Work Your Brain — 09/20/06

• Thank a Democrat for Lower Gas Prices — Richard Cranium @ The All Spin Zone reminds us that it was Democratic Party Congressional candidate Larry Kissell who held a campaign rally at a gas station in Biscoe, NC on August 3rd to remind voters that the price of gasoline was $1.22/gallon when the GOP incumbent in his district took office. Ever since then, the price of gas has been dropping nationwide.
  

  With third quarter oil industry profit statements due out just before the upcoming elections, it’s pretty easy to assume that the Gouging Oil Party boys in the backroom figured that something had to be done, even if (for the oil companies) it meant taking a bit of a hit on the bottom line for a few months. Ergo, gasoline prices have dropped by nearly 30% in the space of a couple of weeks, even as BP’s shutdown of their Alaskan pipeline continues, and middle east tensions continue apace, and (strangely) the cost of a barrel of crude has dropped by maybe 10%. The good news is that, based on my own water cooler conversation, even the most hard core neocons in our midst understand the play.

  So, the next time you fill up your tank and you don’t have to sign over a second mortgage on house to do it, remember that Democratic Party congressional candidate Larry Kissell from NC-8, is more responsible for the drop in prices than anyone else on the planet. Here’s an idea on how to thank Larry: take $10 of that gas savings, and drop it in Larry’s campaign bucket.

• Gas Prices a Republican Dirty Trick — Becky @ Preemptive Karma takes a different look at how the Republicans are using their Big Oil friends to lower gas prices before the 2006 election.

More

Tags: gas prices, oil industry, privacy, CIA, CIA Interrogation Program, George W. Bush, Article 3, Geneva Convention, Congress, John Warner, Colin Powell, Jack Vessey, Lindsay Graham, John McCain, POW, torture, detainees, terrorism, White House, politics, anthrax, 9/11, phobic nation, J. Edgar Hoover, FBI, Martin Luther King Jr., Iraq, International Red Cross, Maher Arar, Canada, Syria, JFK Airport

comments See also in Politics & Causes, In the News, Geekery, Blogging & Other Blogs, The World, 9-11 & Terrorism, Iraq & Afghanistan, The Middle East

Work Your Brain — Terrorism Edition

• The 9/11 Timeline — To mark the five-year anniversary of the 9/11 attacks, ThinkProgress has created a comprehensive timeline documenting the key events since September 11, 2001. Their timeline charts five threads:
  • The steady increase in international terrorism and the growth of al Qaeda
  • The campaign to block and obstruct the work of the 9/11 Commission, and the failure to carry out the commission’s recommendations
  • The failure to stablize and rebuild Afghanistan
  • The downgrading of the hunt for Osama bin Laden
  • The steady decline of America’s image abroad
• ABC’s ‘Path’ Not Taken — Ruth Marcus @ TheWashingtonPost.com writes a scathing review of ABC’s “Path to 9/11″ mini-series that was fraught with inaccuracies and blantant flaws.
  

  The docudrama is an inherently flawed form, one that invites embroidery. The irony of “The Path to 9/11″ is that this dramatic license was so unnecessary, given the richly detailed narrative in a document available to the docudrama’screators. It was called “The 9/11 Commission Report.”

  Hat tip: John in DC @ AmericaBlog

• More

  Tags: terrorism, ABC, Keith Olbermann, George W. Bush, 9/11, Abraham Lincoln, Gettysburg Memorial, World Trade Center, Mark Juergensmeyer, al-Qaeda, 9/11 Commission, Afghanistan, Osama bin Laden, Condi Rice, George Tenet, Saddam Hussein, al-Zarqawi

  comments See also in Politics & Causes, In the News, Geekery, Blogging & Other Blogs, Featured, 9-11 & Terrorism, Iraq & Afghanistan, Conspiracy Theories, The Middle East

9/11: Around The Blogosphere

Remembering the Day

• For Thou Art With Us — Sarah Bunting @ TomatoNation.com was there.
  

  We come up the rise to the corner where a crowd of people has gathered, all looking up, and the towers come into view — the south tower closer to us and to the left. “Ohhh, man,” we both say, and “Jeeeesus Christ,” and “This is not good. This is not good at all. This is fuckin’ bad.” So dumb. So dull. We sound like frat boys when the keg is dry, but there’s nothing else we can say about what we’ve got in front of us. In front of us, high above us, the south tower has a huge hole torn through it, a burning, screaming maw with thick black smoke pouring out. Occasionally, flames lick up one corner of the twisted mouth of the hole and then retreat, only to reappear on the other side. It doesn’t seem real. It doesn’t even seem that serious at first, actually, until I remember just how big the building is, how many stories high — and that the hole must therefore cover twelve stories, at least. “This isn’t the kind of history I want to be present at,” I say, lamely, to Bob. “Me neither,” he says.

