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September 12, 2003 QUESTIONS ABOUT 9/11....Via Unfogged, this is a genuinely interesting list of 20 questions about 9/11 that we don't have answers to. I can't say that every one of the items is genuinely mysterious, but several of them dealt with things that I had never heard of. Here's #2:
Read the rest. I especially recommend #3, #7, #12, and #16. And while #1 is hardly news, I'd sure like to know the answer anyway. It would be easy for George Bush to let us know. Posted by Kevin Drum at September 12, 2003 08:48 PM | TrackBackComments
if you want to whet your conspiracy appetite, check this out. it's got everything. it boggles the mind. and even better, it's basically non-partisan. Posted by: ChrisL at September 12, 2003 09:10 PM | PERMALINKI hesitate to say this, because the righty folks will get all bent out of shape: But on some of these questions, our Gov't is behaving like the good ol' USSR. Stonewalling, secrecy, letting people unwittingly sacrifice their health, letting important, public investigations stop dead. It is a shame on our gov't. They serve us. The secrecy meme has gotten out of control in the US gov't. Go read up on how the Soviets handled Chernobyl -- there are some sad parallels. Who would have thought, right here in the leading nation of the free world? On several of these questions (though not all) it seems like the gov't really doesn't have anything to hide, either. It is simply secrecy for secrecy's sake. Posted by: Timothy Klein at September 12, 2003 09:38 PM | PERMALINKI wonder if it would be an effective strategy to portray Bush as a guy who knew. Simply challenge him to take a monitored polygraph test in which he is asked about his knowledge of the attacks, and his connections with saudis. I'd bet a tinfoil hat these guys can all be traced back to the skull and bones society at yale... Posted by: Anon at September 12, 2003 10:07 PM | PERMALINKIf Bush/Cheney are defeated in the coming elections, their adminstration will remain in power November 2004 until January of '05. That 3-month period is going to be critical, as there will be a major effort to destroy or hide any evidence relating to the WTC attacks. It's time for Congress or somebody to start thinking about this and take preemptive action. Posted by: peter jung at September 12, 2003 10:42 PM | PERMALINK12.Why did 7 World Trade Center collapse? This one didn't ever trouble me that much. It collapsed because a building twice as tall of it collapsed on top of it, one would assume. Posted by: neil at September 12, 2003 11:53 PM | PERMALINKone would assume. That's the gist of the problem. Shouldn't there be some kind of record, some engineering report, if this were true? Posted by: Boronx at September 13, 2003 12:20 AM | PERMALINKThey're all good questions, but why NORAD didn't shoot the planes down does fly in the face of everything we were told from 1950-1989: "No Soviet jet can get through to bomb us." Was that all a lie? It makes me wonder. Posted by: Linkmeister at September 13, 2003 12:34 AM | PERMALINKLinkmester Makes me wonder, too. I worked with a guy who was a former employee at SAC, and he was quite flabergasted. He said during his tenure, in the past, 15 min was their response time. They had it drilled into their heads all the time -- they had 15 minutes to get planes into the air and knock down any threat. He also said that the idea of being forced to shoot down civilian friendlies was not alien to them, either -- they trained for that possibility. (They didn't like it, but recognized that any plane could pose a threat). Posted by: Timothy Klein at September 13, 2003 12:43 AM | PERMALINKRemember when golfer Payne Stewart's plane was detected going off course? As I recall, fighter jets intercepted his plane about 6 minutes later. There is no good excuse for our very expensive air force not to have been similarly efficient on 9/11. Those who ordered that stand down should be tried for treason and shot live on CNN and FAUX at Ground Zero. Then we get back to the real terrorists. Posted by: pessimist at September 13, 2003 01:06 AM | PERMALINK"Did either Ashcroft or the Pentagon have advance information about a 9/11-style attack and, if so, why wasn't this shared with the American public?" Yeah that's right, the Pentagon had advance warning of the attacks, but Donald Rumsfeld still decided to go into work when the planes were due to hit. And of course Ashcroft knew as well but forgot to mention it to Ted Olsen. And Bush is behind the Kennedy assassination and the Roswell landings too. Posted by: Ross at September 13, 2003 01:18 AM | PERMALINKRoss, of couse, is completely correct about any paranoid theories that the White House had any suspicion that "a 9/11-style attack" was a serious possibility. (The same reasoning applies there as with the theories that FDR deliberately let Pearl Harbor get bombed flat.) But I would still like to know more about the precise nature of those "threat asssessments" and "security concerns" that CBS and Newsweek mention. Is it possible that the government received some kind of very vague warning, but became obsessed with the idea that the threat could only possibly