The Russian Nuke Theory

I love how he proves he was a nuclear intel official; with a military uniform. At any rate, he's a thorough nut, apparently peddling his book on Lula for $51.00.

Note that in this segment, the interviewer gets AA11 and AA77 mixed up, and Dimitri does not correct him:



He's a no-planer and a nukes under the towers guy.

Dahlia S. Wasfi, Anti-Zionist Crusader

Or, it just wouldn't be a Troofer Conference without the requisite Jew-bashing conspiracy theory:



It takes her awhile to warm to her subject, but it's clear that the crowd loves it once she gets to the Zionist stuff (about 6:25 into the video). Note that she repeats some of the sillier tropes of the anti-Israel crowd, like the BS about "the Nile to the Euphrates" phrase appearing on the wall of the Knesset. This is a persistent myth, even mentioned in the Wikipedia Entry on the Flag of Israel.

Persistent critic of Israel and Zionism Israel Shahak is equally explicit. In his The Zionist Plan for the Middle East he states

A good example is the very persistent belief in the non-existent writing on the wall of the Knesset of the Biblical verse about the Nile and the Euphrates. Another example is the persistent, and completely false declarations, which were made by some of the most important Arab leaders, that the two blue stripes of the Israeli flag symbolize the Nile and the Euphrates, while in fact they are taken from the stripes of the Jewish praying shawl (Talit).

In Part II, she ignores the actual history to tell us that Israel "invaded" the Sinai and the Golan Heights, conveniently omitting for the sake of her narrative that the Egyptians had massed 1,000 tanks and 100,000 soldiers on the border of Israel, in preparation for their own invasion, or that the Golan Heights were used by Syria to bombard Israeli settlements.

Troofers March In LA

It comes through loud and clear that the march leaders aren't happy with the nutbars being at the front of the parade. Note as well that one of the banners promotes 9-11 Mysteries, the movie inspired by Holocaust Denier Eric Hufschmid. The music gets really annoying after about ten seconds.

How Far Down Does the Rabbit Hole Go?

That's what came to mind as I read this post over at Troof Action:

What does trouble me though, is the belief that "The Mossad Did 9/11!" is exactly the message the Mossad wants the truth movement to put forth. I mean, look at the Dancing Israelis. They could have videoed the airstrikes on the towers quietly from a tall building in Jersey City,or a boat on the river, or from inside a van quietly. Instead they sent a bunch of guys dressed as Arabs to Liberty Park to attract attention.

Same thing with Larry Silverstein. "Silverstein confessed to blowing up Building 7" is exactly what he wants the truth movement to say. That way truthers mark themselves as just a peculiar flavor of Jew-haters.

See, the Mossad intentionally sent the Dancing Jews to film the towers so that they would get blamed for 9-11, so that people could dismiss the 9-11 Truth Movement as Jew-haters. But doesn't that mean that the Mossad knew about the attacks in advance, and therefore they were in on the plot? And Larry Silverstein must have been coached by his Rabbi to say "pull it" on national TV.

How many blows to the head would it take before that started to make some sense?

Jon's Excellent Campout

Jon posted about his experience at the Cindy Sheehan fest in Washington DC here. But being the snarky guy I am, I thought I'd go through Jon's photos and add my own commentary:

A pity that the day was cold and wet; I just wish I had been sleeping somewhere else that night. Oh, snap!

It was cold on Monday, and rained Monday night. Joshua, and Robby and maybe someone else, I don't remember, had guard duty for the camp on Monday night. The rest of us were taken to the church.

Ah, pity the souls who had "guard duty". I am sure they came up with some democratic way of giving Joshua and Robby the task.

Somebody suggested calling this "Stuck on Stupid," but I snorted and said, "Nobody thinks Cindy is stupid," and everybody agreed.

Yes, I am totally checking out the brunette with the coffee cup. I think she's doing the guy with the red and grey sweater, but she obviously doesn't love him. He's got a 'CD VO' armband which tells me he's a controlled demolition fan. I get the feeling she prefers guys who are into the family members:

The name I mentioned was 9/11 victim, and husband of Lorie Van Auken, Kenneth Van Auken.

So later that night, I'm snuggled up close to her in the church and I'm thinking, if if just gets a little colder I'll suggest that we join sleeping bags, but then I doze off and:

I was banished from the populated area because I am a BAD snorer.

But the next day she listened to my 9-11 rap. Unfortunately, the photographer made it look like there were only 3 people in the room:

I tried to tell him to make it look like there were at least four of us, but no luck. And then I got busted the next day. But I was thrilled on Monday when our people showed up in the courtroom:

All except for the hot brunette and her boyfriend. Crap, if the cops had just let me out on Saturday night I'm convinced I could have scored. She's a Lorie Van Auken groupie, just like me!

The Sounds of Silence

Over at Truth Move, several people are appalled at an email that's been going around the movement claiming that Steven Jones is disinfo and that Judy Wood is legit. Well, half-right, anyway. But John Albanese brings up a valid point:

Has Jones submitted his paper, along with samples, to independent labs for verification?

no - he has not.

Are we to simply take his word - as an article of faith? Many in the movement do. But - if we are having a truly objective discussion on this subject - lets be real here. Dr. Jones' paper has not yet been independently verified. And - claiming it is DENIAL - akin to people's resistance to global warming - is not an altogether intellectually honest comparison.

Victoria Ashley counters:

Actually they have. Several different researchers have verified the findings.

Albanese:

well this is big news! Please point us in the direction of these independent labs that have independently tested samples from the WTC dust. I thought it was only Jones who had done this.

And suddenly the crickets are his only reply; nothing in the last four days.

Update: Well, that got things going over there; suddenly lots of new posts on the thread. Victoria Ashley points to this "independent" confirmation by a chemical engineer, who just happens to be a member of Box Boy Gage's Gaggle. He calls in to a radio show in Keene New Hampshire (where have we heard of that town before?). The program's name is "Empire Watch" which gives us a good clue that it's kook city. But in the interview, I can see no direct confirmation of "nanothermite"; just talk about the iron microspheres and the red and grey chips.

Basile mentions joining Gage's gaggle. Here's the interesting part, however. He's not listed there now on their engineers page. He's listed at STJ911 as having a BS degree in chemical engineering. I can see that quite a few of the engineers at AE 9-11 Troof are chemical engineers, so I'm a little baffled as to why he doesn't appear on their roster.

The other "independent confirmation" apparently comes from one Frédéric Henry-Couannier. But here's what he found (pdf file):


And yes, he's a Troofer himself, which explains why he thinks maybe his sample was "deactivated to prevent my independent corroboration of a crucial proof." So far from being independent confirmation, he is in fact non-independent and non-confirming. As lawyers like to say, that's an admission against self-interest, which is considered the strongest kind of evidence possible.

All Of Thems are Disinfo!

