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TechnoratiHow 9/11 Should Be Remembered
The Extraordinary Achievements of Ordinary People
Eight years ago, 2,600 people lost their lives in Manhattan, and then several million people lost their story. The al-Qaeda attack on the Twin Towers did not defeat New Yorkers. It destroyed the buildings, contaminated the region, killed thousands, and disrupted the global economy, but it most assuredly did not conquer the citizenry. They were only defeated when their resilience was stolen from them by clichés, by the invisibility of what they accomplished that extraordinary morning, and by the very word "terrorism," which suggests that they, or we, were all terrified. The distortion, even obliteration, of what actually happened was a necessary precursor to launching the obscene response that culminated in a war on Iraq, a war we lost (even if some of us don't know that yet), and the loss of civil liberties and democratic principles that went with it.
Only We Can Terrorize Ourselves
For this eighth anniversary of that terrible day, the first post-Bush-era anniversary, let's remember what actually happened:
When the planes became missiles and the towers became torches and then shards and clouds of dust, many were afraid, but few if any panicked, other than the President who was far away from danger. The military failed to respond promptly, even though the Pentagon itself was attacked, and the only direct resistance that day came from inside Flight 93, which went down in a field in Pennsylvania on its way to Washington.
Flights 11 and 175 struck the towers. Hundreds of thousands of people rescued each other and themselves, evacuating the buildings and the area, helped in the first minutes, then hours, by those around them. Both PS 150, an elementary school, and the High School for Leadership and Public Service were successfully evacuated -- without casualties. In many cases, teachers took students home with them.
A spontaneously assembled flotilla of boats, ranging from a yacht appropriated by policemen to a historic fireboat, evacuated 300,000 to 500,000 people from lower Manhattan, a nautical feat on the scale of the British evacuation of an army from Dunkirk in the early days of World War II; the fleet, that is, rescued in a few hours as many people as the British fleet rescued in days (under German fire admittedly, but then New York's ferry operators and pleasure-boat captains were steering into that toxic cloud on a day when many thought more violence was to come).
Adam Mayblum, who walked down from the 87th floor of the north tower with some of his coworkers, wrote on the Internet immediately afterward:
"They failed in terrorizing us. We were calm. If you want to kill us, leave us alone because we will do it by ourselves. If you want to make us stronger, attack and we unite. This is the ultimate failure of terrorism against the United States."
We failed, however, when we let our own government and media do what that small band from the other side of the Earth could not. Some of us failed, that is, for there were many kinds of response, and some became more radical, more committed, more educated. Mark Fichtel, the president of the New York Coffee, Sugar, and Cocoa Exchange, who scraped his knees badly that morning of September 11th when he was knocked over in a fleeing crowd, was helped to his feet by "a little old lady." He nonetheless had his Exchange up and running the next day, and six months later quit his job, began studying Islam, and then teaching about it.
Tom Engelhardt, the editor of this piece, began to circulate emails to counter the crummy post-9/11 media coverage and his no-name informal listserv grew into the website Tomdispatch.com, which has circulated more than 1,000 essays since that day and made it possible for me to become a different kind of writer. Principal Ada Rosario-Dolch, who on the morning of September 11th set aside concern for her sister Wendy Alice Rosario Wakeford (who died in the towers) to evacuate her high school two blocks away, went to Afghanistan in 2004 to dedicate a school in Herat, Afghanistan, that included a garden memorializing Wakeford.
In a Dust Storm of Altruism
Hollywood movies and too many government pandemic plans still presume that most of us are cowards or brutes, that we panic, trample each other, rampage, or freeze helplessly in moments of crisis and chaos. Most of us believe this, even though it is a slander against the species, an obliteration of what actually happens, and a crippling blow to our ability to prepare for disasters.
Hollywood likes this view because it paves the way for movies starring Will Smith and hordes of stampeding, screaming extras. Without stupid, helpless people to save, heroes become unnecessary. Or rather, without them, it turns out that we are all heroes, even if distinctly unstereotypical ones like that elderly woman who got Fichtel back on his feet. Governments like the grim view for a similar reason: it justifies their existence as repressive, controlling, hostile forces, rather than collaborators with brave and powerful citizenries.
Far
more people could have died on September 11th if New Yorkers had not
remained calm, had not helped each other out of the endangered
buildings and the devastated area, had not reached out to pull people
from the collapsing buildings and the dust cloud. The population of the
towers was lower than usual that morning, because it was an election
day and many were voting before heading to work; it seems emblematic
that so many were spared because they were exercising their democratic
powers. Others exercised their empathy and altruism. In the evacuation
of the towers, John Abruzzo, a paraplegic accountant, was carried down
69 flights of stairs by his coworkers.
Here's how John Guilfoy, a young man who'd been a college athlete, recalled the 9/11 moment:
"I remember looking back as I started running, and the thickest smoke was right where it was, you know, a few blocks away, and thinking that, like, whoever's going to be in that is just going to die. There's no way you could -- you're going to suffocate, and it was coming at us. I remember just running, people screaming. I was somewhat calm, and I was little bit faster than my colleagues, so I had to stop and slow up a little bit and wait for them to make sure we didn't lose each other."
Had he been in a disaster movie, he would have been struggling in some selfish, social-darwinist way to survive at others' expense, or he would simply have panicked, as we are all supposed to do in disaster. In the reality of September 11th, in a moment of supreme danger, he slowed down out of solidarity.
Many New Yorkers that day committed similar feats of solidarity at great risk. In fact, in all the hundreds of oral histories I read and the many interviews I conducted to research my book, A Paradise Built in Hell, I could find no one saying he or she was abandoned or attacked in that great exodus. People were frightened and moving fast, but not in a panic. Careful research has led disaster sociologists to the discovery -- one of their many counter-stereotypical conclusions -- that panic is a vanishingly rare phenomenon in disasters, part of an elaborate mythology of our weakness.
A young man from Pakistan, Usman Farman, told of how he fell down and a Hasidic Jewish man stopped, looked at his pendant's Arabic inscription and then, "with a deep Brooklyn accent he said 'Brother if you don't mind, there is a cloud of glass coming at us. Grab my hand, let's get the hell out of here.' He was the last person I would ever have thought to help me. If it weren't for him I probably would have been engulfed in shattered glass and debris." A blind newspaper vendor was walked to safety by two women, and a third escorted her to her home in the Bronx.
Errol Anderson, a recruiter with the fire department, was caught outside in that dust storm.
"For a couple of minutes I heard nothing. I thought I was either dead and was in another world, or I was the only one alive. I became nervous and panicky, not knowing what to do, because I couldn't see... About four or five minutes later, while I was still trying to find my way around, I heard the voice of a young lady. She was crying and saying, 'Please, Lord, don't let me die. Don't let me die.' I was so happy to hear this lady's voice. I said, 'Keep talking, keep talking, I'm a firefighter, I'll find you by the response of where you are.' Eventually we met up with each other and basically we ran into each other's arms without even knowing it."
She held onto his belt and eventually several other people joined them to form a human chain. He helped get them to the Brooklyn Bridge before returning to the site of the collapsed buildings. That bridge became a pedestrian escape route for tens of thousands. For hours, a river of people poured across it. On the far side, Hasidic Jews handed out bottles of water to the refugees. Hordes of volunteers from the region, and within days the nation, converged on lower Manhattan, offering to weld, dig, nurse, cook, clean, hear confessions, listen -- and did all of those things.
New Yorkers triumphed on that day eight years ago. They triumphed in calm, in strength, in generosity, in improvisation, in kindness. Nor was this something specific to that time or place: San Franciscans during the great earthquake of 1906, Londoners during the Blitz in World War II, the great majority of New Orleanians after Hurricane Katrina hit, in fact most people in most disasters in most places have behaved with just this sort of grace and dignity.
It Could Have Been Different
Imagine what else could have sprung from that morning eight years ago. Imagine if the collapse of those towers had not been followed by such a blast of stereotypes, lies, distortions, and fear propaganda that served the agenda of the Bush administration while harming the rest of us -- Americans, Iraqis, Afghans, and so many others, for people from 90 nations died in the attacks that day and probably those from many more nations survived at what came to be called Ground Zero.
Not long ago I talked to Roberto Sifuentes, a Chicano performance artist who was then living in New York. Like many New Yorkers, he still marvels at that brief, almost utopian moment of opening in the midst of tragedy, when everyone wanted to talk about meaning, about foreign policy, about history, and did so in public with strangers. It was a moment of passionate engagement with the biggest questions and with one another. On a few occasions, Sifuentes was threatened and nearly attacked for having approximately the same skin tone as an Arab, but he was also moved by the tremendous opening of that moment, the great public dialogue that had begun, and he took part in it with joy.
In five years of investigation and in my own encounter with the San Francisco Bay Area's Loma Prieta earthquake 20 years ago, I've found that disasters are often moments of strange joy. My friend Kate Joyce, then a 19-year-old living in New Mexico, had landed in New York on the very morning of September 11, 2001, and spent the next several days in Union Square, the park-like plaza at 14th Street that became a regular gathering point.
She relished the astonishing forum that Union Square became in those days when we had a more perfect union: "We spoke passionately of the contemporary and historical conflicts, contradictions and connections affecting our lives," she wrote me later. "We stayed for hours, through the night, and into the week riveted and expressive, in mourning and humbled, and in the ecstasy of a transformative present." Such conversations took place everywhere.
