As Seen in Vanity Fair's August 2006 Issue!
As Seen in US News & World Report's September 11 Fifth Anniversary Issue!
As Seen in Time Magazine's September 11, 2006 Issue!
As Seen in Phoenix New Times' August 9, 2007 Issue!
Saturday, November 13, 2010
Turns Out Al Capone's Vault Was A High Point
In Geraldo Rivera's career. Here's the nadir:
Note the bit where he talks to McIlvaine and he says "I don't want to get into the details of how you think he died." Could that possibly be because he doesn't want McIlvaine spoiling his "the family members are not like the nutjobs," conclusion? Let's remember that McIlvaine thinks his son died before either of the planes hit the buildings.
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):
Rosie had Bob McIlvaine and Tony Szamboti on her radio show (MP3 file) a week or so ago. It's the usual bit of nuttery; the program leads in with a lie: "How many buildings collapsed on 9-11 Mom? Three."
Well, three if you don't count WTC-3. And St. Nick's.
Bob McIlvaine talks about the explosions before the planes hit. Never mind that mop-jockey Willie Rodriguez is the only person to claim there were explosions before the plane impacts. Bob's got people from Ladder 10 who told him there were explosions, and Willie who says there was one before the planes, so therefore Bob's got numerous reports of multiple explosions before.
Tony Szamboti chips in (breathlessly--the guy sounds like he's just finished the mile run) to tell us fire can't melt steel. Oh, except for in a few cases. Left unsaid, of course, by this engineer is that fire doesn't have to melt steel for the metal to lose its load-bearing capacity.
The 9-11 Commission didn't even mention Building 7's collapse! (They didn't even mention St. Nick's collapse either, but the dolts never bring that up.)
We're proud to have the endorsement of The Jersey Girls, who single handedly forced the Bush Administration to convene the 9/11 Commission after one year of inaction following the attacks of September 11.
We are pleased that Patty and Lorie have signed our petition. We have also received signatures from Josef Princiotta, Manny Badillo, Bob McIlvaine, Ellen Mariani. Let us know if there are any of them we are not listing here!
Manny Badillo and Bob McIlvaine are Jersey Girls? Who knew? And of course Patty (Casazza) and Lorie (Van Auken) are only two of the original Jersey Girls (a third, Mindy Kleinberg also endorsed Gage's group, although she apparently did not sign the petition). Where's Kristen Breitweiser, the most famous of the JGs?
Once again, a "Truther" (and a father of a WTC victim) talks about how nobody wants to talk to him because they know he's going to start in again with the 9-11 conspiracy theories. Bob goes on about how many friends he's lost because of his involvement in 9-11 "Truth", about how very few of the family members are "Truthers", etc. But it's okay because he's talking about how lousy his normal life is compared to how wonderful he feels in the company of fellow Truth Cult members.
He confirms some of what we might expect. McIlvaine was apparently a prominent member of Peaceful Tomorrows, a group of antiwar family members of 9-11 victims. He talked about how great it was getting on television in Columbia. Okay, so Bob's a tad leftist in his politics; that fits for much of the middle-stage 9-11 Truthers; those who came on board in 2004 and 2005. Dylan's film brought in the youngsters who were more politically apathetic or libertarian.
Doing the second ten minutes here. First there is a complaint about how very few people who were rounded up initially ended up charged. But we know now that very few other people in America were involved in the plot. There is no mention of Zacharias Moussaoui, however, which is a rather glaring error. By November of 2001, the narrator says, the Jersey Girls decided that an independent investigation was needed to do what the Justice Department and the media "seemed unwilling do". Boy, gave the Justice Department two months, did they? We get a little teaser of CT nonsense from one of the Girls:
"We felt that the country was at risk from terrorists and incompetence... and um, maybe worse."
Oh, yeah, maybe worse, nudge nudge, wink wink, say no more.
Then we get into the destruction of the towers. Again, no direct controlled demolition discussion, but it's certainly hinted at. "Why did the buildings fall? How could skyscrapers just like, crumple to the ground in ten seconds?" As usual, the narrator is unable to resist the "factoid". "Never before, or since, had fire caused a steel frame building to collapse."
Of course, that's BS both ways. The World Trade Center towers did not solely collapse because of fire; there was also a little matter of the planes slamming into them, destroying columns and stripping fireproofing from the steel. And steel-framed buildings have collapsed from fire before; just not highrise steel framed buildings.
