Tuesday, July 20 2010   -   9/11 Consequences

By Philip Giraldi
July 19, 2010
Campaign For Liberty

The Ministry of Truth

The Ministry of Truth was how George Orwell described the mechanism used by government to control information in his seminal novel 1984. A recent trip to Europe has convinced me that the governments of the world have been rocked by the power of the internet and are seeking to gain control of it so that they will have a virtual monopoly on information that the public is able to access. In Italy, Germany, and Britain the anonymous internet that most Americans are still familiar with is slowly being modified. If one goes into an internet café it is now legally required in most countries in the European Union to present a government issued form of identification. When I used an internet connection at a Venice hotel, my passport was demanded as a precondition and the inner page, containing all my personal information, was scanned and a copy made for the Ministry of the Interior -- which controls the police force. The copy is retained and linked to the transaction. For home computers, the IP address of the service used is similarly recorded for identification purposes. All records of each and every internet usage, to include credit information and keystrokes that register everything that is written or sent, is accessible to the government authorities on demand, not through the action of a court or an independent authority. That means that there is de facto no right to privacy and a government bureaucrat decides what can and cannot be "reviewed" by the authorities. Currently, the records are maintained for a period of six months but there is a drive to make the retention period even longer.

The excuses being given for the increasing government intervention into the internet are essentially two: first, that the anonymity of the internet has permitted criminal behavior, fraud, pornography, and libel. Second is the security argument, that managing the internet is an integral part of the "global war on terror" in that it is used by terrorists to plan their attacks requiring governments to control those who use it. The United States government takes the latter argument one step farther, claiming that the internet itself is a vulnerable "natural asset" that could be seized or damaged by terrorists and must be protected, making the case for a massive $100 billion program of cyberwarfare. Senator Joseph Lieberman (D-CT) argues that "violent Islamist extremists" rely on the internet to communicate and recruit and he has introduced a bill in the Senate that will empower the president to "kill" the internet in case of a national emergency.

But all of the arguments for intervention are essentially themselves fraudulent and are in reality being exploited by those who favor big government and state control. ...

', 'This article was brought to my attention via the long-running, excellent Newsletter from Information Clearing House, a daily wire (headlines only or brief blurbs) of the "News you won't find on CNN". Check 'em out!!

See also related story below, 73,000 blogs shut down as FBI probes Qaeda posts.  

Monday, July 19 2010   -   9/11 Consequences

By The Associated Press
July 19th, 2010
RawStory.com

Since the terror attacks of Sept. 11, top-secret intelligence gathering by the government has grown so unwieldy and expensive that no one really knows what it cost and how many people are involved, The Washington Post reported Monday.

A two-year investigation by the newspaper uncovered what it termed a "Top Secret America" that's mostly hidden from public view and largely lacking in oversight.

In its first installment of a series of reports, the Post said there are now more than 1,200 government organizations and more than 1,900 private companies working on counterterrorism, homeland security and intelligence in some 10,000 locations across the U.S.

Some 854,000 people -- or nearly 1 1/2 times the number of people who live in Washington -- have top-secret security clearance, the paper said.

 

Friday, July 16 2010   -   Other Important News

By Jon Gold
July 12, 2010
http://peaceoftheaction.org/2010/07/12/free-at-last/

They tried and tried to put the glove on, but it just didn't fit. I kid, I kid.

On March 20th 2010, I was arrested for crossing a police line. Today, I was acquitted for the crime, along with Cindy Sheehan, and Jim Veeder. Sadly, Matthis Chiroux, Elaine Brower, and Lafloria Walsh were found guilty of failing to obey.

This was my first arrest and trial so all of this was new to me. Before the trial began, our lawyers and the prosecutor tried to work things out so there wouldn't be a trial. The prosecutor offered a "pay and forfeit" without any conviction, and all of us declined. We stood our ground, and wanted the chance to clear our names. We felt strongly that our arrests were unjust, and wanted our day in court.

Cindy told me a couple of times before the trial that it was going to be boring, and it was. The only "excitement" came when Elaine, Laflora, and Cindy were allowed to testify. Everyone did great. When Casey was brought up, Cindy started to cry. I leaned over to Ann Wilcox (one of our attorneys, Mark Goldstone was the other), and said I want to testify. ...

