and occupation of a country, was taken as an article of faith by 70% of the population here. Despite testimony by IAEA’s El Baradei and our own Scott Ritter, the BushCo derided people who insisted Saddam was not and could not possibly be, a threat.

All I ask is that people look carefully at the evidence.

No. Take it to a newspaper. There isn’t a journalist alive who wouldn’t leap at your story if you have the evidence to back it up. It’s a good bet that you don’t have it.

“Clutch414, haven’t you EVER encountered a detail that was in a book without actually reading it?”

Ummm,like how, osmosis? How else are you supposed to get info from a book, other than READING IT???

Plus, I quote you from above…”I was not implying that i read the book or even knew anything about it.” You said you didn’t know anything about it. If you didn’t know “anything about it” then, I ask you again, how did you what it contained?

“If not, how did you ever make it through a high school lit class?”

Ummm…it was lit class…where…you know…we actually READ books. How else do you get through a lit class? I mean, I kinda sorta figured it was implied by the name “Literature” that we would, you know, be reading books. Am I the only one?

Do you actually read your posts before you hit the “Submit Comment” button?

“Yeah, but that begs the inconvenient truth that at the time 9-11 happened she WAS, uh……National Security Advisor. And she blatantly misstated the shock value of the planes.

Er, and the reason to chalk this up to anything but bog-standard incompetence and cronyism would be, what?

“Despite testimony by IAEA’s El Baradei and our own Scott Ritter, the BushCo derided people who insisted Saddam was not and could not possibly be, a threat.”

And this is evidence of competence?

And for otherwise intelligent people like Sadly, Novians to engage in Godwinism (”She brought up the Turner Diaries! Everything she says must be wrong!”) is plain wrong.

That would be, but that’s not what’s happened. When someone acts like a nutter, spews a lot of silliness, BS and invective, and then whips out The Turner Diaries as a source, it’s reasonable to conclude that you’re dealing with an idiot. Credibility, and all that.

She could say the sky is blue, but at this point, I’d double-check it myself before placing any bets.

That said, I have not heard a theory from the “9/11 Truth” crowd which really seemed credible. I can’t prove that they are false, or totally dismiss them. But they don’t sound credible to me.

Feel free to totally dismiss them. If you’re an atheist you totally dismiss each new appearance of Jesus on a tortilla or Mary in damp marks on a wall. I hope.

Clutch414, I guess your humor valve is a bit underdeveloped, no? The comment about the high school lit class was what is commonly known as a “joke.”

To answer your other point: The way you encounter details from books you have not actually read, is….from people who have read them; in conversations; on blogs (like this one!); in references in news stories; etc etc etc. In other words: HUNDREDS of ways.

I will confess to you that despite getting all As in honors English in both high school and college, I never actually read “Moby Dick.” But I know there’s a whale in it! Wow, how’d I do that?

If not, how did you ever make it through a high school lit class?

Um, I read the assignments.

Perhaps you are suggesting there is a Classics Illustrated comic book version of “The Turner Diaries”?

“‘Despite testimony by IAEA’s El Baradei and our own Scott Ritter, the BushCo derided people who insisted Saddam was not and could not possibly be, a threat.”
And this is evidence of competence?”

It is not evidence of incompetence; it is evidence of intentional deception and marginalizing dissenters. An interesting side note here is the recently released autobiography by the former president of Spain, Aznar, who was part of Bush’s “coalition of the willing.” Aznar reveals in his book that Saddam had offered to step down a month before we invaded. (Bush had always claimed that he had no choice but to invade as Saddam clung stubbornly to power.) Bush told Azner, “We’ll be in Iraq before the end of March.” His mind had been made up.

But this thread is evidence of some bias against allowing any inconvenient facts to muddy the official narrative.

I rarely see people trade insults here except when the Beth, Soggy, et al (aka the Douche Patrol) show up.

Really, only Israel stirs up base emotions like this.

I really don’t understand the anger. I just want a version of the truth that doesn’t stink like the Pike Place Market on a 95 degree day. Does that make me obsessed and unintelligent?

“Perhaps you are suggesting there is a Classics Illustrated comic book version of “The Turner Diaries”?

Yeah, there is, but don’t bother with it. It’s over your head.

“It is not evidence of incompetence; it is evidence of intentional deception and marginalizing dissenters.”

Marginalizing dissenters is a form of incompetence. You can’t be competent if you only listen to people who tell you what you want to hear.

I heartily endorse putting 9/11 Truthers and Iraq War Truthers on some remote island together and having them fight to the death.

Conspiracy theorists drive me nucking futs.

“But this thread is evidence of some bias against allowing any inconvenient facts to muddy the official narrative.”

Nonsense. There’s plenty of skepticism about elements of the official narrative, for instance what the Bush admin knew and thought beforehand, but the events on 9/11 itself are pretty much self-explanatory.

Just because you don’t take the baroque conspiracy theories seriously it doesn’t mean you trust the Bush administration.

The baroque conspiracy theories can be dismissed through reason and logic alone.

I rarely see people trade insults here except when the Beth, Soggy, et al (aka the Douche Patrol) show up.

You’re not a baseball fan?

I just want a version of the truth that doesn’t stink like the Pike Place Market on a 95 degree day.

You get one when you have some evidence that isn’t laughable. The “missile hits Pentagon” theory is absolutely nuts.

First off, if that was supposed to be a joke, you fail at humor. I’ve noticed the “it only was a joke” defense is used numerous times by many people as the ultimate backpeddle.

Next, there’s a HUGE difference between knowing there’s a whale in Moby Dick (a literary classic, well known by almost everyone) and knowing what scenarios are presented in The Turner Diaries (an obscure book written by a white supremacist for white supremacists). Plus, YOU YOURSELF SAID THAT YOU KNEW “NOTHING ABOUT IT.”

I’ll ask again, how would you know an obscure part of an obscure book without reading it or “knowing anything about it”? I really not suprised you haven’t aswered this. I know I never make any claims about the content of something I admit to “not know anything about.” That’s reserved for Fox News pundits.

You see, that’s the problem with conspiracy folks. They cherry pick evidence to support their ridiculous claims, even if that crackpot claim has been debunked in it’s entirety by real, falsifiable science and observation and simple common sense.

I gotta stop reading this thread or else I’m going to have develop perma-faceplam. I’m starting to get a hand-shaped welt on my face and my co-workers are getting worried.

Also, have you seen the surveillance video of the plane hitting the pentagon? It has to be the smallest 767 on the planet

That’s because it was a 757 moving past a wide-angle (minimizes scale of far-field objects) camera that only shoots 15 frames per second – into a very large building.

That’s because it was a 757 moving past a wide-angle (minimizes scale of far-field objects) camera that only shoots 15 frames per second – into a very large building.

This is very much the equivalent of bits of dust in space shuttle footage being seized upon as UFOs.

Cui bono works fine for small-scale, manipulable events; it’s never worked all that well for large-scale events, manipulable or otherwise, because “benefit” tends to accrue to multiple parties in multiple and often unpredictable ways (as does harm).

