As always, Joel, a very nicely written expression of absolute and utter insanity based on a delusion which it's hard to believe that someone who seems intelligent could buy into, but I guess that at some point you parted ways with reality and now you've left it so far behind that you might as well be living in cloud-cuckoo land.

For those interested in some actual facts about the ridiculous 9/11 truth theories, I recommend this excellent report from the BBC.

For those who would like to see a really exhaustive and definitive debunking of one of Joel's 'unequivocal' bits of paranoid fantasy, I recomment this report on the Pengatogn attack.

Joel, your movement peaked a year or more ago, was so thoroughly discredited that no one pays any attention to it anymore, and is now resting a couple of layers deep in the ashbin of history.

Except maybe among Ron Paul supporters, of course...

Dave

If this is speculation then so is the official story. You can not trust our government, period!

Fantastic! The paradigm shift is occurring right now all around us. Well said, my friend. We are with you.

WeAreChangeLA

The 9/11 truth movement itself must define exactly what the first real credible and comprehensive investigation must consist of.

But, but, but...I thought we already had 'unequivocal truth'? If that's the case then why would we need an investigation? And if the investigation you plan is the 'first real credible' one, then that doesn't mean that your supposed 'truth' is in fact NOT credible or real?

Dave

Dave, instead of an excellent report from the BBC I only got an excellent '404 - page not found' error from the BBC. It's been deleted! It's a conspiracy, I tell you!

Joel,

There IS at least one major flaw to your conspiracy theory:

If it really existed and was as efficient and all-powerful as you say it is, scribblers who endeavour to expose and overthrow it would be summarily whacked.

If I ran the conspiracy, you and everyone like you would have been fitted for concrete overshoes long ago.

And yet, here you are, alive and kicking.

Honestly, Joel I've read some idiocy on BC lately, but this takes the cake. The same way that my wife had me at "hello", you lost me at "America's political system is a criminal conspiracy" (FIRST PARAGRAPH).

Perhaps if you stopped all farting around and introduced compulsory voting (which engages the entite community in the process, and there can never be any doubt that ALL the people have spoken), you'd have a lot less reason - none, in fact - to keep whingeing about the whole bloody thing.

Because that's what it is, one giant one-argument whinge that is becoming so boring, doctors could prescribe it to insomniacs instead of mogadon.

It'd probably work a lot better too. You'd be asleep in 20 seconds.

Sorry, mate, I know you're entitled to your views and all and I respect that, but it just looks really quite insane.

Not to be snide, but can't there be a sanity clause added to the header "A Sinister Cabal of Supieror Writers"....

Dr. D. As sometimes happens, the Movable Type Conspiracy added junk to the URL when I pasted it. Try this corrected version.

If it really existed and was as efficient and all-powerful as you say it is, scribblers who endeavour to expose and overthrow it would be summarily whacked.

Hell, if I were running the conspiracy he'd not just be whacked, he'd be taken away for reeducation and once he was properly programmed we'd send him out to hunt down his fellow conspirators. Either that or we'd just disappear him and erase all record of him. No need to leave messy bodies around.

Hey wait, maybe that's the REAL conspiracy. Perhaps everyone who knew about the conspiracy and all the other conspiracies was in the WTC when it got hit and they were all conveniently wiped out. Makes as much sense as anything else.

Dave

Dave

The only problem with the official conspiracy theory (OCT) is that there is not one single shread of evidence behind it.

False flag attacks are the rule rather than the exception for starting wars.

"If this is speculation then so is the official story. You can not trust our government, period"

What absolute bollocks ... it's worked for 200-plus years, and you voted for it, too)whether or not your party won, and that's just part of the process). Accept it, because that's why it works.

It's worth remembering too that these are, to say the least, interesting and special times.

And interesting and special time require some intersting and special measuresm whether we all like them or not.

9/11 wasn't that long ago. How quickly we forget that a bunch of people with, ahem, quite fervent religious beliefs and given to wearing tea-towels as hats, can do what they did isn't that far fetched - especially in a free society like America. That's what they took advantage of, and that's why you are currently suffering some domestic incovenience.

Basically, whether you choose to stick you head in the sand or not, you ARE at war. And it's not a war of your own choosing, but someone else's.

Get over it, and be part of the solution, not the problem. To paraphrase one great American, Stop asking what your country can do for you, and work out what you can do for own contry.

IN the meantime, stop talking bollocks.

911 TRUTH rules, OK! Indeed, the only thing that keeps the war on Terror going is 9/11...which has been promoted as the work of islamic terrorists...BUT as we know, the FBI says it has no evidence BIN LADEN was involved, and several of the suspects turned up alive over the following month:

'On June 5, 2006, the Muckraker Report contacted the FBI Headquarters, (202) 324-3000, to learn why Bin Laden's Most Wanted poster did not indicate that Usama was also wanted in connection with 9/11. The Muckraker Report spoke with Rex Tomb, Chief of Investigative Publicity for the FBI. When asked why there is no mention of 9/11 on Bin Laden's Most Wanted web page, Tomb said, "The reason why 9/11 is not mentioned on Usama Bin Laden's Most Wanted page is because the FBI has no hard evidence connecting Bin Laden to 9/11."



Surprised by the ease in which this FBI spokesman made such an astonishing statement, I asked, "How this was possible?" Tomb continued, "Bin Laden has not been formally charged in connection to 9/11." I asked, "How does that work?" Tomb continued, "The FBI gathers evidence. Once evidence is gathered, it is turned over to the Department of Justice. The Department of Justice than decides whether it has enough evidence to present to a federal grand jury. In the case of the 1998 United States Embassies being bombed, Bin Laden has been formally indicted and charged by a grand jury. He has not been formally indicted and charged in connection with 9/11 because the FBI has no hard evidence connected Bin Laden to 9/11."



It shouldn't take long before the full meaning of these FBI statements start to prick your brain and raise your blood pressure. If you think the way I think, in quick order you will be wrestling with a barrage of very powerful questions that must be answered. First and foremost, if the U.S. government does not have enough hard evidence connecting Bin Laden to 9/11, how is it possible that it had enough evidence to invade Afghanistan to "smoke him out of his cave?" The federal government claims to have invaded Afghanistan to "root out" Bin Laden and the Taliban. Through the talking heads in the mainstream media, the Bush Administration told the American people that Usama Bin Laden was Public Enemy Number One and responsible for the deaths of nearly 3000 people on September 11, 2001. Yet nearly five years later, the FBI says that it has no hard evidence connecting Bin Laden to 9/11. '

No evidence bin laden involved in 9-11

dave: 'As always, Joel, a very nicely written expression of absolute and utter insanity based on a delusion which it's hard to believe that someone who seems intelligent could buy into, but I guess that at some point you parted ways with reality and now you've left it so far behind that you might as well be living in cloud-cuckoo land.'

and that was written by the fellow who cant put two words together about Chavez and sound sane and reasonable.

The truth is easier to see Dave is you dont park your head in Bush's rear end.

Who's talking about Bush here, Brian.

If you can't see that America is in deep strife, and much of it NOT of its own making, then you are as mad as Joel.

EWe all now then US govt has done some shit of late that it shouldn't be proud of, nut one of the most insane propositions I've ever heard is that the US government is responsible for the destruction of 9/11 and the deaths of thousands of its own people.

