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Poking holes in the official story of 9/11 (mutiple alerts)
Toronto Star ^ | May 26, 2004 | Antonia Zerbisias

Posted on 05/26/2004 7:41:02 PM PDT by Rennes Templar

Citizens can choose to buy the official line on the events of Sept. 11, 2001 — or they can ask questions about holes in that story as big as the crater at Ground Zero.

This week, at the unlikeliest of locations, the Ukrainian Cultural Centre in west-end Toronto, the International Citizens' Inquiry into 9/11 picks up where it left off in San Francisco in March.

Here, international authors, filmmakers, academics, military and intelligence experts as well as, yes, probably the occasional conspiracy theorist, are mixing it up with ordinary people who can't accept that all the systems simply failed on one terrible and tragic morning.

They're gathering to focus attention on why, still, nearly three years after two planes tore through the World Trade Center, one crashed into the Pentagon and a fourth into a Pennsylvania field, the White House still hasn't produced a plausible explanation for why so much went so wrong all at once.

"To ask questions and to ask them fearlessly," says Citizens' Inquiry director Barrie Zwicker. "This is the heart of this."

Indeed, a majority of Canadians doubt the line out of Washington. A poll conducted for the non-profit inquiry (http://www.911inquiry.org) this month shows that 63 per cent of us believe the U.S. government had "prior knowledge of the plans for the events of September 11th, and failed to take appropriate action to stop them."

Perhaps that's a testament to our media, which were not at Ground Zero, not personally affected by events and not waving the flag.

Whatever the explanation, Zwicker, a media critic for more than 30 years, says the U.S. press abdicated its responsibility to probe what happened and has been "complicit" in advancing the official explanation.

"If the corporate media had looked at this from the beginning, we would be living in a different world now," he insists. "(U.S. President) George W. Bush would have been impeached by now."

Inquiry's unasked questions include: Why were fighter jets not scrambled in time to stop the planes from smashing into the buildings? Why did the U.S. chain of command — including the commander-in-chief Bush — not act when the hijackings were in progress? Why were so many warnings missed? And why did it take the Kean Commission — Washington's official 9/11 inquiry — so long to get going, and only after the bereaved families noisily lobbied for more than a year?

Among the questioners coming to Toronto are University of Ottawa economics professor Michel Chossudovsky (War and Globalization, The Truth Behind September 11), French political activist and best-selling author Thierry Meyssan (9/11: The Big Lie), former fighter pilot turned security expert Dr. Robert Bowman of Florida, the Center for Cooperative Research's Paul Thompson, who compiled a comprehensive 9/11 timeline (http://www.cooperativeresearch.org), and Ellen Mariani, a 9/11 widow who is suing the government instead of taking a multi-million-dollar payout.

True, some of the participants have some unusual theories. For example, Meyssan, despite eyewitness accounts, has suggested that it was in fact a missile that hit the Pentagon. But at yesterday's opening session at least, not a tin-foil hat was in site among the mostly middle-aged crowd of 100. In fact, they looked like the kind of people you might see slinging hash for the homeless at a soup kitchen.

That despite sneers yesterday from warbloggers and their acolytes. They claim that those who challenge the idea that some suicidal Arabs armed with box cutters managed to outsmart the greatest technomilitary power history has ever known are "conspirazoids," "left-wing loonies" or "fanatical Muslims."

All of which works great for Bush and company. That's because, by lumping 9/11 skeptics with whackos who pick up alien voices with their tooth fillings, the mainstream media can marginalize any and all questioners as "conspiracy theorists."

"The official story is a conspiracy theory: Osama bin Laden and his co-conspirators did it," Zwicker emphasizes. "It's a brilliant narrative, but upon examination of the evidence, it crumbles into dust, just like the dust of the World Trade Towers."


TOPICS: Canada; Crime/Corruption; Editorial; Extended News; Foreign Affairs; Miscellaneous; Unclassified
KEYWORDS: 911attacklovers; antiamericanism; canada; conspiracy; michaelmorons; tinfoil
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"For example, Meyssan, despite eyewitness accounts, has suggested that it was in fact a missile that hit the Pentagon."