The problem with mopst conspiracy theories’ use of the cui bono principle is that they either a) decide that if everyone benefited, everyone was in on it; or b) focus on the party they perceive — sometimes arbitrarily — as having benefited most under the assumption that “cui bono” assigns culpability in direct proportion to received benefits. Even in basic police work, you don’t assume that potential motive and likelihood bear that precise a geometric relationship.

Of course, conspiracists also have a bias for assigning culpability and agency to the largest possible institution that benefits, on a similar assumption that size equals likelihood…and, rather weirdly, that large bureaucracies are somehow more effective and efficient than small cabals.

19 terrorists and a few plotters in Pakistan and Afghanistan pales by that logic before the “likelihood” of the U.S. government and its various agencies. They’re bigger, so in conspiracy logic they have correspondingly greater agency. The idea that organizational size actually slows down resource deployment or that it can generate obstacles to the implementation of sweeping and complex plans that don’t exist for smaller organizations is simply alien to conspiracism.

In essence, conspiracy theory assumes that events on a grand scale (or events with consequences on a grand scale) require actors on a correspondingly grand scale. Theirs is a world in which the ant never causes the avalanche, nor the butterfly’s wings the hurricane. If a mistake or a bit of cost-cutting in the hydroelectric dam up the river causes a countywide drought, it must be a conspiracy between the upriver county, the megafarms and the bottled-water concerns; the idea that its an unintended consequence of some contractor trying to defraud a few thousand from the upriver county just isn’t a motive on the rigth scale, because the “cui” doesn’t cover enough of the later “bono.” This is despite the fact that the original contractor’s scam and his own reward fit into a more reasonable, less narratologically-determinate version of the “cui bono” principle.

Any 9-11 conspiracy nj should first have to solve something pretty simple. Like what Paul Simon did with Edie Brickell. Then they get to move up a level to planes and buildings.

Alright, I agree to disagree about this, because I Love You Guys.

I’m on to Malkin and Teh Ghey Leather Boyz…

“First off, if that was supposed to be a joke, you fail at humor.” Nope, you fail at comprehension.

” I’ve noticed the “it only was a joke” defense is used numerous times by many people as the ultimate backpeddle.” You also fail at spelling. It’s backpedal.

“Next, there’s a HUGE difference between knowing there’s a whale in Moby Dick (a literary classic, well known by almost everyone) and knowing what scenarios are presented in The Turner Diaries (an obscure book written by a white supremacist for white supremacists). Plus, YOU YOURSELF SAID THAT YOU KNEW “NOTHING ABOUT IT.”

Don’t scream yourself into a tizzy, please. Then you won’t be around to make fun of tomorrow! No, there is not a “huge difference.” In both cases, details of a book are known by picking up on discussions about it or hearing something about it. How well known the book is really is not relevant. I mean, even if you are talking about a book that has been read by 4 people, if those people share details of the book in a conversation/blog/email with you, it doesn’t really matter if millions haven’t read it. But that said, “Turner Diaries” is not as “obscure” as you claim. (After all, the proof is that ti set off an immediate reaction among a bunch of disparate posters the minute it was mentioned.)

ll ask again, how would you know an obscure part of an obscure book without reading it or “knowing anything about it”? I already HAVE answered this, numerous times, and will so again: By speaking to people who have read it; by getting emails by people who remarked on the planes scenario it mentioned; by seeing references to it in news stories. There, satisfied?

Your argument is ridiculous.

“Like what Paul Simon did with Edie Brickell. ”

Oh god, I DON’T want to think about that.

Once again:

Isn’t this an awful lot of upset for a very minor group distraction? Shit, the mainstream media says shit more absurd than Loose Change very hour on the hour and you don’t get this heated up about it…

The problem with discussing 9/11 conspiracy theories is that it tends to attract 9/11 conspiracy theorists.

There are many reasons why 9/11 conspiracy scenarios are hard to take seriously. To me, one of the most obvious is the complete failure of the top guys in the Bush administration to respond to what was happening during September 11. Nearly all the important decisions that day were made by second-tier officials. Perhaps never in the history of the United States has the country’s leadership been so totally, so pathetically gobsmacked by an emergency.

Pretty strange behavior for cold-blooded conspirators reacting to events that they themselves supposedly set in motion.

Sorry, backpedal. That’s one hell of a way to NOT address my point. Also, I don’t think you want me to go back through your previous posts and proofread them, do you? You should be the last person criticizing anyone’s spelling or grammar.

As far as my main point concerning you…let me put it this way:

You seem to know an awful lot about a book you claimed to know “nothing” about.

And you’re right…if someone does tell me about a book, then, yes, I know SOMETHING about that book. However, I would never claim that I know “nothing about that book” like you did. Shall I quote your post again?

Does logic ever enter into anything you do?

Brad was right on the money with this topic title. I’d say he didn’t go far enough with it.

He should’ve said:

“9/11 conspiracy theorists aren’t too bright and certainly aren’t bound by reason or logic.”

Keep the tinfoil-helm shiny!!

*sigh*

This government couldn’t cover up something small like the firing of a group of US Attorney’s for political reasons secret, and conspiracy nutjobs want me to believe that the government has been able to keep secrets about 9/11 being an inside job?

Riiiiiiiiiiiiiiight.

Isn’t this an awful lot of upset for a very minor group distraction?

No. First I’m not upset. Second, people should be called on stupid shit when they present it, myself included.

Are all truthers 15? They all have the same attitude of “I’m the only one who’s ever thought of this, you stupid not me realizing this shocking truth people”.
Geebus.
You’re looking for the hand of God in the chaos that is life, truthers. You want there to be a controlling narrative, even if it’s a “bad” one. The world does not work like that. No one here is suggesting the official story is the entire truth. However, it contains a great deal more of the truth than your claims.
For example, Flight 93 was shot down. Planes don’t crash into three separate debris fields. The heroic passengers story is pure propaganda.
But that doesn’t mean your every fantasy is true. Extraordinary claims require extraordinary proof, and truthers, like all religious fanatics, use the absence of proof as confirmation of its concealed existence. Truthers are basically born again Christians of a different stripe. They’re zealots because to see doubt in others reminds them of the hidden questions in their hearts.
At least try and become an agnostic, plz.

Doc Amazing, if you counted the posts on this blog, you would find the vast majority are humorous send ups of b-list right wing bloggers.

Yesterday, joannegm showed up on one of those threads, with the standard truther fare.

So the distinguished Brad Rocket put this post up, allowing the rest of us to go back to snarking on the Malkintents of the world upstairs.

The plain facts regarding the various 9/11 conspiracy theories have been discussed before, and the conspiracy theories have been found wanting.

Take a missile hit the Pentagon theory, please.

