“It is the power of the lone whistle-blower of conscience, occasionally given voice in what remains of our free press and which can influence presidential elections, as happened quite dramatically this last time around. There are those like Joe Wilson, who exposed presidential fraud masquerading as national security concern over bogus Iraqi purchases of uranium from Niger, and more recently the truth-telling of Ali H. Soufan, a former FBI agent and lead interrogator of terrorists.”

Yes, there are those like Joe Wilson and Ali Soufan.  And these are the more famous ones, the ones for whatever reason found themselves in that place in which they were.  There are others, maybe not so famous…. but they too are where they are.  These are the protectors of democracy.  While we may argue incessantly the details, the fact is….. these people exist.

Good article, Mr. Scheer.

I feel compelled to quote TaoWalker.

“Hokahey”.

Treason, Betrayal and Deceit: 9/11 and Beyond

By Alan Sabrosky.

“Sept. 10, 2009

“A significant development in the 1990s was the formation of the neo-conservative think tank known as PNAC (Project for a New American Century), whose members prepared position papers for the Israeli government and for a future US Administration sharing their views. That happened in 2000 with the election of George W. Bush, and a contemporary writer summarized the tip of the neo-conservative iceberg in his first Administration this way:

The “outsiders” from PNAC were now powerful “insiders,” placed in important positions from which they could exert maximum pressure on US policy…PNAC had a lock on military policy-creation in the Bush Administration.

Especially significant in terms of subsequent events was the acknowledgement in one of PNAC’s own documents that their program for America (and Israel) would not readily be accepted by the American people. What this meant, PNAC opined in 2000, was that “the process of transformation, even if it brings revolutionary change, is likely to be a long one, absent some catastrophic and catalyzing event—like a new Pearl Harbor.”

9/11 Reconsidered

On September 11, 2001, the PNAC people in and out of government—and by extension AIPAC and Israel—“coincidentally” got the event they needed, barely eight months after coming into office. Most people are familiar with the basic details of that day—two commercial aircraft crashing into the two tallest buildings in New York City’s World Trade Center (WTC), a third striking the Pentagon, and a fourth ending up in a Pennsylvania field. Few people will forget the images of the burning buildings, their collapse, the casualties, and the sense of shock and tragedy that ensued.

The official 9/11 Commission’s work and report were at best an incomplete exercise. Many people dismiss the findings of the Commission, and that includes its co-chairs. Many others who utterly distrust the 9/11 Commission report, dismiss the US Government’s explanation of it, and point to both an official cover-up and an “inside job,” include veteran fighter pilots, EMTs (Emergency Medical Technicians), air defense experts, experienced commercial pilots, demolition experts, architects and civil engineers – none of them professions that inherently attract and retain the gullible and credulous.

Several things are very clear to me from a careful assessment of both official and critical evaluations of the 9/11 attacks. First, the striking aircraft alone simply could not have brought down either of the two buildings in the manner in which they fell, much less a third building which was not hit by a plane (I expect the one intended to do that as a “cover” had ended up in that Pennsylvania field), given the available physical evidence and a wealth of expert testimony. This means the attackers had assistance on the ground, and it had to have been active before the attacks occurred: preparing buildings for controlled demolition is not something done haphazardly in the midst of chaos.

Second, only two intelligence agencies had the expertise, assets, access and political protection to execute 9/11 in the air and on the ground: our CIA and Israel’s Mossad. Only one had the incentive, using the “who benefits” principle: Mossad. And that incentive dovetailed perfectly with the neo-con’s agenda and explicitly expressed need for a catalytic event to mobilize the American public for their wars, using American military power to destroy Israel’s enemies. Only the unexpected strength of the Iraqi resistance kept Syria and Iran from being attacked in the second Bush Administration. Thus, the evidential trail for 9/11 and the wars in Afghanistan & Iraq run from PNAC, AIPAC and their cohorts; through the mostly Jewish neo-cons in the Bush Administration; and back to the Israeli government.”

http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article23460.htm

Ardee, sometimes I think tooling around on your towmotor has burised your brains.  What do you mean “We” deserved it.  Whose ‘WE,”  white man.  a couple of thousand of people got killed who had nothing to do with any of this stuff.  For public relations purpsoes.  To frighten and enrage the population so they would hold still for the absuridites that got the US into wars that, so far, have killed over a milliion people.  Most of whome were as irrelvant to the conflict as the 9/11-anthrax people.

Nobody ‘deserves’ mass slaughter.  As you well know.

Folktruther,

You’re painting with a pretty broad brush there, but you know you’re right.

911 didn’t happen because we elected a guy with an IQ hovering right at one hundred.

It didn’t happen because he then hired a VP with vascular dementia who then took over as de facto secretary of defense, national security adviser and chief of staff.

It didn’t happen because the acting national security adviser was a Soviet Union specialist who had no clue about AQ when she took office.

It didn’t happen because the acting secretary of defense’s most relevant experience had been as head of a pharmaceutical company and before that he been more concerned with missile threats.

It didn’t happen because the one guy with any brains or common sense or combat experience was ignored in his fictitious role as secretary of state.

It didn’t happen because the head of the counter-terrorism unit that had worked for three previous administrations was suddenly moved to below cabinet level and was therefore forbidden from communicating directly with POTUS.

No, this was not a confederacy of dunces that dropped the ball despite repeated and frantic warnings from the outgoing administration and Richard Clarke.

No, this was conspiracy of geniuses that managed to latch on to the fact that this had been in works for years and then assumed command of the attack.

Right on.  Anybody who doesn’t believe that is a total dumbass. I gotcha.

And anyone who points out that the people who are being attacked most vehemently for not believing this rock-solid story are progressives and therefore it’s possible that this story was planted by right-wing provocateurs hoping to discredit leaders of the progressive movement by using unsuspecting left-winging dupes as hitmen to propagate a delusional sequence of events—well, anyone who says that is just a knuckle dragging Cro-Magnon moron. 

I gotcha.  Right on.  I’m there.

—

Asides:

Whatever you do DO NOT read Richard Clarke’s Against All Enemies.  That guys is a total Bush lover.  I mean the title itself comes from the oath of office, so it’s obvious he’s insinuating that President Bush was an enemy of the constitution.  Anyone who says that obviously was in on the conspiracy.

And don’t ever, ever read Rise of the Vulcans by James Mann. It would be a terrible, terrible thing to actually know the backgrounds of Bush’s war cabinet.

Kesey Seven

Objectively the 9/11 attacks were a failure, a Horror indeed to the people there, and a trauma for the families and friends of those people, But the towers held 50,000 workers, and while every one of them suffers nightmares the dead have been spared only one worker in 20 was killed. An amazingly light toll under the circumstances.

What was inexcusable was instead of treating the injury, the GOP and the Media twisted the knife in the wound in order to give itself more power, repeatedly showing the worst of the video like a porn addicted slob who can’t get enough.

