Hard News: The March for Democracy
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The trouble with the 9/11 conspiracy theories is that there are actually a lot of unanswered questions around 'who knew what and when' on that day. There was an awful lot of post-attack duck-and-covering going on within the US establishment, and the official investigation and report was actually pretty feeble.
And how. I'm astonished that The Ground Truth: The Story Behind America's Defense on 9/11, the recent book by John Farmer, hasn't been huge news in the US.
Farmer was chief counsel to the 9/11 Commission, and is dean of Rutgers University law school. He essentially says that most of what public agencies told the commission was a pack of lies.
Sample quote:
“at some level of the government, at some point in time…there was an agreement not to tell the truth about what happened... I was shocked at how different the truth was from the way it was described …. The [Norad air defense] tapes told a radically different story from what had been told to us and the public for two years. This is not spin.”
He is not alleging a prior conspiracy -- but an orchestrated litany of lies afterwards, to cover up incompetence and official fecklesness. He's been publicly backed by at least two members of the commission -- one of them, the chair, Thomas Kean, was the Republican governor of New Jersey.
I just don't get why this isn't the year's biggest story in America.
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Via that Peter Griffin article:
I love his work on Family Guy.
My kids always have a laugh when I tell them I'm going to have a meeting with Peter Griffin.
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Actually, as an adjunct, I'd love to have Kim Hill invite a scientist on to her show simply to talk about the scientific method for the benefit of her audience.
She did. With Paul Callaghan for a couple of years. Review of a book of the series is here:
http://www.lumiere.net.nz/reader/item/1277
Te Papa being a venue for such tripe is certainly a concern and I'll let Gio write to them!!
To Mark Cubey: Call Paul for an opinion if you have concerns about an interviewee.....I'm sure he could enlighten you and put you in the right mood for the interview.
I am surprised at some of the responses to the Gage interview and talk. Seems we may have some closet conspirators amongst us......cue X Files intro music again.
However, on a wee other note. Has anyone been to "Natures Discovery" lately? a franchise[?] that includes Westfield Queensgate and Papanui. They now have a free stand displaying creationist literature and "resources". (Small captial letters). For some reason I have an immense desire to cease visitng the place until they rid the place of it.
Finally:NO NO NO NO...NOT THE MOON AGAIN...............AAAAHHHHHHH
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So was it you 2 that bought down building 7? :)
Actually, no. On that day I was in China, busy training the butterfly that caused Hurricane Katrina.
*Gio - thank you for your moving and eloquent article on Gage's Te Papa presentation. It reminded me exactly how I feel about these lunatics.
Seconded!
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I just don't get why this isn't the year's biggest story in America.
Because America needs its cult of dead heroes. It needs figureheads that can't talk back to weigh down political decisions and make any criticism of them "tasteless" and "unpatriotic". Questioning whether all those people needed to die on 9/11 is akin to wondering whether young soldiers who die in Iraq and Afghanistan needed to die. It strikes too close to the bone, requires too much self-reflection and self-criticism.
This isn't a uniquely American trait, though the fetishization of those who die violently is almost as strong in America as it is in many dictatorships. It's one of the few features of American culture that is scary and troubling, which is what makes it all the more distressing.
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He is not alleging a prior conspiracy -- but an orchestrated litany of lies afterwards, to cover up incompetence and official fecklesness. He's been publicly backed by at least two members of the commission -- one of them, the chair, Thomas Kean, was the Republican governor of New Jersey.
I just don't get why this isn't the year's biggest story in America.
Possibly because it exposes an inconvenient truth: that the government bears only culpability, but not guilt, for the events of the day. It's one thing to allege a grand conspiracy centred on the Oval Office, and have people accept it, but quite another to state as a fairly bald fact that the Alphabet Soup, objects of fear, admiration, loathing and intrigue, were so thoroughly incompetent pre fact that it was necessary to lie comprehensively post fact to ensure the continuation of their elevated reputations.
I can actually understand why people wouldn't want to hear it. Evil from the top down is much easier to stomach than incompetent from top to bottom and side to side, since the former is transient while the latter is embedded and systemic. -
Isn't that what every other museum in the world does?
