What Happened?

Okay, looking for some help from my fellow internet detectives on this one.  Over the last couple of months, a large part of the action over at 9-11 Flogger has been devoted to the YouTube video interviews of 9-11 FreeFall, hosted by Andy Steele(sp?).

Anyway, a couple of days ago they had a post up about this interview:



Pretty standard nuttery, but since it featured my childhood home state of New Jersey I felt like it deserved a response.  So I surfed on over there today, and guess what?  The post had disappeared.  Not only that, but all of Steele's recent posts had also been scrubbed.

If I were a conspiracy nutbar, I could come up with any number of explanations, most of them involving some government plot to silence Steele or the interviewee in this case, David Meiswinkle.  Or some of the other interviewees in the last month or so, whose videos have similarly disappeared.

But I'm not.  So I'll just assume that something Meiswinkle has done, or something on his fruitcake site was embarrassing enough to get the recent Free Fall posts scrubbed from Flogger.

More info on this kook here.   Any thoughts on why he was so embarrassing to the movement that they not only deleted this post, but also KO'd the rest of Steele's recent interviews?

Meiswinkle does have some closer-to-home proposals, such as supporting initative and referendum, or this one about better monitoring authorities in New Jersey that can issue debt, which he calls a breeding ground for corruption. But a top priority would be creating another 9/11 commission, headed by his attorney general, to do a better job investigating the 2001 terrorist attacks. He alleges that President George W. Bush’s administration tried to cover up the events leading to the attack and that Chris Christie, as the U.S. Attorney for New Jersey beginning a few months after the attack, “betrayed New Jerseyans who died in that holocaust” by never bothering “to investigate the greatest crime in history.” - See more at: http://blogs.app.com/capitolquickies/2009/10/28/meet-the-candidates-david-meiswinkle/#sthash.NZoyzdgE.dpuf

Meiswinkle does have some closer-to-home proposals, such as supporting initative and referendum, or this one about better monitoring authorities in New Jersey that can issue debt, which he calls a breeding ground for corruption. But a top priority would be creating another 9/11 commission, headed by his attorney general, to do a better job investigating the 2001 terrorist attacks. He alleges that President George W. Bush’s administration tried to cover up the events leading to the attack and that Chris Christie, as the U.S. Attorney for New Jersey beginning a few months after the attack, “betrayed New Jerseyans who died in that holocaust” by never bothering “to investigate the greatest crime in history.” - See more at: http://blogs.app.com/capitolquickies/2009/10/28/meet-the-candidates-david-meiswinkle/#sthash.NZoyzdgE.dpuf

Meiswinkle does have some closer-to-home proposals, such as supporting initative and referendum, or this one about better monitoring authorities in New Jersey that can issue debt, which he calls a breeding ground for corruption. But a top priority would be creating another 9/11 commission, headed by his attorney general, to do a better job investigating the 2001 terrorist attacks. He alleges that President George W. Bush’s administration tried to cover up the events leading to the attack and that Chris Christie, as the U.S. Attorney for New Jersey beginning a few months after the attack, “betrayed New Jerseyans who died in that holocaust” by never bothering “to investigate the greatest crime in history.” - See more at: http://blogs.app.com/capitolquickies/2009/10/28/meet-the-candidates-david-meiswinkle/#sthash.NZoyzdgE.dpuf

Meiswinkle does have some closer-to-home proposals, such as supporting initative and referendum, or this one about better monitoring authorities in New Jersey that can issue debt, which he calls a breeding ground for corruption. But a top priority would be creating another 9/11 commission, headed by his attorney general, to do a better job investigating the 2001 terrorist attacks. He alleges that President George W. Bush’s administration tried to cover up the events leading to the attack and that Chris Christie, as the U.S. Attorney for New Jersey beginning a few months after the attack, “betrayed New Jerseyans who died in that holocaust” by never bothering “to investigate the greatest crime in history.” - See more at: http://blogs.app.com/capitolquickies/2009/10/28/meet-the-candidates-david-meiswinkle/#sthash.NZoyzdgE.dpuf

More Brilliant Analysis from the Waterboy

Kevin Ryan checks in with a fatheaded article on the explosions in the lobby of the Twin Towers on 9-11.