Even bin Laden, now hidng in a cave, admits he did it - with no help from the US govt.

This entire rant is wrapped around a single quote from Ron Paul, taken completely out of context. RP's position on the conspiracy theory was put to rest a long time ago.

And BTW, just remember... the burning temp of jet fuel might not be high enough to melt steel, but a blast furnace can melt it using wood coals. How strong do you suppose the updraft was in WTC?

Re: #12.

Brian, why does the 9/11 attack require direct personal involvement by bin Laden to be real?

Looking for bin Laden under every rock seems unrealistic. He can certainly work from afar and indirectly and do plenty of harm.

The nature of covert cell structure, in fact, inherently prohibits bin Laden's direct involvement in the events of 9/11.

Doesn't make what happened any less real, though.

Dave

In point of fact, the steel floor supports didn't need to melt, only be weekened enough to sag off of their supports at each outer wall.

The weight of one floor pancaking into another was enough.

Also, the buildings fell straight down because the strenghened elevator shafts in the center of the building guided the falling walls like papers on a spindle.

That's how a fireman and several people that were rescued survived in stairwell B in the second collapse. The wound up stranded several stories above the pile, which illustrates how strong and reinforced those stairwells were.

Doc, what really happened with the BBC link is that Dave, possibly over-stimulated by Mr Hirschhorn's article, formatted the link incorrectly. It was nothing at all to do with the site technology and I have now fixed it.

The BBC and CNN both reported that the third building, WTC7 (Solomon Building), collapsed 25 minutes before it actually collapsed. Go to youtube.com and search for "WTC BBC" and watch.

While at youtube.com, search for Larry Silverstein WTC7. Mr Silverstein was the man who made 3-4 billion dollars from the insurance settlement (our new attorney general ruled in favor of him receiving it). You will find a PBS documentary clip of him saying that he made the decision to "pull" the building.

I also highly recommend getting a copy of Loose Change Final Cut which is being shown everywhere in the world besides the US.

We don't know what happened, but we do know that the 9/11 Commission was a cover-up. Would you expect anything else from the group that lied us into war, lied about Jessica Lynch, lied about Pat Tillman, lied about WMD, lied about the elections et . .

Fool me 15 thousand times, shame on me.

How moronic do you have to be to believe that a conspiracy happened?

How many people would have to be involved?

How many of those would actually keep quiet?

Where are the miles of wiring that would have to have been in the buildings beforehand to have a controlled demolition?

Does anybody remember anyone going into the WTC to wire up the building? This kind of stuff doesn't happen overnight, or even a few overnights.

I swear, the more I read this stuff, the more I realize that some people are just too damn stupid to think for themselves, are disconnected with reality, and willing to believe anything.

As one of the politics editors, I would like to take this moment to apologize for having published this piece which can only be considered a vicious gang rape of the human mind. We have chosen as a group to allow any well (or at least marginally coherent) written piece to be published here. As a result, the most extreme elements of the internet including those with paranoid delusions and Ron Paul supporters will find an outlet here. To accomodate this, I propose a new flag for all articles called Whackjob that allows readers to filter through the world of the mentally ill to more easily find such gems of writing which we have on this site (usually written by me ;)

An alternate suggestion John, publish it as a satire?

Great article. I feel ashamed to live amongst so many sheep that refuse to stand up & realize how many lies we are living under.

The tide is turning.

Paul, who do you think you're fooling (except maybe yourself) Do you honestly think that that many people could keep their mouths shut for over 6 years without one of them potentially making millions by telling their story?

I thought the ones who blindly followed Bush were bad! What's the world coming to?

What lies would they be, Paul? That the Iraq war has nothing to do with 9/11.

Well, we all know that. That's why a lot of nations that wouldn't go near Iraq are involved in an anti-Taliban campaign in Afghanistan. But the truth is, the Iraq war came about as a result of some very serious bad advice (Don Rumsfeld and the other cronies who didn't read their history books, take a bow).


And now you're mired in it, what's to be done?? The iraqis are a wonderful people, and 90 per cent of them prefer a US-led coalition helping to run the place than a stalinist regime whose favourite tricks were feeding people feet-first into industrial paper shredders while they watched - and laughed, and killing 12-year-olds with nerve gas inside priosn cells so that no member of a family that had fallen out of favour would survive.

They don't want a return to the kind of horror with which they lived on a daily basis. The only ones who do are active members of the Ba'ath Party and islamic fundamentalist insurgents. The rest of Iraq wants their kids to go to school, to have jobs, power and water and similar lives to ours.

Believe me, I lived there as a boy and I know the truth of it. Most of them would prefer to see a US Marine or a British paratrooper turn up on their doostep than a squad of Saddam Hussein's secret police.

Still, the conduct of the "peace" after the war was ill-advised, badly planned, run largely by private-enterprise cowboys and has now possibly run its course.

But Afghanistan is a very different proposition. That is an absolute hotbed of islamic fundamentalism, and was absolutely the place where 9/11 was conceived. Even bin Laden has admitted this was the case, and actually warned about "something very big" in America months before it happened.

If you don't stand up to the towel heads now, there won't be any separation of church and state in the US in 100 years.

There won't be any church for a start, and even worse, there might not be any US.

Plus, Paul I reckon you'd look great with a tea-towel wrapped around your head. Is that what you want, because that's their aim?

And you've got the hide to call those of us who don't believe this bollocks sheep. What idiocy. Freedom, sadly, comes at a price, and the price is standing up to bullies and mass murderers.

None of us wants war if it can be avoided as it's total insanity (at best), but we're dealing with people here who a) don't want to talk and b) have as their aim a worldwide islamic caliphate - a kind of throwback to the middle ages where everyone is muslim, and not just any kind of muslim, but a particular brand of fundamentalist muslim.

But you know what, even if we did become muslims under their scheme of things, those of us in the west who've had the wherewithal to build great societies would still be running the place. So the problem won't ever go away. They underestimate our strength of will entirely, and nonsense like Joel's doesn't help.

Fact is, this shit has already been going on now since the middle ages.

Joel - the 'true' story of 9/11 will be written in a generation or two by the victors of whatever war or revolution is going on now...imo the whole effort is a waste of energy: it will not work as a general 'call to arms'

Hmm.

troll, are you also on the bandwagon of "9/11 Truth?"

Please say it ain't so!

...Clavos - as you know New York City is a movie set: the towers were never really there in the first place

the only 9/11 conspiracy that I'm interested in is how the US has been pocketed by the Family Saud and the religious interests that support it

Whew!

That moment really rattled my foundations (or something).

Bingo on the Saudi Wahabbists. Ruvy's dead on with that.

"the most extreme elements of the internet including those with paranoid delusions"

like those who think there's a war on Xmas.

There are indeed all sorts of delusions. Some are more destructive than others, however.

Dave

I found it interesting that the very first comment was by a guy like Dave. He said:
" As always, Joel, a very nicely written expression of absolute and utter insanity based on a delusion which it's hard to believe that someone who seems intelligent could buy into, but I guess that at some point you parted ways with reality and now you've left it so far behind that you might as well be living in cloud-cuckoo land."