  More

  Tags: 9/11, World Trade Center, terrorism, New York, American flag, Afghanistan, Osama bin Laden, Conspiracy Theories, George W. Bush, Matt Lauer, Rudy Giuliani, ABC, tragedy, patriotism, Ground Zero, We Will Never Forget, al-Qaeda, CIA, Pakistan, Taliban, Joint Special Operations Command, NSA, National Counterterrorism Center, Tora Bora, al-Zawahiri, Paul Krugman, NATO, Bill Clinton, Rush Limbaugh, Pentagon, healthcare, Iraq

  comments See also in Politics & Causes, In the News, Geekery, Blogging & Other Blogs, The World, Featured, 9-11 & Terrorism, Iraq & Afghanistan, Conspiracy Theories, The Middle East

Work Your Brain — 09/09/06

A Little Fun First

• Thursday Thirteen #2 — ribbiticus @ Pond Perspective offers some gems of advice. Here are my favorites:
  

  5. It may be that your sole purpose in life is simply to serve as a warning to others.

  10. Some mistakes are too much fun to only make once.

  11. We could learn a lot from crayons. Some are sharp, some are pretty and some are dull. Some have weird names, and all are different colors, but they all have to live in the same box.

  12. A truly happy person is one who can enjoy the scenery on a detour.

  13. Nobody cares if you can’t dance well. Just get up and dance.

More

Tags: Thursday Thirteen, Crayons, terrorism, Logan Airport, Bill Clinton, George W. Bush, Congress, wiretapping, Osama bin Laden, Mother Jones, liberals, 9/11, religion, aetheists, women, virginity, Journal of Sex Research Western soceity, involuntary virgins, economy, America

My 2 Cents On The ABC 9/11 Docu-Drama

I haven’t seen it.  I can only comment on what I’ve read.  There seems to be a lot of posting flurry going on.  Plus, it’s been covered by the MSM.

So, I can’t really comment on the actual movie because as I said I haven’t seen it.   I wasn’t one of the ones chosen to preview it.  I’m apparently not right-leaning enough if what the rumors say is true.  I do find it odd that ABC didn’t honor President Clinton’s office’s request for an advanced copy but handed it out to all of those right-wing bloggers.  That just smacks of rudeness.  I mean, he was the President and the movie is about him.

I have no problem with a movie attacking a former President, even a former living President, as long as it tells the truth and is factual.  Even ABC admits that this 9/11 “docu-drama” stretches the truth and isn’t factual; however, they have packaged it as an educational tool for children as if it is in fact a truthful telling of the events as they happened.

Right-winger blogs seem to be interpreting the public outrage against the ABC 9/11 Docu-drama as a political thing, as if it’s all about Clinton, as if Democrats and liberals are all about circling the wagon because Clinton is being solely blamed in the movie for 9/11.  Once again they don’t seem to be paying attention.  They’re own unhealthy preoccupation with Clintion has kept them from seeing the true problem is the fact that this movie is about lying to the public, an Orwellian refabricating the facts.  But then maybe they don’t care.  After all, maybe the facts and the truth aren’t important to the right so much as having a President in power and being in control of the facts and the fact-telling.

Tags: ABC 9/11 Docu-Drama, lie, truth, Bill Clinton, rightwinger

Work Your Brain — 09/06/06

• We Know The Who And The What, But What About The Why? — The (liberal)Girl Next Door asks what I’ve been asking all along: “Why out Valerie Plame?” The media seems content to have the mystery of who did the outing solved without wondering as to the why. Now that new evidence has come to light that Plame was working on the task force to determine whether or not Iraq had WMD, why was it so important to get her out of the way?
• But Bush has nothing on at all! — lambert @ CorrenteWire theorizes as to why there haven’t been any more terror attacks on American soil since 9/11 since we’re told every other day that an attack is right around the corner. If the terrorists are so competent and dangerous, why aren’t we living in a war-torn country where things are being blown up on a weekly basis? It can’t be that our security is safer; we’ve prove it isn’t.
  

  A fully credible explanation for the fact that the United States has suffered no terrorist attacks since 9/11 is that the threat posed by homegrown or imported terrorists — like that presented by Japanese Americans during World War II or by American Communists after it — has been massively exaggerated. Is it possible that the haystack is essentially free of needles?