For some bizarre reason I am on the ae911truth mailing list, so this morning I got an e-mail asking people to call up members of the New York City council and read off this script regarding how WTC7 was blown up by the illuminati using supermagiconanothermite and all. That was pretty routine, but I was especially amused by this warning midway through:

As always, two simple rules for participating in this campaign:

1) Talk only about World Trade Center Building 7, do not mention Misprision of Treason as we are not using such heavy handed tactics, but a friendlier approach with the City Council

2) Be courteous and respectful

Each morning NYC CAN informs the council members’ offices that anyone who is disrespectful, or who mentions other aspects of 9/11, is trying to sabotage the legitimate call for a proper investigation into the collapse of World Trade Center Building 7. And to ensure that opponents of truth do not undermine our effort, we will need each and every one of you to get involved and drown out their vitriolic voice with courtesy, clarity and honesty.

Hello! Disinfo? This is the majority of morons that make up your so-called movement, including I would imagine many of the people who signed your petition. How screwed up is your movement when you have to call up people you are trying to influence, and as a matter of routine, tell them not to listen to other members of the movement, because you think they are "saboteurs"?

Jesse The BSer Ventura: I Called It!

Remember back in December when the Governator had his Conspiracy Theory Show on the 9-11 Fruitcakes? There was a segment where Van Romero painted superthermite on a steel beam and lit it on fire (starts about 40 seconds into this clip):



Note that Romero asks the question, "Does it burn long enough and hot enough so that we have structural failure?" at about 1:50 into the video. Hilariously, Ventura cuts off Romero at that point. As I said at the time:

"And we see that while the unpainted beam did not catch fire, the painted beam did seem to light up. But will it fail structurally?"

Well, no kidding they skip right over that part. Apparently the idea that the steel caught on fire, however briefly, is enough to convince Jesse that this was how they did it. And nobody stops to mention that the claim is that they destroyed columns (vertical) not beams (horizontal), and that we haven't seen the beam actually destroyed in the video by any means. It's another TrutherBurn fiasco!

Well, Dave Thomas, who debated Richard Gage in November obtained the original video of Van Romero, including his conclusion:

Cindy Sheehan Tells the Story of Her Arrest

It's a lot more interesting than anything the Troofers are doing today:

I began to plan a way to join Matthis and Elaine when I went to the front of the barrier and saw my dear friends, who have always been there for me, lying on the sidewalk by themselves. Just as I was figuring out how to get over the barriers, the section I was at collapsed onto the sidewalk and I took the opportunity to step over hoping that dozens, if not hundreds, would follow.

Well, you can probably guess how that turned out; neither dozens nor hundreds followed.

Why, when the barrier was compromised, did more people not follow us to actually put their beliefs into higher relief than merely marching in a circle on Saturday? While we were being (tightly) handcuffed and loaded onto the hot paddy wagon, the crowd of on-lookers chanted, “This is what hypocrisy looks like.”

Indeed. She whines about the food, she whines about the cell, she whines about her fellow protesters not joining her. And she closes with a common slur about police officers:

Three of us went to pick up our property this morning at the Park Police station and as we were being jacked around, an officer named Thomas (Badge number 628) told me that if I “stopped getting arrested” I wouldn’t have to go through all of this.

I said: “when the wars stop, I will stop.” He actually then told me: “The wars will stop when we nuke them and take their oil.”

I wonder why they are called “pigs.”

Cindy never mentions Jon Gold. Jon's story is over at Troof Action:

From there, we were placed into a truck that had a VERY cramped sitting area. I am somewhat claustrophobic so it was hard for me to get in. I did. On the way to the jail, we were talking about how we should have been let go, among other things.

After we arrived at the jail, they took off our plasticuffs, and they frisked us. Then we were placed into what can only be described as a human kennel. The cells were SMALL, and comprised of steel walls, steel beds, steel sinks, and steel toilets. The bars were made up of big bars, and a steel mesh that kind of looked like this from Star Trek TNG. It was easily 85-90 degrees in there, with one big fan blowing. There was very little air circulation. My shirt became my pillow, and I put my socks in the water, and wrapped them around my head Rambo style in order to cool off.

Cindy's cell was too cold, Jon's was too hot. I like this juxtaposition though:

We all plead not guilty, and have a trial sometime in June, but one of the more interesting things to happen was a request from the White House to create a "stay away" area around the White House that if we were to enter, we would get an automatic sixth months in prison.

And:

I was often asked if I would do it again. My answer is without hesitation.

And yet he didn't go for the six month tour?

Another Truther With Delusions of Grandeur

Following in the footsteps of Kevin Barrett, who managed 2% of the vote in his run for the House, some-time philosophy professor and long-time truther Richard Curtis has announced his run for the US Senate from Washington State.

It doesn’t have to be that way. The powerful, those who want the status quo, will resist change – with their many millions of dollars in advertising money. Just as the British pulled back their empire, so can we!

This is what is so exciting about this campaign. I can actually win! Without the spoiler issue for either Republican or Democratic minded people, the voters can vote their
values.

Now admittedly Patty Murray is hardly the safest seat in the Senate, this is the woman who was voted dumbest senator for 5 straight years in a poll of staffers after all, and once praised Osama bin Laden's contributions towards day care centers in Afghanistan (not to mention being a WSU grad) but I still don't think Richard poses any threat to her.

Mixed Nuts

I am hearing from several people that the source for Luke's bank statements that Louie B has been posting is none other than Sabrina Rivera, Luke's ex-girlfriend. You can argue whether that makes the charges more or less credible; more because she is in a position to know, less because she may be bitter about their breakup.

Jon Gold's bust the other day came following a march led by International ANSWER. Who is ANSWER? A bunch of Stalinists:

This was no accident, for the demonstration was essentially organized by the Workers World Party, a small political sect that years ago split from the Socialist Workers Party to support the Soviet invasion of Hungary in 1956. The party advocates socialist revolution and abolishing private property. It is a fan of Fidel Castro‘s regime in Cuba, and it hails North Korean dictator Kim Jong-Il for preserving his country’s ”socialist system,“ which, according to the party‘s newspaper, has kept North Korea ”from falling under the sway of the transnational banks and corporations that dictate to most of the world.“ The WWP has campaigned against the war-crimes trial of former Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic. A recent Workers World editorial declared, ”Iraq has done absolutely nothing wrong.“

Meanwhile, a District Court judge has demonstrated the short-sightedness of Obama's proposal to use the criminal justice system to fight terrorism.

A terror war prisoner, once considered of such high value by the Bush administration that former Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld ordered he be tortured, has taken his first step toward freedom thanks to a federal district court judge, who ordered the government to free him after nearly 10 years of imprisonment at Guantanamo Bay.

Though 39-year-old Mohamedou Slahi, an alleged 9/11 conspirator, won his habeas corpus appeal before U.S. District Judge James Robertson on Monday, he likely does not know it yet. That's because the judge's decision was classified, according to published reports.

"After the [9/11] attacks, he was fingered by a senior al Qaeda operative for helping assemble the so-called Hamburg cell, which included the hijacker who piloted United 175 into the South Tower," The Wall Street Journal reported in 2007.