involve bombs on airliners? Posted by: Bruce Moomwa at September 13, 2003 02:28 AM | PERMALINKBruce:I think for the answer for that you need to do some searching in the memory hole. Pre 9/11, the debate on the security front was "rogue missles" vs. terrorism. The Bush admin was pushing that the real danger was missles from rogue nations, and pushing NMD. In doing this, they basically dismissed any concerns regarding terrorism, including cutting funding used to fight it. As well, I believe this basically blinded them to any evidence that may have come in regarding 9/11. (The Phoenix memo, for example) Not so much malicious, really, but this really disgusts me, that they ignored national security for political gain. Of course, when 9/11 happened they changed their tune and nobody remembers. Actually, what really bugs me is that the Bush admin seem to be only using 9/11 for political gain. Everything they do surrounding this has a political tinge to it. And this is one thing I would hope would be apolitical..if anything is. Posted by: Karmakin at September 13, 2003 03:00 AM | PERMALINKWow. Do the words "grassy knoll" and "Vince Foster" ring any bells here? So, Bush doesn't want this blame hunt to go on. Big shock. He's tearing a page out of his predecessor's handbook. Different issue, same principle. This has the signs of turning into a Bush Hunt, similar to the Clinton Hunt the wacko righties were engaged in. The tone is eerily similar. Air defense of the continental United States, once upon a time a vital strategic priority, has since that time fallen into a neglected afterthought. Some of this was the result of budgeting, but mostly it was a result of deliberate changes in national strategy. During the 1950's and into the 1960's the US Air Force was divided into three main combat commands. The Strategic Air Command of long range bombers armed with nuclear bombs, the Air Defense Command of Fighter-Interceptors arrayed to shoot down attacking Soviet nuclear bombers, and the Tactical Air Command of light bombers, photo recon aircraft and fighter-bombers for fighting on the front lines in Europe and Asia in co-operation with the US Army. And the three commands were funded and valued in the same ranking as I just listed. One example of the higher priority ADC had over TAC was the F-86 Sabre jet production. The US Army had powerful Nike Ajax and Nike Hercules surface to air missiles based in protective rings around many US Cities. Elaborate lines of early warning radar stations were built in Canada and the Arctic Circle to watch for enemy air attack. The Royal Canadian Air Force was integrated into the master plan for continental air defense. Civil Defense air raid sirens dotted many cities and were a familiar sound from periodic testing. Fighter squadrons of NORAD were kept in a very high state of rediness with at least some portion of each squadron ready to take off within minutes. The Navy Skyray squadron at San Diego even set a record fast 90 second response rate, 90 seconds from the point of first warning to the point of the alert Skyrays clearing the runway in flight. But with the growth of the intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) threat starting from 1957, the importance of NORAD grew into question. Why defend against enemy bombers if enemy missiles could bypass our air defenses? New theories of Mutually Assured Destruction (MAD) began to supplant the old strategy relying on defense. Followup projects to replace the aging fighters, missiles and radars of NORAD were downgraded and delayed. During the Nixon administration, the guardian anti-aircraft missiles were scrapped and the launch sites closed. The Civil Defense air raid sirens went silent. Now NORAD was mainly considered an early warning system, instead of a defense system. NORAD's job now to merely to blow the whistle announcing the start of a worldwide nuclear holocaust. Eventually even the Air Defense Command ceased to exist, it's assets absorbed into the new Tactical Command which also absorbed the bomber assets of the old Strategic Air Command and the fighter-bombers of the old Tactical Air Command. Although Tactical Command still has the theoretical mission of National air defense, in reality it's focus is on deployment to overseas combat very like the mission of the once third priority Tactical Air Command. It's no great surprise that the air defenses of the United States were found wanting on 9-11-01, it was a long road from 1961 to 2001, and one taken by choice. Our great offensive power was supposed to 'deter' enemy attack, so why have defenses? In fact according to the conventional thinking having defenses is a bad thing because it could scare our enemies into thinking we no longer wanted to partipate in a mutual nuclear suicide pact. We got hit so easily on 9-11 because we deliberately made our nation into a soft target. I can't help but marvel at the parallel reasoning used by the old critics of air defenses to the reasoning used by the new critics of ballistic missile defenses. In the 1960's we heard "why have air defenses if the enemy will bypass them with ballistic missiles?" Today we hear "why have ballistic missile defenses if the enemy can just