NIST admitted to the presence of an incendiary explosion at the concourse level and to the deaths and injuries caused by it, stating, a “fireball killed or injured several occupants in the Concourse Level lobby (NIST NCSTAR 1-7, p 73).” However, a scientific explanation was never provided. Instead, an untested hypothesis was given as fact.

 He goes on to analyze how much jet fuel could have "flowed" down the elevator shafts, particularly the ones which went all the way to the bottom of the towers.  Get this bit:

The jet fuel would have adhered to the surface of the elevator shaft as it traveled downward. The elevator shafts were lined with 2-inch thick gypsum planking and the low surface tension jet fuel would have wetted this thoroughly. An estimate of the surface area in an express shaft is 60,000 square feet. A quick experiment shows that gypsum board soaks up approximately 0.03 gallons of kerosene per square foot.  All the available jet fuel (120 gallons) would have been lost in this process before the jet fuel bolus reached the mid-point of its fall.

If jet fuel had dribbled down the shafts, he might have a point. But perhaps Ryan just missed the key word in NIST's analysis: fireball.

I suggest that Kevin Ryan follow up this article with one exposing the implausibility of jet fuel "flowing" upwards (defying the law of gravity!) during that explosion.

The Pantheon of Conspiracy Theories

Robert Sapolsky opines on conspiracy theories in the pages of the Wall Street Journal in light of the upcoming anniversary of the JFK assassination. He makes a point that will come to no surprise to our regular readers, but it is nice to see it proven out in a study, that if you believe in one conspiracy theory that you are more likely to believe in many, even if they are mutually contradictory.

Recent research by Michael Wood and Karen Douglas of the University of Kent in the U.K. points to the distinguishing characteristics of this frame of mind. In a systematic analysis of online discussions of 9/11 conspiracy theories, they showed that critics of these theories (that is, supporters of the conventional account of 9/11) tend to cite evidence in support of their stance. Conspiracists, by contrast, devote more space to arguing against the conventional view and are far less interested in supporting the validity of their alternative explanations.
 Other recent work by Dr. Wood and his colleagues shows how this mode of thinking goes a step further: Conspiracy theorists can be so focused on rejecting all official versions of things that they come to embrace alternative explanations that are mutually contradictory.
 The study concerned conspiracy theories surrounding the 1997 death of Princess Diana and her boyfriend Dodi Fayed. The alternative "real" stories listed as options by the researchers included: Queen Elizabeth having Diana killed to prevent the mother of the future king from marrying an Arab, Diana's being killed by business enemies of the Fayed family, and the princess and Fayed faking their own deaths.
 Volunteers were asked to rate the likelihood of each story. Conspiracists in the group often endorsed scenarios that were mutually contradictory. Those who believed, for example, that Princess Diana was assassinated were significantly more likely than chance to believe that she is still alive. In other words, when contemplating any given scenario, the fervent conviction that we are constantly being deceived trumped their ability to assess the internal consistency of their own thinking.

The Alleged Mind of a Truther

I foresee a brilliant future for this cat, standing near exit ramps from the freeway, holding a cardboard sign and waving a styrofoam cup. Judging by his appearance, that could even be his present. Note the usual creative facial hair. He uses the f word near the end, so I'd say NSFW after 4:00.

Betcha He's a Truther

Paul Anthony Ciancia, the shooter at LAX, fits the profile of the Alex Jones wing of the nutbars:

The 23-year-old man who allegedly killed a TSA official at Los Angeles International Airport yesterday was carrying a one-page “manifesto” that included references to the “New World Order,” the Federal Reserve and “fiat currency,” according to a knowledgeable source with ranking law enforcement contacts.

Paul Anthony Ciancia, who allegedly wounded three other TSA workers before being shot and critically wounded himself, also expressed antagonism toward the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) and its chief until she resigned in August, Janet Napolitano, the source said. Ciancia’s note called former Secretary Napolitano a “bull dyke” and contained the phrase “FU Janet Napolitano,” the source said.