Posted on 02/15/2005 1:19:18 AM PST by JohnHuang2
On April 20, 2001, a Peruvian military jet pilot confused a small plane carrying missionaries for one carrying drug runners and shot it down. In the last two weeks, MSNBC has been leading the charge to bring this case to closure.
Its on-air personnel – Chris Matthews and Joe Scarborough in particular – have been asking hard questions about why no charges have been brought against CIA agents who may have lied about the nature of this crash. The MSNBC website invites citizens to communicate their concerns about this presumed cover-up through MSNBC to the U.S. government.
This would be all well and good were it not for the likely role that MSNBC played in the cover-up of TWA Flight 800. On July 18, 1996, about 12 hours after TWA Flight 800 exploded off the coast of Long Island, a military officer – off the record – told a very tired Fox News senior reporter that "a major screw-up" had occurred and that the "White House" had ordered the military to "stand down" for 48 hours until policy decisions were reached.
This did not surprise the Fox journalist. For hours the previous evening, Fox News had reportedly been involved in a bidding war for an amateur video tape of the 747 being destroyed by what appeared to be missile fire. When the electronic bidding war reached $50,000, Fox was eliminated from the process.
The high bidder seems to have been NBC and/or its new sister network, MSNBC. This makes market sense in that MSNBC had been launched just two days prior, and the publicity would have been well worth the cost. Still, I say "seems" because my sources here will not speak on record, nor will MSNBC follow up on queries. Here is exactly what I know, no more, no less.
In the summer of 2001, my partner James Sanders, and I were negotiating with Broadcast Network News (BNN) – the world's largest independent news producer – to distribute our documentary on the subject of TWA Flight 800, "Silenced." These were serious negotiations. The person with whom we were communicating was BNN's chief executive officer, Steve Rosenbaum.
One day that summer, Rosenbaum called me in a state of high excitement. "Jack," he said, "you will not believe the conversation I just had." Although Rosenbaum thought our video had market potential, he was not at all convinced of our thesis, namely that missiles had been fired at TWA Flight 800. The conversation in question eliminated just about all doubt.
As Rosenbaum explained, he had been interviewing a candidate for a position as BNN's technical director at a rooftop cafe when an airplane passed overhead. The conversation moved naturally to airplanes and then, with Rosenbaum taking the lead, to TWA Flight 800.
"I've seen the video," said the candidate, who had until recently been working at MSNBC.
"You mean 'Silenced'?" said Rosenbaum, a little surprised.
"No," the candidate answered, "the video, the actual video of the plane being shot down."
As the candidate told Rosenbaum, late on the night of the crash, editors at MSNBC had the tape on their monitors when "three men in suits" came to their editing suites, removed the tape, and threatened the editors with serious consequences if they ever revealed its contents.
The threats worked all too well. Despite my repeated requests, Rosenbaum could not get the technical director, whom he hired, to go on record. Over the years, I have asked various producers at MSNBC to follow up, but if they did, they kept what they learned to themselves.
Earlier in his research, Sanders had been approached by a technician at another station who had monitoring the competition's feeds from Long Island and made a bootleg copy of that same amateur video. What is more, he withheld a copy from the FBI when its agents came to confiscate whatever relevant tapes his station might have. Despite a series of phone calls, Sanders could not persuade the technician to hand over the tape. His fear was palpable enough, however, to convince Sanders that he was telling the truth.
Although I have not seen the video myself, I have heard from scores, if not hundreds, of credible people who swear they saw it on television in the first hours after the crash. That at least one among the hundreds of eyewitnesses would have had a video camera handy during a beautiful summer sunset evening makes perfect sense. The FBI admits to having confiscated two still photos and predictably writes off the images to dirt or scratches on the lens. A video would have been much harder to dismiss.
Nelson DeMille has obviously heard these stories as well – and perhaps more. In his best-selling novel, "Night Falls," a confiscated amateur video drives the plot. Although he spices the video up a bit in the retelling, DeMille is not just spinning fantasy. His insider details have the ring of authenticity about them.
What makes the MSNBC involvement all the more ironic is that the CIA was responsible for producing the 15-minute animated video used successfully to discredit the eyewitness testimony. If the MSNBC producers are interested in exposing not just a routine CIA cover-up, but the most consequential cover-up in American history, my fellow investigators and I will be happy to lead them right to the source.