sneak a WMD into harbor aboard a container ship?" Maybe vigorous air defenses couldn't have stopped the 9-11 attacks. But maybe air defense might have worked. I know I will feel a little bit safer when the first anti-ballistic missile system is due for initial limited deployment in Alaska in 2004. If the lunatic commie pygmy tyrant of North Korea launches a rocket aimed at California in a fit of insanity, there will at least be a chance to stop the rocket before it hits. Better to have real defenses than rely upon our enemies acting rationally. Posted by: Brad at September 13, 2003 04:41 AM | PERMALINK"It's no great surprise that the air defenses of the United States were found wanting on 9-11-01, it was a long road from 1961 to 2001, and one taken by choice. Our great offensive power was supposed to 'deter' enemy attack, so why have defenses? In fact according to the conventional thinking, having defenses is a bad thing because it could scare our enemies into thinking we no longer wanted to partipate in a mutual nuclear suicide pact. We got hit so easily on 9-11 because we deliberately made our nation into a soft target." Rubbish. Our strategy worked perfectly well in doing what it was supposed to do -- deterring an attack by the Soviet Union. What we failed to do was adapt to the new Age of Megaterrorism. "I know I will feel a little bit safer when the first anti-ballistic missile system is due for initial limited deployment in Alaska in 2004. If the lunatic commie pygmy tyrant of North Korea launches a rocket aimed at California in a fit of insanity, there will at least be a chance to stop the rocket before it hits. Better to have real defenses than rely upon our enemies acting rationally." Again, rubbish, because -- again -- we are not adapting properly to the new age and its new kinds of threats. The "lunatic commie pigmy tyrant" can't launch a missile without the assistance of his entire military establishment, every member of which will know they're committing certain suicide -- and the murder of their families -- by atacking us in this way. (When Hitler gave his final orders to burn Germany to the ground, all his military officers simply ignored him.) By contrast, if you smuggle in a nuke, there is a reasonable chance your victim won't be able to trace its origin back to you with certainty, and will therefore be reluctant to attack every single country on Earth -- guilty or innocent -- that MIGHT have sent it. This is why nuclear proliferation is such a deadly threat to civilization -- we're about to enter an age in which nuclear deterrance no longer works -- and it's why smuggled nukes are an infinitely better attack technique than missiles even right now, when missile defense systems DON'T exist. (As Robert Wright said two years ago, missile defense is the equivalent of armor-plating your front door while leaving your back one a screen door.) There is very little doubt in my mind that North Korea is building missiles entirely for retaliatory defense and/or for trying to stick up nations such as Japan that CAN'T retaliate with nukes, rather than to attack the US with them. From the viewpoint of sheer cost-effectiveness, we need to be spending most -- or all -- of the huge sum we're about to spend on missile defense on other aspects of military defense and offense. And that's not even counting the extremely strong technical arguments that it may NEVER be possible to make missile defense work (as elaborated recently by a large number of scientific groups, including the National Academy of Sciences): (1) In the post-boost phase, inflatable decoy nuclear warheads are impossible to distinguish from real ones and will always be much cheaper to make than additional interceptor warheads; (2) No practical missile interceptor can race fast enough to hit an enemy missile while it's stil in the boost phase; (3) Even high-powered distant lasers can't burn through the thick side of a solid-fueled missile during its boost phase. As usual, this combination Harding-Nixon Administration we now have is living in fairyland, or maybe a combination of fairyland and Charles Ponzi Land. Posted by: Bruce Moomaw at September 13, 2003 05:54 AM | PERMALINK20. Where is Osama bin Laden? Being tracked until his capture serves Bush best. Oct 04. Posted by: whoknows at September 13, 2003 05:55 AM | PERMALINKThat's a good point, Brad. I kind of think your missing the point, rhinoman. It ain't a blame game. It isn't about finding a smoking gun. It is about our gov't doing its damn job. We deserve to have everything answered to the fullest extent possible. You read that post Brad just had above? We have not heard a single policy discussion with 1/10th of the content of that post since 9/11. Fundamental questions have been ignored. That is dereliction of duty, plain and simple. And it is doubly stupid, because it seems to be intentional, and unneeded. I like to rock climb and mountaineer. One thing the Amer. Alpine club does is publish accident reports. They are extremely useful to read. What you find the great majority of the time when somebody died is that either a) they had monumentally back luck, or b) they made a thousand little mistakes (or both a) and