The senior al Qaeda operative in question? Ramzi bin al-Shibh. And the torture? Nope, not waterboarding:

The memoranda indicate that, on several occasions from July 8 through July 17, Slahi was interrogated by a masked interrogator called “Mr. X.” On July 8, 2003 Slahi was interrogated by Mr. X and was “exposed to various lighting patterns and rock music, to the tune of Drowning Pool’s ‘Let The Bodies Hit [the] Floor.’” On July 10, 2003 Slahi was placed in an interrogation room handcuffed and standing while the air conditioning was turned off until the room became “quite warm.” The next day, Slahi was brought into the interrogation booth and again remained standing and handcuffed while the air conditioning was again turned off. After allowing Slahi to sit, the interrogator later “took [Slahi's] chair and left him standing for several hours.” According to the memo, Slahi was “visibly uncomfortable and showed signs of fatigue. This was 4th day of long duration interrogations.”

On July 17, 2003, the masked interrogator told Slahi about a dream he had where he saw “four detainees that were chained together at the feet. They dug a hole that was six feet long, six feet deep, and four feet wide. Then he observed the detainees throw a plain, unpainted, pine casket with the number 760 [Slahi's internment serial number (ISN)] painted on it in orange on the ground.”

On August 2, 2003 an interrogator told Slahi “to use his imagination and think up the worst possible thing that could happen to him” and asked him “what scares him more than anything else.”

If that's considered torture, then clearly Khalid Sheikh Mohammed will have to be freed too. And that, folks, is unacceptable.

This Is Dedicated to the One I Love....

Jon Gold can't even get busted without dedicating it to the family members.

SPLC Notes KBDI Crackpottery

In a terrific column.

Now, however, a mainstream media source is providing an uncritical platform for FEMA camp lore: KBDI Colorado Public Television aired the video “Camp FEMA: American Lockdown” twice last weekend and has scheduled another showing for March 13. The 90-minute film opens with newsreel footage of Japanese-Americans being forced into internment camps during World War II and then trots out conspiracy die-hards who suggest that freethinking Americans today may face the same fate. Those featured include syndicated radio host Alex Jones, who frets about one-world government at Infowars.com; longtime Patriot broadcaster John Stadtmiller, who insisted after the Oklahoma City bombing that the U.S. government was behind the mass murder; and James Lane of the Patriot group We Are Change, which does not believe that al-Qaeda perpetrated the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks.

I love the ending:

But not everyone was happy. Jacob Gore of Aurora, Colo., who had been a small contributor to KBDI for a couple of years, told Hatewatch he stopped watching the station after it aired the Sept. 11 programs. “I can’t believe I’m seeing this on public television,” he recalls thinking at the time. In a comment posted on KBDI’s website, he also asked to be taken off the station’s mailing list. “I’m sure when sanity returns to KBDI,” he wrote, “I will hear about it through the usual channels (the microchip implanted into me by the government, of course.)”

LOL! No, we'll put the secret message in the chemtrails! ;)

Scratch a Truther....

Who is Adam Syed? He's a Cincinnati-based 9-11 Truther and violinist. And yes, he's a Holocaust Denier. Check out his review (Kameelyun) at Amazon of a book of Holocaust Denial. I love the opening:

This book reminds me in many ways of David Ray Griffin's 9/11 books....

Indeed.

It was once official orthodoxy that 4 million were murdered at Auschwitz but in 1990 that number was reduced down to 1 million. And so on and so forth. And the 'homicidal gas chambers' as murder weapon has been called into serious question by many people including, notably, German chemist Germar Rudolf, who is currently serving prison time in Germany for his research in which he concludes that these gas chambers, logistically, could never have served for the gassing of large numbers of people. Now, the casual reader might be reading these technical details and wondering "So what? Hitler's regime was still cruel to Jews nonetheless, gas chambers or no." This is true and no serious revisionist denies this. However, as Dalton says at the beginning of Chapter 1, the main "holocaust" of the mid 20th century was World War II, and there were sub-holocausts within it: the hundreds of thousands toasted in Hiroshima and Nagasaki, the Allied firebombing of Dresden, Hamburg and Cologne, et cetera.

The Auschwitz Gambit is so familiar a lie that Nizkor (a site debunking the Holocaust Deniers) has a special page dedicated to it. And note that none of the "Holocausts" listed above were committed by the Nazis and their allies; no mention of the Holocaust of Lidice or Nanking.

Drooling Old Actors in Their Dotage for 9-11 Troof

Ed Asner has recorded a radio spot for Box Boy Gage's group (MP3 file). Of course, Asner has been a Truther for several years; here he is way back in 2004:

What's sadder; the fact that Asner's huge body of work is spoiled at the end by his feverish conspiracy theory rantings, or that Architects and Nutbars for 9-11 Troof thinks they can exploit him to promote Richard Gage?

Poll Vault: Angus-Reid

According to this, 26 percent of Americans believe that the 9-11 attacks were a pretext for war:

In the online survey of a representative national sample of 1,007 American adults, 62 per cent of respondents disagree with Ahmadinejad’s claims that the “Sept. 11 incident was a big fabrication as a pretext for the campaign against terrorism and a prelude for staging an invasion against Afghanistan.” Only 26 per cent of respondents agree with this notion, and 12 per cent are undecided.

However, note a few key points here. First, it's an online survey, not a telephone poll. Second, in looking at the actual question asked, it did not mention Ahmadinejad himself, it just as if they agreed with the statement. Third, another question asks, "The commission that investigated the attacks of September 11, 2001 concluded that an attack was carried out by 19 hijackers who were members of the al-Qaeda terrorist organization, led by Osama bin Laden. Do you believe this is actually what happened on 9/11?" For that question, only 12% said no. In addition, in the crosstabs, we see that while 33% of self-identified Democrats agreed with Ahmadinejad's statement, only 13% disagreed with the 9-11 Commission, although there is a large number of "not sure" responses (20%).

When we go to some of the specific conspiracy theories, only 15% find the controlled demolition of the WTC credible (with 11% not sure and 74% dismissing it). The shoot-down of Flight 93 is also found credible by 15% (with 22% not sure and 62% finding it not credible). No plane at the Pentagon checks in at 13% credible, 11% not sure and 76% not credible; those numbers are virtually identical to the controlled demolition numbers. TV fakery? 6% find it credible, 7% not sure, and 87% find it not credible. Unfortunately, there are no crosstabs to let us know the percentage of Democrats versus Republicans on those questions.

Overall, I'd say that the results make it pretty clear that somewhere between a quarter and an eighth of all Americans are Troofers. But, as I have said often in the past, just because (say) 30% of all Americans believe Elvis is still alive, doesn't mean they spend their spare time searching for him. Active 9-11 Truthers are probably smaller than 0.01% of the population.

Who Is Ronald F. Avery?

He's the latest fruitcake to appear on Alex Jones' show here:

He's also a member of Architects & Engineers for 9-11 Nuttiness; one of those 1,000 or so signers who's actually a degreed and licensed architect.

And yes, he's a thorough fruitcake, as you can see here:

Jesus Christ is an extraterrestrial hyperspace alien -- and he's turning people into aliens!

That's the astounding bombshell revelation of Ronald F. Avery -- who was himself born of woman yet made alien by Jesus! -- as told in his book, Alien Physics -- and in a shocking and exclusive interview with the Weekly Universe!

If you scroll down to the end of that page, you'll see it's the same guy:

Ronald F. Avery describes himself as "a licensed architect and interior designer in the so-called state of Texas. My religious/spiritual/philosophical station is that I have become an extraterrestrial hyperspace alien."