We had that more perfect union, and then we let them steal it.
Perhaps Barack Obama, the candidate who delivered that address on race, pain, and nuance entitled "A More Perfect Union" some 18 months ago, could have catalyzed us to remain open-minded in the face of horror, to rethink our foreign policy, to try to grasp the real nature of the attack by that small band which was so obviously not an act of war, and to make of it an opportunity to change, profoundly. Such a response would have had to recognize that many were killed or widowed or orphaned on that September 11th , but none were defeated. Not that day. It would have had to recognize that such events are immeasurably terrible, but neither so rare as we Americans like to imagine, nor insurmountable. (Since 9/11, far more have been killed in the 2004 Indian Ocean tsunami, the 2005 Pakistan earthquake, the 2008 Burma typhoon, and of course the wars in Afghanistan, Iraq, and the Congo, among other events. More in this country have, in fact, died of domestic violence since that day.)
Obama, the candidate, might have been capable of that; of President Obama I'm not so sure. He has, after all, expanded the war in Afghanistan that was the first monstrous outcome of that day in New York. But he's had his moments, too, and it may be that another set of disasters -- the social disasters of racism, poverty, and government failure laid bare during and after Hurricane Katrina -- helped make it possible for him to become our president.
After the 9/11 storm struck, the affected civilians in New York were seen as victims; after Katrina, those in New Orleans were portrayed as brutes. In both cities, the great majority of affected people were actually neither helpless nor savage; they were something else -- they were citizens, if by that word we mean civic engagement rather than citizenship status. In both places ordinary people were extraordinarily resourceful, generous, and kind, as were some police officers, firefighters, rescue workers, and a very few politicians. In both cases, the majority of politicians led us astray. All I would have wanted in that September moment, though, was politicians who stayed out of the way, and people who were more suspicious of the news and the newsmakers.
The media, too, stepped between us and the event, failing us with their stock of clichés about war and heroes, their ready adoption of the delusional notion of a "war on terror," their refusal to challenge the administration as it claimed that somehow the Saudi-spawned, fundamentalist al-Qaeda was linked to the secularist Iraqi government of Saddam Hussein and that we should fear mythical Iraqi "weapons of mass destruction." Rarely did they mention that we had, in fact, been bombing Iraq without interruption since 1991.
After 9/11, it could all have been different, profoundly different. And if it had, there would have been no children imprisoned without charges or release dates in our gulag in Cuba; there would have been no unmanned drones slaughtering wedding parties in the rural backlands of Afghanistan or the Iraqi desert; there would have been no soldiers returning to the U.S. with two or three limbs missing or their heads and minds grievously damaged (there were already 320,000 traumatic brain injuries to soldiers deployed to Iraq and Afghanistan by early 2008, according to the RAND Corporation); there would not have been a next round of American deaths -- 4,334 in Iraq, 786 in Afghanistan to date; there would have been no trillion dollars taken from constructive projects to fatten the corporations of war; no extreme corrosion of the Bill of Rights, no usurpation of powers by the executive branch. Perhaps.
We Are the Monument
It could all have been different. It's too late now, but not too late, never too late, to change how we remember and commemorate this event and that other great landmark of the Bush era, Hurricane Katrina, and so prepare for disasters to come.
For the 99 years before that hurricane hit the Gulf Coast on August 29, 2005, the biggest urban disaster in American history was in my city, San Francisco. Half the city, including more than 28,000 buildings, was destroyed, and about 3,000 people probably died. The earthquake early on the morning of April 18, 1906, did a lot of damage, but the fires did more. Some were started by collapsed buildings and broken gas mains, others by the army troops who streamed in from the Presidio at the northern tip of the city and ineptly built firebreaks that instead actually spread the fires.
The presiding officer, Brigadier General Frederick Funston, presumed that the public would immediately revert to chaos and that his task was restoring order. In the first days after the disaster, the truth was more or less the other way around, as the Army and the National Guard prevented citizens from fighting the fires and collecting their property, shot people as looters (including rescuers and bystanders), and generally regarded the public as the enemy (as did some of the officials presiding over the post-Katrina "rescue"). As with many disasters, a calamity that came from outside was magnified by elite fears and institutional failures within. Still, on their own, San Franciscans organized themselves remarkably, fought fires when they could, created a plethora of community kitchens, helped reconnect separated families, and began to rebuild.
Every year we still celebrate the anniversary of the earthquake at Lotta's Fountain, which, like Union Square after 9/11, became a meeting place for San Franciscans in the largely ruined downtown. That gathering brings hundreds of people together before dawn to sing the silly song "San Francisco," get free whistles from the Red Cross, and pay homage to the dwindling group of survivors. (Two, who'd been babies in 1906, arrived this year in the backseat of a magnificent 1931 Lincoln touring car.)
Some of us then go on to the fire hydrant at 20th and Church that saved the Mission District, the hydrant that miraculously had water when most of the water mains were broken and the men who had already been fighting the fire by hand for days were exhausted beyond belief. The oldest person at the gathering always begins an annual repainting of the hydrant with a can of gold spray paint, and then some kids get to wield the spray can.
San Francisco now uses the anniversary to put out the message that we should be prepared for the next disaster -- not the version the Department of Homeland Security spread in the years after 9/11 with the notion that preparation consists of fear, duct tape, deference, and more fear, but practical stuff about supplies and strategies. My city even trains anyone who wants to become a certified NERT -- for the nerdy-sounding Neighborhood Emergency Response Team -- member, and about 17,000 of us are badge-carrying, hard-hat owning NERT members (including me).
Every city that has had, or will have, a disaster should have such a carnival of remembrance and preparation. For one thing, it commemorates all the ways that San Franciscans were not defeated and are not helpless; for another, it reminds us that, in disaster, we are often at our best, however briefly, that in those hours and days many have their best taste of community, purposefulness, and power. (Reason enough for many of those who are supposed to be in charge to shudder.) For the fourth anniversary of Hurricane Katrina, New Orleanians were invited to ring bells, lay wreaths, pray, encircle the Superdome, that miserable shelter of last resort for those stranded in the hurricane and flood, and of course listen to music and dance in the streets to second-line parades, but also to keep volunteering and rebuilding. (Perhaps the most overlooked aspect of that disaster is the vast army of citizen-volunteers who came to the city's aid, when the government didn't, and are still doing so.)
New York has its pillars of light and readings of names for the anniversary of 9/11, but it seems to lack any invitation to the citizenry to feel its own power and prepare for the next calamity. For there will be next times for San Francisco, New York, New Orleans, and possibly -- in this era of extreme and turbulent weather, and economic upheaval -- a great many other cities and towns in this country and elsewhere.
That hydrant on a quiet residential corner of San Francisco is about the only monument to the 1906 earthquake and fire. The rebuilt city, the eventual rise of disaster preparedness, the people who go on with their everyday lives -- these are the monument San Francisco needed and every city needs to transcend its calamities. New Yorkers could gather in Union Square and elsewhere to remember what happened, really remember, remember that the heroes weren't necessarily men, or in uniform, but were almost everyone everywhere that day.
They could open their hearts and minds to discuss mourning, joy, death, violence, power, weakness, truth and lies, as they did that week. They could consider what constitutes safety and security, what else this country could be, and what its foreign and energy policies have to do with these things. They could walk the streets together to demonstrate that New York is still a great city, whose people were not frightened into going into hiding or flight from public and urban life. They could more consciously and ceremoniously do what New Yorkers, perhaps best of all Americans, do every day: coexist boldly and openly in a great mixture of colors, nationalities, classes, and opinions, daring to speak to strangers and to live in public.
The dead must be remembered, but the living are the monument, the living who coexist in peace in ordinary times and who save one another in extraordinary times. Civil society triumphed that morning in full glory. Look at it: remember that this is who we were and can be.
214 Comments so far
Show All"How 9/11 Should Be Remembered"
Well, truthfully.
The article below is ESSENTIAL READING in order to understand the underlying REASONS for 9/11.
The two documents are very well researched and referenced (over 400 footnotes). The articles are lengthy, some parts not easy to follow and they need to be read with an open mind. The insight into the cancer on the body politic is extremely hard to swallow and very painful to digest. Human hope and defiance of realization refuse to accept facts, logic and analysis.
The implications challenge how we look at politics, economy, history, finance, war and terrorism. Many persons in the documents are well known; many are right now in pivotal positions of politics and finance. These people do shape OUR life and that of our children right now. The details are stunning. The consequences are BEYOND BELIEF.
“Collateral Damage” by E. P Heidner, part I and II.
>>> www.scribd.com/people/documents/2169400-ep-heidner <<<
"Fifty questions on 9/11", by Pepe Escobar, Asian Times, Sep. 12, 2009
http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=15189
EXCERPT:
... September 11 - the neo-cons' "new Pearl Harbor" - remains the darkest jigsaw puzzle of the young 21st century.
It's useless to expect US corporate media and the ruling elites' political operatives to call for a true, in-depth investigation into the attacks on the US on September 11, 2001. Whitewash has been the norm. But even establishment highlight Dr Zbig "Grand Chessboard" Brzezinski, a former national security advisor, has admitted to the US Senate that the post-9/11 "war on terror" is a "mythical historical narrative".