b) combined). This has nothing to do with trying to blame the dead person -- it has everything to do with trying to help prevent deaths. You learn to recognize the little tell-tale signs of danger, and act accordingly. Things you might never expect could kill you. In the reading reports, one almost never finds a blinking red light that said 'DANGER.' The same would apply here, wrt 9/11. Posted by: Timothy Klein at September 13, 2003 06:07 AM | PERMALINKHate to site-pimp, but I have nearly all of the answers sought by the intrepid Philly reporter. I mean, they're not real answers, but... Posted by: Norbizness at September 13, 2003 06:31 AM | PERMALINKKevin, I think you're being a bit unfair in singling #7 (Why did Bush continue reading for half an hour) out as particularly significant. At the time, between the first and second plane crash, they may have thought that it would be good for public confidence simply to carry on with the arranged schedule and not appear to panic. Josh Marshall captured it well at http://talkingpointsmemo.com/sept0302.html#091103108am, I think. Posted by: William at September 13, 2003 07:20 AM | PERMALINKI thought everyone already knew the answer to number 12. Building 7 blew up because Rudy Giuliani, despite the objections of his security experts that it was a terrorist target, insisted on giving some money to a contributor by putting his "bunker" on the WTC site, and the fuel tank for the emergency power blew up. The NYC followup is here. "America's Mayor" was not mentioned in any of the news stories, presumably because he was America's Mayor (and I swear, anyone wants him we'll pay shipping), but the reason he was there that day is that when the city was attacked, he went for his bunker. It may be a mystery to the rest of the country, but we've known it all along here. Posted by: julia at September 13, 2003 07:38 AM | PERMALINKWhat - no connection to Oklahoma City? Posted by: Kevin C at September 13, 2003 08:00 AM | PERMALINKI was in a strange position that day: I got on a train at 2pm British time -- 9am EDT -- and listened to the horrors unfold on the radio. Three hours later, I got off the train, grabbed the special edition of the evening paper, and saw the full extent, in raw, badly pixellated colour. Then I got home and saw the pictures. There were rumours and counter-rumours: a real sense of panic. The supposed bomb at the State Department; the 'missing' planes; the odd disjunctions which, at first, you can attribute to the pressure of the day, but which can be viewed as unanswered questions. What I do know is that I'd read, only a couple of weeks previously, a piece in the Observer talking about Osama's plans for a 'big one'. One curious thing is that Bush claimed to have seen pictures of the first plane while waiting for his classroom photo-op. Which was, of course, impossible until amateur video surfaced. Posted by: nick sweeney at September 13, 2003 08:08 AM | PERMALINKBush didn't know about it beforehand, nor did anyone else, of course. They should have known and the reason they didn't was that during the first nine months of the Bush presidency, he sloughed off the surveillance of bin Laden and his cronies. This is detailed in The Age of Sacred Terror. The reason that Bush neglected bin Laden is not because he was in cahoots with him or the Saudis but for the most pathetic reason imaginable: Bush felt that nothing Clinton was doing was worthwhile. Therefore, if Clinton thought bin Laden and Islamist terrorism was the primary danger, it couldn't be. As you may recall, Bush and Rumsfeld up through 9/11 were obsessing over Star Wars II, an all but worthless defense boondoggle. There is little doubt that had Gore been president, most if not all of the 9/11 plot would have been foiled. These were not supermen. The terrorists were reasonably competent despite some dumb mistakes, but American security under Bush/Ashcroft/Mueller/Rice/Tenet was more incompetent than ever. If Gore had been president and 9/11 had, by some fluke, gone down, there would have been Republicans screaming for his resignation before the first tower fell and he would have been forced to resign within a week. And if by some fluke Gore managed to hold onto his job, Afghanistan would probably have been invaded (a very bad idea, but politically all but inevitable whomever was presidentl), but Iraq would never have happened. This would have increased our chances of actually bringing bin Laden to justice. And there certainly would be a far better perception of the US government than the world has now. Posted by: tristero at September 13, 2003 08:25 AM | PERMALINK>What - no connection to Oklahoma City? Well, if Tim McVeigh had the emergency fuel tank for his municipal bunker on the 23d floor of Tower 7 in the building, we didn't hear about it. Giuliani, on the other hand, did. Of course, maybe Saddam was keeping his there. That would explain a fair amount. Posted by: julia at September 13, 2003 08:53 AM | PERMALINKKevin--You normally seem pretty skeptical so why are you making the presumption that the 'facts' posed in these questions are actually true. These 20 questions are a rhetorical device that tries to induce readers to simply accept numerous