The inconvenient truth of 9/11 is the Bush Administration was both incompetent and dishonest. It would be years before Americans would learn that they had been warned about Al Qaeda, and had ignored same. Years before we’d learn that their evidence against Saddam was bunk, and they had used their failure on 9/11 to lie us into a needless debacle in Iraq. The Bush Administration deserves impeachment for this, as well as other lawbreaking.

It doesn’t make the fact proof truthers any more credible.

Because you asked for it, America, my two cents on three topics:

(1) Conspiracies: Some exist.

(2) 9/11 conspiracy theories: They don’t (to me) make a ton of sense so far.

(3) Knowing what some books say without having actually read them: Joan’s making a lot more sense than Clütch.

“(3) Knowing what some books say without having actually read them: Joan’s making a lot more sense than Clütch”

Even though she claims to know nothing about them?

Yeah, and she really zinged me by saying that the comic book version of “The Turner Diaries” is over my head. I’ll be recovering from that all day.

I say it’s no fair for someone who writes jokes for Mallard FIllmore to come over here and bag on us non-professionals.

I never said that you can’t know something about the content of a book without reading it. I had no qualms with that claim.

But…not only did she say that she hadn’t read it…she said that she didn’t KNOW ANYTHING about it. So I am supposed to take the word of someone about a subject that they admitted they “knew nothing about?” And I am the one who is not making any sense? Seriously?

clutch! What happened to the umlat? I barely recognized you!

To me it’s simple. It’s part Righteous Bubba – Come up with some evidence, as investigators and journalists do every day, and not only will you get to say “toldyaso”, you’ll get stinkin rich in the process. Um, if they don’t kill you in your sleep.

The other part is simply why is the general official narrative so hard to believe? We know al quaeda was trying to attack, they used readily available weapons (box cutters and airplanes), they worked at it for years, they attacked the very targets they had attacked before, and with good planning and dedicated operators who are willing to die, it’s just not that hard to pull off. It makes sense, it fits together, and it works with what we know historically.

I’m gonna go do something else now…

mikey

Well, I hate to break up the Gathering of Fruitcakes; but…

something to ruin the day of moon hoaxers, JFK freaks, and 9/11 Fairy Tales’ers everywhere.

“diseased thinkers…”

Just when I am ready to get some more hate on for Sadly, No!, y’all had to go and post that. 😉

They are all a bit wacked out.

For the record, I thought the kook’s line about getting through lit class by knowing what’s in books without reading them was kinda funny (and obviously intended as such, my irony-impaired cohorts’ takes notwithstanding).

But again, the most important point here, and one made at least twice upthread by people more eloquent on the subject than I–

WHY THE CHRISTING FUCK WOULD THEY FRAME THE WRONG COUNTRY? WHY WHY WHY?

Just gimme something, anything. I’ll accept even the VENEER of plausibility. And no fair coming back at me with stories about how you tried melting steel once by ramming a Big Wheel into it and it totally didn’t work.

Simply, the number of people involved in a conspiracy like this would be large. Where are they? How come not one of them, or their brother in law, or bitter ex-wife, has come forward?

Why? Why does it have to be a large number. Say you’re the President/King/Head MoFo, and you find out an intereswting piece of information, like there is going to be an attack during the summer, perhaps involving planes. If it doesn’y happen, then no harm done, but if it does happen, then you can justify a great deal. So you have some folks look into it, same as you normally would.

An investigation turns up some unusual items at flight schools around the country, but you can count on the turf conflicts between the CIA and FBI, of which you heard accounts from your dad, the ex head of the CIA. In the meantime, you do nothing, not even tell your advisors. The worst happens, and maybe a handful of people know anything about it. The insistence that you need a lot of people to pull off a conspiracy is nonsense.

Why? Why does it have to be a large number. Say you’re the President…

Okay let’s fantasize.

[Note that the large number invoked is pretty much about wiring buildings etc.]

“clutch! What happened to the umlat? I barely recognized you!”

I removed it because my metalosity has been diminished by this topic. I no longer have the energy to be so F’n metal. Maybe after I get home from work, have a sandwhich, and rock out to some The Trooper by Iron Maiden I will recoup enough energy to place the umlat back in my name. Maybe it will take a serious Guitar Hero II session. I am a living room rockstar, much to my wife’s shagrin.

Until I re-up my metalosity I shall go sans umlat.

But I appreciate the concern.

*sigh*

*chagrin. Sorry.

See? My lack of metalosity is affecting my spelling.

“For example, Flight 93 was shot down. Planes don’t crash into three separate debris fields. The heroic passengers story is pure propaganda.”

So your “conspiracy” is OK, but others can’t have their own ideas about what did or didn’t happen on 9/11? And, if your observation is correct, it spoils the official story of 9/11, which means we should reopen and have a completely independent assessment of what really happened on that day.

Like, why did 77 hit the Pentagon 60+ minutes after 175 hit the WTC? What was the order that still stood that Dick Cheney gave to the subordinate as they were tracking 77 into the Pentagon? Why wasn’t Operation Vigilent Warrior/Guardian part of the official Commission report? And why haven’t we seen conclusive tapes of 77 hitting the Pentagon, taken from the gas station accross from the Pentagon? Eyewitnesses? What details do they see of an object supposedly traveling 500 MPH at ground level? Those pieces of debris could have easily been scattered by a huge-ass bomb that was packed with pieces of aluminum against the side of the Pentagon. And can one look at the crater in PA and truely believe 93 made that? And why is 93 locked away under armed guard in Iron Mountain?

I don’t profess to know what happened on 9/11, but I don’t believe the official Commission report that 19 Arab hijackers successfully commandeered 4 flights on 9/11 and beat the system the way this administration has written the story. I continue to search for answers because I don’t believe justice has been served for the 3000 that died that day. Call me a conspiracy kook/nutjob, but it will take more than peer pressured invectives to make me believe that this administration’s documented evil actions for the past 6 years were rooted in an attack of which they had no hand in facilitating.

Just a parting shot here:

I have been referred to as a “kook” by several people here who—I’d like to underline this—–have NO IDEA what I think happened on 9-11, because I have never said what I believe happened. All I have done on this entire thread, is poke holes in the notion that anyone who questions the official story needs to be dismissed out of hand as a lunatic. This premise evidently is too much for most of you. The minute I suggested that people who questioned the government’s explanation for the physical events of the day, and their sequence, might have excellent reasons to mistrust the Bush Administration, I invited a torrent of abuse. Now, isn’t that just a bit silly?

Also, I have noticed that all of the alternative theories that have been referred to by other posters have been lumped together, as though those who doubt the official version of events will believe anything and they all believe everything. There are conflicting ideologies, just as there are over any controversial event (if you doubt that, check out a bookshelf on the crucifixion of Christ at a municipal library some time). For example, there are those who postulate that explosives were used at the WTC but do not doubt that planes were involved; there are those who have poked large holes in the ID info about the hijackers and their flying ability but have no use for the “Cheney ordered a shoot down” scenario. It all depends on whom you speak to. And smearing a whole group of people by highlighting their most ridiculous membership is intellectually dishonest: it’s kind of like judging all rock and roll by bon jovi.