...
None of these questions has been convincingly answered - according to the official narrative. It's up to US civil society to keep up the pressure. Eight years after the fact, one fundamental conclusion is imperative. The official narrative edifice of 9/11 is simply not acceptable.
END OF EXCERPT
Thanks, Mike, for citing the Escobar piece. Interesting that CD, which sometimes runs Escobar's stuff, chose not to post this one. Not to worry. We and many other posters have picked up the slack. This issue will not die.
"The CIA's Intervention in Afghanistan
Interview with Zbigniew Brzezinski,
President Jimmy Carter's National Security Adviser
Le Nouvel Observateur, Paris, 15-21 January 1998
Posted at (GR, the link removed for this post) 15 October 2001"
http://www.globalresearch.ca/articles/BRZ110A.html
"Hearing On US Interests In The Central Asian Republics
House of Representatives,
Subcommittee on Asia and the Pacific,
Committee on International Relations,
Washington, DC.
(U.S. government Web page link removed for this post)
12 February 1998
Centre for Research on Globalisation, (link removed), 20 October 2001"
http://www.globalresearch.ca/articles/CON110A.html
"Clinton Administration supported the "Militant Islamic Base"
Editorial note
Posted at (GR, link removed) 21 September 2001"
http://www.globalresearch.ca/articles/DCH109A.html
"The al-Qaeda attack on the Twin Towers . . ."
consider: al-Q is only a jurisprudent creation of the Intelligence(sic) Community(sicsic).
Give me a break with all the conspiracy theories. Area 51, Kennedy was killed by the Mafia, CIA, Cubans, all the moon landings were a hoax, AIDS is a government plot, Holocaust never happened during WW II, U.S. military caused the 2004 Indian Ocean Tsunami, Kentucky Fried Chicken makes black men impotent, and the Nazis had a Moon Base. Now we have the 9-11 conspiracy theories. People please stop watching Oliver Stone movies, ignoring the facts, and viewing bogus paranoia websites. Please read intelligent research by credible sources regarding 9-11 such as PBS’s Nova, Popular Mechanics, and National Geographic to name a few.
"Please read intelligent research by credible sources regarding 9-11 such as PBS’s Nova, Popular Mechanics, and National Geographic to name a few."
please read David Ray Griffin's Debunking 911 Debunking which addresses the moronic content of these "intelligent" (service) publications.
I was v. interested in Ms Solnit's essay but dismayed by the number of respondees using it as an excuse to peddle escapist conspiracy theories.
I can't speak for the other respondees, but I'm equally dismayed by your using Ms. Solnit's flawed essay as an excuse to peddle escapist orthodoxy.
· Yr Obd't Servant
OS,
I am a civil engineer, and there is nothing about the plane impacts and subsequent collapses, including Building 7, that would suggest any kind of deliberate demolition. In fact, I and some of my co-workers watching the damage on the TV were surprised the buildings stayed up as long as they did.
The building's collapse was due to structural failure, period. In fact, the collapses look so much like structural failure that it would have required a science-fiction level of expertise in explosive placement combined with Hollywood special effects to simulate what the films of the collapse clearly show.
Please entertain all the conspiracy theories you wish to entertain, (the "let it happen" theory is certainly plausible) but please base those theories on the fact that the building collapsed due to the structural damage and fire resulting from airliner impact, or in the case of building 7, falling debris from the adjacent towers and subsequent out of control fire.
Your relentless appeal to authority (yourself), and your juvenile framing of the debate at hand really leads me to doubt your engineering claims. I am a scientist myself, and have concluded along with hundreds of other engineers and scientists that controlled demolition was indeed responsible for the collapse of the WTC towers.
Just based on comments alone, I'll take these folks word over yours any day:
http://www.ae911truth.org/supporters.php?g=ENG
And Dr. Niels Harrit's paper on the presence of high explosives in the dust as well:
http://www.bentham-open.org/pages/content.php?TOCPJ/2009/00000002/00000001/7TOCPJ.SGM
Mr pjd, you say:
"...collapsed due to the structural damage and fire resulting from airliner impact, or in the case of building 7, falling debris from the adjacent towers and subsequent out of control fire."
Please tell me how every point of structural support in building 7 could fail at the same moment. Your bald assertions of "expertise" and dubious "common sense" convince no one, not even yourself, since your convictions seem based on sheer blind faith.
And let me repeat that there are far more authoritative figures than you, and whose expertise is proven and decorated, who give far more detailed analyses to support their claims. Thus, short of writing a book to defend your dubious science, your efforts are a waste of time.
Or perhaps, like David Koresh, or some of the "military rabbis" in the Israeli army, you have a direct line to God, who told you that he suspended the laws of physics on Sept. 11.
"Please tell me how every point of structural support in building 7 could fail at the same moment."
It didn't. The films of the collapse show it to be a progressive collapse from the damaged area downward. and no, it didn't collapse at free fall speed, as the films clearly show as well.
"[who told you that he suspended the laws of physics on Sept. 11.":
OK, lets talk about physics. Please State Newtons three laws, in mathematical form right now, no googling.
"there are far more authoritative figures than you, and whose expertise is proven and decorated, who give far more detailed analyses to support their claims."
NONE of them were structural or materials engineers; none, for the most part, they were nutty quacks.
If you aren't a trained engineer structural engineer, then what level of arrogance leads you to think that you can determine the mechanics of the collapse.
I deal with capitalist versions of unscientific, uneducated, stupid assholes of the same sort as you you "truthers" every day trying to prevent another Buffalo Creek disaster. Unless you can show me some expertise in these technical matters. Go fuck yourselves. You are enemies of any progress toward a just, socialist society.
Ah, so pjd is a "socialist"! No doubt of the Stalinist variety, since he will brook no dissent...
PJD412,
It is quite telling that you assert the exact opposite of NIST's final report on WTC7, when you state "it didn't collapse at free fall speed, as the films clearly show as well."
Why would NIST stipulate that free fall did occur for 2.5 s -- could it be that the facts are crystal clear ?
Are you able to explain how the video has generously proven to any 1st year physics student ~ 2.5 s of free fall?
Can you illustrate and establish what "damaged area" you mention ( at the bottom & not visible in the video ? ), and then explain why there was no twisting moments around the weaken areas ? Because the video completely demonstrates a uniform visual progression downward, which is only explainable as gravity's relentless and uninhibited ( by the building's nominal structural integrity ) acceleration downward.
Please do consider that our collective ability to rationally understand facts are especially limited, when they are confrontational to one's treasured beliefs -- as described by H. L. Mencken.
The core of Mencken's social philosophy was relatively simple.
He believed it is the nature of the human species to reject what is true but unpleasant and to embrace what is obviously false but comforting.
Stand up for what the truth demands and imposes from heroes and patriots. We have much work to do.
You ask "If you aren't a trained engineer structural engineer, then what level of arrogance leads you to think that you can determine the mechanics of the collapse?"
Because Newton's applicable F=mg is amenable to very simple analysis with the video and freely available timing tools, and that the absence of the delays ( also stipulated by NIST's preliminary report ) in collapse from overcoming structural resistance -- proves that the structural integrity MUST HAVE been somehow removed ( for free fall to occur at all ).
As far as your observations and suggestions at the end, they only make clear your undernourished ability to reason, and attempted appearance of being a professional.
_||_
thank you clovis for rebutting that fool. i didn't have the time or desire.
people, email the whitehouse the charlie sheen youtube clip, as well as his letter and supporting bibliography "20 Minutes With The President". it goes over the first 20 of countless unresolved questions RE 911
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZyKR2-A0KPU
national geographic was a hit piece. as if their experiment showing a girder (MUCH smaller than the ones in the twin towers) buckled a tiny bit under 2000 degree temps -- hardly creating the "foundry" effect witnessed that day and still too hot to recover into december 2001. also, the explosive demolition projected huge chunks of the building a quarter of a mile away. 911 was rigged to look different than a typical demolition.
peace
I'm pleased that so many people seem to get the fact that we have been lied to over and over about 9/11.
We all need to support the efforts of the people behind NYC CAN. That might just be the openeing we've been waiting for.
I'm not here to tell anyone exactly what happened that day, or even who was behind it. I just know that the official story is impossible.
Giuliani needs to explain how he "knew" the towers were going to collapse.
Someone needs to explain Bldg. 7
The people who profitted from the put options placed on airline stocks need to be questioned. If that doesn't show foreknowledge, I don't know what does.
Ted Olson needs to be questioned under oath about his bogus claims about calls from his wife.
Cheney needs to be questioned under oath.
This is only a start, but it would be a good start.
Support an independent investigation.
"Cheney needs to be questioned under oath."
and, being a good citizen, he would, of course, tell the truth?
Cheney couldn't tell the truth if his life depended on it!
Not true. He has openly admitted to ordering people tortured in interviews with the media.
And look what happens? Most of the media read the redacted memos and say he was right, and they leave it at that.
You need to see the program about all the top Truthers and their allegations on the National Geographic program. They reject all scientific tests, real investigations of their own theories.
Able Danger is the real cover-up, but all this nonsense of the Truther's demolition and no plane hitting is the smokescreen intended or not.
http://channel.nationalgeographic.com/episode
/9-11-science-and-conspiracy-4067/Overview
David Ray Griffin completely rebuts the National Geographic farce with hard science. You're wrong, and you're on the wrong side of history.