assertions within the 'questions' without proof. It is classic debating style that is not worthy of unquestioned acceptance from you [comment also posted on Arthur Silber's site]. Posted by: Kurt Brouwer at September 13, 2003 09:12 AM | PERMALINKWhat? Does no one remember the increased travel advisories of the summer before that? From about mid-July on, the FAA kept issuing travel advisories, claiming there was going to be a major attack sometime over the summer. First they were international; but by August, they applied to domestic flights as well. (I only remember all this because I had to do a lot of travelling that summer and my overly worrying mother anxiously called me with the news of each one.) Don't get me wrong, I hate the administration as much as the next good liberal, but just because they cancelled travel plans....that's weak. As I recall, pundits of the time were mad at the administration for putting such an unneeded dent in the airline business. Perhaps they expected little but more of this? Posted by: the Hermit at September 13, 2003 09:13 AM | PERMALINKJulia, you're incomplete on 7 World Trade Center. I'll throw out a new one. On a documentary on PBS Wed. Sept. 10, 2003 a pilot who flew one of the fighters that escorted Air Force One was asked about his role. He said that it was very difficult knowing that if a passenger jet entered Air Force One's air space he would have to shoot it down. He would have done it though because he was to shhot down any incoming plane by order of the Vice-President. It came out very matt-of-fact. The pilot wasn't trying to make a point about the Vice President, he was just recounting the events of that day. The Vice-President ordered this pilot to shoot down a passenger jet? I don't believe the Vice-President has that authority unless the President is incapacitated or unable to communicate. So #21: Was the President unable to communicate or in any other way incapacitated or did the Vice-President assume command responsibilities that were beyond his perogative? Posted by: JPhillips at September 13, 2003 09:36 AM | PERMALINKKurt: which of the "facts" in the questions are not true? I can see that #2 might refer to cancellations which did not in fact happen; #3 might refer to a small fortune which was not in fact made (though what did happen with all those put options, then?). But all the other questions refer to facts, not "facts": there was a meeting on Aug 6th 01; there were 19 people involved; the jets were not intercepted; Bush did not immediately leave the classroom; Flight 93 crashed in Western Pennsylvania; Zacarias Mooussaoui has been called the 20th hijacker; the planes did have black boxes, not all of which have been found or the contents released; Rumsfeld did raise the issue of Saddam Hussein very quickly; 7 WTC collapsed; EPA announcements were misleading; Dick Cheney went to an undisclosed location; lots of $$$ were donated; there was an attack, and Daniel Pearl was also murdered; five people died from anthrax; explosives were found in a bus terminal; 28 pages were blacked out; Osama bin Laden either is or was somewhere. None of the things which are given as fact in 18 of the questions are anything other than undisputably true. Possibly some of the pieces in the interpretation are false; possibly some of the questions are misleading if read to assume that they have substantive answers. Inasmuch as they mainly remain open questions, though, they are hardly misleading. Posted by: Nasi Lemak at September 13, 2003 09:46 AM | PERMALINKAs far as the amerithrax attacks, there's a great article in this month's Vanity Fair that basically says it was Hatfill. It's a very compelling article, I was glued to it, and highly recommend it (nice picture of Clooney on the front page too, but don't let that deter you fellas). Hatfill appears to be a very, very odd dude. He had links to apartheid guerillas in Zimbabwe apparently, at the time of the big anthrax attacks there. Posted by: sohotosoho at September 13, 2003 10:16 AM | PERMALINKI should mention, the article is by a guy who consulted with the FBI in looking at a bunch of real and fake anthrax letters and did his own research. He says he wrote the VF article because he's frustrated at FBI stalling the investigation. Posted by: sohotosoho at September 13, 2003 10:18 AM | PERMALINKThe only "Bush Knew" conspiracy hypothesis worth considering is that the administration assumed the hijackers would do a TWA-style tarmac standoff. Condi's "we never thought they would crash into buildings" statement has more weight w/r/t this. But I am reminded of Hanlon's Razor "never attribute to malice what can be adequately explained by stupidity". Anyone remember the Air Force's recruiting slogan on TV the summer of 2001? "Nobody Comes Close"... On 9/11/2001 our federal defense establishment failed us. Our Defense Department was even hit. This is like a fire at the fire station, folks. Yet 9/11 is not a blackeye for our administration. I will go to the grave in bewilderment over this. Posted by: Troy at September 13, 2003 10:27 AM | PERMALINKIs there any longstanding grudge that the Bush family ( famous for it's long grudges.. ) has against the Rockefellers?
