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from ProjectCensored Website
Those in political power along with media elites would like to see the ongoing grassroots debates surrounding unanswered 9/11 questions and discrepancies disappear, despite the mountains of evidence that suggest that American citizens were told little about the truth of the biggest single-day attack on their homeland in history.
Nearly ten years after the events, many unanswered questions still exist:
The academics and intellectuals who have tried to answer these questions have been ignored or derided by corporate mainstream (and even some progressive leftist) media, political pundits, and government officials who clearly intend to silence the so-called 9/11 Truth Movement, or anyone who questions the officially sanctioned government stance on the matter.
However, the questions will not go away and increasingly beg for answers.
After careful examination of the
official story about 9/11 (in which the commission never even mentioned
Building 7), along with the forensic data omitted from official reports,
these professionals have concluded that a new independent and transparent
investigation into these massive and mysterious structural failures is
needed.
Gage, along with other architects and engineers, attacked NIST’s first reports such that NIST eventually changed their conclusions, addressed new evidence, and released a new draft report in 2008. In the thirty days after the 2008 draft report was released, NIST took public questions on the report.
Gage’s group sent a letter that covered
myriad inconsistencies and omissions in the 2008 report. However, the final
report released later in 2008 addressed almost none of the concerns raised.
The scientific method was not adhered to in this study.
NIST continues to state that looking at the thermitic materials found at Ground Zero noted in the demolition theory,
Despite their own claim that evidence of demolition is inconclusive, they decided not to test or address it at all, as if this could not and/or did not happen (see chapter 7 of this book for more details).
Again, the scientific method was not fully followed by
government agencies.
There are records of bin Laden being treated in an American hospital in Dubai for a urinary infection, often linked with kidney disease, and a related order for a mobile dialysis machine, essential to his survival, that was shipped to Afghanistan. Griffin, along with doctors that he cites, says it would be impossible for bin Laden to survive in a cave with that machine for any substantial period of time.
Griffin goes on to
note that the US and British governments are aware of bin Laden’s death, and
have been covering it up to continue the war on terror. (See Griffin’s book
on the subject, Osama bin Laden: Dead or Alive?).
Sunstein
acknowledges that the US government has been involved in conspiracies in the
past, but he confidently believes that this is no longer a problem. (See the
Truth Emergency section of this volume for more on this issue, especially
chapter 6.) He claims that groups that question the events of 9/11 are
dangerous and could lead some people to violence (while presenting no
concrete evidence to prove this).
Sunstein is essentially
calling for a return of the Counter Intelligence Program (COINTELPRO) from
the cold war days when agents of the US government covertly infiltrated
antiwar and civil rights groups with the intent to disrupt and discredit
their activities - provoking violence or planning illegal acts themselves in
order to bring groups up on criminal charges.
Over one thousand architects and engineers have signed a petition to
reinvestigate the 9/11 destruction.
This may not surprise anyone considering mainstream media’s deafening silence on 9/11 issues, but this wasn’t an organ of mainstream media; it was an alternative radio station founded on principles that encourage coverage of underreported stories. To be fair, no news director said I couldn’t cover the story, and the story ran that weekend.
The point is that I had felt constrained by the prevailing atmosphere of suspicion and fear surrounding media reception of 9/11 topics generally - including at this “progressive” station where people are sharply divided on the issue. I’ve never seen such general weirdness surrounding media coverage of an issue except for the Kennedy assassination.
In the 1970s people mocked those few who suggested Lee Harvey Oswald didn’t act alone, branding them “conspiracy nuts,” just as 9/11 activists now are labeled “truthers,” which sounds like “flat earthers.”
Some of these activists have embraced the “truther” tag, but I suggest they should refrain. The term is not meant to be a compliment. I asked theologian David Ray Griffin, who spoke at the conference, why he thought the media was acting so bizarrely towards 9/11 issues.
Griffin pointed out how the terms “conspiracy theory” and “conspiracy theorist” are manipulated to make reporters fear losing their reputations and jobs.
The press conference was a newsworthy story whether or not anything the group claims is true.
It’s a valid story because so many citizens are questioning the official explanations for the tragedy of September 11, 2001. The fact that over a thousand licensed architects and engineers are demanding a new investigation increases that relevance. If what they say is even partly true, the implications are profound, but either way, there’s a legitimate story.
I don’t expect news agencies to endorse the views of groups like AE911Truth; that’s not their proper role. I do expect them not to run for cover when they hear those unsettling words: “9/11.”
Democracy is
not served by reporters fearing to cover sensitive stories.
A group called New York City Coalition for Accountability Now (nyccan.org) is attempting to convince the New York City Council to investigate the anomalous circumstances surrounding the collapse of World Trade Center Building 7. All the Web sites I’ve mentioned have links to some of the more credible 9/11 Web sites.
The AE911Truth links page is a good place to start. I will be following related issues on this Web site as well: examiner.com/x-36199-Conspiracy-Examiner.
The article’s title - “Cass
Sunstein Wants to Nudge Us” - is an understatement given the views Sunstein
has expressed over the years, but it at least heads in the right thematic
direction: that much of Sunstein’s academic writing has been focused on
social control and government control over information.
The Times then quotes Sunstein suggesting that, as a government official, he would not execute the
more radical or experimental elements of his academic ideas. But, as Baker
points out, that comment was made in the fall of 2009 - before Sunstein’s
paper on conspiracy theories came to light in the media. What appears in the
Times to be Sunstein backing off his more controversial ideas is, in
actuality, no such thing.
The first is that he is a political chimera who has supporters and detractors on both sides of the political spectrum. Among conservative critics, the populists have come out against him, while the intellectuals appear to have thrown their weight behind him.
Even as Glenn Beck declared Sunstein to be “more powerful than the Fed” and desirous of “controlling your every move,” columnist George F. Will declared that his ideas would lead to better, smaller government and would,
In the
UK, Sunstein’s works are “required reading for aspiring Conservative MPs,”
reports the Daily Telegraph.
As head of OIRA, Sunstein is responsible for reviewing
all new government regulations. Yet thus far his decisions - those that we
know of - have been on a small scale and largely technical, such as his call
to streamline the process of naming and writing regulations so that citizens
have better access to them.
Even if he does, it’s likely the mainstream media will support at least some of his efforts to push the political debate towards an “acceptable” center. In a 2009 New Yorker review of his book On Rumors, Sunstein is given credit for predicting the circumstances that would lead to the rise of Internet rumors such as the “birther” claim that President Obama wasn’t born in the US, and the “death panel” allegation about health care reform. He is then cast as the hero fighting against these trends.
Given the existing precedent, it’s likely that any attempt Sunstein makes at shaping the content of public information will likely find a positive hearing in the old guard media.
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