I don't know. But it must be a hell of a difficult job. Sure, this guy is a quack. But this one?
I was thinking about this on my way home, and for the life of me I can't see why a tall building collapsing from the top down would be expected to do anything other than fall pretty much straight down.
Oh see, you've just bought into the whole 'gravity' conspiracy.
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Apropos vetting museum function room bookings: is it really that hard? I bet 99% of bookings are obviously innocuous corporate gigs, social functions, and the like, which would require minimal labour to approve. The odd case like Gage would be well worth taking a few days to consider in order to protect the reputation of the institution and the mental health of the community.
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I think it's more than just dodging guilt. It's also how 9/11 was used to justify 2 wars. That does need a strong and consistent narrative. I'm not really surprised that people readily dismiss all and everything that anyone but the official government sources say regarding the affair - to do so was deeply linked to a lack of patriotism, anti-Americanism, etc. It is weird to think that it wasn't that long ago either.
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@ Gio
Isn't that what every other museum in the world does?
I was in the Science Museum in London and there was a magnificent exhibition right next to the Fiat Bambino (and other cars) that caught my interest. Of course this was considered a necessary part of this Science Museum and I immediately knew what this was ( I like to think I am read at least).However, the Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy does not seem to be considered factual history,vetted for suitability, so not every other museum in the world I suspect.
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There are unanswered questions about 911, but it's still fairly obvious what sent the towers crashing down.
Any official report into how something so terrible could have happened, and why it wasn't stopped, was always going to suffer from obfuscation and lying by officials trying to save their arses. Because the true story would reveal an official incompetence so breathtaking it would horrify the entire nation and destroy careers.
But that appears to be all the “truthers” need to create a grand conspiracy.
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I bet 99% of bookings are obviously innocuous corporate gigs, social functions, and the like, which would require minimal labour to approve.
How obvious is obvious? Just because an organisation has an innocuous name is no guarantee that it's not dodgy. Sure, you could probably take a guess that "9/11 Citizens for Truth" might be worth having a closer look at; but all they have to do is name themselves something dull like "Institute for the Study of Structural Integrity in Controlled/Uncontrolled Demolitions (ISSICUD)", and make the booking in that name. Or, say, the Smith Family Christmas party... a purely social gathering of the family and friends, which just happens to include a noted right-wing agitator (he's a close friend of the dad), and is an open invite to anyone who subscribes to their mySpace page... Basically, I think that it's pretty easy to game any vetting system that doesn't go into a level of detail sufficient to make the system itself uneconomic.
I'd be willing to bet that in the case of the museum in Australia, they don't have a staffmember checking the bona fides of every room booking; someone will have tipped them off. The fact that they took the booking in the first place, then booted them shortly before the actual gig implies that they found out fairly late in the piece.
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I'm astonished that The Ground Truth: The Story Behind America's Defense on 9/11, the recent book by John Farmer, hasn't been huge news in the US.
Vanity Fair's article from a few years back on the NORAD response on the day was a pretty amazing read too.
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The odd case like Gage would be well worth taking a few days to consider in order to protect the reputation of the institution and the mental health of the community.
Reputation seems the bigger concern here. I'm actually pretty happy with the mental self-defence of the average citizen. Questions they might stick their hand up for after the presentation are not the same as what they might, upon reflection, think. Tying back to pre-threadjack moments, I think the recent referendum showed this pretty clearly. It's interesting that a huge number of people voted no, but piss-all turned up for the march, despite the huge financial backing. People aren't as stupid as all that, after all, and are capable of holding nuanced views.
It seems likely that a lot of people Gio says walked out of the show were similarly disgusted. I personally would have, particularly during the parts where they showed the people dying graphically. I'm all for fictional graphic violence, or controlled consensual violence, but can't stand the real thing. Couldn't watch Schindler's List, got too upset after about 20 minutes. I don't think it was shit, it just freaked me out too much, it was too real.
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I bet 99% of bookings are obviously innocuous corporate gigs, social functions, and the like, which would require minimal labour to approve.
So can the lot, as some of us could have a problem with corporate gigs for a start!