 

Friday, July 16 2010   -   Legal Response to 9/11

By David Edwards
Monday, July 12th, 2010
RawStory.com

Fox News' senior judicial analyst made some surprising remarks Saturday that may go against the grain at his conservative network.

In a interview with Ralph Nader on C-SPAN's Book TV to promote his book Lies the Government Told You, Judge Andrew Napolitano said that President George W. Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney should have been indicted for "torturing, for spying, for arresting without warrant."

The judge believes that it is a fallacy to say that the US treats suspects as innocent until proven guilty. "The government acts as if a defendant is guilty merely on the basis of an accusation," said Napolitano.

Nader was curious about how this applied to the Bush administration. "What about the more serious violations of habeas corpus," wondered Nader. "You know after 9/11 Bush rounded up thousands of them, Americans, many of them Muslim Americans or Arabic Americans and they were thrown in jail without charges. They didn't have lawyers. Some of them were pretty mistreated in New York City. You know they were all released eventually."

"Well that is so obviously a violation of the natural law, the natural right to be brought before a neutral arbiter within moments of the government taking your freedom away from you," answered Napolitano.

 

Wednesday, July 14 2010   -   9/11 A/V Galleries

Posted July 14, 2010
from Shoestring's blog at 911blogger.com

Check out this excellent recent documentary, which has just been posted on the Internet, about Nato's secret armies that were set up across Western Europe after the Second World War. While these "stay-behind" armies were supposedly intended to help put together a resistance if the Soviet Union invaded their countries, they went on to commit terrorist attacks against their own populations, so as to influence domestic politics.

The documentary describes how, from the late 1960s to the early 1980s, Western intelligence agencies collaborated with right-wing extremist groups to commit false flag terrorist attacks, which would often be falsely blamed on left-wing groups. It features interviews with, among others, Daniele Ganser, author of NATO's Secret Armies: Operation GLADIO and Terrorism in Western Europe.

 

Wednesday, July 7 2010   -   Endorsements & Support

July 5, 2010

Dear Readers,

If 911Truth.org is a resource that's important to you, please support it.

First of all, a sincere THANK YOU to each of you who have recently contributed to 911truth.org or do so on a monthly basis. To readers who have not donated, or have not done so in a while, please consider - today - what you can give to help maintain the organization and the website. If it's useful to you, we'd appreciate your support...  

Wednesday, July 7 2010   -   In the Media

July 7, 2010 Update - Part of this interview was replayed again last night, nationally, on the Australian Top 30.

Listen here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ILyQiXK7jPY&feature=player_embedded

John was interviewed on the 2DAY FM Breakfast radio show on the 25th June 2010. This program goes right across Australia, and is one of the most popular shows in the country. This time slot is normally the Kyle and Jackie-O show, but the show today was hosted by Chris and Charli.

 

Tuesday, July 6 2010   -   Open Letters

An Open Letter to Terry Allen, Noam Chomsky, Alexander Cockburn, David Corn, Chris Hayes, George Monbiot, Matthew Rothschild, and Matt Taibbi¹

by David Ray Griffin²
July 6, 2010
GlobalResearch.ca

According to several left-leaning critics of the 9/11 Truth Movement, some of its central claims, especially about the destruction of the World Trade Center, show its members to be scientifically challenged. In the opinion of some of these critics, moreover, claims made by members of this movement are sometimes unscientific in the strongest possible sense, implying an acceptance of magic and miracles.

After documenting this charge in Part I of this essay, I show in Part II that the exact opposite is the case: that the official account of the destruction of the World Trade Center implies miracles (I give nine examples), and that the 9/11 Truth Movement, in developing an alternative hypothesis, has done so in line with the assumption that the laws of nature did not take a holiday on 9/11. In Part III, I ask these left-leaning critics some questions evoked by the fact that it is they, not members of the 9/11 Truth Movement, who have endorsed a conspiracy theory replete with miracle stories as well as other absurdities.