More

Tags: George W. Bush, terror attacks, 9/11, Terrorists, economy, irresponsible government, failed policy, Valerie Plame, WMD, Iraq, Conspiracy Theories, Matthew Fenton, National Naval Medical Center, Bathesda, Walter Reed, War, American soldiers, 101st Fighting Keyboarders

comments See also in Politics & Causes, Geekery, Blogging & Other Blogs, The World, 9-11 & Terrorism, Iraq & Afghanistan, Conspiracy Theories, The Middle East

News Quickies — 09/06/06

• Due to last month’s terror alert, British Airways is claiming a £40m ($75.9m) loss.  Between August 10th and 17th, it cancelled 1,280 flights and incurred costs of hotels, catering and recovering baggage for stranded passengers. [“ BA says terror alert cost it £40m” (BBC News)]
• “A coalition of 300 Iraqi tribal leaders on Saturday demanded the release of Saddam Hussein so he could reclaim the presidency and also called for armed resistance against U.S.-led forces.” Yikes! [“A Demand for Hussein’s Release” (WashingtonPost.com)]
• On the fifth anniversary of the September 11th attacks, CNN will replay their coverage of the day’s events on the Internet.  Viewers will be able to watch how events unfolded starting at 8:30am, just minutes before the first reports of the first airplane hitting the World Trade Center started, all the way until midnight in real time.  For the day, the usually for-fee service will be free. [”CNN.com to replay 9/11 attacks coverage” (Yahoo!News)]

Tags: British Airways, airport security, terror alert, Saddam Hussein, Iraq, 9/11, CNN, WTC

How Many Lives Are Lives Worth?

Last month, while Israel was making war against Hezbollah, I kept wondering whether the death toll of Israelis and Lebonese was worth the lives of the two Israelis who were kidnapped at the beginning of the war. After all, it was their lives that started it all.

Is there a point where the cost of innocent civilians and the lives of patriotic soldiers outweighs the original loss? What I mean is, do the lives of the few outweigh the lives of many? What makes the lives of those two soldiers worth more than those Israel was willing to kill or send to die for them?

Closer to home, how many Americans lives need to be lost before we’ve spent more than it was worth to invade Iraq?

As The Martian Anthropologist reminded me today (not that I could forget), President Bush has repeatedly linked the tragedy of September 11th with the invasion of Iraq. According to him, the two are irreversibly intertwined in the War on Terror.

Whenever he invokes those emotional memories of the loss of lives on September 11th, he’s telling us that every American life he sends to die in Iraq is for those lives lost that day. He’s telling us that he’s sending more Americans to die, to kill innocent and not-so-innocent people in exchange for those lives already lost. Those are what the lives are worth.

I think it’s something to ponder today of all days consindering as of today more Americans have died in the War in Iraq than on September 11th.

(CNN) — As the fifth anniversary of the September 11, 2001, attack on the United States approaches, another somber benchmark has just been passed.

The announcement Sunday of four more U.S. military deaths in Iraq raises the death toll to 2,974 for U.S. military service members in Iraq and in what the Bush administration calls the war on terror.

The 9/11 attack killed 2,973 people, including Americans and foreign nationals but excluding the terrorists. The 9/11 death toll was calculated by CNN.

Tags: Israel, Hezbollah, Lebanon, Iraq, American soldiers, War on Terror, 9/11, George W. Bush

Work Your Brain — 09/02/06

First Some Fun

• Thursday Thirteen #3 — Baggage @ Baggage That Goes With Mine wrote thirteen reasons why the internet is better than real life. This is my favorite.
  

  11. On the internet, you can pop into a forum or a blog and tell a person that their beliefs are dumb, they should be breastfeeding, they should never co-sleep, they should divorce their husband, they should shave their legs, and they should stop wearing mom jeans. In real life, people would punch you in the face.

In Memory Of Katrina

• But you can keep them for the birds and bees — Mac @ PeskyApostrophe wonders about all of that Katrina aid money the U.S. asked for and got from other countries last year. She comes to the same conclusion I did.
  

  I’m appalled at a variety of things when it comes to the Katrina rebuilding effort and FEMA’s role in it all, but this is a whole new level of incompetence. As part of my new job, I am now involved in grant-writing. In a good portion of grants, the grantee expects a report as to how the money was used. While I’m sure these gifts did not come with any reporting requirements, if one of our grantees found out their money had been either wasted or didn’t got to the program for which it was intended that would pretty much guarantee they’d never give money to us again. And you have to wonder if, should another emergency situation arise, these countries would think twice about giving aid money to the U.S. if we’re not going to use it and use it wisely.

• First the Flood, Now the Fight — Spencer S. Hsu @ WashingtonPost.com wrote a special report on the butting of heads between FEMA and state and city officials in the rebuilding of the Gulf States and New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina. FEMA swears it’s not trying to be difficult but the process seems to be designed to wear down those requesting help until they just give up and either take what little they’ve been given, which isn’t much if anything.
  

