"In the wake of growing skepticism, the U.S. government is taking the unusual step of responding to conspiracy theories about the Sept. 11, 2001, destruction of the World Trade Center.(via WUFYS - they have more - particularly about the NIST stuff)
The National Institute of Standards and Technology, or NIST, headquartered in Gaithersberg, Md., investigated the causes of the collapse of the twin towers. Yesterday NIST announced it had posted a "fact sheet" addressing alternative theories about the World Trade Center fires and collapse.
The government's response comes in response to accusations and suspicions of increasing numbers of Americans that the official explanation of the events of Sept. 11, 2001 – that 19 Muslim terrorists hijacked four U.S. jetliners and crashed them into the World Trade Center and Pentagon, with a fourth being downed in rural Pennsylvania – are wrong. In fact, a shocking new Scripps Howard poll shows a third of Americans believe the U.S. government was complicit in the Sept. 11 terror attacks."
wow. I didn't even hear about that poll.
I can't find the source/details of the poll but:
"According to a recent Scripps Howard/Ohio University poll, 36 percent of Americans believe it is somewhat likely or very likely that the federal government either was an active participant in the 9/11 attacks or had prior warning of them."I presume that a Scripps Howard/Ohio University poll is un-pushed - which to my knowledge is the first that has ever been conducted. That's big news of itself.
The reporting is appalling (and undeafening) - but the message machine is broken. They have no idea how to deal with this stuff any more - the new model appears to be to try to conflate everything from the black helicopters to the absolutely reasonable.
The Star Trib quotes from the Onion (with a venture into Vince Foster territory) - and then offers this "conspiracy theory":
The federal government had prior knowledge of the impending 9/11 attacks -- either as an active participant or a willing victim. Yet it did nothing to stop them because they allowed it "to launch an open-ended, perpetual 'war on terror,' actually a war against any and all enemies the US government may designate. The case of Iraq shows that the target countries of this war need have nothing whatsoever to do with 9/11."911pressfortruth clinically demonstrates that they did have prior knowledge.
and here's the SF Chron:
"Some liberal conspiracy theorists believed the Bush administration used terrorist warnings in 2004 to scare people into voting against Democratic contender John Kerry."The message machine is broken, and/or they are effing desperate. What % of the population do you think would agree with the 'conspiracy theory' that the terror warnings are, in part, political? I would expect the number to be at least 40%. If they are trying to alienate the 911 conspiracy theorists, then they are doing a terrible job.
* here's an interesting comment in SeattlePI:
"University of Florida law professor Mark Fenster, author of the book "Conspiracy Theories: Secrecy and Power in American Culture," said the poll's findings reflect public anger at the unpopular Iraq war, realization that Saddam Hussein did not have weapons of mass destruction and growing doubts of the veracity of the Bush administration.I'm not sure how he knows that there's more purchase, given that I can't think of the issue ever being polled before (apart from the push-ish polls by zogby which had even higher numbers) - but it's an interesting comment none-the-less - not least because it suggests that there is a very ripe market for the movie - and as i've said before, the movie is devastating.
"What has amazed me is not that there are conspiracy theories, but that they didn't seem to be getting any purchase among the American public until the last year or so," Fenster said. "Although the Iraq war was not directly related to the 9/11 attacks, people are now looking back at 9/11 with much more skepticism than they used to.""
(btw - that SeattlePI article went with the headline "Was 9/11 an 'inside job'?" - which is remarkable. fwiw, according to googlenews it was previously called "Poll: A third of US public believes 9/11 conspiracy theory")
12 comments:
These days, the corporate media uses its' power to PROTECT the politicians from accountability. Obvious? To some perhaps. But this must be understood to grasp why corrupt government officials were not held accountable for their role in the 9/11 attacks.
All it would take is to have a single member of Congress (preferably a Republican) attempt to defend the Kean/Hamilton report WITHOUT the support of the corporate media. They wouldn't be able to do it because that report wasn't done in good faith.
Of course they knew something was up. Here are two of many examples:
These guys were in place to film it:
http://www.sundayherald.com/37707
This guy was not flying on planes:
http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2001/07/26/national/main303601.shtml
So people knew... the question is why they didn't do anything.
I agree with old school about the psychological barriers to internalizing the idea that one's own government could do citizens harm for their own nefarious ends. This despite our all knowing, or perhaps "knowing" in an emotionally distant way, that our government carried out experiments using LSD on unwitting citizens, used U.S. servicemen in radiation and nerve gas experiments, and funded a 40-year study in which poor citizens were deliberately left untreated for their syphilis. These are all uncontested facts, acknowledged by our government. Yet it is too dangerous psychologically to believe that our current government, as opposed to one long past, could deliberately harm us.
I think there are two things that may need to happen before people can look the implications of 9/11 in the eye: 1) They must separate the evil actors from "The Government," and 2) they must find a way to absolve themselves of the responsibility for enabling these bad actors.