And I will close out by pointing out the breathtakingly obvious fact that you can know a detail about a book that you have picked up from a secondary source, without actually reading the book (I don’t know why there was so much hysteria over that point). Literally the ONLY thing I know about “The Turner Diaries” is the fact that at some point in the book there was a scenario of terrorist flying commercial jets into buildings. I honestly don’t remember who told me or where I read it, but I am certainly mystified as to why so many people wet their pants over it. (“She claims to know nothing about it,” blah blah blah? Yeah, so what’s your point??) Well, the point is that there are posters here so eager to pounce on and discredit someone with an open mind on the subject that they will use anything they can get their hands on—aha! She mentioned a controversial novel!—to try to discredit you.

This is mind boggling. And scary. Also…….not funny.

I have been referred to as a “kook” by several people here who—I’d like to underline this—–have NO IDEA what I think happened on 9-11

If you read back over your comments it’s pretty easy to see the same tedious shit that every other kook peddles. If we’re all mistaken, oh well. Write better.

“f you read back over your comments it’s pretty easy to see the same tedious shit that every other kook peddles. If we’re all mistaken, oh well. Write better.”

Well, if I need help with my writing skills, it’s pretty easy to see to whom I should turn.

So your “conspiracy” is OK, but others can’t have their own ideas about what did or didn’t happen on 9/11? And, if your observation is correct, it spoils the official story of 9/11, which means we should reopen and have a completely independent assessment of what really happened on that day.

I dunno anything about Flight 93, but if you want to open the investigation go get off your ass and open it.

I have been referred to as a “kook” by several people here who—I’d like to underline this—–have NO IDEA what I think happened on 9-11, because I have never said what I believe happened.

Great. 1000s of words without telling us what you think. Heaven forbid you should do something as obvious as that. Instead we’re treated to your condescension, implications (controlled demolition) and non sequiturs (Tuner Diaries, Jose Maria Aznar). When you’re challenged on your implications you just complain about being insulted or ignore the question. Thanks for wasting everyone’s time. Troll.

“Great. 1000s of words without telling us what you think. Heaven forbid you should do something as obvious as that. Instead we’re treated to your condescension, implications (controlled demolition) and non sequiturs (Tuner Diaries, Jose Maria Aznar). When you’re challenged on your implications you just complain about being insulted or ignore the question. Thanks for wasting everyone’s time. Troll.”

I haven’t told you what I think because I haven’t decided. I am uncertain. Is that not allowed? What i continue to take issue with is the reversion to personal abuse towards anyone who questions the government’s story. That was my initial response to the opening post of this thread and I stand by it.

Blah blah blah I personally do not believe the CIA was behind 9-11, but I don’t at all think it is a stretch to imagine that some people who have richly profited from the forthcoming events since then might have been somehow involved. Especially since there was a time that bin Laden (in his mujadeen years) WAS an important asset of our government… blah blah blah…

What conspiracy? I was trying to allow that there are elements of the official narrative which are difficult if not impossible to believe.
That does not force me to believe that it was a pre-planned inside job designed to be the biggest psych ops in history.
We’re abusing you primarily because you’re acting like an idiot, and calling us fools to boot. You’re acting like a wingnut, so you are treated as one.
But we’re also quite familiar with your claims. Most, if not all, of us have been to the same websites as you, seen the same documentaries, and asked many of the same questions. The problem, from your perspective, is we’re not leaping to conclusions based on our pre-established prejudices. I fully accept that CheneyCo is capable of such a bloody and manipulative act, but I don’t accept that they have the skills required to pull it off. One thing that is quite, quite clear about the authoritarian mindset is they can’t accept others forming negative opinions of them. Quite simply, they wouldn’t be able to accept hiding behind incompetency. However, going to great lengths to hide incompetency is exactly what one would expect the type to do.
Quite simply, you give them too much credit, because you are blinded by hate and anger. These folk are not evil geniuses, but incompetent, pathological, greed-heads.

I haven’t told you what I think because I haven’t decided. I am uncertain. Is that not allowed?

Sure that’s allowed and if I believed you I’d say come on back when you have decided what you believe. But see, I don’t believe you. You complain about being insulted but come around taking us for suckers who are going to believe you’re just playing devil’s advocates when really you just lack the guts to say what you really believe. No hard feelings though. Here’s some pie.

I’m glad this discussion is still going on because I get to read this blog way after it’s posted. I come here for the snark and the writers are the best and the commenters are just as funny. I was floored when I read the reaction of the commenters to that guy a few posts back about 9/11. I agree the guy should get his own blog and didn’t read the majority of his posts. As far as 9/11 goes, I think that there are more questions then answers. I mean legitimate answers, not the answers the conspiracy therorists want to hear. Unfortunately I have resolved myself to the fact that as long as the current govt. status quo stays in place we will never know the entire truth. I guess that makes me a conspiracy theorist. You know the one thing that could have shut most of the conspiracy theory down was the big release of the pentagons video footage of the plane that hit the pentagon. I watched it and still couldn’t tell. I watch the forensic shows on A&E and last night watched a segment on how NASA can enhance a photo to discern what the human eye cannot. If a US local police dept. can get NASA to enhance a photo why can’t we get enhancements of the video footage from the pentagon? Or any of the other million photos of the other planes that day. I guess I could go on and on about all the shit that just doesn’t add up no matter who’s doing the presenting but I won’t. This blog is one of the best as far as I’m concerned for exposing the hypocrisy that is known as the republican party, but man, when you’re on the receiving end of the snark it sure does knock the wind out of you. You guys are that good. P.S. I’m open to anyone sending along any NASA photo enhancements of said airplanes. I gave up looking into 9/11 a while back, the latest being the video from the architects and engineers which I thought was pretty informative.

Yeah, what Colleeen said!

“Sure that’s allowed and if I believed you I’d say come on back when you have decided what you believe. But see, I don’t believe you. You complain about being insulted but come around taking us for suckers who are going to believe you’re just playing devil’s advocates when really you just lack the guts to say what you really believe. No hard feelings though. Here’s some pie.”

See, you are a compulsive abuser. I hope you’re not married or living with a S.O. because man you must be a serious bully at home! I have never encountered such a hostile paranoic in my life! (And you say 9-11 questioners are paranoid? Look in the mirror!) Why would I lie to you about not having made up my mind? “Lack guts”? A moment’s thought would demonstrate that’s not logical, because if I committed to saying I believed ALex Jones 100%, say, or David Ray Griffin, I couldn’t possibly get any more abuse here than I have already gotten.

My theory is that you were placed in a wrestling ring instead of a playpen at a young age and never recovered.

“Yesterday, joannegm showed up on one of those threads, with the standard truther fare.” Post a link. Prove it. Can’t—because you made that up; it’s a lie.

I have not posted any “standard truther fare” anywhere. As a matter of fact I didn’t even post anywhere yesterday as I was away from my desk. I did not even encounter this link until about noon today.