  Through hundreds of such disputes large and small, the most costly disaster in U.S. history is fast becoming its most contentious, with appeals and disputes worth nearly a billion dollars bogging down repairs of critical public systems and delaying the return of residents.

  Current and former officials at all levels blame FEMA workers’ inexperience with eligibility rules, weaknesses in U.S. disaster laws and inconsistent treatment by Congress for much of the wrangling. The huge scale of the storm and honest disagreement over whether federal or local taxpayers should pay the tab add to the conflict.

  “Disasters should be difficult to declare. . . . But once you get them, FEMA should not worry about cutting costs,” said Daniel A. Craig, who stepped down in October as head of FEMA’s recovery division and is now consulting for New Orleans. “Public entities are eligible for everything they have lost due to the disaster. It is not up to FEMA to cut corners or makes sure money is saved.”

  Gil H. Jamieson, FEMA’s deputy director for Gulf Coast recovery, agreed that “we’re in this to rebuild the city” and added: “We are not in it to delay for the sake of delay. Are there folks who sometimes hose it up? Absolutely. But I think we’re doing a good job of helping it recover.”

  The disputes come as the costliest part of the recovery begins: restoring water, power, roads, bridges, schools and other public facilities along the Gulf Coast. Agency veterans said the spending will have more impact on the physical rebuilding of the Gulf area than anything else FEMA does over the next decade, possibly eclipsing its role in aiding individual victims of the storm.

  The Sewerage and Water Board of New Orleans, for instance, sustained $446 million in storm losses, said Executive Director Marcia St. Martin. But FEMA has committed just $113 million so far.

  FEMA notes that New Orleans promised U.S. environmental regulators $640 million in repairs before Katrina, and that the antiquated system is too big for the Crescent City’s reduced population.

  “That’s what makes a city — if you don’t have water, sewer and drainage, you don’t have a city,” lamented Robert Jackson, spokesman for the sewer board. “The money so far only scratches the surface of the devastation.

  Hat Tip: Susie @ Suburban Guerrilla

More

Tags: Thursday Thirteen, Internet, Hurricane Katrina, FEMA, aid money, Gil H. Jamieson, Daniel A. Craig, Gulf Coast recovery, New Orleans, Islamofascism, George W. Bush, Muslims, women in the media, Support the Troops, defense appropriation bill, Defense and Veterans Brain Injury Center, Iraq, Afghanistan, Congress, Pentagon, Lower 9th Ward, National Hurricane Canter, 9/11, Max Mayfield, Osama bin Laden, Hezbollah, terrorism, Ann Jones, Taliban, NATO, Christians, American Dream, Martin Niemoller, Germany, Nazis, Rocky Anderson, Utah, Salt Lake Tribune, patriotism, lie, Walter Jones, Colonel Lawrence Wilkerson, Colin Powell, Dick Cheney, Caddam Hussein, Donald Rumsfeld

News Quickies

• Former Iraq POW Jessica Lynch is pregnant.  She and her boyfriend, Wes Robinson, are expecting their first child in January. (CNN.com)
• 43% of Americans believe the United States is now safer from terrorism than it was before September 11, 2001.  25% believe it is less safe.  Over half believe that an act of terrorism will likely happen in the US in the next few weeks, over half believe that the federal government is unprepared for any terrorist attack targeting any U.S. town or city, and over half believe that the federal government is unprepared to deal with the damage from a terrorist attack.  Plus, over 50% believe that the U.S.-led war in Iraq has made the country less safe from terrorism and almost 60% believe that the U.S.-led war in Iraq has made the world less safe from terrorism. (CNN.com)
• British budget airline Ryanair filed a £3m compensation claim against the British government yesterday due to losses from the new airport security restrictions incorporated two weeks ago that still are resulting in lines so long that they have “spillover tents” outside of two of the terminals. (Guardian Unlimited)
• “Research in 56 countries found that rates of asthma, hayfever and eczema increased more often than they decreased between 1991 and 2003.” (Guardian Unlimited)
• A geography teacher was placed on paid administrative on the second day of school for hanging several flags from other countries in his classroom.  Apparently, a Colorado law that makes it illegal to display foreign flags permanently in schools.  How stupid is that?  Why is that law even necessary? (TheDenverChannel.com)

Tags: Jessica Lynch, 9/11, terrorism, Iraq, Ryanair, airport security, stupid laws

Innocent Man Detained For 5 Years Without Apology From U.S.

There are some Americans who would have you believe that everyone picked up on suspicion of terrorism should forfeit their rights as a human being. Some Americans will tell you that the fact that we are “at war” means that we have the right “to do what we have to do” in order to protect ourselves without apology and without conscience. There are Americans who don’t understand that when we deny other human beings the simple rights that we expect from each other, we stop being human beings ourselves.