In any other disaster the number of dead goes up, but not when hyped like this. The numbers went from over 10,000 down to 6,000 that stayed for weeks, and only later after the numbers could have no more impact went down to 3,500.

By contrast with Katrina, the count was underplayed and never finally recorded adding a few that were noticed years later trapped in the debris and who knows how many still trapped at the dump unnoticed.

Back at what was known as The Pile still more people died, most not aware of it at the time because the EPA pronounced the air safe, and those who volunteered, and those who lived in the area, have been slowly dying even more horridly than those quickly killed, many doing so with no help of financial or medical assistance. Because they had acted from a sense of honor they received none in return.

The men and ideology that launched were horrid, and they succeeded because the administration was at least asleep at the guard, but the administration accomplished the goals of Al Queda far more than Al Queda could have ever had managed or hoped to do for themselves. This is what I will remember.

bane-richter:
‘AQ is no longer in Afghanistan, according to our own Military. The only hypothetical contradiction left out of this article is how many more people would have been killed had a small nuclear device been used - by the resulting War of Terror. A prepetually revolting excuse to send American weapons into the Middle East to start killing people. ...’

“Start”?

ardee—I don’t know about “deserve”, but I am pretty sure the U.S. ruling class will keep screwing around in the Middle East as it has for the last 100 years or so until they take some really serious damage, or go bankrupt.  I think our friend Marshall probably reflects their thinking pretty well.  He must read the Times or something.

Perhaps, had a nuclear weapon been used on the Towers, the Tenth Mountain Division would not have been ordered away from the Tora Bora cave complex where bin Laden was trapped. Perhaps Osama would have been captured or killed and therefore no invasion of either Iraq or Afghanistan would have been necessary.

Perhaps that is precisely why that division was so ordered?

On this anniversary of the attack on that center of international finance that so unfairly treats much of the third world I am reminded of the words of a great man, one who spent his life teaching school kids in Chicago, one who marched with Dr. King in Selma and Montgomery, and one whose words once graced threads on Democraticunderground.com. Until, when the question was posed, “why were we attacked on 9/11”, and this honest and insightful poster responded,” Because we deserved it”.

Pocho, wherever you are I hope you are well.

AQ is no longer in Afghanistan, according to our own Military. The only hypothetical contradiction left out of this article is how many more people would have been killed had a small nuclear device been used - by the resulting War of Terror. A prepetually revolting excuse to send American weapons into the Middle East to start killing people.
One day, we may see similar arguments, of a nuclear threat, to launch a genocidal attack on Iran. War Criminal Powell holding aloft phony uranium visuals was apparrently enough
to start a second illegal war, post 9/11.
Every nation that goes on a quest for wholesale slaughter taps the old lie of “Defense”, and with their 2000 coup -
Bush and crew had already planned, and in fact publically announced, years earlier, their intentions to kill hundreds of thousands to control wealth.  We can all believe in bad guys, but luddites are still unable to see that it’s sometimes us and much as it is them.

AQ is no longer in Afghanistan, according to our own Military. The only hypothetical contradiction left out of this article is how many more people would have been killed had a small nuclear device been used - by the resulting War of Terror. A prepetually revolting excuse to send American weapons into the Middle East to start killing people.
One day, we may see similar arguments, of a nuclear threat, to launch a genocidal attack on Iran. War Criminal Powell holding aloft phony uranium visuals was apparrently enough
to start a second illegal war, post 9/11.
Every nation that goes on a quest for wholesale slaughter taps the old lie of “Defense”, and with their 2000 coup -
Bush and crew had already planned, and in fact publically announced, years earlier, their intentions to kill hundreds of thousands to control wealth.  We can all believe in bad guys, but luddites are still unable to see the difference.

Perhaps unwittingly, Scheer begins his article with a hypothetical that contradicts his premise.  If AQ had succeeded in using a nuclear device (as they are known to be seeking) on 9/11, we would not be having second thoughts about Afghanistan.  It is just such a likely scenario that makes our efforts against them so important.  It’s this failure to see the moderate world’s struggle against extremism as a military conflict (with ideological overtones no doubt) that inform’s the left’s lack of resolve in prevailing through proactive deterrence.  And I heap blame on a general populace that so quickly tires of the effort even though it is that effort that has ensured them the security to carry on their daily lives free of 9/11 follow ups.  But I expect the follow up will come; in chemical, biological, or incendiary form, but come it will.  And for a time, we will no longer have to suffer this tiresome questioning of our moral certitude.

Wanderer,S

Your basic position seems to be:

“I know that certain things could not have taken place, so I need not listen to any evidence that would conflict with what I know, and I must believe the version put forth by a flawed commission and unresponsive US agencies.”

We agree that the lack of reason displayed by people today is unfortunate. I just think you should start with your own logic.

An important event regarding 9/11 will take place shortly——a trial will commence regarding civil liabilities for 9/11.  The only person who didn’t accept the US government’s bribe or payoff in lieu of litigation is pursuing a civil liabilities lawsuit.

I haven’t seen the lawsuit particulars yet, but this could be a very interesting trial unless…...

Wanderer- I have to say- and I say this with all due respect- you are full of dreck.  Of couse lack of evidence constitutes evidence of an argument, negative evidence in a court of law as well as in the court of public opiion.  When witness recall their testomony leaving no evidence of a crime, the defendant is freed. 

When the FBI states that it does not put bin Laden on their criminal list because there is no evidence connecting him to the crime, that is evidence that he is not guilty of it.  When the US authorities state that there is no ‘paper trail’ connecting the ‘19 Hijackers’ to 9/11, and a number of them turn up working as pilots,etc abroad, that is evidence that the story is a crock.

Actually there is abundant evidence of a much more plausable scenerio compiled by the 9/11 truthers, but you don’t want to consider it.  You are afraid to evaluate it because it leads to impicaations that conflict with firmly held power delusions.  The problem is not that the evidience doesn’t exist, but that you are too chickenshit to accept it.  But, to do you justice, your intellectual cowordness is replicated by tens of milliions of other Amereicans.  The mmin problem being emotional denial.

As too groups of people not revealing secrets, thousands of scientists made the atomic bomb without revealing what they were doing.  Tens of thousands of intellegence agents don’t reveal secrets under pain of sanctions.  And the sanctions in this case would be terminal. 

But this is mere reason, and not sufficient to shake the idiotic absurities of indoctrinated cretins.

Jean Gerard—Indeed, scandalous, atrocious events surround 9/11, especially on the part of government officials, which spooky conspiracy theories serve to obscure and cover up, just as anti-Semitism and conspiracy theories about Israel serve to cover up Israeli misdeeds and discredit legitimate critics of the Israeli government.  I could concoct a conspiracy theory of conspiratism, but I think that most of it is just a desire to believe that one has knowledge and power where one is actually ignorant and powerless.  In this it is like religion/superstition and other forms of magical thinking.