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Jack, if you have to disguise what you're doing, then you can't get mega-publicity for it, so mission accomplished, I would say. But also, if tip-offs are involved, then good. Fine. You just have a policy that says "we reserve the right to cancel events that promote misinformation contrary to our mission as an institution of higher wotsit", and then you can cancel when tipped off. The bridge club 40th anniversary do will probably still make a booking without fear.
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I personally would have, particularly during the parts where they showed the people dying graphically.
There was no such graphic representation, sorry if you read that into something I wrote. Unless you count endless replays of the planes hitting or the buidings falling. I found however equally graphic the lack of mention of the deceased, except as piece of debris - he made a big deal of the fragments of bones projected at great distance from the towers, which for him counted as evidence of deflagrations.
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He is not alleging a prior conspiracy -- but an orchestrated litany of lies afterwards, to cover up incompetence and official fecklesness
There is a bit more to it than that. The whole scenario played right into the hands of the Hawks, Cheney et.al.
Do these words ring any bells "Do the orders still stand sir?"There was a young man who had come in and
said 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?"This has been discussed at length as to whether the orders were to shoot the plane down or to continue to stand down.
The official line is now the latter.
Go figure. -
However, the Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy does not seem to be considered factual history,vetted for suitability, so not every other museum in the world I suspect.
Was it purporting to be true? No? didn't think so.
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Because America needs its cult of dead heroes. It needs figureheads that can't talk back to weigh down political decisions and make any criticism of them "tasteless" and "unpatriotic". Questioning whether all those people needed to die on 9/11 is akin to wondering whether young soldiers who die in Iraq and Afghanistan needed to die. It strikes too close to the bone, requires too much self-reflection and self-criticism.
This isn't a uniquely American trait, though the fetishization of those who die violently is almost as strong in America as it is in many dictatorships. It's one of the few features of American culture that is scary and troubling, which is what makes it all the more distressing.
More or less the point the article I linked to was making - a number of widows* of the 'dead 9/11 heroes' have deviated from the convenient script the media provided for them. As a consequence they've generally been subject to sustained villification from that same media.
*word used advisedly. Almost all of those on the receiving end appear to be women. And that's a whole 'nother can of worms.
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One more week until full moon. Glad I got me chill pills :)
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Jack, if you have to disguise what you're doing, then you can't get mega-publicity for it, so mission accomplished, I would say.
Well, you'd only have to disguise it from the venue. You could still advertise via mailing lists, websites, etc. You'd probably end up preaching to the converted - but then that's pretty much what these guys do anyway, isn't it?
But also, if tip-offs are involved, then good. Fine. You just have a policy that says "we reserve the right to cancel events that promote misinformation contrary to our mission as an institution of higher wotsit", and then you can cancel when tipped off. The bridge club 40th anniversary do will probably still make a booking without fear.
I'd be astonished if Te Papa didn't already have such a policy in place. Or some similar weasel worded declaration involving "events beyond our control" etc. That's pretty standard for venue hire that I've used. The issue at stake would be that they chose not to invoke it when made aware of the possible controversy.
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I'd agree, except that the issue isn't that Gage et al are controversial. Lots of things are controversial. The issue is lending the imprimatur of the institution to pseudo-scholarship.
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There was no such graphic representation, sorry if you read that into something I wrote.
I think I did get the wrong end of the stick there. Your freefalling man image was not from the show. I can see now that you specifically mention that most of what he talks about are the pieces of people left afterward.
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There is a bit more to it than that. The whole scenario played right into the hands of the Hawks, Cheney et.al.
Oh, FFS Steve -- would be it within the realms of possibility that you don't need some bullshitty conspiracy to explain why nobody was in any great rush to claim responsibility for the greatest terrorist attack on American soil in the country's history. You know, the slaughter of over three thousand human being who were citizens of dozens of nations besides the US?
I'd also respectfully suggest that it's not the biggest story of the year for another exquisitely human reason: The awesome technological and economic might of the world's largest economic and military superpower couldn't prevent 9/11 from happening. Human error on human error, incompetence on top of what turned out with 20/20 hindsight to be lethally bad calls...
One hell of a downer.Good on John Farmer for calling out folks who, not to put too fine a point on it, stood up before the 9/11 Commission and perjured themselves. But let's not insult him by saying his name in the same breath as 9/11 'Truther' loons.
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