"As always" Dave? It would seem that you either read Joel H. routinely implying that he regularly writes on the subject of absolute and utter insanity... or "As always" Dave, you are out there in front looking to throw the first punch. You are correct about " expression of absolute and utter insanity based on a delusion", what you appear not to understand is that the absolute and utter insanity based on a delusion is yours.
It also appears that you that you are either being paid to write such drivel, or that it is you that are "living in cloud-cuckoo land".
If you had spent 1/100 of the effort J.H.put into his article 1. it probably would have over taxed you and 2. you might have actually presented a modicum of an argument.
Please if you will, explain to me and others here how all three towers fell at free-fall speed while allegedly pan-caking their way down? I propose you can not, because you can not defy the laws of physics just as the explanation of the towers coming down at free fall speed can defy the laws of physics. But you can try.
Dave (brick wall), I can write and talk all day to you but I would only be wasting my time, what I have written here is for the benefit of others.
J. Hirschhorn is correct in his analysis and wrote and presented the perspective of truth well. I don't know you, and from what I have read of yours I care not to know you. But I do ask and recommend that you quit making such a fool of yourself in public. If on the other hand you are merely playing the devil's advocate, I recommend a new, different, and more exciting strategy.
With out people like J. Hirschhorn, America as we thought we knew it and hoped it would remain as such, does not stand a chance. What we will be faced with is a mediocracy of "Dave's" where in the entire meaning of life may be permanently tarnished with the indelible stain of ignorance.
p.s. Dave, please don't take this personally, it was not meant to be.

It drives me crazy when people debate the Laws of Physics!If they told you that water froze & made ice at 70 degrees Fahrenheit on 9/11,would you believe them?I'm a pilot,ex-Air Force,a mechanical engineer,& a welder.There is ZERO evidence & Zero scientific PROOF to support ANY of the governments claims, PERIOD!!!No ivestigation is really needed to prove someone is lying when they tell you water freezes at 70 degrees!There is enough evidence to Hang Bush and his staff, ALL the heads of the News Media,half of Congress,the editors of Popular Mechanics, Professor Edgar of MIT,Professor Sozen of Purdue and many more!And all we have to do to find EVERYONE involved is offer anyone of these Criminals a Plea bargain & we will get every address & phone number. [Personal contact info deleted]

Dr.Bob

I wonder if Joel could possibly really believe this UFO/Bigfoot/Atlantis/JFK-assassination sort of mythology-worship and navel-gazing. Or does he just get off on seeing the krazee comments roll in, and giggle as rationalists like Dave Nalle try to make reasonable arguments against fairy dust.

The irrational, all-encompassing hatred of the federal government expressed by these posters is a bit chilling, however. What exactly do they think is going to come of all this? Few of them seem articulate enough to say.

Joel, I believe that a quote for a recent episode of "Life on Mars" fits here...

"If I was as sure as you are, I'd never fart for fear of shitting myself"

I smell a great episode of MythBusters on the horizon.

John B, would you have to stamp your fictional ACLU-war-on-Christmas articles "Whackjob" also? Or are editors' articles exempt?

If Bin Laden did it why does DHS consider websites like ae911truth.org to be as dangerous as the terrorists? ae911truth.org is a website by professional architects and engineers who demand a new investigation because it looked like a controlled demolition. If you label me a terrorist for thinking 9/11 looked like a controlled demolition and demanding a new investigation you risk losing common consensus.. In other words neither pride nor faith will stop the truth from being true. The truth movement simply moves to expose the truth for what it is. We honestly don't know everything, but we will find out.

"If Bin Laden did it why does DHS consider websites like ae911truth.org to be as dangerous as the terrorists?"

They don't. If they did, it would have been shut down in a heartbeat, and its staff jailed on terrorism charges.

But no one's touched it...

P.S. Have your doubts, fine, but remember this fact: Molten metal found under WTC 1, 2, and 7 was flowing like lava, yet this critical evidence was not included in FEMA, NIST or the 9/11 commission's analysis.

I don't know about you, but I personally would consider pools of molten metal to be important evidence in an investigation. I think it tell us a lot about the conditions inside the buildings before they collapsed, and it might explain why they fell between 60-80% the acceleration of gravity. Normally I would expect resistance from structural support to slow the collapse considerably. But as NIST says, within 12 seconds nothing but rubble was left of those 110 story towers. That's roughly 10 floors of steel columns buckling every second.

Its just hard for be to believe that gravity alone could do this. Because according to the officials after the initiation of collapse gravity is the only force acting on this object. I guess this is why their analysis ends at the onset of collapse, because to follow through would expose the dilema that is the 9/11 truth movement. Its not easy to explain how fire alone could cause this. Further analysis is required, yet our government refuses to do it.

So what will it take to convince you to support the truth?

Clavos, I don't that's funny.

Rather, I don't think that's funny. I am more afraid of your complacence than I am of authority.

John's completely wrong on the "war on Christmas" nonsense, but there's a substantial difference in degree: John can always find some grinchy examples of idiots somewhere who really do want to stamp out Christmas, and declare himself right. And if so, so what? Christmas will continue. Also, it's not so unreasonable to think that some people would be happier if Christmas went away.

The so-called "truthers," on the other hand, seem to actually believe -- despite all evidence and history -- that George Bush personally ordered missiles flown by remote control into buildings as an excuse to wage war. Or something. They seem to be more about poking holes in existing theories than actually offering a coherent counter-theory. In support, they offer suggestions that the U.S. government regards dumb websites as terrorist organizations. Um, yeah. We've committed thousands of troops to the ISP hosting ima911troother.con!

I suspect one could offer counter-evidence to John that might actually slow him down. Maybe. There's just no reasoning with people for whom "BUSH+JEWZ=DEATH" makes sense.

There's dumb, and then there's DUMB.

DrBob (who must be a pretty rotten mechanical engineer if you ask me) says:

It drives me crazy when people debate the Laws of Physics!

I agree. You can't debate the laws of physics. You can, however, understand them. As Dr Greening here does.

Dr. Dreadful, want to see something strange? Check out Dr. Greening's link where he says:

"WTC 7 was 570 ft. (47 stories) 1.3 times the height of the J.L. Hudson."

then we verify the height at Wikipedia to find:

"The building was 610 feet (186 m) tall, with a trapezoidal footprint that was 330 ft (101 m) long and 140 ft (43 m) wide."

and

"Height
Roof 741 ft (226 m)"

So what is it? 570 feet, 610 feet, 741 feet?

It was 174 meters, which is 571 feet. It fell in 6.6 seconds. This is an average acceleration of 80% gravity. Nothing accelerates at 100% gravity unless it is in a vacuum. Since building 7 was not in a vacuum its structural support did not provide much resistance. And since there are no blueprints available for buildings 1 and 2 I can only assume they had no structural support, if I am expected to believe your official conspiracy theory.

But I know better than that. Some of us still believe intentionally ignoring critical evidence in an investigation is obstruction of justice. But this ain't about some small crime. This was the New Pearl Harbor spelled out in PNAC's Project for a New American Century.

"If Bin Laden did it why does DHS consider websites like ae911truth.org to be as dangerous as the terrorists?"

that's an easy one. It's because the delusional mindset of the truthers fits the profile for potential domestic terrorists. They're McVeighs and Rudolphs waiting to happen.

"It's because the delusional mindset of the truthers fits the profile for potential domestic terrorists."