The veiled accusations and vehement denials would continue for nearly five years - despite official findings in 2001 that he had no terrorist links and in 2003 that authorities had violated his rights by colluding to keep him in custody.

Of the estimated 1,200 mostly Arab and Muslim men detained nationwide as potential suspects or witnesses in the Sept. 11 investigation, Benatta would earn a dubious distinction: Human rights groups say the former Algerian air force lieutenant was locked up the longest.

His Kafkaesque journey through the American justice system concluded July 20 when a deal was finalized for his return to Canada. In the words of his lawyer, the idea was to “turn back the clock” to when he first crossed the border.

But time did not stand still for Benatta: The clock ran for 1,780 days. The man detained at 27 was now 32.

“I say to myself from time to time, maybe what happened … it was some kind of dream,” he said. “I never believed things like that could happen in the United States.”

Benemar “Ben” Benatta, a former Algerian air force lieutenant, arrived in Canada on September 5, 2001 seeking political assylum. A week later, he was escorted back across to the U.S. and turned over to U.S. immigration. Benemar Benatta didn’t learn about the the 9-11 terrorist attacks until September 12th when FBI agents paid him a visit. He was sent to a federal prison in Brooklyn and when he insisted he wasn’t involved in the attacks, they threatened to send him back to Algeria — a certain torture and death sentence for his desertion. The interrogations continued.

Prison guards, he said, dispensed humiliation in steady doses - rapping on his cell door every half hour to interrupt his sleep, stepping on his leg shackles hard enough to scar his ankles, locking him in an outdoor exercise cage despite freezing temperatures, conducting arbitrary strip searches.

Benemar Benatta was never charged of any crime during this time and in November 2001, the FBI prepared a report clearing him of any involvement in the 9/11 attacks. However, no one bothered to tell Benatta and in fact they didn’t bother to set him free or allow him access to the outside world.

Finally, in April, he was transfered to Buffalo to face federal charges of carrying a phony ID when he was first detained. Benatta was denied bail while he fought the case. However, at least he was allowed into the general population of federal defendants housed at an immigration detention center. It was also the first time he was allowed access to the news and the first time he was allowed access to scenes of what had happened at the World Trade Center and he was shocked.

It wasn’t until the second anniversary of the attacks that U.S. Magistrate H. Kenneth Schroeder Jr., in a bluntly worded ruling, found that Benatta’s detainment for a deportation hearing was “a charade.”

Though terrible, the Sept. 11 attacks “do not constitute an acceptable basis for abandoning our constitutional principles and rule of law by adopting an ‘end justifies the means’ philosophy,” Schroeder wrote. Based on that decision, another judge tossed out the case on Oct. 3, 2003.

“That gave me so much hope,” Benatta said. “For me, it’s like (the judge) had so much nerves. He gave me some kind of hope in the judicial system all over again.”

However, Benatta demanded asylum but the U.S. Immigration authorities wanted him deported for overstaying his visa. (Brilliant, isn’t it? We lock him up for no reason and then want to deport him because we locked im up? Punish the victim! The United States Way!)

An immigration court first set bail at $25,000, then ruled he should stay behind bars indefinitely - a situation a United Nations human rights group decried as a “de facto prison sentence.” Most asylum seekers are released pending the outcome of their cases.

It took another two years before a Manhattan attorney, Catherine M. Amirfar, found a solution: She convinced Canadian authorities to let her client apply for asylum there without jailing him.

“Canada was willing to take him back and turn back the clock five years,” she said. “Of course, Benemar will never get those five years back.”

The last detainee was deported in his prison smock without an apology. He remembers cold stares when he ate his first meal at Wendy’s and went to a mall to buy clothes.

Today, there’s no more soul-numbing confinement. But he’s still caught in waiting game, this time to see whether Canada will grant him asylum - a decision at least six months away. He also wonders if he can regain enough spirit to start a new life.

“Now I’m not the same person,” he said. “When I came to the United States, I was optimistic. I had so much energy. That’s not the case now.”

Source: 9/11 Detainee Released After Nearly Five Years

Imagine five years of your life gone because you were in the wrong place at the wrong time. Imagine that you had been seeking help from countries that were supposed to be the good guys and instead you ended up tortured and imprisoned for 5 years.

And Benatta isn’t the only one. The U.S. has a history of playing games with detainees since 9/11. How many of the Guantanamo Bay detainees were cleared and weren’t told?

Tags: 9/11, Benemar Benatta, Algeria, detainees, FBI, political assylum, U.S. Immigration

Recommended Reading - 08/04/06

• Tin Foil Hats And Tiaras For Everyone! — The (liberal)Girl Next Door talks about the recent poll revealing that 1/3rd of Americans believe that 9/11 was “an inside job” and what that staggering fact could or should mean for our future as a country.
  