Then we get into World Trade Center 7, and I'm sorry, but I'm beginning to doubt this is anything less than a CT film cleverly disguised.
We get the mother of a firefighter giving us the next lie:
"The largest structural collapse in world history, the largest loss of life on American soil since the Civil War and not one governmental or elected official wanted to know why and how this happened?"
In fact the collapses of the World Trade Center buildings are probably the most studied disasters of all time. Major building code changes have come out of these studies. Are these women, who tell us how much they have studied 9-11, simply unaware of all this?
The announcer also tells us that Tom Kean (whose name is hilariously mispronounced the way it looks--it's really pronounced Kane) and Lee Hamilton headed the commission which was evenly split between Republicans and Democrats, but the commission members were all former "DC insiders and lawyers". (Menacing music). Boo, hiss.
Then we get a gripe about the money. As usual they cannot resist having one of the family members lie for the camera. Bob McIlvaine is called on to do his part:
"Remember in the 1990s they spent a hundred million dollars to investigate Clinton's sexual exploits. 100 million dollars!"
Except of course that the Starr Investigation cost $80 million and it investigated a heck of a lot more than Clinton's sexual exploits (including Whitewater), and resulted in the imprisonment of the sitting governor of Arkansas, as well as other convictions. McIlvaine is the father of a 9-11 victim and a longtime 9-11 Denier. He even appeared on Cynthia McKinney's bizarre Citizen's Commission back in 2004.
The Alex Jones bust gets good coverage here; nice to see the fat man being led away in chains, what a disappointment that the New World Order lets him out again a few hours later. Richard Gage pops up the next morning to announce his promise that by 2008 he will have 1,000 Architects & Engineers signed up to his group; of course he only missed that by about 500.
Bob McIlvaine appears to express skepticism that the FBI could possibly have found out that the pilots were trained in the various flight schools all in "one day".
The film Anatomy of a Great Deception is being pushed lately by Truthers; the fact that Box Boy's clown posse gets 5% of the sales is probably a big reason why.
The film is much more personal than Loose Change or 9-11 Mysteries; it might well be subtitled, "How I Became a Truther" because that is the theme. Of course, in essence it's the same old CT crap in a new wrapper.
The auteur, David Hooper, starts with a simple question. Why did Bush stay in Booker Elementary so long after the first two plane crashes? He concludes (like most idiot Truthers) that he or his Secret Service detail must have known it was safe. He emphasizes that it was known that two other planes had been hijacked and yet Bush stayed there.
This is, of course, wrong. Bush left Booker at about 9:34 or 9:35, before it was known that AA Flight 77 or UA Flight 93 had been hijacked. As I have pointed out several times, it would have been reasonably difficult to target Booker Elementary from the air. Sarasota is not a small town, and there were 42 different elementary schools in the city back then. Hitting the Pentagon or the Twin Towers was pretty easy; all three are enormous buildings, easily visible from quite a distance away and very distinctive.
It doesn't get any better. After that he goes on to talk about WTC-7. He expresses astonishment that Shyam Sunder discounted the use of explosives bringing down the building. Why would Sunder even bring that up? Very suspicious. Of course, Hooper is taking advantage of the argument that he was discovering this circa 2011-2012, and therefore he didn't know that the Truthers had been claiming WTC-7 was a controlled demolition well before Sunder's analysis of the building collapse was complete.
He also is amazed to learn that some 9-11 families are requesting a new investigation of WTC-7. Why? Good question, David! Nobody died in that building. And of course, the family members shown are all the goofball Truther family members like Lorie Van Auken, Mindy Kleinberg and Bob McIlvaine.
He flashes some books and films at us; I particularly love seeing 9-11 the Ultimate Truth by one of my favorite nutbars, Laura Knight Jadczyk.
This was Laura Knight-Jadczyk and her channelled material came from a
mysterious source: "We transmit "through" the opening that is presented
in the locator that you represent as Cassiopaea, due to the strong radio
pulses aligned from Cassiopaea, which are due to a pulsar from a
neutron star 300 light years behind it, as seen from your locator. This
facilitates a clear channel transmission from 6th density to 3rd
density."