Really? What's your degree in psychology? Its much more like an Ad Hominem against the truthers. But normally Ad Hominems are harmless, this is not. Address their message, if you disagree with it so much. Let's talk about it publicly, if you dare. We both know where the cards will fall, so let them fall. What have you got to be afraid of? That we're telling the truth? Oh come on..

The fact that you think it's the truth is what proves your altered memtal state. True believers are the most dangerous potential terrorists. Your 911 beliefs are equivalent to the racist beliefs of a Randy Weaver or the messianic beliefs of a David Koresh. To those who watch for domestic terrorism it's a red flag. You can maintain that you have secret truth all u want but it does not change the reality of how you are perceived.

Whenever I read a piece like this I'm most affection by one emotion.

I'm so very proud to live in a country where folks question every seemingly obvious fact. Scream from rooftops when, at least for them, the facts don't add up. Most importantly they have the freedom and protection to do so.

I am not amazed that a group of folks believe the US government is behind 9/11. I'm amazed anyone could believe there could be a conspiracy of this magnitude snuggled tightly between the loving, interlocking arms of the Democrat and Republican parties.

I'm also extremely wary of any modern day movement that feels the need to produce their own "Manifesto".

STM: '
Even bin Laden, now hidng in a cave, admits he did it - with no help from the US govt'

I should be surprised that someone on 2007 is unaware that OBL has denied publically he was behind 9-11 attacks...but im not.

So FYI:

'USAMA BIN LADEN: In the name of Allah (God), the most beneficent, the most merciful. Praise be to Allah, Who is the creator of the whole universe and Who made the Earth as an abode for peace, for the whole humankind. Allah is the Sustainer, who sent Prophet Muhammad (peace be upon him) for our guidance. I am thankful to the Ummat Group of Publications, which gave me the opportunity to convey my viewpoint to the people, particularly the valiant and momin (true Muslim) people of Pakistan who refused to believe the lies of the demon (Pakistani military dictator General Pervez Musharraf).

I have already said that I am not involved in the 11 September attacks in the United States. As a Muslim, I try my best to avoid telling a lie. I had no knowledge of these attacks, nor do I consider the killing of innocent women, children and other humans as an appreciable act. Islam strictly forbids causing harm to innocent women, children and other people. Such a practice is forbidden even in the course of a battle. It is the United States, which is perpetrating every maltreatment on women, children and common people of other faiths, particularly the followers of Islam. All that is going on in Palestine for the last 11 months is sufficient to call the wrath of God upon the United States and Israel. There is also a warning for those Muslim countries, which witnessed all these as a silent spectator. What had earlier been done to the innocent people of Iraq, Chechnya and Bosnia? Only one conclusion could be derived from the indifference of the United States and the West to these acts of terror and the patronage of the tyrants by these powers that America is an anti-Islamic power and it is patronizing the anti-Islamic forces. Its friendship with the Muslim countries is just a show, rather deceit. By enticing or intimidating these countries, the United States is forcing them to play a role of its choice. Put a glance all around and you will see that the slaves of the United States are either rulers or enemies of Muslims. '
etc

Bin Laden denies he did 9-11

Dave: 'Brian, why does the 9/11 attack require direct personal involvement by bin Laden to be real?

Looking for bin Laden under every rock seems unrealistic. He can certainly work from afar and indirectly and do plenty of harm.

The nature of covert cell structure, in fact, inherently prohibits bin Laden's direct involvement in the events of 9/11.

Doesn't make what happened any less real, though.
======================================

Bush launched a war against Afghanistan to catch the man he claimed was responsible for 9-11...only to later claim...he was not interested in catching him anymore.

Why deos 9-1 require OBL involvement? Well, thats what YOUR govt claimed...so ask them.

Theres no evidence this fictious Al-qaeda was involve at all...AQ is just another bogey man to frighten dumb americans into backig wars in the middle east...

'Looking for bin Laden under every rock seems unrealistic.'

well, duh...thats what the americans were doing in Afghanistan, and blasted a mountain to do so...maybe the should have had you as advisor....

'
The nature of covert cell structure, in fact, inherently prohibits bin Laden's direct involvement in the events of 9/11.'

This makes you sound like an expert when you are not.

Silversurfer,

I don't think you are being genuine when you say a brilliant man like Donald Rumsfield didn't know his history of Iraq & didn't know what he was getting himself into. Of course he knew it & I would guess he doesn't give a sh%t that the country has been decimated & is more interested that we have 14 military bases in Arabia & are that close to controlling their oil.


I think 9/11 was "controlled" by Rummy,Cheney & God knows who else. I would guess that at least 50+ million Americans think the same.

I also realize that there was a very real problems with radical Islam world-wide & something had to be done, because Europe wasn't going to defend herself. So in a way, I understand why they did what they did.

However, I think these guys have gone OVERBOARD with the whole plan.

Afghanistan was one thing, but wrecking Iraq & trying to occupy her is draining our economy, spirit & dividing us too deeply.

Fighting wacked out Islamics on our terms & getting closer to the natural resources of the Middle-East could have been done with a smarter, lower-key plan, that actually worked with some countries instead of trying to muscle everybody.

This admin had the know how to work with Iran in some capacity & I think my generation can actually cut thru all the crap & bad history & still "work" or co-exist with them. Iran was on our side after 9/11, their people actually have a very strong moral code. If you F with them they F back, but we have never had the guts to deal with them straight.

Cheney & Rumsfield are brilliant, ballsy men, but they don't have the personalities to be true World Leaders. Maybe they don't want to be,maybe they wanted it all for themselves.I don't know? But my generation & the next is going to have to work with other powers & try & bring some decency back into the human race.

I still have plenty of hope, but what a steamy pile we are all left with.

Caleb #45: Yeeeees - and...?

What exactly am I supposed to find strange about the fact that Wikipedia, an online encyclopedia edited by any Tom, Dick or Harriet with time on their hands, has errors?

I'm not sure what exactly you think you're trying to prove. Video recordings of the collapse of one of the towers show it took more than 16 seconds - nowhere near free-fall time.

Brian, 50:

Don't be ridiculous. Your citation is from October 2001. Bin Laden has claimed to have been behind 9/11 on more than one occasion since then.

Dr Bob,

Are you still flying with a civil airline? Please tell me which one, and the next time I'm heading across the Pacific, if it's not Qantas, I'll go with them :)

The nature of covert cell structure, in fact, inherently prohibits bin Laden's direct involvement in the events of 9/11.'

This makes you sound like an expert when you are not.

And what makes you think I'm not, Brian? It's been one of my special areas of study as a historian, plus I have a family background which has given me a certain amount of experience in the area.

Now admittedly I'm not part of a covert Chinese communist cell operating out of Australia, but one doesn't have to be in a cell to understand how they work.

Dave

Here's two replies, one to Paul and the other to Brian.

First, Brian, OBL may well have said what he said, but he also indicated a few months before 9/11, "watch for something big". Having lived in Iraq, and havin many Arab friends and aquaintances, I can tell you that telling out and out lies is not regarded the way it is in the west - provided it serves your purpose. Basically, you can lie your bloody head off as long at helps achieve whatever goals you are trying to achive.

Second, to Paul, who seems to display an appalling ignorance about this stuff, like most 9/11 "truthers" (and what a misnomer that is).