Perhaps he could start up the Hyperspace Aliens for 9-11 Truth Group; at this point I'm beginning to think there are probably thousands of them, too. And he's like that parody Truther from South Park; he's got his own scale models of the towers:

Hat Tip: Commenter NESNYC. Great find!

Update: Blog-buddy Dan K Stanley had his own run-in with Avery a month or so ago at an End the Fed rally. Lots of humor in this one; love the guy who yells out (about a minute in), "Oh, I'm crazy! Yeah, I'm a pedophile, too!" Or the gal who says private companies are prohibited in the constitution.

Unfortunately there are a lot of explosions going off in the background (or could that possibly be wind blowing across the microphone?).

Bits and Pieces

Remember Sean Fitzgerald, the Truther who killed his father? Not guilty by reason of insanity:

Gilbert placed Sean Fitzgerald in the custody of the State Hospital in Pueblo, where he will remain for an undetermined amount of time until doctors and the courts determine if and when he is well enough to be released.

I am pleased that the reporter got the facts right on Sean's delusions starting before his bicycle accident:

Medical witnesses testified that Fitzgerald’s mental illness surfaced at least 10 days prior to the murder, while he was living in Thailand. He began telling people that the Thai government was following him.

The symptoms began even before he suffered a concussion when the bicycle he was riding collided with a truck. Details of how that accident occurred are unclear, but a forensic psychiatrist who examined Fitzgerald raised the possibility that he might have deliberately veered into the truck.

Meanwhile a Truther proposes a "Debunker Honesty Test":

I tend to think that if an individual finds nothing strange about the case of WTC 7 (and that is just one example), they are likely either dishonest or in denial. This is how I'd summarize it:

The 47-storey WTC 7 was destroyed in a way that rivals a highly skilled controlled demolition. Could office fires (=the final official explanation) replace the time-consuming and expensive practice of controlled demolition? Just light a few fires and expect a highrise to come symmetrically to its foundations into a neat pile of rubble a few hours later? Sounds quite economical to me!

Well it is certainly quite economical. Unless you count the $1.4 BILLION in damage the collapse of WTC-7 caused to the Verizon Building. At that point you might notice that the damage caused by the destruction of WTC-7 amounted to far more than even the value of that building. And that's before we talk about the damage to other buildings, such as Fiterman Hall.

New Era of Glasnost at 9-11 Blogger?

I don't know yet, but there are signs that the Iron Curtain instituted over there under Reprehensor is coming down. I discovered the other day that my IP ban has been lifted. I haven't dared to try to post a comment yet, but I see that apparently JREF Forum member Alien Entity posted on the April Gallop thread, and while it got voted down, LeftWright, the new head honcho, actually defended his right to post:

AlienEntity1 has just joined us and has not broken any rules. I think the thing to do is just counter his arguments in a civil manner.

AlienEntity1 - Would you care to clarify the situation? Are you AlienEntity over at JREF?

Also, if you aren't familiar with April Gallop's story, you owe it to yourself to take a thorough and objective look at it.

So far he hasn't banned AlienEntity1, although the threat seems to always be lurking in the background. We'll just have to sit back and see how this goes.

Well, Under That Standard the Entire Truth Movement is Frivolous

April Gallop's lawsuit got laughed out of court today. This of course would be no surprise to anybody who's been reading this blog; both James and I covered some of the problems with the lawsuit here and here. But the judge in the case went right to what the lawyers refer to as the res of the matter:


Or, as Google puts it aptly:

Coleen Rowley Makes Some Sense

In this interview at Antiwar.com. I've slammed her a few times for failing to articulate clearly that she doesn't believe that the government allowed the 9-11 attacks to happen, but here at least it is clear that what she is talking about is how some incompetence (particularly at the CIA) resulted in the attacks not being stopped.

And there I find it hard to disagree with her. She points out that the Moussaoui case was brought to DCI George Tenet's attention in August of 2001, in a Power Point presentation entitled "Islamic Extremist Learns to Fly". She makes the interesting point that it was not Moussaoui's laptop computer that contained the information that would have linked him back to KSM and Ramzi Bin-al-Shibh; rather items in his personal possession.

I suspect her case on the preventable nature of 9-11 is weaker than she claims; even if they had traced Moussaoui back to KSM, would that have revealed the hijacking teams? I don't know, but certainly it would have resulted in a lot of attention being given to Muslims learning to fly in the US.

We spend a lot of time here debunking the 9-11 Truthers for their fantasies of controlled demolition and the missile at the Pentagon. So I was disappointed that Coleen showed up at a 9-11 Truth conference to lend them some of her credibility. But after listening to this interview, my sense is that Rowley's no kook. She's clearly very much anti-war, but that's not a kook position, even if it's not my position.

We Are Change Stalks Major NWO Operative

It's a tough job, but Luke and his buddies are up to it. One Truther details his qualifications to "spread the truth" to her:

I have been in love with Jennifer Love Hewitt since I was a teenager. I even once made a movie about her called "I Love Jennifer Love Hewitt" this is absolutely serious. Ever since I saw her on Party of Five I've wanted to marry her. I encountered her in a coffee shop once in Hollywood California and was unable to work up the courage to approach her. I have also been a 9/11 advocate for quite some time. I would like to offer myself up to spread the truth to her because my knowledge of her....

John Albanese Recycles the Old Stuff

There are three more videos in this series that you can find here. It's the usual "Troof Lite Just Asking Questions" stuff: why were no planes scrambled to protect the Pentagon (because the military didn't know about Flight 77's hijacking until 3 minutes before it crashed), why did Bush oppose the commission (because he knew it would be politicized), why did nobody get fired (because the focus was on fixing problems, not assigning blame). Albanese recycles the same old tropes about how the commission only got $4 million (not true; it was later increased to $13 million), when the Monica Lewinsky investigation took $50 million (not true; that was the total for all the Kenneth Starr investigations, including Whitewater, which resulted in several convictions). I do love that he claims that some of the disinformation out there is deliberately sabotaging the movement, but conveniently he won't specify which information he's talking about. And I especially love his indignation that ABC wouldn't interview Bob McIlvee (sic); surely if it's that important, he could at least get McIlvaine's name right!

Matt Naus Provides His Annual Entertainment Quota

Sorry I missed this, but apparently he didn't post it until today at 9-11 Blogger, although it's apparently from December of last year.

Matt always puts on his crazy hat for these Truther Tea Party events and this is no exception. The surging Troof Movement shows the same die-hards it did last year and nobody else. Note that they claim this is the fourth anniversary of the Milwaukee tea party; in fact it's the third anniversary and the fourth annual. Remember those thrilling Milwaukee tea parties of yesteryear? In 2007, a bunch of Ronulans tagged along, and it actually looked like the Troof was catching on in Badgerland:


But last year, it was down to the same diehards we see today:

New WTC-7 Photos Released

Kudos to JREF Forum member Big Al for pointing these out (zip file). This photo shows once again the substantial damage to the southwest corner of the building:

Also note this for the "minor office fires" as Box Boy Gage would claim:


Update: Bob McIlvaine pushes the WTC-7 smoking gun nonsense for NYC-CAN and Box Boy.