Do you really believe their story about Bldg. 7?
Do you really not question the molten metal?
Do you really think a hijacker's passport could have made it out of his pocket, through the fireball, through the collapse of a 110-story building, only to be found in perfectly legible condition by the authorities?
Really?
Steel doesn't need to melt to clause a structural failure, only get sufficient heated, to lose their strength. Haven't you ever heated a steel bar with a torch to bend it? Cherry red (1300F) is enough to give it the consistency of stiff taffy. I have seen several instances of burned buildings (ordinary burning wood) where steel columns were bent over double like hairpins from the heat.
Building 7 failed the same way the other buildings did, and even if there are some unexplained features of it's particular collapse, how does it call into question the fact of the collapse of the two towers? The presence or not of a passport surviving the impact is completely irrelevant to an engineering evaluation of the building's collapse.
"I have seen several instances of burned buildings (ordinary burning wood) where steel columns were bent over double like hairpins from the heat."
wood burns hot and long.
kerosene doesn't.
And when steel is sufficiently heated, does that cause it to turn into aerosolized microparticles, as have been found in the debris, and does that make everything else that made up the towers and/or was inside them--concrete, plastic, synthetic fibres--turn into dust in midair? And how does a bent steel beam turn into molten metal and remain in a molten state for weeks on end? And while we're at it, mr. structural engineer (yeah, right), what do you say of the fact that Dr. Nils Harrit, a Danish Nobel Laureate in physics, says there is no question the buildings were brought down my military-grade explosives?
Bring America Back !!!!
****I do not like Ms Skolnit's selective memory discourse.
Mainly, I don't want to recall 9/11 in the same light as
the Katrina disaster or the San Fran earthquakes or wildfires.
****So, as suggested in the marginal pop-up for the article, I will not "Buy The Book", her new Disaster in Paradise or whatever her feel goody memoirs are. But, I will google to find out what she wrote about JFK, now that I know.
****Sure, 300,000 got the boats out of lower Manhattan. But, only 25,000 were perhaps from the Towers' evac.
One man, William Rodriguez--a Janitor, re-entered the North Tower when he realized he had the keys to the locked stairwell doors; he went back up opening the doors for the responders and evacuees as well. Then, it is said that Mr Rodriguez==my personal Hero of 9/11, just may have been the last one out before North Tower came down.
=======How could Ms Skolnit's lengthy discourse not have a memory of William Rodriguez; ? may I offer one reason..many documentarians are in denial of Mr Rodriguez' factual explanation that, while opening the stairwell doors--He definitely heard various sub-explosions--timed blasts going off with rapidity thruout the North Tower. Selective memories deny that those were pre=planted C-4 detonations, weakening , severing, undermining with blast caps the core
support girders prior to the main collapsing demolition !
****In her very first paragraph, Ms Skolnit advances her knowledge that "al Qaeda attacked the Twin Towers". FBI says no evidence exists linking bin Laden with 9/11; bin Laden himself has denied involvement. Just as Amy Goodman is a Gateway to the Building #7 Demolition, Ms Skolnit must be a Gateway to al Qaeda information which, not even the FBI lays claim . What a memory she has !
***Mind you, Skolnit educates us that 'Hasidic Jews', not Cephartics or Reformed--were helping folks who may even have looked 'Arabic'...meaning I suppose the milk of human kindness overcame even the Mid-East Conflict.
====Many journalists seem to remember that a Jewish internet service broadcasted a warning to its readership not to go to work that day to the Twin Towers, and forewarned an attack.
I believe, of the 2800 dead victims, one person was claimed to have been Jewish.
****Israeli Prime Minister Bibi Netanahu then was asked what he thought of the 9/11 Attacks, He made the Freudian slip of saying "very good", er ah he corrected himself saying...I mean, at least the US now knows what we've been going thru here in Israel. ! No sorrow for our USA Victims of mass death, no sorrow for us as the best friend Ally-nation, as Bibi just wanted us to experience the brand of terror they do. Let us not even go to the Larry Silverstein or Frank Twoohey Jewish stories, or the Building #7 smoking gun.
****After the Attacks, a 9/11 Victims Family Recovery Fund was established, into which heart broken Americans could send milions upon millions of charitable contributions to assist those surviving family members. But, somehow the Federal Government or NYC Government became custodians, and before Families could tap into their lawful monies, they had to sign never to sue anybody or the Govt for damages or liability negligence !! Now if the milk of human kindness intended those monies for the victims families, why would they have had to sign away future legal Rights ???? I think basic law 101 would hold it illegal to force a person to sign away a future right, or entitlement !
***Mesothelioma==dust in the lungs==many 9/11 responders contracted this despite being told it was safe to work in the rubble==see Michael Moore's DVD "Sicko" on US refusal to pay for med care for these now-ill responders !
**And, it is no wonder Tom Englehardt edited Skolnit on this doo gooder piece==for He has been soft on 9/11, probably as far back as 9/11!
WE WILL NEVER FORGET, and we should never remember it wrongly !!
All Enron criminal investigation records held by SEC destroyed in WTC 7 demolition. Bombs heard; countdown heard; emergency workers clear the area before hand; owner silverstein caught on video saying "pull" the building
Firefighters at airplane entry in WTC 1 and 2 said fires containable, people standing in open holes, no excessive heat; FEMA cuts live feed of first responders communications (proving fire was not a problem, that the situation was being contained) on "national security grounds"; what is FEMA hiding? -- that collapse was NOT imminent due to jet fuel fire without assist from military nanothermate?; FEMA cut communication lines in Katrina, with local Sheriff having to guard telecommunications from our own federal government --- a govt intent on making a bad situation worse for political and economic gain; entire new orleans is now a privatized mess (schools etc) -- all part of the sociopathic disaster capitalism model; watch for another false flag to bring disaster capitalism writ large to the entire nation; we have to expose 911 or more will follow
good news:
September 10, 2009
New York – In a last minute decision, lawyers for the City of New York have conceded that the New York City Coalition for Accountability Now (NYC CAN), a group comprising 9/11 family members, first responders and survivors, indeed did submit over 30,000 [actually they've now got 80,000] valid signatures to put the referendum for a new 9/11 investigation before the voters of New York City this November.
http://nyccan.org/
And when the study concludes that the buildings collapsed due to hijacked airliner impact, and that it really was due to a brilliantly simple and cheap terrorist hijacking scheme, motivated by genuine grievances over murderous US/Israeli policy in the middle east, what will you do?
Google "20 Minutes With The President" a mock interview between Charlie Sheen and President Barack Obama, written by Sheen just a few days ago. Sheen seeks an interview with Obama RE 911. The following is an excerpt. Sheen also has a detailed bibliography.
PBO – You have five minutes left. The floor is yours. Brief me.
CS – Thank you Mr. President. Okay, first; On the FBI’s most wanted list Osama Bin Laden is not charged with the crimes of 911. When I called the FBI to ask them why this was the case, they replied: “There’s not enough evidence to link Bin Laden to the crime scene,” I later discovered he had never even been indicted by the D.O.J.
CS – Number 2; FBI translator Sibel Edmonds, was dismissed and gagged by the D.O.J. after she revealed that the government had foreknowledge of plans to attack American cities using planes as bombs as early as April 2001. In July of ‘09, Mrs. Edmonds broke the Federal gag order and went public to reveal that Osama Bin Laden, Al Qaeda and the Taliban were all working for and with the C.I.A. up until the day of 9/11.
CS – Number 3; The following is a quote from Mayor Giuliani during an interview on 9/11 with Peter Jennings for ABC News. “I went down to the scene and we set up headquarters at 75 Barkley Street, which was right there with the Police Commissioner, the Fire Commissioner, the Head of Emergency Management, and we were operating out of there when we were told that the World Trade Center was going to collapse. And it did collapse before we could actually get out of the building, so we were trapped in the building for 10, 15 minutes, and finally found an exit and got out, walked north, and took a lot of people with us.”
WHO TOLD HIM THIS??? To this day, the answer to this question remains unanswered, completely ignored and emphatically DENIED by Mayor Giuliani on several public occasions.
CS – Number 4; In April 2004, USA Today reported, “In the two years before the Sept. 11 attacks, the North American Aerospace Defense Command conducted exercises simulating what the White House says was unimaginable at the time: hijacked airliners used as weapons to crash into targets and cause mass casualties.” One of the targets was the World Trade Center.
CS – Number 5; On September 12th 2007, CNN’s ‘Anderson Cooper 360′, reported that the mysterious “white plane” spotted and videotaped by multiple media outlets, flying in restricted airspace over the White House shortly before 10am on the morning of 9/11, was in fact the Air Force’s E-4B, a specially modified Boeing 747 with a communications pod behind the cockpit; otherwise known as “The Doomsday Plane”.
Though fully aware of the event, the 9/11 Commission did not deem the appearance of the military plane to be of any interest and did not include it in the final 9/11 Commission report.
CS – Number 6; Three F-16s assigned to Andrews Air Force Base, ten miles from Washington, DC, are conducting training exercises in North Carolina 207 miles away as the first plane crashes into the WTC. Even at significantly less than their top speed of 1500 mph, they could still have defended the skies over Washington well before 9am, more than 37 minutes before Flight 77 crashes into the Pentagon, however, they did not return until after 9:55am.