These beings apparently communicated with Ms
Knight-Jadczyk through the means of a Ouiji board and with the help of
another individual, Fred Irland, whose name, curiously enough, can be
found nowhere in the published Cassiopaean material. At first, the
communications were the ordinary sort of thing expected from ouiji
aliens. But as they got better at it, the answers began to take on a
life of their own.
He also shows 9-11 Evil, where Victor Thorn blows the yarmulke off Israeli involvement in 9-11; no link on that bit of slime, but you can find it easily.
There's also 9-11 Finding the Truth, which is written by a Judy Wood devotee named Andrew Johnson. I mean, seriously.
He makes the usual ridiculous claims, like that WTC-7 fell almost as fast as a bowling ball, and into its own footprint. Well, if its footprint included the Verizon Building and Fiterman Hall. He says that the destruction of the building crippled the investigations of Enron and Worldcom; that would be news to Kenneth Lay, Jeff Skilling and Bernie Ebbers.
I would dread to continue with this ridiculous movie; fortunately it was only up for a day or two at YouTube before Mr Hooper had it taken down with a copyright claim. Apparently he only wants to wake up the sheeple at $14.95 per shearing.
Never heard of this guy before, but surfing over to his website, I see he's kind of a kinder, gentler Alex Jones. Lots of fear-mongering about Agenda 21, the Federal Reserve, Obama's gonna take your guns, etc. He announced last week that he was going to "take on" the Rethink 9-11 Campaign, Richard Gage's latest effort to reanimate the corpse of 9-11 Troof.
I had little hope for this to begin with; about the best that could be anticipated was that he would yammer something about how the Truthers were distracting people from the very real dangers we face because (insert alternate paranoid fantasy here).
Instead, he took on the task of sucking up big-time to the Truthers, repeating every talking point from Gage and the others like a trained parrot.
Rethink 911 is the first ever global 9/11 anniversary campaign.
Sponsored by a coalition of more than 40 organizations, ReThink911 is
placing ads in 11 major cities around the world this September 2013.
But what is there to rethink? According to a group called Architects
and Engineers for 9/11 Truth, you need to start by rethinking the third
building that fell that day.
And it goes downhill from there. Tony Zamboni gives the usual bs about how no building in history every came down that way that wasn't a controlled demolition, and works in his usual spiel about the missing jolt. Bob McIlvaine repeats his bizarre claim that his son died before the planes hit:
I can say with confidence that Bobbie died, and I can say with
confidence before the planes hit. So the point is, the planes had
nothing to do with his death and I could prove that in a court of law
pretty easily.
And they've got a new poll!
According to that poll, 38% of Americans have doubts about the official
account of 9/11 and 10% do not believe it at all. That is compared to
only a minority of those polled, 40% who are completely satisfied.
Well, that's giving a very generous reading to the actual poll results (PDF file)
40% I am completely satisfied with the government’s account
38% I have some doubts as to whether the government’s account fully explains
everything
10% I do not believe the government’s account at all
12% I don’t know/ Not sure
Some doubts as to whether the government's account fully explains everything? That's not tinfoil hat territory by any means; I might even go along with that statement. They want you to lump the 38% who are reasonably skeptical that everything has been disclosed, with the 10% who are nutters. I'd say that the 38% should go with the 40%; call them people who are generally satisfied with the government's explanation, but may have minor doubts about some of the details.
For starters, they use a picture of the Jersey Girls, featuring Kristen Breitweiser in front:
Except that Breitweiser does not appear in the film except in old TV clips, and the other three widows are actually the stars of the show (in addition to Bob McIlvaine).
That photo was used on the DVD cover for PfT, which we covered back in the dog days of 2006, but at least they had the decency to remove Mrs Breitweiser:
Following the attacks of September 11th, a small group of grieving families waged a tenacious battle against those who sought to bury the truth about the event -- including, to their amazement, President Bush. In this documentary, six of them -- including three of the famous 9/11 widows known as the "Jersey Girls" -- tell the powerful story of how they took on the greatest powers in Washington, compelling lawmakers to launch an investigation that ultimately failed to answer most of their questions. The filmmakers collaborated with the media group Globalvision (WMD: Weapons of Mass Deception, Beyond JFK) to stitch together overlooked news clips, buried stories, and government press conferences, revealing a pattern of official lies, deception, and spin. As a result, a very different picture of 9/11 emerges -- one that raises new, and more pressing, questions.