I do hope the re-investigation goes forward because the people doing that seem to be concentrating on observable material facts.  The behavior of people like Giuliani needs exposure after all these years of myth and fable.

Folktruther:
‘The way the US power system defends obvious public relations absirities like the Warren Commission conclusions and the ‘19 Hijacker’s Conspiracy’ is by making people afraid to question them. ...’

Which is why this discussion isn’t taking place.

By lastdaywatchers, September 10 at 6:32 pm #

Tony Wicher you ask people to

Google searches for “9-11 conspiracy”
The Charlie Sheen/Obama interview is a fraud.

Tony to you like promoting false info?
————————————————————————
lastdaywatchers,

No, it’s not a fraud, my simple-minded friend. The Sheen video never claimed to be an actual interview with Obama. It was a statement in video of Sheen’s views on 9-1l by means of a fictional interview, a screen-play, if you will. I would say this fact is probably obvious to every person commenting on this thread except you.

The way the US power system defends obvious public relations absirities like the Warren Commission conclusions and the ‘19 Hijacker’s Conspiracy’ is by making people afraid to question them.  The questioners are sleazed in the mass media and threatened with losing their jobs, damaging their careers, or being considered paranoid, stupid, ignnrant, etc.  this is the primary defense of violent power delusions in the US, questioners being sleazed by both the Progresives and Cosnervative mainstream truthers.

But in additon, specialized items of information are isolated from other items, repressing the holisitic implications that give them meaning. It is therefore impossible to give a reasonaable historical narrative of the public relations homicides.

For example, the 9/11 destruction of the buildings occurred at the same time as the anthrax homicide, which also induced fear in the American people.  They are part of the same historical event which kickstarted the War on Terrorism, and may be seen as a coordinated event.  The anthrax was publically acknowledged to come from American military labs, giving weight to American involvement in 9/11 also.  If, after all, Americans were involved in anthrax, why could not Americans be involved in 9/11.

In addition, both of these events were preceded by the 1993 bombing of the North towere by a 1500 pound bomb.  The explosive and technology of the bomb is was provided, it was publically acknowledged at the trial, by Salem.  In a separate item of information, it is publically acknowledged that Salem was an FBI asset.  astonishingly, the FBI gave the Terroists the material for this bomb, and this is stated in separate items publically.  The judge also claimed that the bomb contained cynanide in the sentencing, the Terrorists putting the cynanide they had around the house in the bomb.

The point is, this tower explosion and cynanide plot was a long term plot that preceded 9/11.  the 1993 explosion occurred right after Clinton assumed office.  And the senior Bush who he succeded was head of the CIA under Reagan.  If one thinks of this 9/11-cyanide operation as a years long operation, as heads of German and Egyptian intelligence agencies have publically said it was, it becomes more a plausable narrative. 

It becomes an historical conspiracy rather than a few persons plotting in a room.  And it is more likely to overcome the fear induced by the mainstrream authorities to prevent the simple reasonable truth from emerging.  And if this false flag operation is put into the historical context of false flag operations conducted by the US and Israelis, who provided Arabic speaking operatives to spy on the Terrorists, It can be seen not as a unique operation, but one of a sequence, which is publically known and acknowledged.

As it is, the ‘19 Hijackers’ have been emotionally implanted in the public mind, even though many of them are still living and working in other countries, and no evidence whatsoever attaches them to the crime.  The media, including truthdig, can then talk about the ‘20 hijacker’ as part of this fictitious narrative.  And reasonable truthers like Anarcissie and Tropicgirl can disparage the notion that members of the Bushite regime were involved, which is even less posible to know than that they probably were inovlved. 

Fear and disconnected information helps a power structure to divide and rule.  and they can be combated by a little courage and holistic truth.

Tony Wicher you ask people to

Google searches for “9-11 conspiracy”

The Charlie Sheen/Obama interview is a fraud.

Tony to you like promoting false info?

But if you want to pass on the truth google search the
May 15th Prophecy and you with see exactly what about to
happen next with 100% accuracy

Or just click on the Lastdaywatchers name above

Google searches for “9-11 conspiracy” skyrocket.

It’s gonna happen, I tell you. They can’t keep a lid on it.

http://www.prisonplanet.com/google-searches-for-911-conspiracy-explode-after-sheens-letter.html

NEW YORK CITY CLERK ACCEPTS SIGNATURES ON THE NYCCAN PETITION TO PUT 9-11 INVESTIGATION ON THE BALLOT

The NY City Clerk reported that the city will accept the original petition signatures submitted on June 24 and will no longer dispute their validity.

NYCCAN “went to the board of elections to see the referee (judge) and the city called us and said it conceded” board member Manny Badillo said on Thursday.

Manny then went on to commend the different groups who are working together on the approaching 8th anniversary to get the word out, including: Architects and Engineers for 911 Truth, We are Change, NYC CAN, Alex Jones and Charlie Sheen and his “20 Minutes with the President” letter.

The next step for NYC CAN is to win an ongoing court case to determine a legality of their petition. From there it can be put on the ballots as a referendum in November 2009 election.

On September 9, Badillo announced that many of the 80,000 plus petition signers will march from Union Station to City Hall to show to the world that New Yorkers are demanding a new investigation into the events around 9/11/01.

posted on 6-30-09

6-30-09
The 100% Accuracy of the May 15th Prophecy, The Son & The Foot
= Show with 100% accuracy the Son (Jesus) who is a symbol of the foot (heal) in Genesis 3:15 faithfulness to his last dying breath to fulfill with 100% accuracy the accounts laid out by King David in Psalm 22:1-31 which shows the death & resurrection of him to be exhalted, also shows with 100% accuracy the prophecy of economy, Lebanon and Iraq, shows the link between the stars and the pyramid is not tobe understood by secular men, give update on the revival of the wounded head of Alexander The Great http://lastdaywatchers.blogspot.com/2009/06/100-accuracy-of-may-15th-prophecy-son_30.html

Robert you left out the other 6 million or so also targeted by the Germans along with the Jews. That pernicious gap needs to be filled. You can thank Jews (ironically) for doing that. Now remember those people (homosexuals, Romany, Communists, Socialists etc.) too who died because of hate and scape goating of the weaker and law abiding.

If any of them could be called “compromised” it is due to the environment that makes the idea of any kind of large scale conspiracy untenable to a “rational” person. You will find skeptic groups who as part of their repertoire to smack down conspiracies of various kinds. It is so deep and so insidious that it has a life of its own. The best kind of “stand alone complex” (See the entire series Ghost In The Shell, it influenced the Matrix movies) that is independent and self generating and sustaining. No one need be heavy handed or even light handed. It is fully autonomous. It has become a standard reflex that even Dr.Chomsky will not question! You wouldn’t want to lose your reputation after spending so many years building it up do you? Once you cross that line you are labeled an “nut” that that is the end for you. I recommend to others if you want to be ignored at best or ridiculed at worst then go ahead. It is a mental system that will do you in no matter what you have to offer. It is set up to do that to you. It is like a meme viral program. As long as people accept its basis it will live on.