I’m with Doc Amazing, t4toby, and Colleen. And I’ll explain what I mean, so no sniping at me, okay guys?

Firstly, one of the multitudinous problems is that there are a lot of details about the events of that day: there are, therefore, a lot of unanswered questions, or official explanations that don’t hold water, or just fiddlyfaddly bits.

This leads to anyone who sees something wrong in, say, the fact that it took over an hour to get any fighter jets off the ground, being lumped in with folks who say that aliens killed flight 93 with a death ray while they were trying to return Elvis. That is, quite reasonable questions, with implications either of astonishing incompetence, deliberate use of a convenient accident, or planned and malign intent, get treated as tinfoil hat requests.

Yes, I know there are nutcases who get strident. Yes, the Bush administration has made terrific hay out of that day. No, I don’t think they set it up.

For what it’s worth, I think there are a lot of questions about the official explanation that should be examined. I also think they probably will never be examined, and at the moment our time and energy would be much better spent preventing the psychos in government from doing any more damage, rather than obsessing about their possible responsibility for past tragedies.

Let the cream pies fly.

CFR’s Hart Suggests False Flag Event For Iran War September 27 , 2007
Steve Watson

Council on Foreign Relations member Gary Hart , famed for stating that Americans will die en- mass on home soil this century, and for declaring 48 hours after 9/11 that it should be used “to carry out a new world order”, has written a scathing letter to the leaders of Iran clearly warning that the U.S. government has a history of staging provocations in order to initiate conflict with other nations and that Iran could be next.

Hart references the sinking of the USS Maine in Havana harbor in 1898, which led to the Spanish American war, as well as the Gulf of Tonkin incident, which was ultimately the catalyst for airstrikes on Vietnam.

Why does Hart reference these two cases? Because they are both examples of staged managed events that were used to coerce the American public into supporting war.

The sinking of the Maine was immediately blamed on the Spanish, with the innovator of yellow journalism William Randolph-Hearst enflaming anti-Spanish sentiment in his papers by definitively claiming that it was a Spanish plot. No reliable evidence was ever produced linking Spain to the event and it is now widely believed that the event was at best a mechanical failure or at worst a false flag operation.

Similarly the Gulf of Tonkin incident saw President Johnson accuse North Vietnamese PT boats of attacking strike carries in the gulf, the USS Maddox and the USS Turner Joy. Documents and tapes released via the Freedom of Information Act have since shown that Johnson knew that there were no PT boats and no attacks, but still went ahead with lying to the American public on national TV to garner support for escalating the war in Vietnam. Johnson also had the NSA fake intelligence data to make it appear as if the two US ships had been lost.

Hart, one of the instigators of the Homeland Security apparatus that has evolved since 9/11, then goes on to state that American people are reluctant to go to war unless provoked and coldly remarks “For historians of American wars the question is whether we provoke provocations.”

He then mentions the Iraq war and refers to how the public were duped into accepting the invasion via the spectre of 9/11. Hart writes “even in this instance, we were led to believe that the mass murderer of American civilians, Osama bin Laden, was lurking, literally or figuratively, in the vicinity of Baghdad.”

To those who do not read history Gary Hart’s letter makes for a confusing read, but to those who know anything about staged provocations, the intent is clear. Hart is declaring that the elite controlled US government has attacked countries based on false pretenses in the past and will gladly do so again.

Hart’s declarations carry the same sentiment as those of fellow globalist Zbigniew Brzezinski earlier this year. The Former National Security Advisor and founding member of the elite policy making group the Trilateral Commission implicitly warned a Senate Foreign Relations Committee that an attack on Iran could be launched following a staged provocation in Iraq or a false flag terror attack within the U.S.

Brzezinski alluded to the potential for the Bush administration to manufacture a false flag Gulf of Tonkin type incident in describing a “plausible scenario for a military collision with Iran,” which would revolve around “some provocation in Iraq or a terrorist act in the US blamed on Iran, culminating in a ?defensive’ US military action against Iran that plunges a lonely America into a spreading and deepening quagmire eventually ranging across Iraq, Iran, Afghanistan and Pakistan.?

Texas Congressman and Presidential candidate Ron Paul has also recently warned that a “Gulf of Tonkin like event” may be used to provoke air strikes on Iran as numerous factors collide to heighten expectations that America may soon be embroiled in its third war in six years.

Here is Gary Hart’s letter in full:

Unsolicited Advice to the Government of Iran

Presuming that you are not actually ignorant enough to desire war with the United States, you might be well advised to read the history of the sinking of the U.S.S. Maine in Havana harbor in 1898 and the history of the Gulf of Tonkin in 1964.

Having done so, you will surely recognize that Americans are reluctant to go to war unless attacked. Until Pearl Harbor, we were even reluctant to get involved in World War II. For historians of American wars the question is whether we provoke provocations.

Given the unilateral U.S. invasion of Iraq in 2003, you are obviously thinking the rules have changed. Provocation is no longer required to take America to war. But even in this instance, we were led to believe that the mass murderer of American civilians, Osama bin Laden, was lurking, literally or figuratively, in the vicinity of Baghdad.

Given all this, you would probably be well advised to keep your forces, including clandestine forces, as far away from the Iraqi border as you can. You might even consider bringing in some neighbors to verify that you are not shipping arms next door. Tone down the rhetoric on Zionism. You’ve established your credentials with those in your world who thrive on that.

If it makes you feel powerful to hurl accusations at the American eagle, have at it. Sticks and stones, etc. But, for the next sixteen months or so, you should not only not take provocative actions, you should not seem to be doing so.

For the vast majority of Americans who seek no wider war, in the Middle East or elsewhere, don’t tempt fate. Don’t give a certain vice president we know the justification he is seeking to attack your country. That is unless you happen to like having bombs fall on your head.Hart, one of the instigators of the Homeland Security apparatus that has evolved since 9/11, then goes on to state that American people are reluctant to go to war unless provoked and coldly remarks “For historians of American wars the question is whether we provoke provocations.”

He then mentions the Iraq war and refers to how the public were duped into accepting the invasion via the spectre of 9/11. Hart writes “even in this instance, we were led to believe that the mass murderer of American civilians, Osama bin Laden, was lurking, literally or figuratively, in the vicinity of Baghdad.”

To those who do not read history Gary Hart’s letter makes for a confusing read, but to those who know anything about staged provocations, the intent is clear. Hart is declaring that the elite controlled US government has attacked countries based on false pretenses in the past and will gladly do so again.

Hart’s declarations carry the same sentiment as those of fellow globalist Zbigniew Brzezinski earlier this year. The Former National Security Advisor and founding member of the elite policy making group the Trilateral Commission implicitly warned a Senate Foreign Relations Committee that an attack on Iran could be launched following a staged provocation in Iraq or a false flag terror attack within the U.S.

