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9/11 ATTACKS Avoiding the hard questions
Miami Herald ^ | Feb. 01, 2006 | ROBERT STEINBACK

Posted on 02/01/2006 8:42:15 PM PST by Anthem

9/11 ATTACKS

Avoiding the hard questions

I was 8 years old when President John Kennedy was shot to death in Dallas in 1963. If grace favors me, I'll be 62 when documents related to the assassination are released to the public, and 84 when the Warren Commission's investigative files into the tragedy are finally opened.

That's a long time to wait for a chance to evaluate the purported truth.

It's a blot on the presumed sophistication of the people of the United States that any aspect of an event so dramatic and shocking should be kept from us. Perhaps it's true, to abuse the line from A Few Good Men yet again, that we can't handle the truth. But there cannot be genuine resolution as long as such critical information remains concealed.

Transformed by 9/11

Since Kennedy's assassination, Americans have lurched between demanding to know and plugging their ears: The Pentagon Papers, My Lai, the King assassination, Watergate, Iran-contra, the savings-and-loan debacle, Monicagate. Lately, however, it would seem the public's verdict is in: Don't tell us. Keep us in the dark. We don't want to know.

This is the worst possible time for probe-ophobia to grip us. Our nation was irretrievably transformed by 9/11 -- and yet there remain troubling questions about what really happened before, during and after that day. Rather than demanding a full and fearless vetting to hone in on the truth and silence the conjecture about 9/11, many Americans remain unwilling to peer into the microscope.

An online cottage industry of theorists, theory debunkers and debunker debunkers has flourished since 9/11. Sometimes the flimsy theories are easy to spot -- come on, if the four passenger jets didn't crash where it appears they did, where did they go? More often, though, the cases aren't so obvious.

A group of experts and academicians 'devoted to applying the principles of scientific reasoning to the available evidence, `letting the chips fall where they may,' '' last week accused the government of covering up evidence that the three destroyed New York City buildings were brought down that day by controlled demolition rather than structural failure. The group, called Scholars for 9/11 Truth, has a website, www.st911.org.

Unanswered questions

The reflexive first reaction is incredulity -- how, one asks, could anyone even contemplate, never mind actually do such a barbaric thing? But before you shut your mind, check the resumés -- these aren't Generation X geeks subsisting on potato chips and PlayStation. Then look at the case they present.

''I am a professional philosopher who has spent 35 years teaching logic, critical thinking and scientific reasoning,'' group co-founder and University of Minnesota professor James H. Fetzer told me. ``When I come to 9/11, it's not hard for me to determine what is going on. This is a scientific question. And it is so elementary that I don't think you can find a single physicist who could disagree with the idea that this was a controlled demolition.''

The group asks, for example,

• How did a fire fed by jet fuel, which at most burns at 1,700 degrees Fahrenheit, cause the collapse of the Twin Towers, built of steel that melts at 2,800 degrees? (Most experts agree that the impact of airliners, made mostly of lightweight aluminum, should not have been enough alone to cause structural failure.) How could a single planeload of burning jet fuel -- most of which flared off in the initial fireball -- cause the South World Trade Center tower to collapse in just 56 minutes?

• Why did building WTC-7 fall, though no aircraft struck it? Fire alone had never before caused a steel skyscraper to collapse.

• Why did all three buildings collapse largely into their own footprints -- in the style of a controlled demolition?

• Why did no U.S. military jet intercept the wayward aircraft?

• Why has there been no investigation of BBC reports that five of the alleged 9/11 hijackers were alive and accounted for after the event?

Our current probe-ophobia is due in part to the political landscape: When one party holds all the cards, any call to investigate an alleged abuse of power or cover-up -- no matter how valid -- will look like a partisan vendetta. Those in power never want to investigate themselves.

Maybe that's politics; he who holds the hammer drives the nails. But the outrage of 9/11 transcends party affiliation.

We need all the outstanding questions answered -- wherever the chips may fall.


TOPICS: Conspiracy
KEYWORDS: crackpot; dryhump; moonbat; tinfoilnutburger
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To: onyx
Happy now?

Ha! That's all the evidence some of these guys want to see.
101 posted on 02/01/2006 9:29:53 PM PST by kenth
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To: Anthem
So do ya think Bush, Cheney, Bush Sr, Rumsfeld, and maybe more planned to kill thousands of Americans and destroy the US economy, after he was elected?

Or did they plan to kill thousands of Americans and destroy the US economy, before he was elected, and then planned a rigged election?

And then planned to go to Afghanistan, kill soldiers, civilians, and on the Iraq to kill more soldiers and civilians?

For Halliburton? Oil? Gas? Stocks? Drugs? Sex? Cash? To live in DC? Go to parties? Fly for free around the world? To feel macho? Because they like attention? Book deals?

What?
102 posted on 02/01/2006 9:30:06 PM PST by roses of sharon ("I would rather men ask why I have no statue, than why I have one". ) (Cato the Elder)
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To: sinkspur
--First, let's see this guy's evidence.

Go read the link I provided. It will take at least an hour, as there are video shorts to watch as well. Come back and convince me. I'm open to well reasoned arguments.

103 posted on 02/01/2006 9:30:42 PM PST by Anthem (One can not lie their way to the truth.)
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To: Howlin

Robert Steinback, Miami Herald columnist.


http://www.miami.com/mld/miamiherald/news/columnists/robert_steinback/


Have a look at his "columns."