Have you seen Fringe? The alternate universe where the twin towers are still standing is how it ended the first season and it will start a new season soon.

If a nuke had gone off I don’t know if their program for control would have been that far advanced. It is still incremental and they got much passed putting us that much closer to a theocracy and that much further away from inverted totalitarianism we are under now. The time table might have been 3 years moved up maybe more but they have to do it till we are on the brink of total disaster to get their way. Then we must fall and they will come in to bring “law an order” as any police state would.

“Did the Twin Towers Collapse on Demand?”

The evidence presented in answer to this question at:

http://www.serendipity.li/wtc6.htm

suggests that it was.

If you have any doubts that 911 was vital to the forces that caused it, you are
not really grasping the power of 911. Like holding up a cross to a vampire. It
immediately freezes in thin air any talk of disarmament, reductions in troops
and invasions, not to mention any talk of reducing military spending (which
alone could cover everyone with healthcare, including citizens countries that we
have hurt, as we are doing to some degree now).

And if you think G. Bush was behind it, then you really need to increase your
reading to at least a minimum on the subject. That’s laughable. I would look at
Israel, world business forces, and of course, the Saudis. Use your head.

Bush didn’t need 911 to perpetuate his desire to accommodate. I believe that is
all he really did. And, of course, now we’ve got Obama for that.

But in a larger view, 911 set back even the mere discussion of peace for years
to come all over the world, but mostly here. That is the price of believing
blindly and not investigating. And, as another blogger mentioned, that is the
huge disgrace of the liberal “gatekeeping” press. They failed hugely here and
we are now seeing them marginalized by listener’s lack of interest in the same
old. They acknowledge all false flag incidents of the past, except the one that
really matters to us now. The 911 truthers are so much more on top of things.

If you don’t face the facts, then you can’t possibly understand what is really
going on. You become an unwitting liberal zombie, infected with the blood of
the real murderers, and nothing you say on the subject makes any sense,
whether you talk about the need to “get” the Taliban or balance powers in the
world with the blood of American youth. Nothing makes sense.

And I wanted to comment on the interesting dialogue of oil. THERE IS NO
FOREIGN OIL. ALL OIL IS ON THE INTERNATIONAL MARKET BY INTERNATIONAL
CORPORATIONS, BY LAW. And this is protected by the trade agreements and
organizations like the World Bank and the WTO. THERE IS NO “DRILLING FOR
AMERICA”. ALL OF IT GOES DIRECTLY TO THE WORLD MARKET UNDER OPEC
AND OTHER ORGANIZATIONS. As far as I know, the only one to get anything for
Americans out of an oil deal has been Sara Palin in Alaska.

I now invoke 911, lets all bow our heads and pray.

What if it was nuclear bomb instead of nanothermite which we now know was
used to turn the Twin Towers into dust? 

Well, the forensic evidence trail would be a bit less detailed. 

We would not have had the difficulty educating those less scientifically inclined
as to the impossibility of three buildings self-destructing—one of which
occurred like the classic controlled demolition.  We would not have had dust
samples that contain unreacted nanothermite.

If it had been a nuke, then high on the suspect list would be Israeli Mossad and
Israeli nukes—as Israel has a history of “false flags” terrorism.  We would not
have suspected Iran, since Iran has no nukes.

Urban Moving Systems
ODIGO
AMDOCS
COMVERSE
Silverstein Properties

Who did 9/11?  WhoDidIt.org lists key suspects—and we should add to this the
BBC insiders who announced WTC7 collapse 23 minutes before it collapsed. 
Also add CNN and FOXNEWS insiders.  Involving the coverup, we should include
editors and owners of “news” media (print, broadcast and internet) who
demonstrate a clear resolve to distort, ridicule and shove out of sight the
evidence that 9/11 is not what we’ve been told.

Bill Maher, Glenn Beck, Ariana Huffington, and to my surprise Olbermann and
Maddow—all very bright people who have turned into Judas goats in the
cover-up—these people should join the thousands of other beguilers in the
newly constructed FEMA camps to secure their penitant confessions—and if no
penitence, keep them locked up without any further due process.

My Fellow Americans,

I’m here to talk about that thing that happened just a few months ago. My speech writers told me to tell you that them people that did it, did it because they hate our freedoms. But as we say in Texas, that’s just a damn lie. And I ain’t gonna do it.

The truth is them people that did it, did it because we been teachin’ ‘em how to do it.  Now let me tell you something, when the great Ronald Reagan was president, he helped fight a war in Afghanistan that was complicated, damn complicated, let me tell you. 

The trouble was the Russians had invaded Afghanistan and were in a position to topple other countries and control the oil out of the Persian Gulf, which is this little rinky-dink ocean that goes right by Iran. Nuff said.

Now we couldn’t abide this, couldn’t abide it a-tall.  So, the Reagan Administration, which my father was a part of by the way, started looking for ways to help. 

Well, it took some fanangling but soon enough we figured out we could funnel money to the Pakistani intelligence agency, that, about from the colonel level on down, were a bunch of radical whackos that had contacts with the radical whackos in Afghanistan.  We gave the money to them, they gave it to the Afghannis. 

But now bear with me, bear with me, because it gets a little more complicated than that.  We also needed help from our good friends the Saudis because they had contacts both in Afghanistan and Pakistan.  So we sent money by way of the Saudis, too, and one or another it ended up in Pakistan or Afghanistan or whereverthehell it needed to go. Like I said, complicated stuff.

You know the rest of the story, kind of.  We kicked them Russians’ ass and they high-tailed it outta there. 

Then Dad got elected and he did something that he thought was really smart at the time but turned out to be not so smart but it’s OK ‘cause we were eventually able to blame it on Clinton anyway like everything else.  You follow?  What I’m trying to say is Dad cut off aid to the Afghanistan rebels, leaving them crazy SOBs to fight it out for themselves, which they did, which is what they’re good at, which is why we was paying ‘em to fight in the first place. You follow? 

So, all hell broke loose for a few years and then things settled down, the Taliban took over, and, hell, we didn’t think them fellars was so bad because they was talkin’ ‘bout letting us Texans build pipelines and shit.

But now here’s a tricky part. Them fellars that has always seemed like good friends of ours, the Saudis—turns out some of their rich friends was using the oil money—the profits from the oil that we buy from them is what I’m saying—to build these things called mass-adras or some shit like that.  Anyways, them schools taught them boys to hate us good ol’Americans because we had bases in their holy land, which is just total bullshit because the only reason we was there in the first place was to protect them from Saddam Hussein when he was about to kick their ass in the early ‘90s.