Note in particular that McIlvaine's son died in WTC-1, but Bob's pushing an investigation into WTC-7. Note as well the moronic inclusion of the Silverstein "pull it" clip.

I saw Bob's presentation at the Treason in America Conference; apparently the Troofers have convinced him that his son died in the "explosion" that Willie Rodriguez reports came before the plane hit the North Tower. Sad stuff.

Update: See this video of McIlvaine discussing his belief that his son died before the plane hit (starting about 7:10):

Yet Another Glorious Failure for the Troofers

And you won't hear about it anywhere else other than here and at JREF. Remember the thrilling NYC-CAN effort last year, that turned out to be NYC-CANT? Well, they decided to duplicate their failure in New Hampshire, where apparently it only takes a handful of signatures to get a measure voted on, and a voice vote at that will get it on the ballot. How'd they do?

Gloriously.

A petition article on several town warrants instructs the state’s congressional delegation to pursue a “new and independent investigation” into the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks. Here’s how it fared in local towns:

u Chesterfield: Failed

u Harrisville: Failed

u Marlborough: Failed

u Nelson: Passed over

u Richmond: Passed

u Swanzey: Failed

One out of six!

Meanwhile, NYC-CANT is still urging funds for their NYC efforts:

Starting on Monday, March 15, 2010, NYC CAN will ask thousands of concerned citizens in New York and across the country to begin calling and faxing three city council members each day. All 51 council members will be contacted over the course of 17 business days.

Each morning, NYC CAN will send out an action alert with the contact info for three city council members’ offices. In our action alerts we will include a set of suggested talking points to use when you call or fax the council members.

Boris, send them some money! I can assure you it will not be used for Luke's tuition.

Hat Tip to our longtime blog-buddy, Orphia Nay at JREF, who's been covering this story like a blanket.

The Horror of Censorship

Or, the inconsistency of Troofers. Hilariously, the dolts are all up in arms over Jesse Ventura's 9-11 fruitcake rant being removed from the Huffington Post:

"I can't believe the Huffington Post today will practice censorship," Ventura says in astonishment. "I've got news for them. ... I won't ever write for 'em again."

Of course the Huffington Post has had a long-standing policy against posting 9-11 nuttery, and while that policy has been inconsistently enforced (see here, here and here for examples of Truthiness that have been allowed to stand), it is at least well-known.

And where do the Troofers get off complaining about censorship? Do they allow me to post at 9-11 Flogger? Not on your life; I was banned over there years ago. Would they let me post at Truth Action? I haven't tried registering, but I was pretty quickly banned from their chatroom. Do they allow non-Troofers to post at the Debunkers blog? Of course not.

Here's the Body himself on the always reliably Troofer-friendly Russia Today:

David Ray Griffin Lies About the Hijackers, Again

I swear Russia Today is becoming "All Truther, all the time". In this clip they interview Griffin, ostensibly about Fujita, but it is really about Griffin's own kooky theories, in which, welcome to 2006, Griffin insists the 9/11 hijackers are still alive.





The most inane part:

Waleed al-Shehri for example showed up (laughter) in Morocco in a press conference. The BBC reported on it. And they said "There is no doubt about the fact that he is the man" because the FBI published his picture around the world and it was the same man. And then there is his brother. And yet when the 9/11 Commission wrote its account they said that Waleed and Wail were the ones probably on flight 11 who stabbed the flight attendant. So they just ignored the fact that these two guys were still alive.

OK, first of all, the BBC did not report on the "press conference" other than to pass on the reports of other who were there. Here is the original report:

Saudi Arabian pilot Waleed Al Shehri was one of five men that the FBI said had deliberately crashed American Airlines flight 11 into the World Trade Centre on 11 September.

His photograph was released, and has since appeared in newspapers and on television around the world.

Now he is protesting his innocence from Casablanca, Morocco.

He told journalists there that he had nothing to do with the attacks on New York and Washington, and had been in Morocco when they happened. He has contacted both the Saudi and American authorities, according to Saudi press reports.

The BBC did not take a stand on whether he was the right man or not, the only person claiming that was the mistaken al-Shehri. This mixup with the photo was resolved years ago by 911 Myths anyway.

And the BBC itself corrected this 4 years ago:

We’ve carried the full report, executive summary and main findings and, as part of the recent fifth anniversary coverage, a detailed guide to what’s known about what happened on the day. But conspiracy theories have persisted. The confusion over names and identities we reported back in 2001 may have arisen because these were common Arabic and Islamic names.

Griffin adds in his brother Wail, acting as if both of them were reported alive by the BBC, but he is not even mentioned in the story. There is a good reason for this, because the mistaken Walid does not have a brother named Wail who was a hijacker. The real Waleed does though, which was confirmed both by his family, and the Saudi government.

Stupid, or dishonest? You decide.

Did Luke Pay His College Tuition With We Are Change Money?

I don't know the answer, but Louie Bee got hold of some financial records that certainly look interesting. Obviously we don't know who that Paypal account he was tapping to the tune of 10 grand a month belongs to. But it appears that somebody's got some serious 'splainin' to do.

Colleen Rowley Continues to Dance Around the Question

Nightline asked her a pretty simple question: "Do you believe the government helped to murder innocent Americans [on 9-11]?" That she was unwilling to give a straight answer speaks volumes, as does this post at the HuffNPuff. As you can see, she continues to dodge the question, preferring instead to tell the reporter what he should have done:

1) Chris Bury and his news crew left right after interviewing me. They apparently only spent a couple hours at the conference that morning (before I arrived) and did not interview any of the sick 9-11 rescue workers or 9-11 victim family members. It turns out that while castigating the victims' quest for more facts about 9-11, they had refused to interview these folks!

They weren't castigating the victim's quest; they were castigating the nutty conspiracy theories. About all we can glean from Rowley's post is this:

4) The Nightline crew appeared so intent on vilification but it missed my presentation on "Truth--the Dribs and Drabs" as well as other speakers' presentations on questions about inconsistencies in the NORAD time lime, the level of pre 9-11 intelligence that existed, and the actual motivations of the 9-11 hijackers (that involve the illegal Israeli settlements and Israel's handling of Palestinians instead of Bush's glib answer "they hate our freedoms").

A reminder, Colleen. Israel was only the third item on Osama's fatwa against the United States, after the presence of US troops on Saudi soil, and the sanctions against Iraq after the first Gulf War.

Update: Rowley appears in this Russia Today piece, as do Richard Gage and his boxes:



Also check out the Troofermobile. Classic!

Fujita Under Fire

According to this, he denies being a Truther:

Fujita, the director general of the DPJ's international department, admitted referring to the attacks 'during informal talks' with the Post following an interview that had focused on Japan's immigration policies.

'But I clearly said I have never concluded that September 11 was a dark plot and never stated that (the collapse) of the Twin Towers was a controlled demolition,' Fujita said in a statement. 'We cannot help but conclude that it's a seditious report distorting facts.' Fujita separately told AFP: 'I'm puzzled and annoyed. I'm considering how I should take action to protest against the editorial.'