  One out of three people think the Bush administration could very well have organized the deaths of 3,000 innocent Americans for the sole purpose of furthering their foreign policy objectives. In other words, a third of this country’s citizens believe that the Bush administration is a terrorist organization. How is it possible that impeachment isn’t even on the table if that many Americans think he’s a killer? Yes, it’s a rhetorical question and we can all say in unison, “it’s possible with the help of a lapdog press.”

• Internet “Conspiracies” — In contrast Red Bull uses the same poll to champion Net Neutrality. More

  Tags: Conspiracy Theories, 9/11, net neutrality, gay hate crimes, Homeland Security, FAS, disaster preparedness, Israel, U.S., Hezbollah, Lebanon, Middle East, Military Families Speak Out

  2 comments See also in Politics & Causes, In the News, Geekery, Blogging & Other Blogs, The World, Featured, 9-11 & Terrorism, Conspiracy Theories, Natural Disasters, The Middle East

Recommended Reading Of the Conspiratorial Kind

• Yakov Shafranovich at NetWizard has been documenting his request to the NSA under the Freedom of Information Act and the Privacy Act for a copy of the records they’ve collected concerning him, especially where this whole USA Today domestic wiretapping thing is concerned. He’s also got the documentation of the NSA’s denial to provide that information to him up as well as links to other people who’ve been denied their own records. You might want to check it out. (Hat Tip: Thoughts of an Average Woman)
• Was 9/11 allowed to happen by the U.S. Government (and not just the Bush Administration)? Here’s an exerpt from a timeline at WanttoKnow.info:
  

  1998–2000: On three occasions, spies in Afghanistan report bin Laden’s location. Each time, the president approves an attack. Each time, the CIA Director says the attack can’t go forward. [New York Times, 12/30/01, more]

  2000–2001: 15 of the 19 hijackers fail to fill in visa documents properly in Saudi Arabia. Only six are interviewed. All 15 should have been denied entry to the US. [Washington Post, 10/22/02, ABC, 10/23/02] Two top Republican senators say if State Department personnel had merely followed the law, 9/11 would not have happened. [AP, 12/18/02, more]

  2000–2001: The military conducts exercises simulating hijacked airliners used as weapons to crash into targets causing mass casualties. One target is the World Trade Center (WTC), another the Pentagon. Yet after 9/11, over and over the White House and security officials say they’re shocked that terrorists hijacked airliners and crashed them into landmark buildings. [USA Today, 4/19/04, Military District of Washington, 11/3/00, New York Times, 10/3/01, more]

  Jan 2001: After the Nov 2000 elections, US intelligence agencies are told to “back off” investigating the bin Ladens and Saudi royals. There have always been constraints on investigating Saudi Arabians. [BBC, 11/6/01, more]

  Spring 2001: A series of military and governmental policy documents is released that seek to legitimise the use of US military force in the pursuit of oil and gas. One advocates presidential subterfuge and hiding the reasons for warfare “as a necessity for mobilizing public support.” [Sydney Morning Herald, 12/26/02, more]

  May 2001: For the third time, US security chiefs reject Sudan’s offer of thick files on bin Laden and al-Qaeda. A senior CIA source calls it “the worst single intelligence failure in the business.” [Guardian, 9/30/01, more]

  June-Aug 2001: German intelligence warns the CIA that Middle Eastern terrorists are training for hijackings and targeting American interests. Russian President Vladimir Putin alerts the US of suicide pilots training for attacks on US targets. In late July, a Taliban emissary warns the US that bin Laden is planning a huge attack on American soil. In August, Israel warns of an imminent Al Qaeda attack. [Fox News, 5/17/02, Independent, 9/7/02, more]

  July 4-14, 2001: Bin Laden may have received kidney treatment from Canadian-trained Dr. Callaway at the American Hospital in Dubai. Dr. Callaway declines to comment. During his stay, bin Laden is alleged to have been visited by one or two CIA agents. [Guardian, 11/1/01, Sydney Morning Herald, 10/31/01, London Times 11/1/01, UPI, 11/1/01, more]

  July 26, 2001: Attorney General Ashcroft stops flying commercial airlines due to a threat assessment. [CBS, 7/26/01] In May 2002, Ashcroft walks out of his office rather than answer questions about it. [AP, 5/16/02, more]

  Aug 6, 2001: President Bush receives an intelligence briefing warning that bin Laden might be planning to hijack commercial airliners. Titled “Bin Ladin Determined To Strike in US,” the briefing specifically mentions the WTC. Yet Bush later claims it “said nothing about an attack on America.” [Washington Post, 4/12/04, Briefing, 8/6/01, more]