Brzezinski alluded to the potential for the Bush administration to manufacture a false flag Gulf of Tonkin type incident in describing a “plausible scenario for a military collision with Iran,” which would revolve around “some provocation in Iraq or a terrorist act in the US blamed on Iran, culminating in a ‘defensive’ US military action against Iran that plunges a lonely America into a spreading and deepening quagmire eventually ranging across Iraq, Iran, Afghanistan and Pakistan.”

Texas Congressman and Presidential candidate Ron Paul has also recently warned that a “Gulf of Tonkin like event” may be used to provoke air strikes on Iran as numerous factors collide to heighten expectations that America may soon be embroiled in its third war in six years.

whatever your names is lady truther- Stuff like that is why you got confused with the misnamed Thinker, who was posting self-righteous truther nonsense yesterday like you are now.
Your response to lawnguylander is very, very telling, albeit not in the ways you’d like.
Qetesh- I agree with the questions you voice. I doubt much of anyone here doesn’t. What I, at least, am basically saying is “fuck off conspiracy theorists, this is real”. I don’t think I know what really happened, but I know that no “lone gunmen” are going to figure it out.

I’m sorry, I still don’t see what doesn’t add up. I trust these assholes as far as I can throw Hastert, and when a bunch of “Iranians” sink a Circle Line or what the fuck ever, yeah, I’ll doubt the official story, but c’mon, the official story about 9/11 is this:

1. Radical Islamic terrorists pull off a media-savvy sucker punch, by exploiting America’s inexperience with this sort of thing

2. Nixon-era insiders scramble to shoehorn their preexisting plans/fantasies into this barely-even-tangential window of opportunity
3. They play Bush like a fiddle, his pliancy in this regard being the main reason they went all kingmaker on him in the first place

3’s irrelevant, I guess, but it’s a list, gotta have at least three. Look, maybe I swallowed the CW because it’s totally damning and reinforces everything I ever thought about these sons of bitches, fundie terrorists included, but I remember the very public discombobulation of those who would use 9/11 to their advantage, and I remember how ham-handed they were when they switched gears on us–I mean, what, was Rumsfeld not in on it?

What doubts are there to have amidst all the blatant perfidy? What, because you aren’t comfortable with the conclusions of experts who’ve never studied the aftermath of anything even remotely like this ever? You’re saying it could’ve been Bigfoot when it looked an awful lot like a bear.

Okay, sorry, I’m being a dick, but can someone please tell me what it is, specifically, that doesn’t add up? I’m not saying I can answer your questions, it’s just that everyone says they have ’em but I don’t know what they are.

p.s. I’m not against conspiracy theories per se. I’m actually working on one about Wes Clark’s 180 on Iran.

p.p.s. I’m just primal-screaming is all. Nobody should feel compelled to respond. Though I AM curious.

For what it’s worth, I think there are a lot of questions about the official explanation that should be examined.

People don’t say what these questions are and when they do they turn out to have answers that are unacceptable to them.

Whatever your questions are, they actually have answers, but people keep insisting they don’t against all evidence. Then they concentrate on details like “why won’t the Pentagon blah blah blah” as if the Pentagon not doing X means that a plane didn’t smash into a building that day. Well it fucking did and no amount of pot will change that.

It’s a really irritating dance.

I don’t know “the whole story” and likely never will as it was a pretty goddamn complicated day and I don’t want to research every last thing just to argue with nuts. But not knowing the whole story doesn’t equate to “Cheney planned it” no matter how evil I believe he is.

What the ‘truthers’ don’t seem to realise is that IF the Team Bush had been behind 9/11, they wouldn’t have kept it a secret. They would have argued that it was essential for national security, and that such an attack would have a positive effect on the economy and stopping gay marriage. And that anyone who disagreed was unpatriotic.

Then Congressional Democrats would have rolled over, and that would be it.

a different brad, what mean em “self righteous truther nonsense”? Did you even read the post? Define your terms.

“Truther” meaning “anything I didn’t see on CNN therefore it doesn’t exist”?

Did you read my post?
I’m quite familiar with truther arguments. Every so often I hold my nose and visit a half dozen websites to keep up with your latest fantasies.
Anyway, whatevah. You’ve made this too personal to bother to keep feeding. None of this is ultimately about you, except insofar as you’re gullible and don’t realize it, just like most religious folk and Bush voters.

Oh, wait, you probably only read one post out of several. Fine, long thread, I retract that part of my snark.
Still, the presumption that everyone who doesn’t agree with you is ignorant is, again, one of those revealing moments you’d be better off avoiding repeating.

What Doc Amazing et al said.

In addition:

I don’t think Bush/Cheney planned 9-11 but they are certainly vicious enough to have allowed it to happen- they could be ignorant of the details of the operation but hey, here was their ‘new Pearl Harbor’ ready-made…what’s not for them to like?

Addtionally, it might not have been a missile that hit the Pentagon- I’m really not sure what it was- but it wasn’t a B757 either. There wasn’t nearly enough debris, and nothing like the sort of fire that would erupt from several thousand gallons of Jet-A sprayed all over the place. And where were the flight data recorders? The passengers/seats/body parts? It didn’t look like any crash site I’ve ever seen for that size airplane. Sure, they found a few B757 parts scattered around…just not nearly enough for a disaster of this magnitude. As to what happened to the AA plane, perhaps it was shot down at sea, meeting and end similar to the UAL ’75 over PA.

The flying skills and experience required to center-punch that relatively low-lying building at speeds in the neighborhood of 300 knots, in a plane the size of a B757, would have been beyond the abilities of what were in effect student pilots…it was no WTC, size-wise. On the other hand it wouldn’t have been all that difficult with a smaller airplane such as a large business jet or fighter, which would explain the small amount of wreckage and fire damage.

I’m puzzled by people who are normally skeptical of the Repuke/fascist trash running the gov’t, yet consider its explanations re 9-11 the gospel truth. Like Peak Oil and its terrifying implications, it is disturbing to consider the consequences of the government lying to us yet again, but we should think about it nonetheless.

And as previous posters have pointed out, who would have thought in the 60s that Johnson lied about the Tonkin Gulf incident? I’m sure that anyone that raised that question would have been dismissed as a ‘commie kook’…but in the end the ‘kooks’ were right. It’s hardly the first time that our government has considered sacrificing American soldiers/citizens to further a political agenda…

People don’t say what these questions are and when they do they turn out to have answers that are unacceptable to them.

Well, questions such as “Why the fuck did no-one manage to get a single jet in the air for over an hour?”, for example. Given that jetboys pride themselves on how quick they can get airborne, you have to admit that this is a trifle tardy, particularly for a country that outspends the entire rest of the world on ‘defense’. I’m surprised that no-one ever made a point of that, to be honest.

Note that this does not mean I believe that Cheney tied them all down with his garter belt: it merely means that the official narrative has holes in it that I’d have thought someone somewhere would have noticed.

Whatever your questions are, they actually have answers, but people keep insisting they don’t against all evidence. Then they concentrate on details like “why won’t the Pentagon blah blah blah” as if the Pentagon not doing X means that a plane didn’t smash into a building that day. Well it fucking did and no amount of pot will change that.