Long story short, a lot of them Saudis, including a turd blossom named Osama Bin Laden ended up in Afghanistan then made plans to blow up our buildings. And they did. They blowed ‘em up real bad.

Anyway, my point is, as much as I hate to say it, our friends gave us the ol’ high-ho without so
much as a kiss when they blowed up them buildings. 

And what we need to do is, well, I hate to say it, but we got to have all electric cars in 10 years. Stop buying oil from the Sauidis.  Stop selling guns and airplanes and shit to people that just want to kill us anyhow.  And it ain’t gonna be easy ‘cause them Saudis own a lot of our stocks and bonds and such but we gotta cut ‘em loose.  I hate to say it. But we gotta do it.

And by the way, my VP over here ain’t had enough blood to his brain in 30 years. So I’m cutting his ass loose, too. 

Ya’ll take care now, ya hear.
 
—-

That would have been a reality check, too.

Kesey Seven

Oh, no, Anarcissie, did you think I meant that Bush was the lead perp. Nothing is more unlikely.  What the 9/11 truthers argue that within the hierarchy there was evidence that some group led the attack go forward or was complicit in aiding it. 

Since Cheney and Rubsfield worked toegether for thirty years, there would be suspciion that they were involved.  But the intelligence plan was so elaborate and well thought out that it would have had to be developed before they got in office.  Whether the US were involved or not.

Brilliant article. I just pray that the implicit message, is not also prophetic.

Wonderful opinion piece Mr. Scheer.  And, so on point.  Your words are so very
true.  Americans can change the course of our nation’s direction by voting our
representatives into office and recalling those same representatives if they refuse
to vote as the constituents have asked. We become less a republic every day and
less a democracy.  We have allowed corporations and lobbyists to run this nation. 
And, we had better stand back because it looks like the U.S. S.Ct. is going to
further that trend.

What if?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FqAF-Alc7CM

Wednesday September 9, 2009 15:33

Liberal arts education [mostly BS artists who don’t think but emote and opine instead], we feel, contributes to our problems and the country’s problems.

September 9, 2009 WASHINGTON — American intelligence agencies have concluded in recent months that Iran has enough nuclear fuel to make a rapid, if risky, sprint for sufficient enriched uranium for a nuclear weapon. But in a series of briefings to President Obama, they say they believe the country is still holding off on taking the last critical steps in designing a sophisticated bomb.

People educated similar to Ryan Crocker will likely be making the decision as to whether Iran is bombed or not. Be terrified.

We haven’t heard from Max Johnson, John Alsip or George Bridges - even to acknowlege receipt of emails.

Liberal arts english grad Mike Whitney [fergiewhitney@msn.com]

Mike Whitney graduated from St. Michael’s College in English Lit in 1975. Since then he has been running his own landscape company in Snohomish, Wa for the last 23 years.

writes

If there is an invasion it will probably be limited to securing the region of Khuzestan which is adjacent to Iraq’s southern flank and contains 90% of Iran’s oil wealth as well as much of its natural gas. This could be achieved with as little as 15-20,000 combat troops, plus a backup of Special Forces.

http://home.comcast.net/~bpayne37/whitman59/whitman59after.htm#eid

Folktruther—In the old days we had good conspiracy theories.  Old-school conspiracists would have shown irrefutable evidence that 9/11 was brought about by the Knights Templar or the Society of St. Louis (the lineal descendants of Jesus Christ, and probably extraterrestrials).  The Mafia, the CIA, the KGB, Mossad, M5, along with the Federal Reserve Bank and the Gnomes of Zurich, would have been shown to have played an undeniable supporting role, with the Masons, the Bilderbergers, the Trilateral Commission, and Robert Moses’s Triboro Bridge Authority in the background somewhere.  Not no more.  Now, we just get a plain old cowardly halfwit like George W. Bush as lead perp.  Phooey.

This is such a disjointed screed it’s hard to find much inner coherence in it, although the general tone is quite familiar and the vague sense of general outrage is not unfounded even if it isn’t too finely focused. ”What if” this, what if that….weren’t (aren’t) things bad enough as they are without having to conjure up endless “what if’s”? Perhaps it might be more pertinent to ask ‘what if’ somebody had done something to stop it. ‘What if’ there had been a mass anti-war movement that had derailed the Iraq invasion? Or better still, ‘what if’ there had been the same level (or much greater) of public outrage over Bill Clinton’s genocidal sanctions against Iraq all throughout the 90’s - that killed more innocent Iraqis than the latest Bush/Obama war - as there was at Clinton’s sexual peccadilloes? ‘What if’ the useless American public had put their foot down a long time ago and halted the genocide in Indochina before it ever got started, before Rusty Calley ever enlisted and Robt. McNamara was still at Ford. What if FDR’s U.S. Luftwaffe had never firebombed Dresden and other civilian targets? What if Woodrow Wilson had not embraced WWI and pushed through the draconic Sedition Act of 1918 and imprisoned Eugene Debs? The list goes on, the crimes mount, the public sits on its hands, and nothing much will ever change. What if is not what is. “In blind and wrathful retaliation for 9/11 we wreaked havoc on Iraq, a nation that our then-president knew had not attacked us, and we continue to slaughter peasants in Afghanistan who aren’t able to find Manhattan on a map.” Because neither invasion was ever “in retaliation” for anything, they’re both willful acts of unilateral aggression. The invasion of Iraq was hatched before 9/11 and was a continuation of the unending assault on Iraq stretching back through the horrific sanctions regime to the first Gulf ‘war’. “We, a people whose nation has never suffered a long and widespread occupation, easily gave vent to our most barbaric impulses”….long before 9/11. “But we do have a saving grace for our experiment in democracy—although unfortunately it did not exist in the Supreme Court or Congress as a barrier to an imperial vice presidency. It is the power of the lone whistle-blower of conscience, occasionally”.…very occasionally, always belatedly, and never with any real effect. The patent absurdity however, of Scheer’s apologetics for Amerika’s alleged “experiment in democracy” – seeking to put its malevolence down to just a rogue “imperial vice presidency” is insupportable. “So, Cheney is again proved wrong” – so what?! The damage is done. Does anyone even have any interest in Cheney anymore? And meanwhile Obama and Biden will go on ravaging Afghanistan, Al Gore will remain unsullied by his own imperial vice presidency and complicity in the Iraq sanctions and more; and we’ll complacently wait for the next impotent ‘whistleblower’ to remind us of just how evil we all are and how we all did nothing to stop it, then or now – and probably never will. It’s the system, stupid!

Firefly ... I agree with every word you wrote!

Anarcissie, you appear to believe reason is incompaticle with believing in the evidence of conspircies.  You suffer from what Michael Parenti has called ‘onspiracyphobia.’  I will pray for you.