Further info here:

Fujita, director general of the DPJ’s International Department, quickly issued a statement in which he said, ‘‘At no point did I draw the conclusion that 9/11 was a conspiracy,’’ while Hatoyama told reporters Tuesday that the views were those of an individual lawmaker and not those of the party, let alone the government.

Update:
Blog-buddy and commenter Angry Soba has the video where Fujita reveals himself to be a garden-variety truther. Note this:

Part 3 blows Fujita's claim that he didn't believe in or consider a controlled demolition of the Twin Towers as he produces yet more stock material from the Truther's vault such as photographs of the firefighters talking about explosions and how it looked like there was a plan to bring down the buildings. He later gives a Richard Gage-like demonstration of free-fall to explain how WTC7 fell by dropping the 9/11 Commission Report. :-D LOL!

So Much for the Favorable Press

The Truthers were all congratulating themselves over the supposedly favorable press they had been receiving lately; see this post for an example. But then a lone nutbar goes and shoots at some Pentagon cops and suddenly it's not some silly game played by paranoids, it's life and death. And the media turns sharply against you.

Check out this terrific op-ed in the Washington Post, which apparently suddenly discovered that a Japanese parliament member was a fruitcake:

Mr. Fujita's ideas about the attack on the World Trade Center, which he shared with us in a recent interview, are too bizarre, half-baked and intellectually bogus to merit serious discussion. He questions whether it was really the work of terrorists; suggests that shadowy forces with advance knowledge of the plot played the stock market to profit from it; peddles the fantastic idea that eight of the 19 hijackers are alive and well; and hints that controlled demolition rather than fire or debris may be a more likely explanation for at least the collapse of the building at 7 World Trade Center, which was adjacent to the twin towers.

Half-baked ideas? They aren't even defrosted! And why did the WaPo suddenly discover the crazies? I have no doubt that it was because of the Pentagon shooter. Of course the Troofers have gone ballistic over the editorial:

It's disturbing -- if not surprising -- that the WaPo would treat a foreign dignitary with such disrespect. Jeezus, Americans, like Israelis, should be careful not to alienate every single ally. Meanwhile, Canadians should be careful not to see their reputation slide further and further into the abyss due to unwavering support for Israel. Even the biggest kid on the block should try to foment a friendship or two.

Isn't WaPo owned by some cultish nut case with links to the neocons?

No, that's the Washington Times. Remember, the paper that actually posted a positive review of Richard Gage's press release?

Ditto for a solid segment on Nightline:


Again, I have no quarrels with the people who produced this segment; I just question the timing. The "Truthers" have always been crazy; the recent shooting just reveals it a little more starkly.

Note the dodge by Colleen Rowley; I suspect she's trying to ride the gravy train while not upsetting the applecart, to mix a few metaphors.

Payday Monsanto Did Appear At the Treason In America Conference

How do you get rid of the embarrassing attendees to your 9-11 Troof Conference? Just like the old Soviets did, you airbrush them out of the picture. Remember three years ago, when the goofballs were holding their "9-11 Accountability" conference in Chandler, Arizona, and it turned out that the guy running the show had written a book of Holocaust Denial? Well, they erased his name from the website, but he still showed up.

So it is with Payday Monsanto:


After our commenter New Yorker pointed this out, we posted on it and Payday Monsanto was promptly airbrushed off the list of performers. But the anti-Zionist crowd apparently had to have their own entertainment, and so he was kept around even though not credited. You've got to hand it to the bastards, they're cunning, if stupid.

Hat Tip: Patrick from Cincinnati in the comments. Great catch!

LTC Shaffer Bails on the Treason Conference

I was surprised his name was attached to this conference in the first place, so I am not surprised he didn't end up showing up. He makes it clear in his video that he is not a truther, but instead calls for another investigation (probably because the last one turned up absolutely no evidence to support his claims).

I am wondering though if he ever intended to show up in the first place. He alludes in the video that he can't make it because of a military obligation. All indications are that LTC Shaffer is still a serving reserve officer. Except when it conflicts with a holiday though, the first weekend of the month is drill weekend for most reservists. This is something that is laid out well ahead of time, and Shaffer would have known that fact before committing to appear at a conference.

I can just imagine him trying to get time off from his CO.

"Yeah boss, I am wondering if I could SUTA March drill to go to the Treason in America conference where I was going to hang out with a bunch of conspiracy theorists that accuse the country, without proof, of murdering thousands of its own citizens. I don't believe this personally, of course."

"Are you ****ing high? Get out of my office."



Needless to say though, this is not making him popular among the truthers.

Reports Coming In From Treason In America Confab

Jon Gold wants us to know that he cried a lot, and was privileged.

Dahlia Wasfi was the second person to make me cry this weekend. The footage she showed of the Fallujah soccer field turned cemetery broke my heart. It also made me angry, and has fueled me for the coming weeks with Cindy. Thank you Dahlia for coming, and thanks to Flip for recommending she speak.

Tears for those gentle Fallujahns:

Box Boy Gage got a little long-winded:

Richard Gage gave the longest speech, and I didn't get to see all of it. He did have some technical problems unfortunately, but everyone applauded him as well. Thank you for coming Richard.

Jeez, Jon, wasn't it just last week that you renounced all of the controlled demolition fruitcakes?

There will apparently be some reporting on this conference on ABC News' Nightline tonight:

From Katie at ABC News, today, Monday, 3/8: "I just wanted to let you know it looks like the story will be airing tonight (barring breaking news, of course). You can look for it on ABC News Nightline, which airs at 11:35 on the east coast, but sometimes earlier in other parts of the country. So tell folks it’ll be on ABC after their late local news." SPREAD THE WORD!"

I suspect the focus will be on the Pentagon shooter, with Dylan and Korey (and possibly Jon and Betsy) appearing only briefly.

Here's some video of the Truthers eating at a restaurant.

Black shirts, check. V for Vendetta mask, check. I love that immediately after Gold they show Gage and say that he's the only "credible source" in the movement; I imagine that didn't go over well with Jon.

Another Doltish Troofer at the Huffington Post

They just seem to slip through Arianna's cracks:

But what about the "big lie" that the White House, Pentagon and the Congress sold to the American people regarding Sept. 11, according to Iran's president (and millions of Americans who also question the government)?

Did a commercial passenger plane really ram into the Pentagon, leaving its facade intact, and then completely disintegrate into pocket-sized shards?

Did a plane really go down in a field in Pennsylvania and leave reporters and coroners on the scene mystified over the lack of bodies and plane parts?

While we're "just asking questions", did a 9-11 Truther post get through Arianna's diligent moderators?

You Won't Like The Answer

I've seen this reaction to the discussion of the Pentagon shooter a couple of places from Truthers, including here by Truth Action correspondent Arceterus:

It is funny, isn't it, how whenever a murder is committed, you don't hear about how they believed in the official story of 9/11. It's only when they're 9/11 truthers that the pieces suddenly come together.