Again, I said there are questions about the official story: I did not say that aliens blew up the Pentagon or whatever. The questions are about the details because the details reveal the discrepencies, not because the details prove the evilnessnessness of Cheney.

I don’t know “the whole story” and likely never will as it was a pretty goddamn complicated day and I don’t want to research every last thing just to argue with nuts. But not knowing the whole story doesn’t equate to “Cheney planned it” no matter how evil I believe he is.

Again, Righteous Bubba, I have to point out that you’re conflating someone (ie me) who doesn’t believe the whole official narrative with someone (ie loonies) who think Cheney planned it. That’s not the case, as I’m sure you know. There’s a whole wide spectrum of thoughts on this issue, just as there’s a whole wide spectrum of political and economic views.

And I still think that our time is better spent on trying to prevent future atrocities, not on arguing about ones that have already happened.

Hey, john_manyjars: you got John Bigboote with you?

Well, questions such as “Why the fuck did no-one manage to get a single jet in the air for over an hour?”, for example.

This question has been dealt with plausibly. I have seen articles and documentaries detailing the command structure and what went wrong. It’s been how many years now? And you still have this question? The answer is really that you’re too lazy to have looked or the question isn’t important. Whichever it is, it’s not worth throwing your lot in with the nuts to deal with it.

Look: I’m surprised that no-one ever made a point of that, to be honest.

THOUSANDS OF PEOPLE HAVE AND THIS HAS BEEN ANSWERED AND YOU WEREN’T PAYING ATTENTION AND YOU THINK YOUR DOUBTS HAVE LEGITIMACY BECAUSE YOU WEREN’T LOOKING.

Again, Righteous Bubba, I have to point out that you’re conflating someone (ie me) who doesn’t believe the whole official narrative with someone (ie loonies) who think Cheney planned it.

Note this: I’m with Doc Amazing, t4toby, and Colleen.

One of these three at least believes that no plane hit the Pentagon, a story so fabulously absurd that you can pick out idiots and ignoramuses by referring to it. If you’re not in that company don’t put yourself in it.

And I still think that our time is better spent on trying to prevent future atrocities, not on arguing about ones that have already happened.

!!! Then don’t argue about it. Go edit the wikipedia articles about it and pay attention to the talk page. People there are mostly pretty good about proof.

Ooh! Ooh! I was hoping someone would say this:

“Addtionally, it might not have been a missile that hit the Pentagon- I’m really not sure what it was- but it wasn’t a B757 either. There wasn’t nearly enough debris”

DUDE. Come ON. Those plane crashes you’re used to seeing on the news, where the fuselage is split in half or one of the wings is sheared off or some such? Those happened right after takeoff. As in, a mere fraction of a second after. Or a spooged landing, whichever, but the point is, if a plane wreck is recognizable as such, that means the plane was going really really slow by aeroplanin’ standards. The one that hit the Pentagon was fucking vaporized, and you’re asking for proof in the form of a mini-bottle of Tanqueray.

I swear to Christ, if a high-profile neocon ever got caught reading “Origin of Species,” you guys would be yammering on about irreducible complexity.

Joanne,

I have thought things over and I think it was wrong of me to suggest that a lack of guts is what has prevented you from telling us what you really think. It’s dishonesty actually. You think you’re arguing from a stronger position if you play devil’s advocate. I think your gasping umbrage at the abuse you say you’ve suffered is another tactic. Carry on pretending nobody is noticing though.

Glad to see this discussion still going on. I actually went to the NASA site to see if they had anything, nope. I thought I asked a perfectly legitimate question in my earlier post. Why can’t we get NASA to enhance the video footage of the airplane crashing into the pentagon? I mean beside the obvious answer that they are a govt. agency. Are they they only ones capable of that kind of enhancement? Funny thing is, it’s not even the pentagon unanswered questions that have me stumped. It is building number 7. Even that day, something didn’t sit right with any of us glued to the tv that day. Building number 7 isn’t about getting the answers that I want to hear, it’s about the answers are not acceptable to me as a rational thinking human. Even though george bush makes me feel like a rocket scientist these days, I’m not. I am smart enough to know that fire did not bring that building down. Well whatever, I do feel horrible for the people that lost loved ones because they will never get the answers in my opinion. Anyhoo, here’s a link to that architects and engineers video, http://www.ae911truth.org/ if anyone wants to check it out. So, um thanks for letting me get my wacky thoughts out here. Now I’m going to newer sadlyno posts which I hope will make me laugh. Happy Friday everyone.

Why can’t we get NASA to enhance the video footage of the airplane crashing into the pentagon?

Did you phone them and ask?

It is building number 7.

This has been dealt with over and over again. Try here and go argue with him: http://www.debunking911.com/pull.htm

Pods! Nukes! Planes? No Planes? Hole in the ground and no wreckage!
Inside Job!

(Deep Breath)

Ok guys, cut the crap. Look around. Is this the America we were born into, or has it changed into something else?
9/11 no longer matters. Let me type that again, 9/11 no longer matters.

What does matter is that this country has turned into a copy/paste of the USSR.

What, exactly, are you prepared to do about it.

Think Fast, time is short.

-Snow

Emailed to 2500 opinion-shapers weekly
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There are no secrets better kept than the
secrets that everybody guesses. ~G.B.Shaw

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[TAKE A REPUBLICAN TO LUNCH
And Talk Some Sense into Them
Before It’s Too Late]

From THE HILL:
Leaders should tell the truth to start to rectify war debacle
By Brent Budowsky
September 26, 2007

….Things have been done in our country, by our leaders, in our times, that have never been done before, and must never be done again.

Will we be known by historians as the partisan generation? The shirker generation? The fearful generation? Or will we belatedly rise to the occasion, learning the lessons of the heroes of our greatest generation, who knew that America can do anything if we are honest with each other and united in our purpose?…
http://thehill.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=68681&Itemid=74

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Seven CIA Veterans Challenge 9/11 Commission Report
OpEdNews – Newtown,PA,USA

…. [Talk radio host Thom]Hartmann then asked, “So you are personally of the opinion … that there was an aspect of ‘inside job’ to 9/11 within the US government?”…

http://www.opednews.com/articles/genera_alan_mil_070922_seven_cia_veterans_c.htm

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CINDY SHEEHAN ADDRESSES SAFETY MOMS

At What Price, Safety?

by Cindy Sheehan / September 19th, 2007

I am consistently amazed at things that right-wing nut jobs throw at me to justify their support of an unjustifiable war. Seriously, when you watch Generals, Ambassadors, Senators and Congress Reps and pundits who still cheerlead for a miserable, failed and murderous policy you can almost see the skepticism in their eyes, too. They know they are lying for their masters now, if they, like George and Dick didn’t always know they were lying.

However, a measly segment of our population are still so willingly ill-informed and ignorant of the facts are grasping for straws….