Folktruther:
‘You are quite wrong, Anarcissie.  The 9/11-anthrax public relations homicide was ESSENTIAL in beginning the War on Terrorism and the carnage capitalism that ensued. It evoked fear and rage in the American people, regressing them so, like children, they identified with a Leader who would protect them as their parents did when they were children.  It was brilliantly successful, public relations being an American specialty. ...’

I disagree.  I am not at all sure it would have been enough to get Bush elected in 2004; I think he was benefiting more from the man-of-God effluvium which had not yet quite ebbed.  By 2006 the lackluster, passive, me-too Democratic Party took over Congress in spite of itself.  In 2008 it was able to run a cautious, conservative Black man of minor accomplishments against a war hero and win by a substantial margin.  As a tool of political management, then, 9/11 has not been at all effective, although it has certainly provided a lot of entertainment for conspiracists and numerous jobs for a largely inept security industry.  As a pretext for war, though, it was much more than enough.  Vietnam, after all, was set off by people shooting at something in the dark which might well have been a figment of their imagination. 

As I say, first the war, then the reason.  The so-called “war on terror(ism)” is simply the good old Anglo-American imperium with yet another plumed hat.  We know that an invasion of Iraq was planned long before 9/11, and the U.S. has been actively meddling in Afghanistan since the 1970s at least.  If one pretext for the required war had not presented itself, another would have been found.  “War is the health of the state.”

truthdig:drilling beneath the headlines
A 9/11 Reality Check By Robert Scheer
Posted on Sep 8, 2009

Hey Robert Scheer:

First, your ” What if…” piece is anything but
reality. Second, it’s insulting to

your readership & bloggers who have spent
considerable time & energy

actually drilling beneath the headlines to come up
with the truth. The cabal

members who sold short airline stocks prior to the
execution of their

terrorist attack scam as well as other facts indicate
that a nuclear device

would never be set off in GOVERNMENT SACHS backyard,
WALL

STREET, the FED’S home base, or any other prime
location owned

by the perpetrators. The murder of those people was
the “shock” of

“shock & awe” designed to usurp power & give the Bush
Dyasty

virtually unlimited powers to plunder & destroy
America. With Bush 3

in the White House having bankrupted the U.S. beyond
recovery,

“W” can now show his “MISSION ACCOMPLISHED” banner.

When you say: ” In blind and wrathful retaliation for
9/11

we wreaked havoc on Iraq,...”, does Haliburton &
Blackwater getting

countless $Billions ring a bell?

And when you say: “We a people… easily gave

vent to our most barbaric impulses..”, did you forget
the miltary

recruiters getting rich signing up people without
jobs by offering

signing bonuses; and when not enough desperate or
brainwashed

folks stepped up, felons were signed to fill quotas.

So let’s not pretend that America is a Democracy &
the citizen in the

street has a vote that counts.

Finally, let’s not forget Patrick Daniel Tillman the
American football

player who left his professional sports career & a
multimillion

dollar contract to enlist in the United States Army
in May 2002,

& was killed by “friendly fire”. That coverup speaks
volumes

about the natures of the beasts running the
U.S.Oligarchy.

A fantastic piece!

The fact that America is the richest and most powerful country in the world, doesn’t make it the most moral, ethical, honest or feasible instructor.

America has completely forgotten what war is about and its consequences, Europe hadn’t and hasn’t. Europe remembers war well.  America has suffered a civil war, but not the kind where mass bombing rained down from deadly fighter bombers.

Europe lost 18 million people in WWII, (both soldiers and civilians), Russia lost 27 million (both soldiers and civilians). In contrast, America lost 450 thousand (mostly soldiers). Civilians in America don’t understand war and Hollywood has a way of glamorizing it and of course, making Americans the heroes. Most Americans have no concept of what it is like to live with war, to live without food or water, without warmth or shelter. When Americans sneer at Europe for being ‘weak’, they have no concept of what they are really doing.

Americans are taught from birth, that they are the greatest in the world, that everything they do around the world is good, that they are a force for good. Much of this goes unquestioned. Stories about how America ‘won’ the war, how Europe needs to bend their knees in gratitude, fail, to take into account the bigger picture.  America didn’t ‘win’ WWII single handed. It was a joint effort. No single country could have won alone. Ironically, the Russians were the ones to march into Berlin and liberate that city from the Third Reich and the Russians would have been the ones to capture Hitler, if he hadn’t committed suicide – a trophy that would have made them the indisputable winners. How different history would be today. 

The point is, America has simply got to stop thinking of itself as better than anyone else; it must stop the mantra – “we are the greatest nation on earth” and therefore can solve the world’s problems by eliminating human beings that we don’t like (the Taliban and Al Qaeda).  By the way, isn’t that what Hitler, Stalin and Pol Pot were doing?

If America really wanted to lead the world to civility and peace, then it would lead by example, not through domination and control.

Time for America to become a true partner with other nations and peoples of this earth.

I’m in total agreement with reparations to those countries which have been
plundered for their human and natural resources.  Plutocrats and corporations
which have been complicit in orchestrating and covering up 9/11 should have
their assets seized and turned over to the people of the world.  Media
conglomerates (NewsCorp, BBC, ABC, CNN and others) who have been complicit
in the coverup should be disbanded, their editors and owners fired/jailed and
media should NEVER get the monopoly on “truth” that has developed
increasingly since the inception of the CFR and media conglomerate
permissions.

There’s plenty of room in FEMA camps for the likes of AlterNet editors/writers
and others who are complicit in treason against the Constitution and big lies to
the people of the world.

9/11 is THE PANDORA’s BOX which, if the phrase has meaning is “the truth
which will set us free (of tyranny)”.

Reopen investigations and let the chips fall where they may.  The past eight
years have been based on the big lies of 9/11.  If it takes an international
tribunal and international investigation, I would not be surprised.  Americans
are in a hypnotic acceptance of the official lies of 9/11 and march in lock step
with those who call we truthers “stupid” and “outrageous”.

The biggest barrier to ‘getting it’ about 9/11 is emotional.  The intellectual
steps are short and straightforward.  I recommend starting with Architects and
Engineers for 9/11 Truth—and also the 911truth.org websites.

I’m in total agreement with reparations to those countries which have been
plundered for their human and natural resources.  Plutocrats and corporations
which have been complicit in orchestrating and covering up 9/11 should have
their assets seized and turned over to the people of the world.  Media
conglomerates (NewsCorp, BBC, ABC, CNN and others) who have been complicit
in the coverup should be disbanded, their editors and owners fired/jailed and
media should NEVER get the monopoly on “truth” that has developed
increasingly since the inception of the CFR and media conglomerate
permissions.

There’s plenty of room in FEMA camps for the likes of AlterNet editors/writers
and others who are complicit in treason against the Constitution and big lies to
the people of the world.

9/11 is THE PANDORA’s BOX which, if the phrase has meaning is “the truth
which will set us free (of tyranny)”.