And if you pledge $104 to these Rocky Mountain Oysters, you'll get a DVD of PfT plus In Their Own Words, all the crappy questions that they had to pull out of PfT because they were even more ridiculous and embarrassing than the ones they left in.
But wait, there's more! If you send another $50, we'll send you David Ray Grifter's The New Pearl Harbor! Oh, we can tell that KBDI is an exemplary PBS network, representing the Rocky Mountain spotted feverish contingent proudly.
And if you are delusional enough to part with 304 bones to the nutbar network, you could actually get 5 DVDs plus two books. The added DVDs are Blueprint for Truth by Box Boy Gage, Fabled Enemas by Bermas, and a DRG lecture from 2007. Why mention the added book (a Peter Dale Scott snoozer), nobody's going to read it.
Cynthia McKinney goes public with charges that 5,000 people were executed after Hurricane Katrina and buried in a swamp.
Blair Gadsby releases a book about his 17-day hunger strike outside John McCain's office and announces that he will donate all the proceeds from it to Box Boy Gage's Architects & Engineers.
The KSM trial begins at Gitmo. Apparently President-Elect Obama plans to shut down Gitmo; it will be interesting to see if he grants KSM a US trial by jury.
Bob McIlvaine, 9-11 Troofer and father of a young man who died in the Towers, repeats the refrain we heard so often in 2008; how joining the 9-11 "Truth" Movement destroyed their families and friendships.
Update: Richard Gage falls about 500 Architects and Engineers short of his goal of 1000 Architects and Engineers on his list as of 9-11-08. Currently he is still approximately 440 short of his goal from four months ago.
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!
Most glaring was the near-uniform method with which the speakers refused to answer the question, "Why?" Dr. Graeme MacQueen echoed this demurral in asking, "If Building 7 was brought down by a controlled demolition…we have to ask the question 'why?' Why have we been lied to for nine and a half years? Why did they do it? These are all valid questions, but I won't visit them today." Tune in next conference?! We took Amtrak and a shuttle all the way up here on a Saturday! The question of motive is a giant, underhand wiffle ball thrown to the folks who put the Pope on the grassy knoll, and forces demolition advocates to strain their own credibility to answer it. It's essential to their cause that it is at least discussed.
Continuing a long-running theme:
Is the personal toll that these beliefs have exacted on the faithful worth it? 9/11 family members spoke of the need to "save our anger," with one even tearfully stating how "my neighbors are scared to death of me...my wife and I don't go out anymore" before launching into a tirade in which he doubted that Khalid Sheikh Mohammed was alive and stated unequivocally that "Muslims had nothing to do with 9/11." One architect cheerfully noted how "I lost my house and my wife...but it's worth it." That's right! You too can trade everything in this life that brings you joy for endless rehashing of senseless destruction and total ostracization. Oh, and a tote bag. Also, could you spot us $250?
Reading from left to right, Bob McIlvaine and Richard Gage? As usual, check the comments for the real hilarity.
This is actually pretty funny. Turns out the kooks are trying to get Stephen Lemons fired. Utilizing their usual crack (pipe) investigative skills, they discovered that one Stephen Lemons of Clinton, Massachusetts had recently served 3.5 years for molesting a 15-year-old boy. Of course, to the 9-11 Deniers, there could only be one Stephen Lemons in the world. That the Stephen Lemons in question looks nothing like our guy (for starters, he appears to be 20 years older or so) is a mere bagatelle, a distraction to throw them off the scent. That the Massachusetts pervert story is from January 29, 2007, and that our man penned his initial column on Eric D. Williams' Holocaust Denial on February 1, 2007 simply shows that he had his escape to Phoenix planned well beforehand.
Failing in this, the Deniers have taken to writing letters to the editor regarding his treatment of Bob McIlvaine, the father of a 9-11 victim, but that isn't going to work either.
BTW, on the subject of people with the same names, an emailer sent me some information that seems pertinent in this regard. Turns out there are at least two Mohammed Attas living in Norway, one in Sweden, and astoundingly five in the United States. Boy, it must suck to have that name here in the USA!
“Perhaps they’re trying to protect her father’s role in torturing these detainees,” said Lorie Van Auken, who lost her husband on 9/11. “And that’s actually what could keep us from seeing justice, is this torture that was done to these people because that evidence is not really evidence. It won’t be admissible anywhere.”