There is admittedly much we still do not know about the explosion of TWA Flight 800, but we know enough about the CIA cover-up to bring indictments. Before turning on the CIA, however, MSNBC might want to look inward. The CIA at least had the excuse of national security. If MSNBC had reasons for betraying its journalistic ethics, I am not sure I know what they are. Indeed, had its new executives stuck to their guns that night, they might very well have prevented Sept. 11.
If you have or know something then out with it! Otherwise, you ARE speculating, and are trying to make some points on me.
Save it for the conspiracy crowd. They appreciate theories devoid of logic, evidence, and/or the way things are in the real world. All I have done here is point out the obvious flaws, and press for accuracy.
<< There is no evidence for a walked on bomb... there are [sic] tons of evidence for a missile. >>
Wrong.
ALL of the EVIDENCE conclusively PROVES that a walked-on bomb was the cause of the loss of the subject Boeing B-747.
And all of the mis-and-dis-information created and promulgated to give the APPEARANCE of "evidence" to cloud and to cover-up All of the EVIDENCE points in every which way and confuses the confused.
Quod Erat Demonstrandum.
And that you and those who share your camp with you are as mis-informed as you are is evidence only of the success of the Gore/Cli'ton "administration's" absolutely-compromised and abjectly-fraudulent "investigation" -- and that shooting "'missiles' from 'grassy knolls'" successfully feeds such fever-swamp-dwelling denizens of conspiricy theories as wish to be so fed.
That said, I think I'll slide over to the Humor Forum for awhile to see what's cookin'
>I'll slide over to the Humor Forum for awhile to see what's cookin'
Stick around. This is the "slower-lower" side of FR :~)
Do you think that whoever threatened him has allowed him to keep the tape?
<< Even if the reason for the Clinton administration cover-up was to cover up the cover-up, why did the Bush administration not reveal what it found out on taking office? So it could further advance a cover-up?
To ask this question shows you do not know how Washington works. You first lesson is that it is not about party. >>
The first and last Rule of American Politics is that at all costs one must Respect the Oligarchy.
[Or -- quite likely via her heinous's apartment -- take the trip to Fort Marcy Park]
Why else is one of the two most cravenly amoral and treasonous creatures to ever darken the oval office's doorstep President Bush's tsunami relief appointee -- and the other permitted to roam at will carrying his un-and-anti-Americanism from Pyongyang to Caracas -- and from Plains to Havana?
Protect the Oligarchy.
[The bastards!]
Fine. I'm open minded.
You've made and assertion. Please provide your conclusive evidence.
Was there not a BA jet in the area at the time?
Good question.
I suspect there are multiple copies of the tape at this point.
The puppet masters may want to play cool and hope they don't surface--fearing that death or pressure on the guy might force them to the surface.
But what do I know! It's a murkey world at best.
BTW, are you Chinese? Wherefrom your screenname?
imho,
you are far too likely to be far tooooo correct . . .
for any shred of comfort for any thoughtful, well informed people.
<< Fine. I'm open minded.
You've made an assertion. >>
Wrong.
I have simply reported.
<< Please provide your conclusive evidence. >>
It is not "mine."
I began my search -- and I remain -- absolutely objective.
I have no dog in this fight.
The evidence simply exists -- and is as accessible to you as to me -- as to anyone who starts as a blank slate.
If you can do that you may be informed.
If, on the other hand, you have predetermined the outcome -- and are looking only for the appearance of "evidence" to support said predetermination -- there is plenty of that, too.
If the Gore/Cli'ton "administration" -- which created every one of this "investigation's" fantasies, delusions and illusions -- was expert at anything at all, it was at shuckin' and jivin' and smoke and mirrors!
At all of that -- in all of Human History -- it knows no peer.
And nor has any gang ever left behind it more smoked and mirrored, shucked and jived!
Just as I thought. No evidence.
YOU have made a bald assertion that TWA800 was brought down by a "walk on bomb" and I have challenged you to produce it. If, and when you do, I will gladly examine it. I am not going to do YOUR research for you. I have already researched this subject and my postings on FR have been cited elsewhere.
If the Clinton's were so omnipotent how is that they are still not in office?
Ping
Been pretty quiet lately....Thanks for the new "ping" on this!!
The mafioso "Clintonistas" have long reaching tenacles and they seem to have as much influence as always....funny about all those 'missing' FBI files..............
I see.
So the P-3, the target drone, and the ATC radar reports are all figments of my imagination?
I read that book and thought that the theory/information seemed very plausible.
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