Yes I have heard this theory too. The passengers on the plane actually were skirted out to a Bermuda Island, and are being held captive indefinitely on the Love Boat.

1 posted on 05/26/2004 7:41:03 PM PDT by Rennes Templar
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To: Rennes Templar

Further proof that liberalism is a mental disorder...


2 posted on 05/26/2004 7:45:06 PM PDT by Russ
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To: Russ

LOL


3 posted on 05/26/2004 7:46:47 PM PDT by Rennes Templar
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To: Rennes Templar

This is a slap in the face to anyone who lost a loved one because of 9-11..

Shame on anyone who is out to make a buck from this.

There is a special place in hell for them.


4 posted on 05/26/2004 7:47:14 PM PDT by baltodog (There are three kinds of people: Those who can count, and those who can't.)
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To: Rennes Templar

These conspiracy theorists always miss the simplest explanation that no-one was truly prepared for 9/11 because the terrorists had never tried anything as audaciously evil like that before in the history of the world. Good people just don't naturally think that way. Now we all have to prepare for the worse case scenario for every terrorist threat, but that just wasn't the case on September 10 2001.


5 posted on 05/26/2004 7:49:02 PM PDT by plushaye
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To: Rennes Templar

Only one alert needed - the MORON CONVENTION alert.


6 posted on 05/26/2004 7:50:49 PM PDT by John Valentine ("The difference between stupidity and genius is that genius has its limits." - Albert Einstein)
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To: Rennes Templar

I was going to post something witty and condescending - but I've drawn a blank - never mind....


7 posted on 05/26/2004 7:51:39 PM PDT by M. Peach (eschew obfuscation)
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To: Rennes Templar

Canadians don't get enough sunlight. They're just plaid dumb.


8 posted on 05/26/2004 7:53:23 PM PDT by halley
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To: Rennes Templar
I read some loony website about this kind of junk about how planes were hidden and the passengers taken to some building and held captive or some such garbage. There are people who believe this junk! I don't suppose they say this about the Towers since there are videos galore of the planes hitting them, but of course, they could have some loony tunes theory about that too!
9 posted on 05/26/2004 7:57:06 PM PDT by ladyinred (The leftist media is the enemy within.)
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To: baltodog

Just wait until something happens to them, will they ask the same questions?


10 posted on 05/26/2004 7:57:53 PM PDT by Contra
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To: halley

>>Inquiry's unasked questions include: Why were fighter jets not scrambled in time to stop the planes from smashing into the buildings? Why did the U.S. chain of command — including the commander-in-chief Bush — not act when the hijackings were in progress? Why were so many warnings missed? And why did it take the Kean Commission — Washington's official 9/11 inquiry — so long to get going, and only after the bereaved families noisily lobbied for more than a year? <<

They are dupes, and useful idiots. Jaime Gorelick's law firm is being paid big bucks, by a Saudi Prince to defend against 600 911 victim's families.

What were Bush's immediate options that day? Shoot down a passenger plane with US Warplanes? Impeachment that day? The planes in NYC had no where good to go if they were shot down. It was a bizarre and unique situation.

This analysis and criticism is strictly armchair quarterbacking from the politically handicapped.

DK


11 posted on 05/26/2004 8:03:26 PM PDT by Dark Knight
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To: halley

There's a lunatic fringe in every country. There are some who swear Elvis is still alive. Others who say the moon landing was faked (as in the movie "Capricorn One"), or they were alien abductees. For every conspiracy theory, they'll be a convention held somewhere for it.


12 posted on 05/26/2004 8:05:09 PM PDT by plushaye
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To: Rennes Templar

Inquiry's unasked questions include: Why were fighter jets not scrambled in time to stop the planes from smashing into the buildings?
--- Perhaps because there were no armed jets that could stop these planes?
Why did the U.S. chain of command — including the commander-in-chief Bush — not act when the hijackings were in progress?
---What could they do?
Why were so many warnings missed?
---You mean the nonspecific August memo? I blew the idea that it could have prevented 9/11 in a bloggers thread.
And why did it take the Kean Commission — Washington's official 9/11 inquiry — so long to get going, and only after the bereaved families noisily lobbied for more than a year?
---What BS. It's called focusing on the WOT.