 

Tuesday, July 6 2010   -   Other Important News

by Peter Phillips and Mickey Huff
July 3, 2010
DailyCensored.com World News

"There is nothing so strong or safe in an emergency of life as the simple truth."
---- Charles Dickens

We face what appears to be a military industrial media empire so powerful and complex that truth is mostly absent or reported in disconnected segments with little historical context. A case in point: The London Times reported on June 5, 2010, that American troops are now operating in 75 countries. Has President Obama secretly sanctioned a huge increase in the number of US Special Forces carrying out search-and-destroy missions against al-Qaeda around the world? If so, this increase is far in excess of special-forces operations under the Bush administration and reflects how aggressively Obama is pursuing al-Qaeda behind his public rhetoric of global engagement and diplomacy. Somehow this information didn't make it into the US media.

The US, in cooperation with NATO, is building global occupation forces for the control of international resources in support of Trilateralist--US, Europe, Japan--corporate profits. A New York Times report on the availability of a trillion dollars in mineral wealth in Afghanistan, on top of the need for an oil/gas pipeline from the Caspian Sea, suggests other reasons for U.S objectives in the region.

 

Saturday, June 26 2010   -   9/11 Consequences

Using the McChrystal Moment to Raise a Forbidden Question

David Ray Griffin
Submitted June 24, 2010
GlobalResearch.ca

There are many questions to ask about the war in Afghanistan. One that has been widely asked is whether it will turn out to be "Obama's Vietnam."¹ This question implies another: Is this war winnable, or is it destined to be a quagmire, like Vietnam? These questions are motivated in part by the widespread agreement that the Afghan government, under Hamid Karzai, is at least as corrupt and incompetent as the government the United States tried to prop up in South Vietnam for 20 years.

Although there are many similarities between these two wars, there is also a big difference: This time, there is no draft. If there were a draft, so that college students and their friends back home were being sent to Afghanistan, there would be huge demonstrations against this war on campuses all across this country. If the sons and daughters of wealthy and middle-class parents were coming home in boxes, or with permanent injuries or post-traumatic stress syndrome, this war would have surely been stopped long ago. People have often asked: Did we learn any of the "lessons of Vietnam"? The US government learned one: If you're going to fight unpopular wars, don't have a draft -- hire mercenaries!

There are many other questions that have been, and should be, asked about this war, but in this essay, I focus on only one: Did the 9/11 attacks justify the war in Afghanistan?

 

Friday, June 25 2010   -   9/11 Precedents

By Robert Parry (A Special Report)
June 24, 2010
ConsortiumNews.com

As the Official Story of the 1980 October Surprise case crumbles -- with new revelations that key evidence was hidden from investigators of a congressional task force and that internal doubts were suppressed -- history must finally confront the troubling impression that remains: that disgruntled elements of the CIA and Israel's Likud hardliners teamed up to remove a U.S. president from office.

Indeed, it is this disturbing conclusion -- perhaps even more than the idea of a Republican dirty trick -- that may explain the longstanding and determined cover-up of this political scandal.

Too many powerful interests do not want the American people to accept even the possibility that U.S. intelligence operatives and a longtime ally could intervene to oust a president who had impinged on what those two groups considered their vital interests.

To accept that scenario would mean that two of the great fears of American democracy had come true -- George Washington's warning against the dangers of "entangling alliances" and Harry Truman's concern that the clandestine operations of the CIA had the makings of an "American Gestapo."

It is far easier to assure the American people that no such thing could occur, that Israel's Likud -- whatever its differences with Washington over Middle East peace policies -- would never seek to subvert a U.S. president, and that CIA dissidents -- no matter how frustrated by political constraints -- would never sabotage their own government.

But the evidence points in that direction, and there are some points that are not in dispute. For instance, there is no doubt that CIA Old Boys and Likudniks had strong motives for seeking President Jimmy Carter's defeat in 1980.

Inside the CIA, Carter and his CIA Director Stansfield Turner were blamed for firing many of the free-wheeling covert operatives from the Vietnam era, for ousting legendary spymaster Ted Shackley, and for failing to protect longtime U.S. allies (and friends of the CIA), such as Iran's Shah and Nicaragua's dictator Anastasio Somoza.

As for Israel, Likud Prime Minister Menachem Begin was furious over Carter's high-handed actions at Camp David in 1978 forcing Israel to trade the occupied Sinai to Egypt for a peace deal. Begin feared that Carter would use his second term to bully Israel into accepting a Palestinian state on West Bank lands that Likud considered part of Israel's divinely granted territory.