Andrews AFB had no armed fighters on alert and ready to take off on the morning of 9/11.
CS – Number 7; WTC Building 7. Watch the video of its collapse.
CS – Number 8; Flight 93 is fourth plane to crash on 9/11 at 10:03am. V.P. Cheney only gives shoot down order at 10:10-10:20am and this is not communicated to NORAD until 28 minutes after Flight 93 has crashed.
Fueling further suspicion on this front is the fact that three months before the attacks of 9/11, Dick Cheney usurped control of NORAD, and therefore he, and no one else on planet Earth, had the power to call for military sorties on the hijacked airliners on 9/11. He did not exercise that power. Three months after 9/11, he relinquished command of NORAD and returned it to military operation.
CS – Number 14; The size of a Boeing 757 is approximately 125ft in width and yet images of the impact zone at the Pentagon supposedly caused by the crash merely show a hole no more than 16ft in diameter. The engines of the 757 would have punctured a hole bigger than this, never mind the whole plane. Images before the partial collapse of the impact zone show little real impact damage and a sparse debris field completely inconsistent with the crash of a large jetliner, especially when contrasted with other images showing airplane crashes into buildings.
CS – Number 15; What is the meaning behind the following quote attributed to Dick Cheney which came to light during the 9/11 Commission hearings? The passage is taken from testimony given by then Secretary of Transportation Norman Mineta.
During the time that the airplane was coming in to the Pentagon, there was a young man who would come in and say to the Vice President, “The plane is 50 miles out.” “The plane is 30 miles out.” And when it got down to “the plane is 10 miles out,” the young man also said to the Vice President, “Do the orders still stand?” And the Vice President turned and whipped his neck around and said, “Of course the orders still stand. Have you heard anything to the contrary?”
As the plane was not shot down, in addition to the fact that armed fighter jets were nowhere near the plane and the Pentagon defensive system was not activated, are we to take it that the orders were to let the plane find its target?
The same way Americans fell for the fraud of Obama and his 'change you can believe in' in 2008, they also fell for 9/11 8 years ago.
19 men who never flew planes before are able to stay off their courses for up to 60 minutes without being intercepted then masterfully hit their targets in an impossible fashion. Two towers designed to withstand the impact of airplanes collapse "because of heat". A third one collapses inexplicably.
Pictures of all the culprits neatly appear on TV 24 hours later. The "they hate our freedoms" propaganda immediately follows.
Bush and Cheney fight tooth and nails against an investigation with Democrats rubber-stamping the cover-up every step of the way. Why? Isn't that enough proof that the government was involved or behind the false flag? What else do you sheeple need to see the light? Or you see it and don't care?
"19 men who never flew planes before are able to stay off their courses for up to 60 minutes without being intercepted then masterfully hit their targets in an impossible fashion."
Not 19, only four people - the designated pilots, flew the planes. They in fact did have considerable time soloing smaller planes, and time in simulators of the airliners they flew. It was a very clear post-frontal day in the eastern US on that day - perfect VFR conditions, easy to navigate visually.
"Two towers designed to withstand the impact of airplanes collapse "because of heat". A third one collapses inexplicably."
They were only designed to survive the impact of a much smaller 707 - and the calculation to determine that was full of optimistic assumptions.
"Bush and Cheney fight tooth and nails against an investigation with Democrats rubber-stamping the cover-up every step of the way. Why? Isn't that enough proof that the government was involved or behind the false flag?"
None of this at all proves that it was a false flag. There are many reasons that they would have blocked an investigation. At a minimum it would have exposed gross incompetence in handing intelligence regarding the plot, or that they deliberately discounted the intelligence because the Bush Adm. considered a terrorist attack of some sort very desirable to their political objectives. But to take this to mean the events of Sept 11 were entirely a grand orchestrated fabrication by the US govt. is ludicrous. One has to be badly detached from reality, and be terribly deficient in grasping the technical problems with secretly demolishing buildings and disappearing four airline flights and their passengers, to believe such stuff.
Uh, pjd, for all your vaunted expertise in engineering (yeah, right), you demonstrate a gaping lacuna in matters of aeronautics. A Boeing 707 is not "much smaller" than a 757, but actually of comparable size, being only very slightly smaller, and of virtually the same weight. And did you answer my multiple choice question above?
Thats the problem Waldo, the sheeple have been so ignorant and brainwashed by the whore MSM that they either do not care or believe the governments REAL CON - CONPIRACY THEORY! From my view, the only way to honor the almost 3000 innocent Americans and the many more that died from the governments lie " that the air was safe to breathe " is to find out who really murdered these people. It seems to me, just the most egregious insult to them and their relatives to allow this whitewash to continue! And do not forget, the people behind 911 have no conscience and are the real terrorists and punic, traitors to the country we love and if we do not find them and allow them to get away with these murders of are fellow citizens it is just a matter of time that one of us could be their victims next time as they would have no compuction about committing this atrocity again.
O.T. (sorry, Solnit)
Bob Avakian's lectures on communism are up in 4 videos at revolution.net.
You don't have to be a Maoist or an Avakian/RCP fan to appreciate that this is probably the most accessible piece on communism available to the masses right now. This is not like listening to Chomsky or Harvey, folks. Trust me, I've read and listened to hours and hours of those guys, and a lot of their work is simply going to fly over the heads of many people. Avakian's explanations are simple and he uses simple and relatable analogies for understanding capitalism and communism.
Part 1 is the history and part 2 is the explanation of cappie/communism. Part 3 is how to make a revolution in the U.S., and part 4 is Q&A. And don't miss his hilarious response in the Q&A about why he doesn't believe in God. All of it is very accessible, so email it around to your friends and get people educated. Facebook it, myspace it, whatever the term is for those social sites - get this out so people can watch it and learn.
Avakian is also easy on the eyes. :p
http://www.revolutiontalk.net/films/
The RCP is a sectarian cult.
Bobba, their leader, changes his policies to drive recruitment, hides behind numerous front groups as a gateway to the cult.
In 1980, this man wrote their manifesto in which homosexuality was a "disease of capitalism" and required re-education camps after the revolution. These people are opportunistic stalinist scum.
Do yourself a favor, and just say no to authoritarian cults that would institute a disgusting totalitarian state if they ever had the chance.
And oh, btw, they now support the gays because it is politically safe to do so.
sept 10 2001: pentagon reports missing trillions.
sept 11 2001: pentagon accounting department destroyed.
I wonder if Iraqi's read heroic stories of how ordinary citizens survived the brutal onslaught of Operation Shock and Awe? Though the invasion of Iraq was similar to Hitler's invasion of Poland in 1939 (Germany claimed that Polish "terrorists" had killed some German soldiers) there was far more destruction with the Bush war, as advanced weaponry delivered millions of tons of high explosives. For several days and nights a relentless barrage rained downed indiscriminately upon the Iraqi public. Tens of thousands died or were crippled in a country that had already suffered grievously for a decade from stifling embargoes of medicines, food and basic day-to-day commodities.
Corporate media of course never discussed the carnage that U.S. (taxpayer funded!) bombs facilitated in a pre-emptive war to bring an oil rich country into the American corporate sphere of influence. Little or no mention was made about the handful of Bush and Cheney corporations that would reap billions of dollars in the post-war period after being awarded lucrative, no bid contracts. No mention was made of how a functioning government of Iraq would be fired enmasse throwing even more Iraqi’s into abject poverty.
I agree with Rebecca that 9-11 culminated in a "war we lost" however that all depends on who you're talking to. For Haliburton, Blackwater, Boeing and American Defence Technologies, the war couldn't have gone better. Any oil company that is permitted to drill in Iraq now, are exclusively chosen from a select group of U.S. oil companies (and maybe BP?) while preventing the rest of the world to participate in booty seized by our government.
Meanwhile, the meaning behind 9-11 has never discussed. It may seem obvious to everyone that an attack on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon is an obvious attack against Wall Street and the military industrial complex with the third plane probably headed for the White House to complete the picture. But the fact that Osama went after such symbolic icons of finance and the military, makes the country's elite more than a little nervous.
Innocent, middle of the road people died on that horrific day, yet Al-Qaeda looked at anyone who resided and worked in those institutions as being part of the overall problem. If it were just sheer casualties that Osama were after, he could have chosen to crash the planes into packed stadiums, crowded venues or cruise ships. But those kinds of attacks would be difficult to connect to an ideological beef, the beef being that corporate America, supported by a corporate sponsored government and aided by a public funded war machine has caused almost a century of despair for Islamic peoples who happen to live in oil rich regions.
Does anyone really believe that an attack on the U.S. by Osama would have occurred if U.S. corporations didn't buy, sell and drill for Middle Eastern oil? At the same time our mainstream media is quick to dismiss such 'fanciful notions' with such condescending remarks like "it's far more complicated than that".
Unfortunately I think that Osama's prediction of what American government would do in response to 9-11 has been spot on. The Bush administration manipulated the events on that tragic day to fleece the public treasury once again to fatten the bank accounts of a few, evil men and institutions that enabled his presidency to begin with.
That's how I'd like to remember 9-11 and that's what I will teach my children.