Auken was speaking on a conference call organized by the liberal Human Rights First.
Later, she declined to back off her statement. “You start to wonder why Liz Cheney would be organizing the 9/11 families,” she said. “It’s just a funny connection.”
Bolding added for emphasis. Connect the dots! Well, this is not the first time that Van Auken has voiced support for 9-11 kookery. Let's remember that she was one of the proposed commissioners for the NYC 9-11 Troofer Commission. She was also quoted voicing support for Loose Change, the crockumentary that this blog was originally formed to debunk:
“There are just so many unanswered questions,” says Van Auken. “I would say you need roughly 400 hours of research to graduate from 9/11 kindergarten class. That’s why it’s so hard to keep people on the same page, because they’re coming at this issue from a million different angles. A friend might tell them about building 7, or they might watch Loose Change on the internet, or they’ll say, ‘Hold it a second, you can’t make cell phone calls from an airplane.’ And then suddenly a little alarm bell goes off in their brain, and they say, ‘Wow, we don’t know the whole story about this.’ That’s all it takes, the little alarm bell, and then, bam, welcome to the place we’ve been living in for the last six years.”
Note: I am not criticizing Van Auken for her comments about torture. I'm criticizing her for the comments I bolded above. She's playing the same game she did in the Press For Truth Movie:
Note the bit about 1:00 in there, where Van Auken says "We felt the country was at risk from terrorism, and incompetence, and, um, maybe worse." Maybe worse, nudge nudge, wink wink.
"When the smoke finally cleared from the pile of rubble on September 11, 2001, we were left with a host of burning questions. The 9/11 Commission did not provide the answers, despite their extensive mandate. 9/11 Contradictions is a work that needed to be written. With characteristic clarity and focus, David Ray Griffin masterfully lays out the most critical of these questions. Now the challenge is to finally get real answers."
-- Lorie Van Auken
We are pleased that Patty, Lorie and Monica have signed our petition. We have also received signatures from Josef Princiotta, Manny Badillo, Bob McIlvaine, Ellen Mariani. Let us know if there are any of them we are not listing here!
Jon Gold, complaining about the recent announcement by Khalid Sheikh Mohammed and others that they are going to plead guilty to planning 9/11:
KSM...
And friends wrote a letter to the judge today that requests, "an immediate hearing session to announce our confessions," and I was AMAZED at the amount of articles citing well-known family members Lorie Van Auken, Mindy Kleinberg, Kristen Breitweiser, Patty Casazza, Bob McIlvaine, Donna Marsh O'Connor, Bill Doyle, Bruce DeCell, Barry Zelman, Michele Little, Sally Regenhard, and Monica Gabrielle's opinions on the subject. AMAZED!!!
In case you couldn't tell... there were 0.
I guess these family members don't count, they aren't celebrities.
They were proud to be guilty and that says a lot about them," said Maureen Santora, of Long Island City, New York, whose firefighter son Christopher died responding to the World Trade Center attacks.
At a press conference after the hearing, her husband Alexander held up photos of firefighters, his eyes brimming with tears.
"I know my son is with us," he said, his voice thick. He wore a New York Fire Department cap.
The Santoras were among nine victims' relatives who watched the proceedings, the first time family members have been allowed to observe the war-crimes trials. Maureen Santora watched from the back of the courtroom, wearing black and clutching a photo of her son in uniform.
Alice Hoagland of Redwood Estates, California, whose son Mark Bingham was on United Flight 93 whose passengers fought hijackers before it crashed in rural Pennsylvania, said the defendants should not be executed and become martyrs.
"They do not deserve the glory of executions," Hoagland said. "I want these dreadful people to live out their lives in a U.S. prison .... under the control of people they profess to hate."
"I don't want them dying a martyr's death, but I want them gone," said Jay Saloman of Seaford, whose brother, Wayne Saloman, 43, was killed in the attacks. "I'm looking for some satisfaction."Monday morning, Saloman and his family watched with pride as his brother's 15-year-old son, Justin, cut the ribbon on a new playground at eafSord Manor Elementary dedicated to Wayne Saloman's memory.
It was a joyful moment for a family that has struggled with grief and anger in the wake of the attacks.