A little history: Iraq is basically the bastard child of the British Empire. After they rolled up the Turks and Germans in the middle east in the first world war, the British (with the French suddenly joining in, as usual, without having done much) carved up the region into mandates, or areas of influence.

Prior to that, there was no real Iraq - the borders are artificial, drawn at the stroke of a pen in Whitehall, and the three Turkish territories of the Ottoman Empire that made it up (Mosul (north), Baghdad (centre) and Basra (south) ) were mainly occupied by three very diverse peoples - the Kurds in the north, the sunnis in the centre and the shia in the south. Which is probably why the Ottoman turks made it three regions, not one country. Since the British mandate and subsequent Iraqi indepwendence in the early 1930s, they have been squabbling for control, independence or influence or all three ever since. In ancient times, hordes of tribes and kingdoms fought over the fertile land between the Rivers Tigris and Eurphrates, known as Mesopotamia, that today makes up much of Iraq. So it's not new at all.

The British, in their post WWI carve-up, got most of the oil - which is why Kuwait isn't part of Iraq and first came under British protection, and why Saddam wanted it. However, Iraq's reserves, north and south, are also huge.

In the 1920s and 30s, the British fought a running war in Iraq that is very, very similar to that being fought by the US-led coalition today. Almost identical, in fact. In other words, a series of ongoing small battles to prevent or take revenge for terrorist attacks. They were doing exactly what the US is doing today just to remain in control (and doing about as well, too).

The Royal Air Force even experimented with the precursor to napalm by dropping it on Kurdish towns and villages in the north because the oil-rich kurds wanted independence.

People like Rumsfeld, you'd think, would have known all that - and like the British before them, while the conquering was easy, maintaining the peace was the hard part. I don't believe for a moment that many cabinet policy advisers in Washington, who are nearly always party appointments and generally not there on merit but rather because of who they know, have much idea at all of foreign policy, and it's well known that they'll often ignore serious suggestions and recommendations from the State Department and the CIA (who, contrary to popular belief, aren't always engaged in spying and bringing down governments - often, they are just reporting back to Washington on the moods of the people in various countries around the world).

If rummy knew the British experience, and the Turkish history, I'm sure he would have planned the whole thing differently, but I'll wager London to a brick that he didn't. One reason makes that painfully obvious. They never thought the "peace" through, and there was ample evidence on the table of the squabbling between the three main Iraqi groups over the past century and how it would impact any foreign "invader" (although Iraqis actually viewed the US-led coalition in 2003 and the British in 1918 as liberators - for a while).

And of course, the British are the worst this time around: London knew about all this stuff all along. Their war memorials are full of the names of thousands of British soldiers who died in Iraq between the two world wars, but they still chose to go along with it. Why?

Well, apart from the fact Britain regards the US as its closest ally and is grateful for the help it received in World War Two, and has never forgotten it, there's more.

It's simple ... oil is the new water od mesopotamia in modern Iraq, and the threat that one of the world's largest reserves would no longer be available at a reasonable price (and would send the OPEC per barrel cost skyrocketing) if the situation got any more out of control than it already had. It's not the only reason, of course, as oppressive, murderous stalinist regimes are always a bugger for everyone who lives (or dies) under them. Believe me when I tell you 90 per cent of Iraqis are glad to see it gone.

They may not want US corporate imperialism, or McDonald's capitalism, but they aren't unhappy to be rid of a pack of absolute bastards.

But 9/11 as US govt plot and an excuse to go to war with Iraq? No way ... they didn't need any excuse. It's a load of absolute fu.king bollocks. You all need your brains examined.

Seriously. Get some help, and soon ...

If rummy knew the British experience, and the Turkish history, I'm sure he would have planned the whole thing differently, but I'll wager London to a brick that he didn't.

Rumsfeld is clearly not a moron. I don't see how he could possibly not have been familiar with the history of the region as it would be relevant to our involvement there. It seems more likely that he made the assumption that 40 years of baathist rule had secularized the country sufficiently to put national identity ahead of religious and ethnic divisions. Not an unreasonable assumption, but on the other hand all he had to do was look at the breakup of the Soviet Union to know that even 70 years of nationalistic communist rule wasn't able to break down religious and ethnic divisions there. Maybe he was a bit guilty of wishful thinking. Or more likely he thought he'd be able to install a new strongman to keep things together in Saddam's place.

Dave

Excerpt Dave, the 40 years of Ba'athist rule hadn't secularised the counttry at all. All it did was add one more lot of madmen to the mix.

And I don't believe the majority of kurds, sunnis or shia are mad ... but most ba'athists who weren't simply the ones who went along with it all to stay alive, were, qyite simply, absolute bastards.

And I don't believe rummy lnew accurately the history of Iraq. Otherwise, they might have landed a parachute division or something similar in the centre of the north to settkle things down.

As it was, all the madmen just headed north as the Americans and Poms advanced.

Rummy and Cheny and co have to take responsibility for the fuck up as the execution in the initail stages was good, but the dfollow up was a balls-up of epic proportions.

Even the cops and surrendering troops - most of whom hated Saddam and regarded the Americans as liberators - were disarmed.

One again Dave, I only agree with some of your argument.

On the need to get rid of Saddam Hussein, however, I have no disagreement at all .... and contrary to the belief of many Americans who think none of it should ever have happened, most Iraqis were happy to see the coalition ride into town.

After a mongrel like that, who wouldn't. And seriously, the US is about as nenign an imperial power as you'll ever get, despite some of their fuck ups (abu ghraib and the like).

The reason for that: like the Poms, their priamry aim is not to bring death and destruction, but something better than was there before.

And I don't give a rat's about whether first-year university students like Brian agree with that or not.

Check this out. Richarge Gage directly demands a new investigation from NIST.

Here's the direct link to the audio.

Isn't this the same group of nuts that claimed that the US Navy shot down the TWA flight to Paris?

LOL, Richard Gage, the guy who's marketing 9/11 conspiracy trading cards? Yeah, he has a whole bunch of credibility.

Gage is a bonafide idiot and he's part of the Architects and Engineers for 911 Truth group, which the Simon Wisenthal Center recently classified as an anti-semitic terrorist organization. Hey wait, isn't the author of this article a member too?

Dave

Dave: "LOL, Richard Gage, the guy who's marketing 9/11 conspiracy trading cards? Yeah, he has a whole bunch of credibility."

Hey Dave, remember those Civil War trading cards, the ones with really bloody battle pictures that used to come with stacks of excellent confederate money?

These blokes like Joel reckon the US dollar is worth nothing anymore, so perhaps they could stick a couple of greenbacks in each pack. A $1000 wouldn't be bad!

I'd buy 'em just for that, and hoik the cards in the round file under my desk where the fuking things belong.

The amount of nuts over there carrying on about this nonsense must actually drive you blokes nuts as well.

9/11 "truthers": One of the great misnomers of all time.

Anyone who thinks they own the absolute truth on anything ought to be looked on with suspicion just for that.

dave

NIST had a conference call yesterday discussing their finding on WTC7 & how a 47 story building could just collapse to the ground. GUESS WHAT?? Still no offical explanation after 2 years of the task..

Their is no argument anymore, it's what do you do to achieve justice.

Paul: "WTC 7 collapse ... Still no offical explanation after 2 years of the task."

I can tell u exactly how it happened, but what's the point. You just believe this rubbish about the conspiracy.