The VERY sad thing about this article is that it borders upon being a parochial platitude.
Yes, human beings have, throughout known history, drawn upon incredible inner strength in the face of horrors and shown a profundity of spirit and resolve.
However.
In a very large measure, September 11, 2001 has NOT been so much a terrifying experience to the people who live within the United States of America as it HAS been and IS to the the people of Iraq and Afganistan. The numbers of dead alone, in these other countries (especially Iraq, which had NOTHING to do with the attacks of 9/11/01) monumentally dwarfs the atrocities of those attacks.
THE question remains. Why do they hate us?
The problem remains. The majority of people in the U.S.A. don't care enough to find out why - much less to change our imperialistic arrogant indifference and, as Ani DiFranco so aptly put it, to "Pull our big dick out of somebody else's sand."
What should we expect from a country born out of the ethnic cleansing of it's native people. Collectively, we are a violent nation which chooses not to secure it's way of life thru peaceful means. Karma might be a real bitch.
"What should we expect from a country born out of the ethnic cleansing of it's native people."
Eh, that applies to most countries in the Western Hemisphere, and a few in the Eastern too.
Nope, that's why I'm a progressive and oppose the wars. I'm just stating we're not unique in that way.
Ok, I don't have time nor patience to read through ALL of these posts, but most of them are completely idiotic. The article barely even mentions who carried out these evil acts. Remember that there is a large number of people who want to kill us; not because of our government but because we don't believe in the same god they do. They can talk and talk about our government in order to continue the brainwashing of their own uneducated robots, but most of you that post are just as brainwashed. Don't you realize that these people want to kill you too? Idiots. Let's just have a concert in Tehran to make Woodstock look like open-mic night at the local bar, and let the whole world come together as brothers? The more I think of it, the more I like it...guess where the bomb would be?
Dryftwood, a little traveling to foreign countries with different religions and culture might do you a world of good and take those blinkers off you.
You see, after a while you'd realise that people the world over are not really all that different, that in many ways they are more hospitable and respectful than North Americans are. Certainly there are people as paranoid and extremist as yourself but thankfully they are very much in the minority.
If you'd like to relieve your symptoms of fear, first stop listening to Fox and CNN and ignorant blowhards like O'Reilly and Beck. In fact, try it -turn your TV off and stop reading mass media for just a week and you might be pleasantly surprised what a difference that it will make. You will find yourself a lot less gullible.
You are left behind with your tiresome hatred and beliefs. The world is waking up to what happened then and who did it, and how they then used for it their purposes - a war to gain what they wanted at any cost to lives, an undoing of our democracy, a gutting of our economy for their own benefit. You can repeat the old lines but they have frayed because they are based on lies that don't explain things nor prepare us to face the next attack on this country, Bush and Cheney's long-planned pandemic.
The families of the victims have unanswered questions.
"The world moves further and further away from the actual events of 9/11/2001 both in time and spirit, and as 9/11 effaces into yet another simple story cast in history, as the parent of Vanessa Lang Langer lost as the towers fell, I want to let it go. I want to stop talking about 9/11. I am tired of the questions unasked and unanswered. I am tired of the effort to burst yet another happiness bubble in our collective American psyche. And, too, I am tired of talking about Vanessa's death. Better for my family, in the immediacy of trying to live out our present days, to focus on Vanessa's life. To laugh at her memories and revel in pictures of her beautiful face. If it were only for the present and the joys I can still share with my children, my family and my fellow citizens, not just of this country but the world, I would let it go. I would so let it go.
"But there is, after all literally, the future. And the future never relied so heavily on redress of questions unanswered in the present. To first ask and then answer what happened that day. Who committed this crime? Who should be held accountable? That is why I support the NYC CAN Ballot Initiative, and I ask for your support as well. It is beyond time for an investigation. It is beyond time."
Okay, who let the winger in?
LOL
He must have dropped in by parachute. There's no way he could fly in with that one huge right wing he has.
You know he'll accuse of us of treason and threaten to crush our nuts next.
Has Common Dreams been declared a "9/11 Truth-free zone" on the eighth anniversary of the crimes? All articles that question the official version of events seem to have been filtered out.
My remembrance of the crimes of 9/11 included writing the following letter to a local newspaper, which was published yesterday:
Eight years later: Still Pressing for Truth and Justice
To the editor:
As we mark the eighth anniversary of the heinous criminal attacks that occurred on September 11, 2001, I will pay my respects to the widows and families of the victims of 9/11 by raising my voice with the growing chorus of citizens who are demanding to know the truth, and who are seeking justice for the perpetrators and their accomplices.
I highly recommend the film 9/11 Press for Truth, which documents the real life story of four women who were widowed by the 9/11 attacks. It follows Kristen Breitweiser, Patty Casazza, Lorie Van Auken, and Mindy Kleinberg (nicknamed "the Jersey Girls"), as they persistently dogged President Bush and Congress for over a year, demanding an investigation into the attacks that killed their husbands.
The administration finally caved in and reluctantly agreed to hold an inquiry, but the 9/11 Commission's belated "investigation" was grossly underfunded (it cost less than one-third of the investigation into Bill Clinton's sex life and finances), and most questions about what really happened on 9/11/01 were left unanswered. The 9/11 Commission did not conduct a serious and competent investigation, and in the end their "report" was discredited as a sham and a cover-up.
Those who dare to ask hard questions, and to challenge the official lies about 9/11, are often ridiculed and branded as quacks and "conspiracy theorists" by establishment politicians and media pundits. Clearly the best way to put all conspiracy theories to rest is to thoroughly investigate all the available facts and evidence, and to follow the trail wherever it leads.
Why are dozens of security videos that were confiscated in the vicinity of the Pentagon within an hour of the attacks still being withheld from public scrutiny eight years later?
Why did the 9/11 Commission ignore numerous witnesses who were willing to testify about explosions going off in the WTC towers before the collapse, and why was there no investigation of the physical evidence proving that explosions had indeed taken place?
Why was there no investigation into the inexplicable free-fall collapse of WTC Building 7, hours after the attacks, which was virtually ignored by the Commission?
There are dozens of unanswered questions and a mountain of evidence and testimony that calls into question the official version of events, and only a thorough and independent criminal investigation into the events of 9/11 will yield the whole truth about what really happened, and provide an opportunity to finally bring the treasonous perpetrators of these crimes to justice.
The "Jersey Girls," along with thousands of other concerned citizens in the U.S. and around the world, have continued to press for truth and justice, and all citizens should join them in demanding a full and impartial criminal investigation and an independent judicial review of all the facts and evidence related to the crimes of 9/11. Let's not wait another eight years to face the awful truth about what really happened on September 11, 2001.
Recommended references:
About the "Jersey Girls" http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jersey_Girls
9/11 Press for Truth – official website: http://www.911pressfortruth.com/
9/11 Press for Truth – on-line viewing: http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=3979568779414136481
Architects & Engineers for 9/11 Truth: http://www.ae911truth.org/
Patriots Question 9.11: http://patriotsquestion911.com/
Michael Canney
Alachua, FL
I also recommend:
Twenty Minutes with the President
Reported by Charlie Sheen
Infowars | September 8, 2009
http://www.infowars.com/twenty-minutes-with-the-president/
9/11 survivors call for renewed probe as 8th anniversary approaches
Posted by Bob Braun, Star-Ledger Columnist
NJ Star-Ledger | August 09, 2009 9:06PM
http://blog.nj.com/njv_bob_braun/2009/08/911_survivors_call_for_renewed.html
America has learned nothing from 9-11. Nor does it want to. It is incapable of ever learning anything from it. It has not even learned that it is a de facto fascist state; it has not learned that its very own policies of relentless state terror (both militarily and economic), murderous fascist war–either directly, surreptitiously or by proxy (i.e Israel)– is most assuredly, the root cause of 9-11. What millions of people outside of America understand clearly to be deserved "blow back," cannot be countenanced as such in the United States. That is beyond the pale, verboten, when in fact, it is the repressed truth of 9-11.The unspoken 'dirty little secret.'
Nor has America shown any inclination whatsoever at implementing any political self-corrective– which may avoid such catastrophes in the future. Quite the contrary. All this, of course, is contingent on if the 9-11 event was not self generated by the internal security apparat of the United States itself: No one can say that permanent war has not become a 'locked in' fact of all subsequent American life. That so many putatively 'serious' progressives continue to use derision and mockery to discredit any such alternate explanations of 9-11 only attests to their incorrigible and perennially innocent naïveté. The willed denial and ignorance on this matter remains astonishing.
Rebecca Solnit is becoming a tedious practitioner of saccharine valedictions and a specialist in sentimental paeans of 'liberal patriotism;' her politics are at best specious, at worst reactionary. Her laudatory hagiography is intellectually muddled and jejune, bowdlerizing any real feelings that she attempts to elicit in her pious moralizing. The real heros are those who have died fighting American fascism or been victimized by its predations, not the celebrated 'can do' proto- fascist uniformed New Yorkers who clean up the messes wrought by America; the very same New Yorkers wearing yellow ribbons in support of "Our troops" in their ongoing barbarism. They would have done better to demand the resignation of the war monger Senator Hillary Clinton, whom they repeatedly elected.