Why is that? It's pretty simple, actually. When you hear that somebody believes the "official story of 9/11" the response is much the same as when you hear that they believe the sky is blue. On the other hand, when you hear that somebody believes the government was behind 9/11, the reaction is much like this:

The Latest Triumph

Is the conversion of Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad:

Perhaps concerned that his repeated suggestions that the Holocaust might not have happened have become less shocking over time, Iran’s president, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad upped the ante on Saturday, telling intelligence officials in Tehran that the destruction of the World Trade Center on September 11, 2001 was staged.

Now I'm sure most of my readers can see the huge turd in that punchbowl of Truthiness; it's the association of 9-11 nuttery with Holocaust denial. Not so the idiots left at 9-11 Flogger. They've found a shiny new pony:

This is GREAT NEWS!!! Pretty soon the whole world will know the truth. I just love reading articles like that. My day is made.

It seems like we''re closing in on the promised land, but after the Jane Standley BBC episode, I never get my hopes up too high.

Dylan Avery and Korey Rowe Interviewed

Dylan Avery and Korey Rowe are inteviewed at the "Treason" conference by ABC News. It is worth it just to laugh at Dylan's goofy haircut. In the second part Korey actually brings up all the money they have donated (yeah right) and then bizarrely claims the "Tea Party" movement originated in the 9/11 truth movement. Who says truthers don't have a sense of humor?

World's Most Famous Truther Speaks Up

Well OK, he is no Charlie Sheen.

Ahmadinejad described the destruction of the twin towers in New York on September 11, 2001 as a "complicated intelligence scenario and act," IRNA reported.

He added: "The September 11 incident was a big fabrication as a pretext for the campaign against terrorism and a prelude for staging an invasion against Afghanistan." He did not elaborate.

Nearly 3,000 people died in the hijacked airliner attacks on New York and Washington, which were carried out by al Qaeda operatives.

In January, Ahmadinejad termed the September 11 attacks "suspicious" and accused the West of seeking to dominate the Middle East.

Luke Blasts SPLC; Claims Pentagon Shooter Was A Setup

Many of the "Patriot" groups cited by the SPLC the other day are local We Are Change chapters, as you can see here.

Pentagon Shooter a Truther; Fits Nutbar Profile

Yep, what a shock:

The user named JPatrickBedell wrote the Sabow case was "a step toward establishing the truth of events such as the September 11 demolitions."

Pot-smoker? Check:

That same posting railed against the government's enforcement of marijuana laws and included links to the author's 2006 court case in Orange County, Calif., for cultivating marijuana and resisting a police officer.

Ron Paul and Mike Gravel fan? Check and check:

Information is being released on John Patrick Bedell, the man who shot two police officers at the Pentagon before being killed. His internet postings reveal that he was a libertarian, conspiracy theorist and part of the Ludwig von Mises Facebook group. The Ludwig von Mises Institute is a think tank that has a working relationship with Ron Paul and is headed by Paul’s former chief of staff, Lou (sic) Rockwell.

In another portion of his site profile, Bedell promoted former Senator and eccentric presidential candidate Mike Gravel whom he said supported selling weed in liquor stores.

Of course, that should be "Lew" Rockwell, not "Lou".

Update: Believes in other conspiracy theories? Check:

This seizure of the United States government by an international criminal conspiracy is a long-established reality. The murder of the United States President in 1963, the associated murders and institutional subversion, and the manipulation of official inquiries and public opinion was effected by individuals within organizational structures that play a central role in the United States government up to the present day. The coup regime founded with the murder of President John Kennedy utilizes a number of mechanisms to perpetuate its criminal rule.

Update II: I like this comment:

So, instead of playing the blame game so unapologetically employed by the Left when they feel they can spin things to their political advantage, I’m not going to say that Bedell’s actions at the Pentagon epitomize the leftist worldview. Rather, he was just crazy, as clearly indicated by his belief in the craziest of modern crazy conspiracy theories, 9/11 Truthism.

(Bolding added for emphasis)

9-11 Truth dot org hastily put out a statement that doesn't mention Bedell specifically but disavows violence:

As a reminder that 911Truth.org NEVER endorses or promotes violence of any kind, and that those who commit violence are not "us", here's our longstanding Mission Statement. Notice our last statement: "We solicit collaboration with others who are committed to achieving these goals by way of peaceful transformation."

Fantasizes about new forms of currency? Check:

KSM Back to the Tribunal?

I'm a little sorry to hear this as the trial would give the Truthers fits, but I'll stick with my earlier expressed opinion, which is that I'm a results guy, not a process guy. As long as the result is either life or death for KSM, I'll be satisfied.

President Obama's advisers are nearing a recommendation that Khalid Sheik Mohammed, the self-proclaimed mastermind of the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks, be prosecuted in a military tribunal, administration officials said, a step that would reverse Attorney General Eric H. Holder Jr.'s plan to try him in civilian court in New York City.

Well, There's Another Semester Down The Drain

A college kid tells us of his three-month stint working for Gage's gaggle:

The most interesting thing about being a journalist is being able to watch the stories you cover develop and grow. The fall semester of my junior year, I took a semester off from school to cover a story that I could not afford to miss. I had been researching the events of September 11, 2001 and felt compelled to take the time to interview eye witnesses, emergency first responders, firefighters, the families of the victims and professionals in various fields to discover for myself the true nature of events that unfolded that day.

As you can probably guess, he did not discover that the 9-11 Truthers are a collection of charlatans, con-men and crackpots. He started verifying petition signatures for Box Boy, and shows a distinct lack of critical thinking:

AE911Truth was a major presence during the revisionary periods of the various reports. Its successful petitioning efforts helped lead to the discovery that WTC 7 fell at free-fall speed for a period of over 2.5 seconds. Not noted in NIST's revision was the clear implication that this feat defies the laws of physics if a gravitational collapse did indeed occur.

Yeah, because freefall "speed" (really acceleration) has nothing to do with gravity. Other than the fact that it's the acceleration due to gravity.

We get more of the doltish "misprision of treason" crap:

While there are many lingering (and discomforting) questions surrounding the events of 9/11, Gage and AE911Truth contend that the science behind the collapses is not one of them. In an interview with the Washington Times on February 23, Gage closed with strong words: “Government officials will be notified that ‘Misprision of Treason,’ U.S. Code 18 (Sec. 2382), is a serious federal offense, which requires those with evidence of treason to act,” Gage said. “The implications are enormous and may have profound impact on the forthcoming Khalid Shaikh Mohammed trial.”

"Patriot" Groups on the Rise, Says SPLC

As you probably know, this is the flag that Alex Jones and his ilk operate under.

Antigovernment "Patriot" groups - militias and other extremist organizations that see the federal government as their enemy - came roaring back to life over the past year after more than a decade out of the limelight.

The SPLC documented a 244 percent increase in the number of active Patriot groups in 2009. Their numbers grew from 149 groups in 2008 to 512 groups in 2009, an astonishing addition of 363 new groups in a single year. Militias - the paramilitary arm of the Patriot movement - were a major part of the increase, growing from 42 militias in 2008 to 127 in 2009.

The SPLC takes pains to note that it is not talking about the "Tea Party" crowd, while noting that those groups may be a fertile recruiting ground for the Patriots:

The Patriot movement has made significant inroads into the conservative political scene, according to the new report. "The ‘tea parties' and similar groups that have sprung up in recent months cannot fairly be considered extremist groups, but they are shot through with rich veins of radical ideas, conspiracy theories and racism," the report says.