Silver surfer,

You are not the US Goverment. The NIST IS & the have not been able to give the public a straight answer for over 2 F-ing years.

Cut the B.S. man.

Yes, because people like Paul wilfully ignore the fact that half the bloody building had been stoved in by the collapse of WTCs 1 and 2.

Take your granny's walker away. She'll collapse pretty fast too.

I know why building 7 collapsed, I saw it with my own eyes... The damned thing burned ALL DAY. The fire was set off by WTC 1's collapse and the fire department couldn't get to it to fight the fire for lack of equipment and they couldn't get to it because two of the tallest buildings in the world were crumppled around it.

...my god how stupid are you?

So what it burned all day? 47 story buildings don't pancake into the ground at near free fall speed. & they don't have molten metal & tempatures above 1,000 degress weeks after the collapse. Yes, I said weeks & it's true. It was mentioned in the conference call.

Again, I listened to the entire 2 hour NIST call. Did anybody hear or are you b.s. with your own opinions?

That's the National Institue of Standards & Saftey. They have been studying WTC7 collapse for over two years, to try & release a accurate report that explains the total collapse. This report will be read by the scientific community, so their b.s. in covering the Gov. ass has to be on a high level.


The lead investigator said they had office fires between 8 to 14 floors, that never got above 600 degress & no diesel fuel, feeding it. I can't tell you how many liars have tried to tell me it was the diesel fuel tanks that feed the fire.

that's debunked.

I feel sorry for the guy that has to release this b.s. report, I can only imagine how much pressure he gets from the Gov. to give just the right story, but after 2 years, he still hasn't produced it!

Maybe the Gov. agency's that were housed in that building should write that report: CIA,FBI & Secret Service.

America deserves better & I hope some brave soul in those agency's will be filled with courage & come forward one day to tell the truth.

1. It DIDN'T collapse at anything like free-fall speeds.
2. Even if it did, what's your point? That the US government is somehow able to defy the laws of physics?
3. It's not at all odd for temperatures to remain high in enclosed fires for a long time, given the right circumstances. Cf. fires that have been burning in Pennsylvania coal seams for over forty YEARS.
4. Even if the high temperatures were somehow part of the conspiracy, again, how did they supposedly defy the laws of physics and what's your point?

"Take your granny's walker away. She'll collapse pretty fast too."

My granny doesn't use a walker and if you said it to her face she'd kick your ass from here to Sunday. Now show some respect.

"That's the National Institue of Standards & Saftey"

Uh, actually, it's the National Institute of Standards and Technology.

That was an impersonal 'you', genius.

Good catch Clavos...

My point is we are currently living in a giant Banana Republic as Joel Hirschorn writes& many of us know it & are going to do whatever we can to correct it.

By voting for... let me guess -

This must say something about Rudy Guilli if you're right. The new technical headquarters for New York in case of a terrorist attack or national crisis was located in Building 7.

Face it, you've got way too many people in your conspiracy required to keep their mouth's shut... and resist temptation to make millions by telling their story. The number of people required to blow up three buildings alone is mind numbing, not to mention the others that'd remember wondering what all the construction, or destruction was all about in the wall next to their desk just days before it happened.

In fact Rudy was headed there from his office at WTC at the time of the collapse.

why would Bush want to blow up Rudy??????

Yes, because people like Paul wilfully ignore the fact that half the bloody building had been stoved in by the collapse of WTCs 1 and 2.

For the record, Ron Paul was on Glenn Beck for an hour yesterday and not only did he unambiguously deny believing in ANY of the 9/11 conspiracy theories, but he actually scoffed at people who held those beliefs. I believe the words he used were 'preposterous' and 'bizarre'.

The relevant video is on CNN.

Dave

@#78:

Just for the record, I was referring in my comment to the 'Paul' who's been commenting on this thread, not to Ron Paul.

Just thank God that they're not interchangable Dr. D!

WTC7 fell in 6.5 - 7.0 seconds - time it yourself.

The NIST guys are just another iteration of "Heckaofa Job Brownie".

And can you tell me exactly which part of the 9/11 War on Terror narrative hasn't turned out to be a lie?

RE: Technically sound analyses of what happened at the World Trade Center have unequivocally shown that the official 9/11 story is not credible.

This is a total, complete, utter lie. The 911 "Truth" Goons simply ignore the facts, ignore every shredding of their position, and then regurgitate their claims again and again.

The bottom line is that the "controlled demolition" people try to have it both ways. They want to claim that a controlled demolition took place, but also that every shred of evidence that proves that this happened has been removed, destroyed or hidden.

But here is my bottom line: if you cannot demonstrate your conspiracy, with physical evidence and the testimony of conspirators, then you are wasting my time. What you are left with is a bunch of insecure people who slobber over apparent inconsistencies in the actual record in a futile attempt to spin it into an alternative view.

By the way, isn't it odd that Osama bin Laden claims credit for the 911 attack? Is he on the conspirators' payroll?

God I hope not...

I loved how Bill Maher handled these fools when they tried to interupt one of his live shows.

Billy where are you now?
We need you!

Jet, don't you mean

_{Gdo, i hpoe ont}?

Breaking news... Bush says he thinks a Republican will win next November... Which means he must already know the outcome... More proof of a conspiracy!!!

It's a damn shame that the guy that did 9/11 is still alive.

How does that happen folks?

I hope ont too...

He'd be dead by now, but Bush had no interest at all in Afghanistan, other than as an excuse to avenge his father's lame attempt and failure in Iraq several years earlier...

"And can you tell me exactly which part of the 9/11 War on Terror narrative hasn't turned out to be a lie?"

Yes, I can: the war in Afghanistan. I'll cite one example of a progressive, Democrat-style govt too. Australia just had a change of government and has promised to pull its combat troops out of Iraq but not Afghanistan because it knows the war in Iraq was founded on a lie.

But it has also criticised some NATO countries (not the US, Britain or Canada) for not pulling their weight in Afghanistan, where the real battle is being fought against islamic fundamentalism - you know, those guys that want all of us (yes folks, the entire world, and that's the real reason for 9/11) to dress in nightshirts and wear towels on our heads. That's the place 9/11 was planned, and from where it was executed. The internet and mobile/cell/satphone are marvellous tools for that kind of stuff.

They'd know, too, because they had to pick up the pieces - litrally, sadly - after the Asian branch of al-Qaeda, Jemaah Islamiyah, set off a couple of bombs in Bali and killed nearly 100 Aussies in the death toll of 200.

Keep sticking your heads in the sand folks, and watch as America disappears down the plughole of history.

As lumpy has noted here, if the British were the Romans of the 17th, 18th, 19th and early-to-mid 20th centuries, and lost their empire the same way, America then is the new Byzantium - the powerful and rich second Roman empire based on the border of Europe and Asia and built largely on the huge profits from the trade between east and west.

And you know what happened to them, don't you? They became too complacent, lost their political will and the will among their own people to fight (largely because of their own comfort) for their own cause and got rolled royally and dreadfully by a particularly nasty breed of war-like islamic fundamentalists no one thought or believed had a chance of doing such a thing.

That's why Constantinople is now known as Istanbul. You are heading in the same direction unless you continue to stand up for yourselves. It is not you who are the bullies, but the people who think killing is the best way to solve a problem. Yes, the US can flex its muscle too often and sometimes for the wrong reasons, but killing ain't its primary purpose.