  Aug 27, 2001: An FBI supervisor says he’s trying to keep a hijacker from “flying a plane into the WTC.” [Senate Report (Hill #2), 10/17/02] Headquarters chastises him for notifying the CIA. [Time, 5/21/02] The FBI Director later states, “There was nothing the agency could have done to prevent the attacks.” [Senate (Breitweiser), 9/18/02, more]

  Sept 10, 2001: “Newsweek has learned a group of top Pentagon officials suddenly canceled travel plans for the next morning, apparently because of security concerns.” [Newsweek, 9/24/01, more]

  Sept 11, 2001: Data recovery experts extract data from 32 damaged WTC computer drives. The data reveals a surge in financial transactions shortly before the attacks. Illegal transfers of over $100 million may have been made through WTC computer systems immediately before and during the 9/11 disaster. [Reuters, 12/18/01, CNN, 12/20/01, more]

  Sept 11, 2001: Described as a bizarre coincidence, a US intelligence agency was all set for an exercise on Sept 11th at 9:00 AM in which an aircraft would crash into one of its buildings near Washington, DC. [AP, 8/22/02, more]

  Sept 11, 2001: Hours after the attacks, a “shadow government” is formed. Key congressional leaders say they didn’t know this government-in-waiting had been established. [CBS, 3/2/02, Washington Post, 3/2/02, more]

  Sept 11, 2001: Six air traffic controllers who dealt with two of the hijacked airliners make a tape recording describing the events within hours of the attacks. The tape is never turned over to the FBI. It is later destroyed by a supervisor without anyone making a transcript or even listening to it. [Washington Post, 5/6/04, New York Times, 5/6/04]

  Sept 13-19, 2001: Bin Laden’s family is taken under FBI supervision to a secret assembly point. They leave the country by private plane when airports reopen days after the attacks. [NY Times, 9/30/01, Boston Globe, 9/20/01, more]

  Sept 15-16, 2001: Several of the 9/11 hijackers, including lead hijacker Mohamed Atta, may have had training at secure US military installations. [Newsweek, 9/15/01, Washington Post, 9/16/01, New York Times, 9/15/01, more]

  Sept 23, 2001: Several of the 9/11 hijackers later mentioned in the 9/11 Commission Report turn up alive. Alleged 9/11 pilot Waleed Al Shehri, on seeing his name and photograph, informs journalists that he is alive. [BBC, 9/23/01, more]

  Dec 2001-Feb 2002: The US engineers the rise to power of two former Unocal Oil employees: Hamid Karzai, the interim president of Afghanistan, and Zalmay Khalizad, the US envoy. The big American bases created in the Afghan war are identical to the route of the projected oil pipeline. [Chicago Tribune, 3/18/02, more]

  May 17, 2002: Dan Rather says that he and other journalists haven’t been properly investigating since 9/11. He graphically describes the pressures to conform that built up after the attacks. [Guardian, 5/17/02, more]

  May 23, 2002: President Bush says he is opposed to establishing an independent commission to probe 9/11. [CBS, 5/23/02] Vice President Cheney earlier opposed any public hearings on 9/11. [Newsweek, 2/4/02, more]

  Visit the website for a more lengthy timeline or watch the documentary or check out the 9/11 information center. (Hat Tip The Martian Anthropologist)

• There’s been lots of comparisons between President Bush and Hitler in the last few years. Both men have been considered to be devoutly religious. Both men, as leaders, requested temporary extraordinary powers to govern, powers specifically banned under their countries’ law, but powers they both claimed they needed to have to deal with the “terrorists”, and the people, having already sold their souls to their self-delusions and denial that the government would do nothing to harm them, agreed. Here is a brilliant comparison to what happened to Germany and how it was the refusal of the German public to stand up to Hitler and The Third Reich that destroyed Germany and what is happening in America and how it is the American public’s refusal to see what is truly going on that will be our downfall. I personally agree that the media then and now definitely is much at fault for refusing to do the job it should do as unbiased observer. (Hat Tip: The Martian Anthropologist)

Tags: Conspiracy Theories, 9/11, George W. Bush, Hitler, NSA, warrantless wiretapping, spying on Americans, Freedom of Information Act, USA Today

Random Thought About Zacarias Moussaoui

Of course everyone’s been voicing their opinion the last few weeks about whether or not Zacarias Moussaoui should have or haven’t been sentenced to death for his part in 9-11 though technically he was in prison on September 11, 2001 and most of the information he had to tell the FBI at the time was in at least one report sitting on one FBI manager’s desk unread.

Personally I haven’t had much to say about it anywhere. Not here. Not around the blogosphere. Not even around the water cooler or at the local Starbucks.