A good heuristic, but what is the scope of the explaination? Are we explaining just 9/11, or 9/11 *and* it's wonderful consequences for Bush's agenda?
It's not condoned inside a civil society with laws regarding citizen behaviour, but the society of nations is not civil, the laws are weak, and men are the same as they've always been. In short, conspiriacies happen, yes they do. They also happened long before the invention of tin foil. Posted by: Joey at September 13, 2003 10:55 AM | PERMALINKI can maintain "open odds" on the various competing alternatives: 1) "Bush" didn't know anything All these have (approximately) a zero-sum on the twin "incompetence / mendacity" scales. What makes investigation difficult is the higher the putative mendacity, the less likely we will find people willing to spill the beans on what they know -- this is political poison of the highest potency. But at 1) we have rank incompetence (the african embassy bombings and the USS Cole were wake-up calls), which is good enough for me. Posted by: Troy at September 13, 2003 11:55 AM | PERMALINKI watched "All the President's Men" the other night. When Hal Holbrook (Deep Throat) said to Woodward "Remember, these are not smart guys" it sure rang true for today. One of the comforting things about conspiracy theories is that they promote the idea that at least SOMEONE is running things, even if its an evil genius -- we hate the idea that earth-shattering events might be only the result of ignorance, stupidity, distraction, inattentiveness, or arrogance. One thing never to forget about the Bush administration is that while they may act like they know what they are doing, they don't; while they may think they have a plan, they don't; while they may feel that they have an intuitive lock on the truth, they don't. The emperor has no clothes. Posted by: CathiefromCanada at September 13, 2003 12:16 PM | PERMALINKA group of conspirators don't need to be omniscient geniuses in order to act covertly and remain secret. The "Bush Cabal" may not be very bright, but that doesn't mean they won't try to do nasty things if the take is big enough. Lastly, the meme that conspiracy thinkers are looking for some comfort in the idea that there's someone really running things is an example of discrediting through pyschoanalysis. Bad pyschoanalysis, IMHO. Posted by: Joey at September 13, 2003 01:43 PM | PERMALINKA few notes on things which aren't in the article: Willie Brown, the mayor of San Francisco, was taken aside by a federal agent during the first week of September, and warned not to fly commercial. Brown has repeated this story several times now. With regard to #3, the anomalous put trading in airline stocks, it's not unusual that no one has been charged. My understanding is that the accounts were established under fictitious names, and no one ever came forth (obviously) to claim the trading proceeds. It might seem dumb that someone (perhaps a Saudi prince close enough to the AQ loop to guess at what was coming) would try to trade on the advance knowledge, without realizing that it would be impossible to get at the profits afterward -- but then again, remember the first WTC bombing, where the terrorist who had rented the Ryder truck WENT BACK TO RYDER TO TRY TO CLAIM HIS DEPOSIT AFTERWARDS. Some of these folks are amazingly stupid. On point #8, the discrepancies in the Flight 93 story, a few items of interest. For one, there were large pieces of wreckage, such as a big piece of engine cowling, which were not found in the area of the crash site. They were found several kilometers back along the plane's direction of travel. That sort of debris scatter is not consistent with a plane breaking up on impact, after either having been flown into the ground deliberately, or having done so accidentally after control was lost due to a fight in the cockpit. It is consistent either with a bomb having been set off on board by the hijackers (possibly in response to an attempt to storm the cockpit), or is also consistent with a scenario in which an F-16 shot down UA93 with an air-to-air missile. Note also that a Flight 93 passenger was in continuous phone contact with a telephone operator just before the crash. He reported hearing an explosion and seeing smoke, and then said, "We're going down!" In any event, the official rendition of the UA93 events seems to look a lot like the original she-went-down-with-all-guns-blazing rendition of the capture of Jessica Lynch. Heroic, yes, but with convenient inconsistencies. What is clear is that some of the UA93 passengers did courageously attempt to retake the cockpit. It may tragically be the case that their foray was interrupted by the Air Force, unaware of the situation inside of 93, and acting under orders to stop the plane before it reached the Harrisburg nuclear facility nearby. Final note: Bush spent the month of August on vacation in Crawford. It's been reported that Condi Rice sent him down there with a terrorism briefing book which predicted imminent AQ action Stateside. One thing we will never know is if Bush even *read* the bloody thing or not. Given what friends and former political employees have said about Bush's reading habits, probably not. One has to hearken back to the Reagan years for a comparison. Donald Regan and Mike Deaver and David Stockman all complained afterward about how hard it was to get Reagan to read their carefully edited and printed briefing books. They all eventually came around to realize that briefing material *had* to be audiovisual rather than written, in order to get and keep Reagan's attention. By all accounts, we're back to that now (after the Presidencies of Bush the Elder and of Bill Clinton, both of whom were apparently voracious readers of their daily briefing papers). Posted by: marquer at September 13, 2003 02:20 PM | PERMALINKJust a couple of things. 