….One of the more morally reprehensible notes from the supporters of death I receive is the one that goes something like this: “I am for peace, too, but not at the expense of my family.” These people are saying that it is okay to ruin my family and thousands of other families in the US who have been torn apart like the bodies of our loved ones to keep other families “safe.” I have news for these people, as bad as the sacrifices have been for some families in America, the people of Iraq have suffered far more for the deceptions and greed of BushCo. Think about this: America killed over a million Iraqis between Gulf I and this current occupation, and that did not keep my family safe, or the families of the people killed in 9-11. How can one sleep at night thinking that her family is safe when so many people are devastated by the policies that she thinks is keeping her family safe? Never mind the National Intelligence Estimates that have rightly showed that our transgressions in Iraq and such inhumane prison camps as Guantanamo and Abu Ghraib are increasing Islamic extremism.

What makes Mrs. Safety think that the Iraqi babies are less precious than her babies? Does the geographic accident of her baby’s births give them more right to be safe than the Iraqi babies? Maybe Mrs. Safety thinks that her babies deserve more protection because they are white and Christian? Or just maybe because they are hers?…

….They are all our sons and daughters as Casey was your son.

We have to stop giving our leaders free-passes to kill our children, anywhere and everywhere.

http://truthaction.org/forum/viewtopic.php?t=2262&sid=19ec6714e826484bb8f41923ba848fea

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[City Council Head Introduces 9/11 Truth Presentation in Bloomington]

Kevin Ryan
Fri, 09/14/2007

We had a very successful event here in Bloomington, Indiana this week. The full theater audience of 600 stayed for over three hours without a break to hear outstanding presentations by Richard Gage and Steven Jones, and gave a standing ovation at the end. The event attracted three city council representatives, and our city council president gave the introduction. A number of architects, scientists and other professionals were in attendance.

Much thanks to the Bloomington 9/11 Working Group, whose sacrifice and heroic efforts made it all work.

Below are two articles, one from Bloomington Herald-Times, published just before the event, and the other from the Indiana Daily Student, published the day after.

Bloomington Herald-Times
Forum looks to account for what doesn’t add up about 9/11
Mike Leonard, 9/09/007

Eye-rolling. Weight-shifting. Body language ranging from anxiety to anger.

Bloomington city councilman Dave Rollo and local chemist Kevin Ryan acknowledge that they see it all when they broach the subject of Sept. 11 and tell people that the purported facts as have been presented to the public just don’t add up.

“They don’t want to hear it,” says Ryan, a quality control manager for a local pharmaceutical company. “And I feel for them on that. If the official story is as false as it appears to be, we’re so far down the wrong road in this country it’s breathtaking.”

Rollo says he was a bit of an eye-roller himself at one point….
http://www.911blogger.com/node/11366#comment-161217

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Paul Craig Roberts, former top Reagan official, once again questions 9/11

Paul Craig Roberts, whose credentials can’t be denied, presents another crystal clear article questioning 9/11:

On Sept. 7, National Public Radio reported that Muslims in the Middle East were beginning to believe that the 9-11 attacks on the WTC and Pentagon were false flag operations committed by some part of the U.S. and/ or Israeli government.

It was beyond the imagination of the NPR reporter and producer that there could be any substance to these beliefs, which were attributed to the influence of books by U.S. and European authors sold in bookstores in Egypt.

NPR’s concern was that books by Western authors questioning the origin of the 9-11 attack have the undesirable result of removing guilt from Muslims’ shoulders.

The NPR reporter, Ursula Lindsey, said that “here in the U.S., most people have little doubt about what happened during the 2001 attacks.”

NPR’s assumption that the official 9-11 story is the final word is uninformed. Polls show that 36 percent of Americans and more than 50 percent of New Yorkers lack confidence in the 9-11 commission report. Many 9-11 families who lost relatives in the attacks are unsatisfied with the official story….
http://www.911blogger.com/node/11269

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9/11 explains the impotence of the antiwar movement
By GeorgeWashington
Created 2007-09-14 10:01
Online Journal has the essay [1]

By Paul Craig Roberts

The antiwar movement has proven impotent to stop the war in Iraq despite the fact that the war was initiated on the basis of lies and deception….
http://www.911blogger.com/node/11363

========================

U.S. Navy ‘Top Gun’ Pilot Questions 9/11

Sept. 5, 2007 – U.S. Navy ‘Top Gun’ pilot, Commander Ralph Kolstad, started questioning the official account of 9/11 within days of the event. “It just didn’t make any sense to me,” he said. And now 6 years after 9/11 he says, “When one starts using his own mind, and not what one was told, there is very little to believe in the official story.”

Click here for the full story on OpEdNews http://www.opednews.com/articles/genera_alan_mil_070905_u_s__navy__top_g…

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BLUEPRINT FOR TRUTH
The Architecture of Destruction

Now Available: The DVD from Architects & Engineers for 9/11 Truth!

The 150+ Architects and Engineers for 9/11 Truth are proud to announce their long awaited DVD production:

9/11: Blueprint for Truth
The Architecture of Destruction
with SF Bay Area Architect, Richard Gage, AIA
http://www.ae911truth.org/store.php

In this stunning multimedia presentation to the University of Manitoba, Canada, San Francisco Bay Area architect, Richard Gage, AIA, provides a packed audience with a tough technical review of the overwhelming evidence of controlled demolition using explosives at all 3 WTC high-rise “collapses” (including WTC 7 – the 47 story high-rise, not hit by an airplane, which also fell at near free-speed on 9/11).

Now you can provide your friends and colleagues the DVD with all the hard evidence presented by a licensed building professional!

Source URL:
http://www.911blogger.com/node/11030

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More Professors Demanding New 9/11 Investigation

University of Massachusetts professor Margulis joins hundreds of distinguished academics and professionals in calling for new, independent 9/11 Investigation:

“The 9/11 tragedy is the most successful and most perverse publicity stunt in the history of public relations. I arrive at this conclusion largely as the result of the research and clear writing by David Ray Griffin in his fabulous books about 9/11. I first met him when he was a speaker at a scholarly conference unrelated to 9/11. He immediately impressed me as a brilliant, outstanding philosopher – theologian – author, a Whiteheadian scholar motivated by an intense curiosity to know everything possible about the world.

“On the plane home and for the next two days I did little else but read Griffin’s first book about 9/11, The New Pearl Harbor. From there I went on to read his even more disturbing account of the bogus 9/11 Commission Report, The 9/11 Commission Report: Omissions and Distortions, which provides overwhelming evidence that the official story is contradictory, incomplete, and unbelievable….”
http://patriotsquestion911.com/margulis.html

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We Thought We Were Free: 9/11 Was Our Reichstag Fire

Was September eleven 2001 our generation’s Reichstag Fire? Read Thom Hartmann’s intro to and excerpts from THEY THOUGHT THEY WERE FREE, and see. http://www.buzzflash.com/hartmann/05/11/har05011.html

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