104 posted on 02/01/2006 9:31:31 PM PST by onyx
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To: Howlin
It's my understanding that the fire might have not been as bad if the Towers had been built using asbestos.
I don't know that you would have bought all that much time in this case; the aircarft coming in laterlly literally 'blew off' and blew out a lot of material that would otherwise 'protect' the building/steel from the effects of fire. Much of the sheet rock used in lieu of other 'wall' materials blew out when the jet(s) hit.
105 posted on 02/01/2006 9:32:45 PM PST by _Jim
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To: kenth
It's Bush's doing fault; it was predicted by that $20 bill, and it's just now uncovered by Robert Steinback who also wrote that "Walmart's Health Keep People Sick."
106 posted on 02/01/2006 9:35:17 PM PST by onyx
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To: Anthem
I wonder, why are the nutty sources you cite actively engaged in building design, or even in the analysis of currently proposed designs or structures, IF these guys are so danged insightful and gifted in building design and analysis ...

Underwriters and arcitects and contractors should be beating a PATH to their doors.

Are they?

107 posted on 02/01/2006 9:36:29 PM PST by _Jim
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To: roses of sharon


Ding, ding, ding!

We have a winner: Halliburton!


108 posted on 02/01/2006 9:36:29 PM PST by onyx
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To: Anthem

I'd like to thank you for being such a good sport, and hanging around to play the straight man for this absolute clinic on the debunking of moonbat conspiracy theories.

You're a peach, truly.


109 posted on 02/01/2006 9:37:23 PM PST by A Balrog of Morgoth (With fire, sword, and stinging whip I drive the RINOs in terror before me.)
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To: Blackirish
I was here before you got here and I'll be here when you're gone. Deal with the article rather than hiding behind that zot crap and you'll be fine.

Otherwise, you can go to the third ring, fourth pit. Doofus.

110 posted on 02/01/2006 9:38:29 PM PST by nunya bidness (“Unsung, the noblest deed will die.” - Pindar)
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To: Alberta's Child
Re: The building structure.

The center core was a huge load bearing stuctural component. Why wasn't it left standing as the floor slabs pancaked (breaking their moorings -- a perpendicular attachment far more vulnerable to vertical moments of inertia than a vertical column would be)?

111 posted on 02/01/2006 9:38:32 PM PST by Anthem (One can not lie their way to the truth.)
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To: Alberta's Child
--Angular momentum isn't enough to make a building that size fall sideways

No, it wouldn't make the whole building fall. It would have fallen off the building, leaving the rest of the building standing.

112 posted on 02/01/2006 9:40:56 PM PST by Anthem (One can not lie their way to the truth.)
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To: Howlin
Is that an old 20?

I think so, but since the evil Bush oil cabal has taken all my money, I can't verify.
113 posted on 02/01/2006 9:41:41 PM PST by kenth
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To: Anthem
No, it wouldn't make the whole building fall. It would have fallen off the building, leaving the rest of the building standing.

Good grief. Even I know the floors pancaked one on top of the other.

Parts of building don't just TIP off.

114 posted on 02/01/2006 9:42:16 PM PST by Howlin (Why don't you just report the news, instead of what might be the news? - Donald Rumsfeld 1/25/2006)
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To: kenth

LOL!


115 posted on 02/01/2006 9:42:34 PM PST by Howlin (Why don't you just report the news, instead of what might be the news? - Donald Rumsfeld 1/25/2006)
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To: A Balrog of Morgoth

I think he's pretty serious.


116 posted on 02/01/2006 9:43:00 PM PST by Howlin (Why don't you just report the news, instead of what might be the news? - Donald Rumsfeld 1/25/2006)
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To: Anthem
I read it and watched the vids. Bunk. I can melt steel in the backyard fire pit with wood. Try it sometime it's not that hard, it stays hot for a long time, sometimes I can go back the next day and kick the ashes and get the hotspots started again sometimes. Other things I have melted. Beer cans, glass, a plastic rake, the bottom of my shoes, potato chip bags, an old playstation black promo disk from Pizza hut and army men.
117 posted on 02/01/2006 9:44:15 PM PST by CJ Wolf (To Zot or Not That is the question.)
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To: Anthem
Go read the link I provided. It will take at least an hour, as there are video shorts to watch as well.

An hour? Waste an hour on a Made It Happen/Let It Happen infomercial?

Come back and convince me.

'sCuse me? I'd say it's your job to convince us

I'm open to well reasoned arguments.

Read the thread again. I can't believe we're wasting this much time with this. We must be bored.
118 posted on 02/01/2006 9:44:38 PM PST by A Balrog of Morgoth (With fire, sword, and stinging whip I drive the RINOs in terror before me.)
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To: COEXERJ145
--I know far more about aviation than you ever will. Jet fuel burns at 2,200 degrees

If you pour jet fuel (again, a light kerosene) into a pan and light it, will it reach 2200o? No, it won't. And you know it. Look, I don't have to know about aviation to understand this. I understand combustion engines. I have a steam turbine driven invention under development right now.

119 posted on 02/01/2006 9:46:08 PM PST by Anthem (One can not lie their way to the truth.)
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To: Anthem
The center core was a huge load bearing stuctural component. Why wasn't it left standing as the floor slabs pancaked
110 stories worth of vertical steel column standing by iteslf?

Vertical steel columns ONCE tied together via the floor 'joists' to the external load-bearing vertical steel columns?

I'd like to see the bending 'moment' at the base of those vetical beams; they would have to be built of 100% Unobtainium, which is at LEAST 1000 times stronger than diamond.

120 posted on 02/01/2006 9:47:11 PM PST by _Jim
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