Reopen investigations and let the chips fall where they may.  The past eight
years have been based on the big lies of 9/11.  If it takes an international
tribunal and international investigation, I would not be surprised.  Americans
are in a hypnotic acceptance of the official lies of 9/11 and march in lock step
with those who call we truthers “stupid” and “outrageous”.

The biggest barrier to ‘getting it’ about 9/11 is emotional.  The intellectual
steps are short and straightforward.  I recommend starting with Architects and
Engineers for 9/11 Truth—and also the 911truth.org websites.

A P.S. on heavyrunner’s comment: one of the things my language students pointed out was America has never been invaded.  Before anyone points out Pearl Harbor, that was not an invasion but an attack (as was 9/11).  We have fought wars but never repulsed an external threat.  They felt strongly that, had this happened to us, we might have had a much different perspective on the USSR and Stalin’s behavior after the war.  It was an interesting and eye-opening statement that left me speechless.  This is not a state I often find myself in.

This may not be the proper forum for discussing the cold war and the current state of Eastern Europe.  This thread will disappear in a few days and the whole topic is far too complex to even scratch the surface in that short time.  I’m blogging at ac-watch.blogspot.com and one of my threads covers the whole EE scenario.  If enough express interest, I can dedicate more time to this interesting topic.  Eastern Europe and Russia have a long and violent history.  In the current context, I would rate this region as one of the highest potentials for large-scale conflict on the planet.  The cold war is still simmering (and may be getting hotter) as economic and geopolitical rivalries play out.  And, the history is so juicy!  They have the most interesting characters!

As an aside to this: much of the cold war, from the individual citizen’s perspective, was a fallacy.  Both sides manipulated public opinion for geopolitical advantage.  We almost went to war during one of those misunderstandings.  I hope that the perspectives I discuss in my blog will help people to see that truth is not always one-sided nor is either side always right.  The lessons learned from an honest analysis of the cold war are very applicable today.  New rivalries grow as we speak.

“We, a people whose nation has never suffered a long and widespread occupation, easily gave vent to our most barbaric impulses, assuming the absolute right to arrest and torture anyone anywhere in the world . . .”

Unless your name is Heavyrunner or Crazy Horse.  We have known occupation.

Naomi Klein has an interesting article in this month’s Harpers.  The Durban Conference on Racism Final Report, which argued that the global north owed so much to the global south because of racism, slavery and colonialism that the debts to the IMF and others should be forgiven as a start toward appropriate reparations.

That statement, which was widely anticipated, was released on September 9, 2001.  Then some events which have not been properly investigated occurred on September 11, 2001 that were used to change the subject.

You are quite wrong, Anarcissie.  The 9/11-anthrax public relations homicide was ESSENTIAL in beginning the War on Terrorism and the carnage capitalism that ensued. It evoked fear and rage in the American people, regressing them so, like children, they identified with a Leader who would protect them as their parents did when they were children.  It was brilliantly successful, public relations being an American specialty.

This endless War transformed the US power system, initated the continuous dispowering of the population, and allowed the US power system to invade who they wished and impose a neoliberal police state in the US.

Identified with by Dem leaders and truthers, who neutralized the opposition to it, as Scheer is doing, and delaying the 9/11 evidence from reaching the population that this mass muder could not be acheived withoot complicity of elements of the Bushite administration, 9/11-anthrax was brilliantly successful in administering the shock initiating and legitimating carnage capitalism.

Now it is simply a mater of preventing the evidence from spreading to the American people, which Obama is doing, while it spreads around the world.  Just as the American media legitimated, by covering up, the Magic Bullet that supposedly killed Kennedy, the
media, and scheer, simply have to ignore the absurdity that the collapse of the buildings in their own footprint was caused by the plane fires.  As enumerble independant specialists have pointed out.

trsting

rfidler.

Correction por favor. On re -read you will note (hopefully) that the quote is from
Dr. Ed. Kendrick’s comments. JTSTRS [just to set the record straight]

Since Dick Cheney believes the “EITs” are not torture, he should be willing to experience them first-hand, at least in the interests of full-disclosure and scientific knowledge.  I can just see Cheney-Chicken-Hawk-in-Chief strapped to a waterboard and somehow waving his five Vietnam War deferrments - how would he be able to do that Darth Vader growl and sneer of his with a torrent of water going down his gullet? 
    I really wish that the mostly-redacted text of reports about EITs could be displayed honestly.  The truth IS important - even if the evildoers never are punished.  My “favorite” image is that of Rumsfeld shaking hands with then-ally Saddam Hussein. 
    Sadly, the victims of 9/11 and the peasants in Iraq and Afghanistan and the average folks in Japan and Europe and the US have a lot in common:  all just dispensable cannon fodder, mere pawns in the minds of the power brokers.

I believe Mr. Scheer is putting the cart before the horse.  First, the war is decided upon; then, the reasons for the war are found.  9/11 was providential, but it was not necessary.

omop:

You call Truthdig MSM?? Yikes!

Check out ‘9/11 Facts’ via any search engine.  So much has been withheld from the public and are verboten so far as any msm discourse is concerned.

Richard Gage of Architects & Engineers for 9/11 Truth will be a guest tonight on http://TvNewsLIES.org radio live.  You can call in with questions.  Listen to the experts not the pundits and the hacks.  Please.

Dr. Ed Kendrick,

quote extract:-
“mainstream media (as in “Truth"dig, AlterNet, MSNBC, CNN, BBC WND and so
on are CONTROLLED to avoid like opening Pandora’s box….”

might check out this interesting link.

http://pakalert.wordpress.com/2009/03/16/six-jewish-companies-own-96-of-
the-worlds-media/

If the official myth is to be believed, it wasn’t atomic blast, it was two planes
that hit the Twin Towers and they “collapsed upon themselves” so fast (10-14
seconds) that defies physics—conservation of momentum—and turned the
concrete to dust, not pancakes.  Not only that, but a THIRD building was
demolished just like a Las Vegas hotel demolition.

Robert Sheer, to write about such a ‘what if’ as an atomic blast is to distract
from what we know.  Scientific proof published on the Bentham Physics
Chemistry journal is that nanothermite was one exotic explosive—irrefutably
identified in dust samples from ground zero by 10 American and European
scientists.

FEMA’s Appendix C entitled “Limited Metallurgical Examination” identifies
molten iron and rapidly melted structural steel that experienced “rapid
oxidation and sulfidation”, yet the FEMA report does not draw a conclusion as
to causality.  This new Bentham aluminothermics scientific paper DOES EXPLAIN
WHAT REALLY HAPPENED TO THE MASSIVE STRUCTURES:  they were
intentionally finished off with explosives.

Debate me on the facts—stop calling the 9/11 truth movement “stupid”. 
These are the most patriotic of patriots since the American Revolution—and
mainstream media (as in “Truth"dig, AlterNet, MSNBC, CNN, BBC WND and so
on are CONTROLLED to avoid like opening Pandora’s box the real science of
what happened on 9/11.