Would you admit you were wrong? Would you apologize to all of the families you have disrespected? Would you apologize to all of the first responders you have disrespected? Would you apologize to all of the sincere members of the 9/11 Truth Movement you have slandered, harassed, and/or threatened? Either by directly taking part in these acts, or by promoting them? Would you apologize to the 9/11 Truth Movement for trying to paint us all as crazies by focusing on the fringiest of the fringe?
The families we have disrespected? You must have us confused with David L. Griscom, who believes that many of the passengers on the four flights are still alive and living it up, courtesy of a fat Swiss bank account. Or perhaps David Ray Griffin, who still cannot let go of "Mom, this is Mark Bingham?" Or Dylan Avery, who talked about how one of the parents of a Flight 77 victim "sent his son off to die?" Or Cosmos, who doesn't believe that his "Uncle" Mickey was a hero on a hero flight?
The first responders we have disrespected? Maybe he's talking about Jason Bermas, who said, "Absolutely the firemen have been paid off?" Maybe he's talking about the new Ed Asner motion picture "Confession of a 9-11 Conspirator", which opens with a (fictional) fire chief confessing that he helped cover up the controlled demolition at the World Trade Center?
The fringiest of the fringe? Let's see, is he talking about Patty Casazza, who thinks that the government knew the time, date and targets of the attacks?
Is he talking about Bob McIlvaine, who thinks his son was blown up before the planes hit the World Trade Center? (Start about 7:10):
Is he talking about David Ray Griffin, the "guru" of the 9-11 Troof Movement, who believes that the families of the victims on Flight 93 were duped by voice-morphed actors playing their loved ones? Is he talking about Troof Movement superstar Richard Gage, who believes Muslims had nothing to do with 9-11? Is he talking about Jim Hoffman, who thinks the thermite was located inside the ceiling tiles?
The problem here is the notion that once you strip away all the nonsense, that there's anything really worth arguing about. If you accept that the hijackers were 19 pissed-off Muslims under the command of Khalid Sheikh Mohamed and Osama Bin Laden, and that there was no controlled demolition and that Flight 93 was not shot down, what's left to debate? If you want to argue that the warnings should have been sufficient and that the attacks could have been prevented but weren't because of incompetence, go right ahead. I disagree, as does Lawrence Wright and virtually everybody else who's looked hard at the evidence, but it's not a completely "fringe" position.
Ah, but there's the rub. Even the supposed reasonable "Truthers" don't believe that; it's just a bit of camouflage. They want to argue incompetence so they can turn around and argue that nobody could be that incompetent, and therefore the government had to know and so we're right back in conspiracy cuckoo land. Pardon me for not accepting your premise; in my opinion that's every bit as crazy as TV fakery and voice-morphing.
That was an interesting, if stupifying hour of TV. One noticeable point was that there was almost no advertising during the episode, which presumably reflects the controversial nature of the show.
Jesse quickly clads himself in the old "I'm just asking questions for the family members," armor. Donna Marsh O'Connor appears and actually seems normal. Compare and contrast her appearance then with this from 2006:
One can feel sorry for her while at the same time recognizing like five years later she should not be appearing at a rally with the 9-11 fruitcake "Inside Job" banner behind her. Sorry, Donna, but you and Bob McIlvaine (who appears later) have sold your credibility as 9-11 family members for the adulation of the Troofers.
Next up, Willie Rodriguez. Hilariously, Jesse claims Willie worked in WTC-2. Wow, way to fact check your stuff, guys. We get W-Rod's claim that he felt the explosion from below him. Never mind that his initial reports were that he heard a big rumble, remember?
Then comes Steven Jones. This time his substance is "superthermite"; it's been nanothermite, thermite and thermate in the past. It's liquid and can be painted on the steel. So they show poor Van Romero painting superthermite on this beam. 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!
Jesse makes it real by claiming it could be everywhere, in every highrise in the country. Because, you know, there are never any fires in highrises which would (according to the theory) suddenly and bizarrely implode due to that painted-on superthermite.
We get a little bit of Manny Badillo, who has basically supplanted Luke in the hierarchy of the 9-11 Troofers although Rudkowski does get to be in the background of the shot. I guess being the nephew of a victim gives Manny a little more credibility than being the boyfriend of a girl who used to go out with a guy whose father died on 9-11.