More patriotic pictures of 'noble' New York firemen has become a gushing, vulgar indulgence, so clichéd as to become flagrantly repugnant. One can no longer distinguish the difference between right wing, patriotic symbolism –when 'liberals' like Solnit insist on appropriating fascist visual iconography and thematic narratives, for their own ends. If these 'good Americans' that Rebecca Solnit celebrates, in this wretched article, have learned one thing, it is that they like and support American fascism; they are throughly at ease with it. They will make sure it continues unabated with no shame and no apologies to the living or the dead, now or in the future. This disinterest and failure to understand why it happened debases any attempt to memorialize the occasion for the American victims.
The 9-11 occasion should not mourn the American dead in an unconscionable exclusivity, but the millions slaughtered before them in foreign lands by America's ongoing terror. The atonement should be for them, the nameless and the forgotten. 9-11 is a mere moral ant hill in comparison to the victims who remain voiceless in the vacuity of American criminal indecency. True atonement for America's victims would resonate with all of humanity; memorializing 9-11 rationalizes away any chance of expiation in a vulgar act of nationalistic solipsism. –(Jill Bains)
Here's the best way I know to remember 9/11:
Support a new independent investigation.
We were lied to.
The laws of physics still applied on that day.
Building 7.
The magical passports.
The molten metal.
The put options.
Support an independent investigation.
Thank you for your opinions. What states do you have a PE licensed to practice structural engineering? I’m licensed in Pennsylvania and Virginia, an the building collpases sure look like structural failures, caused by the airliner impacts and fire, to me...
Your relentless appeal to authority (yourself), and your juvenile framing of the questions at hand really leads me to doubt your claims. I am a scientist myself, and have concluded along with hundreds of other engineers and scientists that controlled demolition was indeed responsible for the collapse of the WTC towers.
Just based on comments alone, I'll take these folks word over yours anyday:
http://www.ae911truth.org/supporters.php?g=ENG
And Dr. Niels Harrit's paper on the presence of high explosives in the dust as well:
http://www.bentham-open.org/pages/content.php?TOCPJ/2009/00000002/00000001/7TOCPJ.SGM
Architect Richard Gage is talking about EVIDENCE, not conspiracy theories...
http://www.ae911truth.org/
"Support an independent investigation."
YES!!! And DON'T TRUST ANYONE in public office who does not support an independent investigation. It is one thing to debate theories about what really happened, and it is prudent to be skeptical of all theories that can't be backed up with evidence and credible testimony. But there should be no debate about the calls for an independent criminal investigation, and a full disclosure of the evidence.
THANK YOU CHARLIE SHEEN!
I would like to tell you how 9/11 should be remembered.
It should be remembered as the day the United States of America could have landed in the real world.
It should be remembered as the day Americans become Panamanians, like me. 2000 of us died in the US invasion of 89. Forgotten. The altar of the first George' manhood drips with that blood, never to dry.
It should be remembered as the day Americans became Chileans. Iraqis. Iroquois. Sioux. Mayans.
That day embodied the hidden terror of every empire: to become The Bombed! The forgotten in the dust, the bleeding without pride or honor, the screaming one from another race and continent, the terrified of the power in a foreigner's hand. The impotent. The humiliated. The tragedy that will only last a few minutes in a foreign TV, and be changed back to soccer.
But, even so, there was opportunity. You had the golden opportunity to become Palestinians in Gaza, or Jews in Auswitch. Or Germans in Dresden, or Australian Aboriginals after the Dreamtime became a nightmare. You could have become, even, some forgotten, terrified, bleeding, dying Panamanian.
You could have been great, grandiose in DIGNITY, in HONORABLE SUFFERING, in JUSTICE, in the graceful tear and resolve.
It could have been remembered as the day Americans become one together with the rest of the world, in a single sorrow, against the same enemies. Instead, most of them choose to believe they were above us. But this is Humanity: those who believe are ABOVE Humanity, are OUTSIDE and BELOW Humanity.
And now, when we, the others, recall (if we do!) that date, it is only with...irritation. Indifference. We remember you never celebrated, commemorated, our 9/11s, because too many of you were involved in provoking them, or justifying them, or forgetting them.
The victims, all of them, deserve better.
For me the Panama invasion was my first introduction to the web of lies and death that this government and media spew. I was young then, fresh from the indoctrination of high school. I couldn't believe no one I knew cared or was bothered by the thousands of innocent dead. Please accept the apology now that I wanted to give then to every Panamanian. I'm sure it means little. Thank you for your post.
USer,
If you never believed that lie, or participated in that aggression, then no apologies are needed. I don't hold you, or people like you, responsible. Good for you that at your young age you already had the sense to see what was happening.
I wish there were more Americans like you. Thanks for thinking, my friend.
Well said. What a truely compromised selective memory most Americans have. A social science teacher told me that ethnocentricism is a problem with countries that occupy a lot of real estate on the globe because, as children, they see this big spot and think they must be important. So they usually are not multi-lingual or respectful of other countries and cultures. He also said the inverse is true. People from small islands and/or countries are more respecful of other countries and cultures because, as children. they see this tiny spot on the globe where they live and don't consider themselves to be a big deal.
Hi AGG,
I think your teacher was spot on. At least in my case! :-)
Glad to see some people mentioning the Ted Olson fraud.
I posted about it, and my post was up there, and now it's gone. Has anyone else gotten censored?
lots of censorship here on this site - you got the little button to panic on
report this post button
O.T., but David Michael Green's new piece is up, here, on Obfraud's health care speech.
http://www.regressiveantidote.net/Articles/Obama_Tries_On_The_Uniform.html
Does anybody know what NYT ad he is talking about here? Apparently a bunch of libs took out a full page ad threatening to run someone against Ob in 2012. I haven't heard about it or seen it.
Anyone?
blair: good link bro - green is a great writer
I like him too, thanks.
I'm a girl, though. ;-)
It doesn't mention anything about a primary challenger, but it does demand he support a strong public option.
http://www.actblue.com/page/
changewecanbelievein?refcode=obamaadhtml
And HuffPo has an article about it.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/09/09
/progressive-obama-backers_n_280272.html
Okay, that helps a bunch. Thanks.
I see the ad was mentioned in the comments section on Greenwald's latest, too. It can be seen at Alternet.
9/11 should be remembered thus:
1) Change the code you dial for an emergency to 666.
2) Rename the world trade center location to BUSH GARDENS.
3) Never again vote for a republican or a democrat.
4) Throughout the month of August advertise in Field & Stream a "real effective" fishing lure shaped like two long rectangular solids.
"Eight years ago, 2,600 people lost their lives in Manhattan"
EVERY YEAR more than 22,000 people die from lack of health care due to the Insurance corporations.
WHERE IS THE PERSPECTIVE, PEOPLE?
Why haven't we declared war on Insurance Corporations? They kill more people than our military do. I'm all for suspending the Geneva Conventions when it comes to Health Insurance executives. They belong to a truely terrorist organization.
Ford, GM, and Chrysler too.
Question.
Which is the larger tradgedy?
A. The loss of life from the attacks on 9/11/01.
B. The loss of life from the invasion and occupation of a country that had nothing to do with the attacks of 9/11/01.
badger: the entire spin of the arab boys being responsible for 9/11 is based on the testimony of ted olsen - solicitor general from '01 to '04 - he says his wife called him twice on her cell (the first story said her cell the second said the plane phone) from one of the flights - those calls set up the psyop about the arab boys and the boxcutters
"The little white lie was about Barbara Olson, a conservative commentator for CNN and wife of US Solicitor General Ted Olson. Now deceased, Mrs Olson is alleged to have twice called her husband from an American Airlines Flight 77 seat-telephone, before the aircraft slammed into the Pentagon. This unsubstantiated claim, reported by CNN remarkably quickly at 2.06 am EDT [0606 GMT] on September 12, was the solitary foundation on which the spurious “Hijacker” story was built.
Without the “eminent” Barbara Olson and her alleged emotional telephone calls, there would never be any proof that humans played a role in the hijack and destruction of the four aircraft that day. Lookalike claims surfaced several days later on September 16 about passenger Todd Beamer and others, but it is critically important to remember here that the Barbara Olson story was the only one on September 11 and. 12. It was beyond question the artificial “seed” that started the media snowball rolling down the hill."
the fbi now concedes those calls "did not take place"
ted olsen is a liar - flat out - now why would he lie...
ted olsen was bush's lead lawyer who successfully argued at the supreme court that the florida recount should be stopped and the presidency awarded to bush by decree. we all know where that one went...
God help me. Is it so hard just to take a minute and think of the folks that died that day without all the BS.
People are thinking of them. It's why there is such a strong desire for the truth. That includes facing this government's actions, here and elsewhere.
Dear Citizens of New York City,
We lost our son Bobby on September 11, 2001.
The death of a child is a pain like no other, compounded by the fact that this wonderful young man was murdered.
When a crime as heinous as this takes place, it is assumed that justice will be served and the perpetrators will be discovered and punished.
Much to our dismay, this has not taken place. We only want the truth.
Our only hope, at this juncture, is to support the NYC CAN Ballot Initiative, calling for an unbiased and non-political investigation of our son’s murder.