13 posted on 05/26/2004 8:08:23 PM PDT by WinOne4TheGipper (I make no guarantee that the above post was written by a sane person.)
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To: Rennes Templar
It is amazing that this was even published.

Clearly the White House failed at securing the nations airlines when people carried box-cutters on to four planes out of thousands... Box-cutters that were legal before 911...

Clearly the White House failed by not shooting down the four civilian airplanes carrying hundreds of people as soon as they found out they were hijacked... Even though no plane had ever been shot down before due to it being hijacked... And no civilian passenger plane had ever been used as a missile before...

The fourth plane was being followed by a fighter plane before it crashed in Pennsylvania. It didn't take long after the first three hijacked planes hit their targets to know what the fourth was up to. In truth we responded pretty quick.

And last, that the White House failed because it didn't know what 19 people were up to out of around 300 million people in the country. As if any form of law enforcement could have exposed it...

And for those who say the White House knew in advance... Your too sick to even respond to.
14 posted on 05/26/2004 8:11:55 PM PDT by DB (©)
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To: Rennes Templar
why so much went so wrong all at once

This was as far as I bothered.

That was just why, it was all at once. If there was to have been a second wave as has been speculated, that was stopped. While out defenses were set to respond in minutes to ICBMs, there were few provisions for domestic flights being used as cruise missiles.

15 posted on 05/26/2004 8:15:46 PM PDT by StriperSniper (Welcome home Thomas Hamill !!!)
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To: Rennes Templar
All of which works great for Bush and company. That's because, by lumping 9/11 skeptics with whackos who pick up alien voices with their tooth fillings, the mainstream media can marginalize any and all questioners as "conspiracy theorists."

Indeed! Eveyone knows 9/11 skeptics pick up alien communications through their toasters, not their fillings.

LOL. So you have a group of people pushing a theory about some arcane conspiracy and they are mad at being called conspiracy theorists? Leave it to liberal idiots to be this stupid.
16 posted on 05/26/2004 8:37:22 PM PDT by swilhelm73
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To: DB
The fourth plane was being followed by a fighter plane before it crashed in Pennsylvania

I don't think "being followed" is an accurate or appropriate description. There was a flight of fighters heading to intercept it, but they had a long way to go and didn't get there before the Militia of Flight 93 took matters into it's own hands and saved the Capital or the White House.

17 posted on 05/26/2004 8:48:21 PM PDT by El Gato (Federal Judges can twist the Constitution into anything.. Or so they think.)
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To: DB
I am of the opinion that our military shot down that fourth fatal flight in PA. There are some witnesses and the debris field indicated a shoot down.

This in no way takes away from the brave actions of those folks aboard Flt. 93. And for reasons of national security the shooting of the airliner was kept secret.

America needed heroes from that dark day and Flt. 93 and its passengers fit the bill. It was (and is) war. I don't regard this part of the story cover-up as part of any conspiracy either. The options were few and far between and the consequences enormous if the shootdown didn't take place.

May G-d bless those souls that died in violence that September day, and may all of America remember it as that beautiful autumn day when war came to our shores.

18 posted on 05/26/2004 9:55:59 PM PDT by abigkahuna
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To: Rennes Templar
But the French made TWO books about that missle theory BESTSELLERS. The missile was reportedly PAINTED to look like a plane, no less.

France hates America. France hates Bush. Simple as that. May we realize that it is still not a "good thing" to let the Islamofascists conquor their country. We'll probably be pulling their ass out of the fire again.

19 posted on 05/26/2004 10:04:15 PM PDT by weegee (NO BLOOD FOR RATINGS. CNN ignored torture & murder in Saddam's Iraq to keep their Baghdad Bureau.)
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To: baltodog
More 911-loving Canadian crap:

Leftist from Canada gets chewed out by Metal band leader.(Hysterical read, some profane language)

20 posted on 05/26/2004 10:07:34 PM PDT by weegee (NO BLOOD FOR RATINGS. CNN ignored torture & murder in Saddam's Iraq to keep their Baghdad Bureau.)
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