2) Troy says: Condi's "we never thought they would crash into buildings" statement has more weight w/r/t this after the Presidencies of Bush the Elder and of Bill Clinton heh, I remember how refreshing it was to again have a sentient being serving as president when Bush started doing his near-weekly press conferences. Bush was certainly more competent than Dukakis, and he also nominated Souter, not a bad choice. How the FBI dropped the ball in 2001 is simply mind-boggling. PBS's "The Man Who Knew" is required viewing. http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/knew/ Posted by: Troy at September 13, 2003 02:28 PM | PERMALINKIn reply to Joey, yes, I can also agree with what you say too -- there's been so much sleazy stuff done during the cold war that maybe its not possible to ever say definitively that a conspiracy theory is wrong. I just feel we do have to watch how much "credit" we are giving to the Bush administration -- I fear we may be inflating their abilities if we believe there was a Grand Plan, and by spending time trying to nail down who did what on 9/ll (in the hope that proving something would be such a scandal that Bush would resign)it will dilute the effort needed for 2004. if Americans elect Bush Not only the next 4-8 years of military adventurism, but also the composition of the federal courts (Clinton did manage to appoint some sort of non-whackjob bubble after the 12 years of Reagan/Bush) for the rest of my life (I'm 36). So yeah, 11/4/04 is going to be a very important day for me. Posted by: Troy at September 13, 2003 03:24 PM | PERMALINK> So, according to Julia, someone told Guliani "the building is safe with its existing 36,000 gallons of diesel fuel, but if you add another tank, we're courting disaster." You know, as soon as someone restates what I'm saying, I'm pretty sure it's going to be a bogus explanation. Someone told Giuliani that a building with 36,000 gallons of diesel fuel wasn't safe at all. Many someones. Repeatedly. The phrase "terrorist target" frequently appeared in the objections, which came from both sides of the aisle. Nice try, though. Posted by: julia at September 13, 2003 05:49 PM | PERMALINKSome people haven't got the word. I recently ruled that "Calling something a conspiracy theory is not an argument". You really have to make some kind of substantive criticism of the claim you're attacking, not just lump it with a bunch of conspiracy theories. Posted by: zizka at September 13, 2003 06:18 PM | PERMALINKNasi Lemak wrote:
NL:??But all the other questions refer to facts, not "facts": there was a meeting on Aug 6th 01; there were 19 people involved;?? KB: I agree. There was a meeting on August 6, 2001. 19 hijackers were identified. The jets were not intercepted etc. You then finished your post with this: NL: ?? None of the things which are given as fact in 18 of the questions are anything other than undisputably true. Possibly some of the pieces in the interpretation are false; possibly some of the questions are misleading if read to assume that they have substantive answers. Inasmuch as they mainly remain open questions, though, they are hardly misleading.? KB: In fact, many of the things which are given as fact are clearly not indisputably true. For example, let?s look at question #4: PHIL. DAILY NEWS:"...4. Are all 19 people identified by the government as participants in the Sept. 11 attacks really the hijackers? KB: Probably not? The only evidence is that there was a report by the BBC. No cite, no reporter name. Since when is the BBC 100% accurate? And from this flimsy evidence he (and others) builds a whole edifice of suppositions. He then refers to a conspiracy site called Unanswered Questions. Finishes with the classic plaint of the conspiracy theorist about this story vanishing into thin air. Let?s look at question #5: PHIL. DAILY: 5. Did any of the hijackers smuggle guns on board as reported in calls from both Flight 11 and Flight 93? KB: Quite possibly (or quite possibly not). A claim is made that there was an FAA memo written on the day of the attacks. How does this reporter know about this memo. Who at the FAA said it was mistaken. Again, there is no evidence given. There were all sorts of reports out that day and in days following. Did Thomas Burnett tell his wife there was a gun aboard? I don?t know. How does the reporter know. He does not say he interviewed Deena Burnett, so how does he know? Finally, again the conspiracy complaint: why has this angle not been investigated. How does Mr. Bunch know it has not been investigated? He does not say unfortunately. How about question #6? PHIL. DAILY NEWS: 6. Why did the NORAD air defense network fail to intercept the four hijacked jets?