The first can be accomplished by emphasizing that it was not the Government, but a limited number of individual actors who happened to have government posts who were responsible. After all, the Government consists of about 8 million employees. With that number of people, inevitably at any given time a certain number of them are engaged in criminal acts that hurt the rest of us. If we can look on the bad actors of 9/11 the same way we look on Aldritch Ames (or Duke Cunningham), it may reduce the feeling of unsafe-ness that results from thinking about 9/11 as an inside job.
The second part of the process might be greatly aided by continuing to focus on and talk about the abundant evidence that key parts of the votes in 2000 and 2004 were fruadulent. Not only does it help focus attention on exactly how bad these people are (and what they truly are capable of) but it also gives the public a way out of being responsible for them. After all, if the election results were fraudulent, then the government actors who may have been to blame are also illegitimate.
Finally, I think you will find that the strong visceral reactions to this kind of discussion will be found most prominently on Daily Kos rather than Firedoglake -- interesting also that at Dkos talk of rigged elections is greeted with the same vigorous defense against acknowledgement as is talk of 9/11 as an inside job.
great points all.
fp'd
Well, I guess I'm weird because I thought they were complicit from Day One. I could not believe that at $30 billion a year for intel, that we would have had no clue whatsoever. Simply not credible.
And so many other questions follow that I find it impossible to believe they didn't have a hand in it.
Most people transfer their attitudes towards their parents to institutions of authority, like the church, school and the government. Believing that the current government killed fellow citizens for their own purpose is like believing that your father killed your brothers and sisters. It's the last reality you want to compute and your mind will try to find alternative rationales for the facts.
Then there's the Big Lie theory, that the bigger the lie, the more people believe it. it certainly happened in Germany.
excellent points, y'all; mamayaga, kathleen, noise, anonymous.
oldschool: just go over and whisper the words "9-11 was an inside job".
Barbara Maha has a thing about that as well. she goes nuts and deletes comments having to do w/the belief there were explosives w/i the Tower(s). that's my biggest disappointment w/her otherwise excellent writing and site.
notice to all (apart from us unhinged wingnuts here): it CAN happen here and hiding your head in the sand won't help US.
'de-niiiii-al! de-niiiii-al!' (sung to the tune of Evita)
The CT label is getting old. At some point the 'incompetence excuse' is simply idiotic.
Many people don't realize how much contempt the current US government (including Congress) has for the public.
For Kean/Hamilton to go on TV/radio shows and be treated like royalty is sick.
"Some liberal conspiracy theorists believed the Bush administration used terrorist warnings in 2004 to scare people into voting against Democratic contender John Kerry."
hell...i betcha 40 percent of Bush's cabinet would admit to at least a little of that off the record
that's fucking stupid...
rimone - everyone goes nuts over the controlled demolition stuff. xymphora and cannon too. as i've said - i'm open on the issue. i have no idea WHY they'd do it, it'd be difficult and unnecessary - but watching those THREE building disappear at 9.8 m/s^2 seems very weird.
Noise - i agree with the CT label. i was sick to my stomach watching the electoral challenge 'debate' in the senate and hearing R after R refer to the xfiles.
Ron - i totally agree - that's why i say the message machine is broken. i can understand then referring to the 911'ers as XFilers - but when they start conflating them with the 'water-falls-downward' crowd, then they have some serious problems. the 'water-falls-downward' crowd is likely to say - 'hey - i need to take a closer look at those 911'ers'
For those who find it hard to believe that the WTC was demolished, why did Building 7 go down, if it was not hit by a plane?
While it certainly would be very difficult for someone to set dynamite in the buidings, it's less so when you consider that Marvin Bush had the security contract for the WTC and United Airlines.
And now Rudy Giuliani and Bernard Kerik are both in the "security" business.
They wanted a police state and needed an attack to justify the gestaspo laws and criminal searches. Without the GWOT, Das Bush can't rule by fiat. He needs his war powers.
Of course, I think he needs a padded cell, but they aren't asking me. Maybe a Puritan stock in the public square. You could throw rotten tomatoes, or go fart in his face.
In case there is the slightest doubt among the GSF members and others assembled here, I've believed it was an inside job of some sort since the instant I saw the look on Raisinbrain's face in that classroom when CNN was replaying that video over and over on THAT SAME DAY.
By the time the NY Post headline appeared in May 2002, I had moved out of the LIHOP camp and in with the MIHOP crowd.
Nothing that has come out since May 2002 has made me doubt it. Not the least of which reports was one that claimed there was some "work" going on in the towers after business hours for several days or even weeks. I saved so many things I may have a copy of that report somewhere . . . maybe Damien saw it, too. And don't let us forget the Frontline report with what's-his-name saying out loud that they "decided to pull" WTC 7. Just the other day somebody was talking about the "torch" that WTC 7 was before it collapsed. I guess that person has forgotten that we were watching, and videos of the demolition survive online.
Nothing to see here, folks! You're imagining everything . . .
It all makes my head hurt.
Kathleen: While it certainly would be very difficult for someone to set dynamite in the buidings, it's less so when you consider that Marvin Bush had the security contract for the WTC and United Airlines.
thank you for that--i just found out about it like a year ago and was totally shocked (even though at this late date, i should be inured to this shit).
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