 

Wednesday, June 23 2010   -   Research/Evidence

New York City officials say a renewed search this year of debris in and around the World Trade Center site has recovered 72 human remains.

June 23, 2010
Telegraph.co.uk

The sifting of more than 800 cubic yards (612 cubic meters) of debris recovered from ground zero and underneath roads around the lower Manhattan site began in April and ended Friday.

The greatest number of remains -- 37 -- were found from material underneath West Street, a highway on the west side of ground zero. The new debris was uncovered as construction work made new parts of the site accessible.

The city began a renewed search for human remains in 2006. More than 1,800 remains have been found.

Some have been matched to previously unidentified 9/11 victims.

 

Sunday, June 20 2010   -   Other Important News

David Ray Griffin
Submitted June 18, 2010
911truth.org

William A. ("Bill") Christison, a former senior analyst for the Central Intelligence Agency who became a supporter of the 9/11 Truth Movement, died June 13, 2010, due to a rapidly advancing neurological disease, which he had contracted three months earlier. He leaves behind his wife, Kathleen McGrath Christison (who had also been a CIA analyst), two daughters (Lynda Carlson and Judith Wooten), and a son (Eric). He had been preceded in death by two other sons (Robert and Thomas). The memorial service was held in Santa Fe, New Mexico, on Friday, June 18.

Born in Boston in 1928, Christison graduated from Princeton in 1950 and immediately joined the CIA to begin what would become a distinguished 28-year career. Starting out as an analyst on Soviet affairs, he worked in the 1960s on the problem of global nuclear proliferation, with special emphases on France, Israel, India, and Pakistan. In the 1970s, he became the National Intelligence Officer for South Asia, Southeast Asia, and Africa. (He and Kathleen met while they were both working in Saigon.) He finished his career as Director of the CIA's Office of Regional and Political Analysis, supervising over 200 analysts covering, between themselves, every region of the world.

In 1979, he and his wife retired from the CIA and moved to Sante Fe, where he started becoming more critical of US foreign policy, especially when he saw that the fall of the Soviet Union, which by ending the Cold War was supposed to bring a "peace dividend," did no such thing, but instead prompted the United States to advance its imperial interests.

Becoming especially critical of US policy with regard to Israel and the Middle East, he (along with his wife) began writing articles for Counterpunch. Some of Christison's most important work, Counterpunch editor Alexander Cockburn told the Santa Fe New Mexican (Steve Terrell, "Former CIA Agent Bill Christison Advocated for Palestinians," The Santa Fe New Mexican, June 15, 2010), came in the wake of the 9/11 terrorist attacks. In a March 2002 Counterpunch article, Christison wrote:

"My number one root cause (of terrorism) is the support by the U.S. over recent years for the policies of Israel with respect to the Palestinians, and the belief among Arabs and Muslims that the United States is as much to blame as Israel itself for the continuing, almost 35-year-long Israeli occupation of the West Bank and the Gaza Strip."

 

Sunday, June 20 2010   -   9/11 Consequences

By Daniel Tencer
June 19th, 2010
RawStory.com

The Pentagon's spy unit has quietly begun to rebuild a database for tracking potential terrorist threats that was shut down after it emerged that it had been collecting information on American anti-war activists.

The Defense Intelligence Agency filed notice this week that it plans to create a new section called Foreign Intelligence and Counterintelligence Operation Records, whose purpose will be to "document intelligence, counterintelligence, counterterrorism and counternarcotic operations relating to the protection of national security."

But while the unit's name refers to "foreign intelligence," civil liberties advocates and the Pentagon's own description of the program suggest that Americans will likely be included in the new database.

 

Friday, June 18 2010   -   In the Media

By Marc Hansen
June 17, 2010
Des Moines Register On Tuesday night, Sean Michalek drove from Victor to Adel for the monthly 911 Truth of Central Iowa meeting.

The trek west took 105 minutes, but so what? Michalek, 64, would have driven nine hours to commune and commiserate with other Iowans who believe the official story of Sept. 11, 2001, is a big fat lie.

"It's the only game in Iowa," he said.

The only game, he meant, for people who think 9/11 is the least examined tragedy in American history.