You guys remind me of turkeys voting for thanksgiving.

Keep going down this 9/11 "truth" track, and you'll be stuffed, roasted and eaten - and the bones thrown out with the garbage.

Prove it. All this speculation gets us nowhere.

Let me clarify a bit, I mean prove your conspiracy theory, not that you're going to stuff, roast and eat truthers for thanksgiving. I'm beginning to think some of you just want revenge for something. I want justice!

Sorry Caleb (maybe, I'm not 100 per cent sure here) ... perhaps our wires are crossed. I'm not a conspiracy theorist.

I believe America needs to protect itself from people with, ah, very fervent religious beliefs and whose preferred headgear is the towel. I also don't believe the US government had anything to do with 9/11, except that some of those getting paid massive salaries to know such things weren't smart enough to see such a thing coming.

I also don't see the United States as the world's primary (or even secondary) agent of evil ... there are plenty of others who fit the bill, and it's not America despite what some of the extreme lefties think here (and I'm a leftie, if not extreme).

One of the sentences in a post of yours above indicated to me that you thought the entire war on terror a pack of lies.

Iraq might be a pack of lies, but the war on terror certainly aint. It doesn't just involve military action either - there are police forces and security agencies all around the world acting right now to prevent the next terror attack.

And I'm Australian BTW, and my (new) government feels the same way.

Our contingent of combat troops are coming home from Iraq over the next year or so, but more are going to Afghanistan.

That's where the real war on terror has to be won. If it's not, we're all fu.ked.

We'll all be wearing towels on our heads in 100 years if it's not.

Jet is right, BTW (and Doc).

I saw it too, from a distance and from wire pictures that were coming in about every 20 seconds.

The building was already alight because of falling, burning debris from towers 1 and 2, and has sustained a fair bit of damage.

Thus, it burned at a much lower heat than the high towers (large quantities of burning jet fuel burn at very high temp and in the construction of 1 and 2, the supports only had to be weakened for it to begin falling FROM THE TOP, NOTE PLEASE, WHERE THE FIRES WERE FIERCEST).

Tower 7 also burned for a much longer time beforev it fell. You don't have to be a rocket scientist to work out why - in fact, most rocket scientists will tell you that's the reason.

The construction of the building was such that once the fires on the bottom floor weakened the structure, the whole bloody weight of the thing brought it down.

What does it take to convince these fools.

I mean, how can you not see that your own government, while it's done a lot of very stupid stuff, isn't stupid enough to attack itself.

Besides, it didn't need any excuse to attack Saddam Hussein. That was a walk-up start, and most Iraqis are damn well glad when the coalition did finally invade.

Believe me on this ... as I've said before, I lived there as a boy and still remain in contact with some friends there.

One of our Iraqi friends told us she nearly wept with relief when a British soldier kicked their door down outside Basra and they realised it wasn't the Ba'ath Party's secret police but the invading army. The poor bloke and his mates had to stay for tea, because they wouldn't let 'em out of there.

And no Pommy is ever going to knock back a cup of tea, even with bullets whizzing around their heads.

On a serious note, though ... this is serious stuff. America (and the rest of us, your friends) are literally fighting right now for their very existence.

Going back to the US isolationist policies of the 1930s will destroy America totally. You must stand up to these people or they'll do it again, and soon.

Our contingent of combat troops are coming home from Iraq over the next year or so, but more are going to Afghanistan.

That's where the real war on terror has to be won. If it's not, we're all fu.ked.

Regardless for the flawed excuses for going into Iraq, it's unrealistic to think that the war with islamic terrorism is limited to Afghanistan in any sense. Iraq is more central and closer to the source of the real threats than Afghanistan is. If you take out every terrorists and taliban in Afghanistan that's great, but you still end up facing the problem of the moneymen in Iraq, Hezbollah, Iran, Syria, the Muslim Brotherhood, etc.

Dave

Bin Laden is financing his war on terror FROM AFGHANISTAN. What you might ask?

Yes billions are being made with nearly no effort to stop it from the Heroin poppy crop.

They had another bumper crop this year setting all kinds of records. Before the war, the poppy fields had been nearly wiped out by the Talaban. Now they're using it to finance (billions) their war effort.

THAT's why we should be in Afghanistan.
They keep blowing up the oil fields in Iraq, where did you think that mondy was coming from. Bin Laden's rich relatives cut him off, that's why he was living in Sudan and then had to move to Af-fucking-ghanistan!

Bin Laden gets money from a hell of a lot more sources than just the poppy crop. He's got fundraisers all over the world and established backers in Saudi Arabia and elsewhere.

Plus, most of the money the Taliban make on poppies goes to their own insurgency, not to bin Laden.

Dave

Still, it's great place for the bastards to hide.

Let's make it not so great.

I'm confused. I recall the media reporting that prior to the invasion The Taliban had stamped out poppy cultivation, which was why heroin was more expensive.

Are we now saying that even though they are no longer in power they are allowing it or even running it - and on such a large scale that Afghani heroin, the most widely available in the West, is now at record low prices?

Yep, I heard the Poms (and probably the Yanks too) were paying farmers to grow other crops and compensating them for the loss of the heroin poppy trade (which might have been a lot by afghani standards, but compared to what you'd pay on the streets here or elsewhere, was almost nothing).

What I heard was that they being quite handsomely compensated, too.

So I dunno about that one. Perhaps the warlords and the Taliban are growing it again and exporting it through Pakistan or Russia AND pocketing the cash. Who would know, though?

Chris (and Jet) - wasn't this was more market manipulation than eradication - ? ...remember that the US backed the Taliban initially and funded their 'war on drugs'

(surfer dude beat me to it...a lesson that one should check the thread before posting)

Chris!!! Dave!?! I'm wounded (ouch) you, you, you mean you didn't read my article-Click here ...for my piece on the BILLIONS the Taliban and bin Laden are sharing playing loan shark to farmers there

Well written article. Provocative comments. From the links in poster Dave's comment I see they explain why the USA couldn't respond to the attacks as they should have but it failed to mention that the exercises they were conducting were the exact scenario that unfolded on 9/11. In their attempt to explain the collapse of WTC 7, they included the statement directly from NIST, "the FEMA investigators conceded that this hypothesis had a low probability of occurring." They went on to say that a final report would be forthcoming later in 2007. We're almost into 2008 and still no final report. Why?

It's not insane to question the events that occurred on 9/11. It's crazy NOT to.

...how is the 'truth' movement more than an academic exercise - ?

Its also physical exercise

Much love.

Caleb: "It's also physical exercise".

What, the kind that blokes tend to do with one hand?? 'Cause mate, that's what it seems like ... one giant wank.

I don't know. I'm just skeptical and suspicious of these orwellian policies like the PATRIOT Act. As much as I want to believe it was just some terrorists I have to be concerned about alternative possibilities.

OTOH, we have to wait for NIST, and perhaps I'm wrong about everything. If so I sincerely apologize for expressing my dissent. Though, today, I think it may be justified. What do you think?

No honestly, Caleb, I don't think there is any conspiracy.

A group of terrorists used the freedom of movement in one of the world's greatest and most free societies (The United States) to commit a terrible atrocity on 9/11.