George Orwell predicted such as world as we now experience with mainstream
media “news” manufactured to stampede and corral the human herd.  Who own
and control the “news”?  The answer to this leads to the answer to who have
conspired to commit and coverup 9/11.

Could it be any worse than instigating war between Iran and Iraq and contributing to the idea of mass slaughter of civilians. And then passing idea’s of an invasion of Kuwait for the purpose of a re-election ploy. All this while pretending to be an Allie and financial supporter while openly manipulating their every move. Lining their military up from one side of their country to the other and then flying the most potent military weapon known to man over this line and obliterating everything that moved.

C.Curtis, finally, a voice from the other Cold Side. Please write more. Americans
just hear words spoken from inside America, a very, very self-contained platform.

An excellent reminder of the relativism of our concerns for human life, and even “security,” by one of the best “lone whistle-blowers of conscious.”

Thanks Mr. Sheer, you’ve done it again, and the LAT remains so much poorer without your presence.

AT

I would like to make a suggestion to Mr. Osama bin Laden…. You need to just apologize for the attacks of Sept. 11 and all will be forgiven….  Shucks the United States does it all the time and it works like a charm….  Like when we “accidentally” bomb a wedding party in Afghanistan and kill scores….  Some high level shill just says, “We regret the loss of innocent life and it won’t happen again.”  Until the next time , of course, but it’s the thought that counts…. So Mr. bin Laden give it a shot…  Or you can take the other route (my favorite) and simply say, “Frankly, the 3000 dead on 9-11 is a number that doesn’t concern me.”  It worked for Mad. Albright talking about the 500,000 dead Iraqi children that were a direct result of US sanctions…
The best of luck to you sir…..

Robert Scheer

“So, Cheney is again proved wrong, but if there had
been a larger attack on 9/11, I doubt whether many
free souls would be around now to tell him so.”

Given the ugly reality of the present; I’m not sure I
understand the point of this imaginary larger 9/11 of
Scheers’. Freedom is a relative term and little
understood by most people. Citizens are allowed to
openly carry pistols and AR-15’s at venues where
Obama is delivering speeches, but; when unarmed,
lawfully assembled citizens demonstrate via marches,
they are baited and assaulted (evidenced by Amy
Goodman’s arrest) and charged with multiple crimes.
If that isn’t a suppression of a basic American
freedom; then what is it? We’ve become a nation of wackos and honest citizens thrown together in the
loony bin called America. Sorry, this article is just
ridiculous.

Good article, Robert. What a pity there aren’t many journos around like you—
who can tell it like it is. I know they are lacking in Australia.

John P
Canberra, Australia

Americans aided and abetted by the pretend christians like to big deal everything. The slightest incident or provocation involving a CORPORATIONS profits is exaggerated and the person[s] or countries involved demonized and marked for violent, illegal retribution for the sake of maintaining the MILITARY-INDUSTRIAL-CONGRESS-CHURCHIANITY COMPLEX which know how to make Americans cower in fright with imaginary fears. A notable example from the Bible is daylight saving time which claims that god stopped the earth for an hour so Joshua had additional daylight to slaughter the inhabitants of Jerihco. You know Joshua fought the battle of Jericho, well it’s just the first daylight saving big made into a big deal.

At that time I owned a small trucking company specializing in the delivery of building materials. I was making deliveries that day, being down a couple of drivers. While the reports had come in while loading the trucks for that days deliveries, I hadnt seen the news footage.

My first stop was at a private home being extensively remodeled. Upon arrival the woman came out and invited me into the house to see the TV coverage. I watched in stunned horror as those planes crashed into the buildings, endlessly repeating on that TV.

The couple , as it happened, were Indian, and I will never forget the man’s words, reacting to my obvious shock at what I was watching. He said,“we in India have been living with stuff like this for years, now its come to your country”.

A 9/11 reality check? Where is it? How was Cheney wrong? It all happened just the way he planned it. Cheney has made a fortune out of the Iraq war and the war in Afghanistan since he has shares in Halliburton and received a deferred salary from them for as long as he was in office. As J. Bonowski said in his documentary The Ascent of Man: “War is not a human instinct. It’s a highly organized and cooperative form of theft.” People don’t have wars to defend themselves, they have wars to make money and assert power over others. That’s what 9/11 was for: to make war possible.

We also tend to forget the destruction and terror we have rained on Latin America. Just ask Nicaraguans, Haitians, Cubans, Guatemalans, Salvadorans, and now Hondurans, Bolivians and Venezuelans about the parting gifts our country has left them like dictators, death squads, collapsed economies and waves of fear-mongering propaganda.

Living in Eastern Europe, I get a far different view of America.  Just yesterday I was arguing with a group of English language students about who contributed most to the cold war.  Of course, my perspective was as an American and was decidedly more sympathetic to “our side”.  Theirs was, to be expected, reversed.  For many here, Stalin is viewed as a savior who protected them from the Fascists.  They view the world through the information they received from the Soviet press and TV.  We would laugh and point to state ownership of those information sources as proof of manipulation and propaganda.  But how many of us view this history through the lens of our “independent media” which often parroted information provided by our government and its agencies.  There was likely bias in those sources too.  An independent analysis of both sides would find distortions and self-serving propaganda in about equal proportions.  History also plays an important part in defining how a society reacts to new situations.  Russian history is very different from ours and this colors how they see the world.

America has been the 800 lb gorilla on this planet for a long time.  Even before the 2nd world war, we were a major force in the world.  We have always reacted in our best interests (or those of the major business entities of the time) and the world as exists today is the result of our choices.  It is no wonder that so many in the world view America with suspicion.  We are hard to ignore and our decisions impact almost everyone.

It is very disturbing that so few of our countrymen have even a passing reaction to the massive carnage we inflict on others.  We mourn the 6000 US service men and women who died in Afghanistan/Iraq but very little is said about the million plus Iraqis or thousands of Afghans who have been killed.  On Friday alone, up to 100 died when an Air Force fighter dropped bombs on 2 hijacked gas tankers that were stuck in the sand in northern Afghanistan.  The pilot didn’t even check the scene before executing his mission.  But we kept those tankers out of Taliban hands so mission accomplished.  In Germany, there is much hand wringing and an official apology for their part in the mistake.  Where is ours?

Arrogance is a terrible sin we must resist.  Americans have long believed we do no wrong but that view is myopic and false.  America supports our corporate elite as they rape and plunder much of the world.  We allow them to corrupt governments and to avoid any punishment for horrendous transgressions of both laws and common moral values.  We sell terrible weapons to governments which then use them to subjugate their citizens and wage war against their neighbors.  We all are guilty of ignoring the worst behavior of our leaders and institutions.  And we are reaping the rewards of this ignorance every day.