I kind of think he’s crazy. I kind of think he wants to be a martyr and I kind of think he’s a terrorist wanna-be. I don’t really even think he was as important in the 9-11 plot as he makes himself out to be.

However, I know that we as a nation need a scapegoat. I kind of would like that scapegoat to be the real criminal mastermind — Osama. I think that the media and the FBI and the justice system really wanted Moussaoui to be an offering to us for the big screw up that here we are almost five years later and the real terrorists still haven’t had their day in court or even their day on the “battlefield.” The real terrorists are mocking us, toying with us, and we’re trying crazy men who want to be martyrs and heroes for other crazy men.

But the randomest thought, the most interesting thing that I’ve heard in all the snippets I’ve caught about Moussaoui in the last few weeks was a sound byte from a police officer (I think) on the radio who pointed out that we had convicted a man and asked a jury to put him to death simply because he didn’t want to incriminate himself before the crime was committed.

Just something to think about.

Tags: Zacarias Moussaoui, 9/11, terrorism

Destroying Ourselves

Jacob Hornberger, founder of The Future of Freedom Foundation, wrote an excellent commentary on April 26th and I wanted to share part of it:

… we now live in a nation in which the president has the omnipotent power to ignore all constitutional restraints on his power. That might not be the way the president and his legal advisors put it, but that is the practical effect of what they are saying to justify his powers. They effectively claim that the Constitution vests the president — as military commander in chief during the “war on terrorism” — with such extraordinary powers that he is able to ignore restraints on his powers imposed both by the Constitution and by Congress.

No restraints on declaring and waging war against other nations. No restraints on the power to secretly record telephone conversations of the American people. No restraints on the power to kidnap and send people into overseas concentration camps for the purpose of torture and even execution. No restraints on the power to take Americans into custody as “enemy combatants” and punish them — even torture and execute them — without due process of law and jury trials.

If all that isn’t dictatorship, what is?

“But President Bush is a good man. He’s trying to protect us. He’s waging war against the terrorists. He’s not evil like other dictators in history. He was elected. He can be trusted.”

People who say that are missing the point. The suggestion is not that Bush is an evil man. The point is simply that Bush now wields the same omnipotent, dictatorial powers that other dictators in history have wielded. That is not a small transformation in American life when it comes to freedom.

“Well, then, where are the mass round-ups, and where are the concentration camps?”

Again, people who ask that type of question are missing the point. The point is not whether Bush is exercising his omnipotent, dictatorial power to the maximum extent. It’s whether he now possesses omnipotent, dictatorial power, power that can be exercised whenever circumstances dictate it — for example, during another major terrorist attack on American soil, when Americans become overly frightened again.

Unless the American people figure out a way to reverse what has happened to their country — and have the will to do something about it — they will earn the mark of shame reserved for those people in history who voluntarily relinquished their freedom in exchange for the aura of security. Like all others in history who have chosen such a course, they will ultimately learn that they have lost both their freedom and their security. [“A Democratic Dictatoriship” (The Future of Freedom Foundation)]

I very much believe that the average American really wants to believe that the kind of abuses that Bush is actually claiming he has a right to and has actually been committing in the name of President of the United States of America simply can’t happen “here” in this country. This is America. We are the good guys. We are better than that. Our Leaders will protect us.

I’m sure that every other nation and people that found themselves lost and misled and trapped one day thought the same thing. That sort of thing couldn’t happen in their village, their country, their nation, their empire. They were invicible; they were great; they were blessed; they were the good guys. Their leaders were supposed to protect them.

I just don’t want to wake up in a police state some day because September 11th happened. It was a tragedy it happened. There are things we can do to fight back, to protect ourselves, but we don’t have to give up everything and destroy our freedoms and everything that made us a great nation, America, the good guys, just because it happened. That’s not going to make anything better.

Destroying ourselves so the bad guys can’t won’t solve the problem.

Tags: Democracy, dictatorship, George W. Bush, The Future of Freedom Foundation, Freedoms, 9/11

Another 9-11 Conspiracy Theory Points The Fickle Finger At Cheney

He is a former Lieutenant Colonel for the United States Air Force who flew 101 combat missions in Vietnam. He has received the Eisenhower Medal, the George F. Kennan Peace Prize, the President’s Medal of Veterans for Peace, the Society of Military Engineers Gold Medal (twice), six Air Medals, and dozens of other awards and honors. His Ph.D. is in Aeronautics and Nuclear Engineering from Caltech. He chaired 8 major international conferences, and is one of the country’s foremost experts on National Security. Dr. Robert Bowman was the former head of the Star Wars program under Presidents Ford and Carter and even was the first to coin the term in 1977.

Oh, and recently, he’s gone public with his opinion that the government’s presented version of what h