Don't forget all those New Yorkers and Firemen dying RIGHT NOW because the EPA said the air was okay to breath in the subsequent days. I'm sure they are under-insured for cancer and other catastrophic medical conditions our wonderful government makes sure the "competitive" insurance corporations don't suffer from. Your father was a fire fighter and you don't question your government? What's wrong with you, man? They're killing us. This is serious shit. Being "under authority" has no value when the "authority" is corrupt. You owe your allegiance to people of good will not government liars.
If we had decent social service nets in this country, those 911 workers and those exposed to the dust and air down there would have adequate health care when they needed it of all kinds - medication, O.T., P.T., psych/mental health services, addiction treatment, in-home care - the works. They would also have disability benefits that would make their lives comfortable while they are unable to work.
Instead, some of those workers had to be taken to Cuba by a fricking documentary filmmaker to get care!
blair: what about the vietnam vets still trying to get care 45 years after vietnam
here:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bonus_Army
read about the vets from ww1 being chased down the mall in washington dc by the tanks of the american army under the command of generals patton and macarthur
telling our vets to fuck off is as american as killin' the injuns
or here:
http://newdeal.feri.org/misc/reuther.htm
to read how henry ford got the army to machine gun striking workers at gm in 1933
Too many minutes of reflection for too many years, wipe the tears and move forward. We owe it to the victims here and around the world to expose the evil greed behind justification for war. The evidence is still piling up. Military grade thermite has been found in the dust from that day (Rock Creek Free Press). Many people have stepped forward to testify they witnessed the jet that hit the Pentagon fly over the north side of the Citgo station. Problem is the 5 stills we have all seen are from the south side ( 9/11 Pilots for Truth ). Momentum is building. No doubt an investigation would involve some of the guilty. I bet some of the guilty were involved in sending Bernie Maddof to prison.
A lot of folks died after that day, here, in Iraq, and in Afghanistan. We should remember all the innocent victims of 9/11, not just the American ones.
Indeed.
Assertions are regularly made among 9-11 Truthers along the lines of "When people understand this, it will change everything" or even "Nothing will change until people understand this." Well, not necessarily.
On the one hand:
Myself, i've known for decades, since long before 9-11-01, actually since before 9-11-73, that the United States of America is BUILT on lies and genocide and war. i (and millions of others) don't need this "linchpin" Truth to know the TRUTH about the United States of America.
My own immediate reaction, when a phone call woke me up and i turned on a television (rare event), was certainty that the US government was involved in some way, most likely by not stopping the hijackings (a la the foreknowledge of the Japanese attack on "our" base in Hawaii in 1941). The possibility of more direct US involvement in planning and carrying out the attack was also on my mind.
BUT: whether it was a carefully planned and carried out internal conspiracy involving orchestrated explosive demolition; or it was a blind-eye allowance of a hijacking attack by flight-school dropouts; or it was simple blowback from decades of US meddling and mass murder and wars "secret" and not-so-secret that caught idiotic Bush administration officials completely by surprise; whichever scenario is the "Truth" means NOTHING to my understanding of what the United States is, and has been, and is capable of doing.
The persistent insistence that i MUST accept the myriad (and divergent) scenarios of the disparate Truth movement or else i am exposed as either a CIA operative or a dupe or a shill, is stupid.
And on the other hand:
As another poster above has pointed out, learning the Truth means NOTHING to millions and millions of United Statesians. "The Truth" about monstrous official crime after crime after crime after crime after crime has been exposed irrefutably and publicly, and the majority in this country opt for distraction, consumption, ignorance, or rabid proto-fascism.
i do not doubt that many in the Truth movement sincerely believe that this will be the key to unlock a transformation of the United States, but it ain't necessarily so. In fact, it ain't even likely. You could get a contrite confession from Dick Cheney, with video released of the meeting at which OBL and GWB finalized the planned false flag scenario, and before too long the US public will have moved on to something else, and the lumbering of the militarist corporatist empire toward its ultimate shuddering crash will continue.
The lashing-out and accusations by Truthers at anyone who does not jump on the bandwagon, is stupid.
They have had a hard row to hoe, to withstand the conspiracy theorist attacks even from their own but they have held their ground and taught everyone a lot about the centrality of truth. So, whether you agree on particulars or not, you know yourself that truth is critical and they have stood behind it despite everything and they are winning against denial.
The country is changing dramatically, in losing hold of so much stability, in seeing so much theft and betrayal. They are learning terrible things rapidly. Ironically, those you call "rabid proto-fascists" have been reporting horrible things here which the left denies still - FEMA camps, a set up for martial law, the pandemic as a means to murder millions - the left being distracted, ignorant and using "conspiracy theorists" or "whackos" to shut out realities.
The truth is out there and it seems good and important that the Truthers have fought for it. But we need it all. 9/11 is essential because it opened a door on Bush and Cheney destabilizing the country and setting it up for their fascist dream (the pandemic being the door into it, timed for when the economy is crashed) and that has to be seen.
Webwalk, I think your point is valid in terms of the methods of some Truthers, which do little more than alienate their interlocutors. In terms of the merits of the case, however, I think your arguments are specious. One cannot take such a watershed event, which has been used by warmongers to turn the world upside down, and say the underlying causes of the event are irrelevant to the reactions, when they are precisely what is used politically to justify acts that would have been otherwise deemed unacceptable. We live, moreover, in an age of dangerous groupthink, when public opinion is mercilessly manipulated by mass media most often in defiance of reality and truth. I happen to live in France, where most people are, like you, ready to believe the worst about the past and present acts of the US government. And yet there is a sort of stone wall of opprobrium surrounding anyone who expresses doubt about the official 9/11 story, even more, far more, than in the US. Most people don't even know about building 7. It is a frightening testament to the power of mass means of communication to control information. Thus, regardless of whether the inherent evil informing so many of the reprehensible foreign policies of the United States of the last 50 or 100 years continues to this day and found continued expression in the events of 9/11, the political reality we have been living for the past eight years hinges specifically on the mendacious official narrative of those very events. It would be no small contribution to the cause of world peace were there to be a mass outcry, especially on an official or semiofficial level, demanding clarification of those events. Thus could a truly terrible, treacherous act lead, perhaps, to positive change. I'm not holding my breath, of course, but as long as the policies based on the original sin of the 9/11 lie continue to kill untold numbers of people, I believe it is imperative for those who have studied the merits of the case to discuss it as much and as rationally as possible with people of open mind.
Though we of course disagree about America my friend, you need to look at other countries before using such harsh measure for us. We actually compare fairly well.
BUT......"The lashing-out and accusations by Truthers at anyone who does not jump on the bandwagon, is stupid."
You are spot on here. any of the "believer" sects at this point lose each time they attack.
webwalk: good post
you say: The lashing-out and accusations by Truthers at anyone who does not jump on the bandwagon, is stupid.
i agree - as a truther myself i agree - it is not helpful
just let me say though - we take a lot more shit than we give back
Regardless of who destroyed the towers, nearly the entire nation decided to act with wanton revenge, somewhere, somehow. Afghanistan? sure why not. Iraq? whatever you say Mr. President. To question the actions of the military and the President was considered anti-American, if not treasonous.
What should have been an investigation of a hideous crime, with a pause for reflection on what may be the reasons, a nation that prides itself on it's Christian heritage, a religion that preaches forgiveness, instead allowed revenge to poison the heart and commit murder, torture, to cripple, and to destroy the lives of hundreds of thousands, maybe millions.
9-11 should be a day of mourning more for the tragedy of American revenge than for the criminal act of that day.
There were some who urged action as you describe pascal.... including some relatives and family of people killed in the towers. Unfortunately, their voices were ignored and powerful interests that thrive on violence took over. It was as simple as naming the attacks as "criminal acts" instead of "acts of war" or "terrorism". We lost our way that time ... hope we can find a better path soon.
John Lewis had a great speech (preaching forgiveness and peace and justice) from the rotunda after the attacks. He was practically shoved from the podium by some bully looking white guys as he finished his speech.
Anybody know what hit the Pentagon then? I know we can't believe the official story but this isn't something I ever followed. I guess there's reams of shit out there I can read. :-)
google national security alert, citizens investigation team. excellent video there
craig renke lives near me in san juan capistrano and interviewed people whose eye witness testimony PROVE that the plane approached the pentagon but flew just north of it just 50-100 feet above the ground ---- with bombs planted in the building!!! the light poles etc were all staged, taxi too; the taxi guy was interviewed and he was PAID to plant his car with the fake windshield deal;
where are the passengers who were on that fated flight? likely collateral neocon damage for a job well done that day
interesting info on whose part of the pentagon was attacked that day (some cheney enemies); also, bush flew from the pentagon heliport the night before right were the bombs went off and was scheduled to return later that day on 911 -- his people were crawling all over the pentagon the night before
also, police chief gags his two cops who were interviewed in the above video (cops who saw the plane on a flight path to the north of the pentagon, and inconsistent with the staged flight poles); and on and on
all politics and fear so far, no real subpoena-powered investigation yet into 911...
Are you ready to testify under oath?
blair: given the size of the hole in the wall - about 20 feet by 20 feet - it looks like a missile
here: http://pilotsfor911truth.org/
on this site pilots explain fully in layman terms why the there was no plane at the pentagon
they have the government's flight path on video and the black box recorders from the planes - you can watch them both in flight simulator video and it is weird - both versions are significantly different
then they explain why both stories are utter bullshit