PHIL. DAILY NEWS: "...Why didn't the fighters that were finally scrambled at Otis Air Force Base in Massachusetts and Langley Air Force Base in Virginia fly at top, supersonic speeds? Why didn't fighters immediately take off from Andrews Air Force Base, just KB: OK, I give. Who says the fighters that were scrambled did not fly at top speed? Again, no evidence given. All the questions the reporter raised are mere suppositions. No evidence given. No context presented etc. Kurt Brower's responses to the unanswered questions are pretty weak, in that he simply calls the sources into question, and prefers to accept the official story. Hardly responses at all, IMO. One point of agreement though, the NORAD question really is off base. The domestic ATC system, not NORAD, were responsible for detecting any civilian aircraft that diverged from the planned flight route. In fact, the national ATC did detect and warn the military about the hijacked planes. Why was the Air Force told to stand down? Another unanswered question. CathieFromCanada, it's the conspiracy theory nuts who give conspiracy theories a bad rap :) I think a lot of people know that our government lies about many things, that we can't trust much of the official story. ( of course, corporate business lies too... to be fair ) So it's natural that people try to piece together an explanation from what we can be sure about, which is always incomplete and sketchy. Of course, some people are better at this kind of heuristic thinking then others, and most theories are utter nonsense. Most conspiracy theorists are unqualified for the work. What does amaze me is that most Americans seem to think our nation is so fundamentally different from all the nations that came before us. That conspiracies and treachery "can't happen here." To me it seems completly plausable and likely that a homicidal sociopath could grab the Presidency. There have been many charismatic and charming homicidal sociopaths in history. And there are even more people who are merely unconcerned about the fate of everyone else. I really think George W Bush belongs to that group. Sort of "empathy challenged," if you dig what I mean. So while I don't think the administration had anything to do with the attack, I think it's possible they knew and sat on their hands because it was just the bogeyman needed to keep the military-industrial money flowing, something which was becoming a worry for all those "retired" generals "working" for Lockheed, Raytheon, etc... And yes, 3000 dead is horrible. But it is pretty easy for Americans to sleep even after our troops have killed tens of thousands of foreign civilians in various places for various reasons. To an extent, we are all cold and heartless about the deaths of other human beings. I have no trouble believing that George W. Bush could think something like " those deaths were neccesary for the long term safety of America. We needed to wake this country up to this terrible threat. And Dick sure needed those no-bid overpriced contracts, because Halliburton is a fine American company that was almost bankrupt." Timothy Klein Thank you for your kind words. You reassure me that the effort I put into my infrequent comments are worthwhile. And also reassure me that of all the left-wing weblogs I surf to CalPundit's has an audience with the greatest portion who still have an open mind. Posted by: Brad at September 14, 2003 05:38 PM | PERMALINKonline casinos | casino bonus | casino directory | high roller casinos | casinos Posted by: doi at May 23, 2004 11:07 AM | PERMALINKKing Chile - Boob Squad - Big Movie Land - Grande Girls - Redhair Sex - Shocking Cocks - Soap Boys - Upskirt School - Passion.com - Threesome Orgy - Cock Kings - Horny Black Girls Posted by: all sites access at June 30, 2004 09:21 AM | PERMALINKCialis Viagra Information Center: Find The top Places to Order Viagra ? (sildenafil citrate) Generic Viagra - Cialis (tadalafil) online. ( Related Viagra - Generic Viagra and Cialis Sites Below )
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