Surprisingly, perhaps, I found a balanced commentary at the Huffington Post:

There is, however, an important caveat to add to the findings. For all of the unglamorous work it does documenting the rise of extremism, the SPLC has been accused of occasionally making mountains out of molehills. Some of the groups it classifies as threats can be better described as having a threatening message but being impotent in reality.

In March 2007, Ken Silverstein of Harpers Magazine, pointed to the massive financial resources the group had on hand (per its tax filings) and concluded that: "What [SPLC] does best... is to raise obscene amounts of money by hyping fears about the power of those groups; hence the SPLC has become the nation's richest "civil rights" organization."

I'm pretty much in the middle on this one; the Patriot groups are crazy, as the Huffpost notes rather succinctly:

And, most remarkably of all, so-called "Patriot" groups -- militias and other organizations that see the federal government as part of a plot to impose "one-world government" on liberty-loving Americans -- came roaring back after years out of the limelight."

I don't think they're dangerous per se; the problem is that lone wackos who agree with their claims may do crazy things in reaction.

Sometimes I Forget

Just how insane the people we deal with on this blog actually are. It is easy, when one has debated Jon Gold, or Dylan Avery, or Jason Bermas, to assume that while they may be a little paranoid, they are not stark raving bonkers.

And then we have this. I noted the other day that the inaptly named "9-11 Debunkers" blog had chastised us a bit for expressing some humor about Steven Jones' nutty claim that the Haiti earthquake was man-made. Well, Scootie (that appears to be his nom de troof) slipped a hinge or two:

So, one of the rare moments of speculation on this blog was not suprisingly seized upon by the 9/11 truth gossip artists. In my last post I talked about the possibility of man-made earthquakes and used a US Air Force document that discusses the physics of teleportation as evidence that technology is much more advanced than we think. Now of course Strawman Pat made out that I was claiming the government has teleportation machines, when I never said that, I was simply pointing out the existence of the document.

In fact, I did not say that the government has teleportation machines, or even that Scootie said that the government has teleportation machines. However, I will say that any idiot who actually thinks because there's a paper somewhere that discusses the possibility of teleportation, that indicates that wow, the technology is far more advanced than we thought, is a nut.

Oh, but we have not begun to plumb the depths:

See that's what we do here, we read documents. We read scientific literature. We do research! We're not just some blogger parrots who act like we know what we're talking about while attacking people's character. And we're skeptical of both sides. We don't endorse pentagon no-plane theories or fake phone call theories, and we're skeptical of the assumption that "pull it" was a confession. We stick to science.

You read a paper on teleportation and assume it indicates that the technology is there to create massive earthquakes? Yeah, that's science, buddy.

Most of the time however I stick to the facts. And one fact I learned, and have referenced a number of times, is that Southcom was, just by coincidence, preparing for a drill based on the scenario of a natural disaster in Haiti, the day before the earthquake ... Fact!

Well, the link goes to some site called NextGov, which is apparently a site pushing up-to-date technology to the government. But if you read the article linked, it's no where near as specific as he indicates.

On Monday, Jean Demay, DISA's technical manager for the agency's Transnational Information Sharing Cooperation project, happened to be at the headquarters of the U.S. Southern Command in Miami preparing for a test of the system in a scenario that involved providing relief to Haiti in the wake of a hurricane. After the earthquake hit on Tuesday, Demay said SOUTHCOM decided to go live with the system. On Wednesday, DISA opened up its All Partners Access Network, supported by the Transnational Information Sharing Cooperation project, to any organization supporting Haiti relief efforts.

Hurricane, earthquake, what's the difference? They were preparing for a drill involving Haiti and the real thing happened? What are the odds? It must have been an inside job; if only they hadn't spilled the beans to the NextGov website!

Oh, but it gets much wackier:

As I said, they blew up skyscrapers with nanotechnology back in 2001. Another fact! You debunkers can deny it all you want but the fact is basic chemistry proves that the red material is thermitic. This stuff ignites when heated to 400-450°C and after ignition we find molten iron. Since iron doesn't melt until 1500°C, this ignition temperature of 400-450°C couldn't possibly melt iron.

Okay, can somebody see the problem here? Scootie claims they found thermitic material that does not get the temperature high enough to melt steel. Therefore, they must have melted the steel with something else! The mind boggles.

Oh, and the claim that Scootie doesn't speculate much? Check out this most recent post:

The following is an excerpt from a recently filmed TED presentation (watch in full here) in which Bill Gates talks about how we humans can go about lowering our evil carbon footprint. Near the end he says...

"The world today has 6.8 billion people. That's heading up to about nine billion. Now if we do a really great job on new vaccines, health care, reproductive health services, we could lower that by perhaps 10 or 15 percent!" [About 1 Billion People!]

Scootie interprets that to mean that vaccines will kill off a billion or so. Of course, if he had half a brain cell, he'd understand that what they are talking about is reducing the rate of population growth, not killing off a bunch of people. In the third world, parents have lots of children for a few basic reasons:

1. Many babies do not survive.
2. Children are valuable in subsistence economies as they provide cheap labor for farming which does not require a lot of training.
3. Their parents do not have access to birth control methods like the pill in the West, which had dramatically reduced birth rates.

If more babies survive due to vaccines, then parents do not have the need to have as many children. If their parents have access to birth control, they will actually be able to avoid having more children.

Now, I think that the fly in Gate's ointment is #2; until you transcend subsistence agriculture in poorer regions of the globe, people will tend to have more kids. But while I am no fan of Microsoft, I certainly don't think Gates wants to kill off a couple billion or more of us for some nefarious New World Order; it's far more likely that he buys into the argument of environmentalists that there are too many people already and that we need to reduce population. A bit creepy, to be sure, but not nefarious by any means.

I'm Sure Kids Would Rather Have a WII

Good lord, here's Joseph Princiotta.



How sad is it that this guy wants to excuse the people who actually killed his cousin (I checked, and Vincent Princiotta is listed as a victim of the 9-11 attacks). Note as well that he lies about how Sal Princiotta died; he did not die from "illness from 9-11"; although he was apparently experiencing respiratory problems after working on the pile, he was actually murdered:

The man suspected of murdering a former city firefighter in Arizona had befriended the 9/11 hero months earlier and scouted his collection of rare coins and Elvis Presley memorabilia, relatives and authorities said yesterday.

Jeffery Lynn Bigham, 56, shot himself Friday after cops tracked him to San Bernardino, Calif. - more than two weeks after he fatally shot Sal Princiotta while ransacking the retired firefighter's Scottsdale home, police said.

Incidentally, although several of the accounts of Sal Princiotta mention that he lost an uncle in the 9-11 attacks, it was not Vincent Princiotta:

He developed a troubling cough and struggled with the pain of losing so many firefighter friends and his uncle, acclaimed Deputy Fire Chief Ray Downey, in the terror attacks.

So how come Joseph doesn't mention this third family member who died on 9-11? I'm smelling BS all over this story.

Hat Tip: Angry Soba (in the comments).