Since then, they have also done the same thing in London, Australia (Bali), Spain, Jakarta and Russia - among plenty of other places. Others, in London, Sydney, and on trans-Pacific and trans-Atlantic flights, to name just a few, have been thwarted by security agencies from different countries.

All the attacks and planned attacks are linked, even if in some cases just loosely, as all these groups are in continual touch with each other.

The country I live in introduced a similar Act to the Patriot Act, and we hate it because beyond a certain point, it breaks down all the rights we take for granted ... but it at least gives law enforcement agencies and security organisations the opportunity (and a bit of time) to make sure that these people can't do it again wherever it is possible to hold them for a time and investigate further.

Our freedoms, sadly, are proving to be a great enemy to ourselves. The fact we still have 99.999 per cent of them in the fight against these idiots should actually be a cause for celebration rather than angst and shouldn't be concerning us overly - for now.

Right now, those freedoms are not at risk from our own governments but from the idiots like al-Qaeada, Jemaah Islamiyah and their cohorts who want to take them away from us.

Just remember, whatever anyone tells you, the war on terror is real. Just because Bush gave it a silly name, it doesn't mean it ain't real.

It doesn't mean war in Iraq, or even just war in Afghanistan. The main focus of this "war on terror" is through police and security agencies all over the world, working together, and tracking and then thwarting these fools as they plot more attacks.

In fact, your own US government has probably done a lot more inside the US itself than you realise to stop even more Americans dying the way people did on 9/11.

So conspiracy? Don't think so.

Perhaps it's a conspiracy to stop terrorism...

Dave

Another conspiracy theory. Probably right, though.

AND realistic, unlike the others.

Yes Dave, but what happens when the solution becomes worse than the problem?

Exactly, Jet. And I think Dave almost agrees with you [and even with me] on that, but prefers to project a more belligerent face in these discussions.

I am a bit shocked at STM's claiming that the Patriot Act and its Australian clone leave us with 99.999% of our rights, so they are ok. The math stinks, and the reasoning too.

"Exactly, Jet. And I think Dave almost agrees with you "

Fred Sanford:
IT'S THE BIG ONE 'LIZABETH!!! I'M COMIN' FOR YA HONEY!!!!

Handy, I reckon my right to catch a bus to work without getting blown up far outweighs (just in the case of these idiots) Habeus Corpus, the right to silence, the presumption of innocence, and a quick and fair trial by a jury of my peers.

I value my rights here as much as an American would value theirs. Rule of law is what makes all of us in the English-speaking countries different to the rest.

But special times require special measures. This is serious shit, here - not some thing dreamt up by the white hopuse of so0me idiots in Canberra or London.

These people are out to get us .. I know, because I have some personal experience of someone's life being taken for no other reason than she was an "infidel" - a 15-year-old one who loved her (heartbroken) family and is dreadfully missed every day. That was the reason given by her killer in court. She was an infidel. What a mongrel that man is.

So don't go telling me you are shocked by my maths on this subject. You don't know a fu.king thing about what it's really about unless you've experienced it.

If the police/security forces can buy a little bit of time to prevent further atrocities (and I know for a fact that in plenty of places, including here, the US and the UK, they have), then good on them.

I'm not worried by our anti-terror laws because I'm not a terrorist, but I'd be really be worried by them if I was.

And if it was up to me, they'd get no trial at all.

But because I believe in rule of law, I'm happy for the law to apply, even if it's not quite what we're used to.

I can't believe some people around the world don't understand just how serious this stuff is.

And I'll remind you again: 9/11 and the 2002 Bali bombings took place before the Iraq invasion.

The war there certainly can't shoulder the blame for those bombings.

America needs to stand up for itself again mass murderers, bullies and people who don't like our religious beliefs because, along with the rest of us, if we lose our will, we'll cease to exist.

Stan, we've got a lot of experience in Britain of implementing extreme anti-terrorist laws and applying them to the folks they're targeted at. What concerns me is the potential for abuse, especially in countries like America and Australia which don't have that level of experience with terrorism. (The sheer scale of 9/11 notwithstanding, the US has only suffered three significant terror attacks ever.) Overkill through fear seems a lot more likely to happen there.

On a brighter note, I hope you all had a bonzer (is that word still in use? was it ever?) Christmas Down Under. Did it snow? ;-)

Lol. Nice cool weather for once yesterday on the east coast. BBQ fired up, (cold) turkey eaten, prawns and oysters swallowed by the dozen, Yeah Doc, thanks ... we still do use bonzer, but less than we did. I think "TV is killing off 'Strine.

I can't speak for the US Doc, but in Oz, the judiciary is independent and unelected, so that no one, hopefully, has an axe to grind.

It's been that independent judiciary that has stopped overkill with this stuff, even in the recent case of Dr Mohamed Haneef (the judge even said that under the government's terms of reference for killing off visas, even he'd be in strife because he associates with criminals) - who is now to be allowed back into the country under the new govt and will probably get his job back at The Gold Coast Hospital in Queensland.

I hope he's also allowed to bring his wife and child, because he really did cop a bit of a raw deal under the old administration. However, since he WAS actually connected to the Edinburgh bombers/would-be London car bombers just by association, the anti-terror laws saw him held by the federal police for a time. Fair enough, as long as he's treated properly and the police do their job properly.

What does annoy me, though, is the airport bullshit. If I go through in a suit, no problem (and let's face, would most terrorists dress in full muslim garb), but if you heading for Mecca with a full beard, etc, the buggers are more likely to stop you.

The Chaser('s War on Everything, google it on You Tube doc - a hoot) has done some comedy skits on it, but only because it isn't that funny.

All that kind of stuff needs rethinking.

Yes Dave, but what happens when the solution becomes worse than the problem?

Then we find a better solution. Or with any luck we've found a better solution before the stop-gap solution gets out of hand. If not, then we have a revolution.

Dave

Yeah, I've seen a few Chaser bits on YouTube - particularly that stunt where they got through the APEC security cordon and started wandering around outside Bush's hotel with one of them dressed as bin Laden - and they arrested the other guy!

So don't be too sure about your airport security scenario...

Far more likely to happen, at least over here, is a terrorist in full Rambo gear carrying seven bombs and a rocket launcher waltzing through security while the TSA is busy strip-searching some poor old bloke because his belt buckle set off the metal detector.

Jacob: As I've suggested elsewhere, if you haven't already, The History of the English-Speaking Peoples Since 1900, by Andrew Roberts, is worth a read to see where we are with all this stuff. Really worth it.

Even though it's history, Roberts is a good writer so it's a bit of page turner. It follows on from Churchill's history, but he's a better and more interesting writer than Churchill (great man that he was).

Does give you a different perspective on where we are, and I'll just add to that: the Anglosphere and the English-speaking people has nothing to do with race.

It's more about what we've inherited, and why it's better, and why all have to stick together to defend it.

Urrr?

Jacob ain't commented on this thread, has he?

Not that your suggestion isn't an excellent one, Stan...

Prob'ly not ... too many prawns.

"But special times require special measures."
"And if it was up to me, they'd get no trial at all."
"I can't believe some people around the world don't understand just how serious this stuff is."

And special people require special education.

"Overkill through fear seems a lot more likely to happen there."

I assume overkill == fascist police state.

Why has security through obscurity never worked?

Your PsyOps is no match for my CompSci.