Jesse decides to stride into Ground Zero and get some samples of steel. Uh, Jess, it's been eight years, we have no steel samples here. We get the usual BS about how the steel was shipped out immediately. No mention of the Fresh Kills dump where everything was examined.
And oh, does he step completely into the sewer, from here on in. I can't imagine how the supposedly responsible Truthers are going to take this.
Jesse goes north to Syracuse to talk to phony Bellone. We learn helpfully from Jesse that Flight Data Recorders (FDRs) are yellow-striped. And at this point you've got to wonder if somebody's really throwing us all a wink, because (as is shown several times during the show) actually FDRs are orange.
Anyway, Mike Bellone is a discredited witness, but you'd never know that from the extensive face time he gets in this episode. Let's let the NY Daily News give it to us straight:
FIRE MARSHALS ARRESTED a self-proclaimed "honorary firefighter" for allegedly touring the country with pilfered FDNY gear to promote a 9/11 book, officials said yesterday.
Michael Bellone, 51, of Brooklyn, who volunteered at Ground Zero and later collaborated on a book about the experience, showed off the equipment during speeches to schoolchildren, authorities said.
After fielding complaints, FDNY investigators questioned Bellone and discovered that a breathing mask, air tank and other gear he was using had been missing from the department since October 2001, officials said.
But do we hear any of this during the breathless passages of smirk-terviewing that follow? No, Mike's a hero of 9-11, and so what he says must be true. Never mind that Bellone also claimed in his speeches to schoolchildren that he was an honorary FDNY member, never mind this:
He was charged yesterday with grand larceny, criminal impersonation and possession of stolen property.
At any rate, Bellone claims that he personally saw one Flight Data Recorder, and that "Nick" (generally identified as Nicholas DeMasi) told him he found two others. As you would expect, Jesse grills him on his claims.
Uh, no, Jesse looks like he's amazed at this. Wow, you went all the way to Syracuse to interview this guy in a diner and you didn't have any idea what he was going to tell you? Jesse, I knew what he was going to say.
So now the 9-11 Truth Movement is the "what happened to the black boxes movement." Because fully half of the show becomes Jesse on the trail of the FDRs, and leads to the show's climactic moment, when we learn Jesse's new conspiracy theory about 9-11.
When one of the producers questions the value of the black boxes, an obviously scripted bit comes with the black British woman snapping about how it might explain how these lousy pilots could hit the buildings. Yawn, how many times do we have to go over the same points? The towers were 210 feet on a side, wider than an average runway.
After some forgettable bits with other idiots, we go back to Bellone. He's got secret people who want to meet with Jesse to give him important 9-11 information. But they don't show up for the meeting and Bellone says they feel threatened and shut off the camera. Then he tells them something confidential off-camera. Ooooh, mysterious! Do I detect foreshadowing? Then we get Jesse leaving a message on some supposed informant's voice mail about how the "Truth shall set you free". Gawd, this is getting thick!
Later, back at Conspiracy Central, the question comes up, is Mike telling the truth? And once again, they fail to mention Bellone's problems in that regard. Then we get some bit with Jesse talking to a NY FBI agent. Jesse tries the "no steel structure" argument. They get some sort of quote from the poor guy about how the feds indeed sometimes do things surreptitiously, just as Jesse did when he was in the SEALs. Of course Jesse nods at this part.
And now, back to phony Bellone! You didn't think we'd leave the show without one last revelation from him, did you? Well, I've been covering the 9-11 Truthers for about 3-1/2 years now, and I've never heard this one before. Bellone claims to have evidence that the "hijackers" had control of Flight 11 before it left Logan Airport.
Wow. I'm flabbergasted at the pathetic nature of this episode. Even the guy who's supposed to be the skeptic (Alex Piper) should be ashamed of his participation in this ridiculous fraud.
Update: Let me add here that while Bellone's claims are laughable, according to this NY Times piece, he really did work on the pile:
Mr. Bellone was a burly nightclub bouncer from Brooklyn with training as an emergency medical technician when he went down to the Pit (sic). Except for some Saturday nights back at the club where he worked, he said he spent virtually all of the next nine months at ground zero.
But he also claimed to have been an "honorary FDNY" which proved to be false, and his claims on Jesse's show were a joke.
The Troofers are crowing about Press For Truth getting repeat showings today on KBDI, the dumbest PBS station in America, but somebody in Aurora (a Denver suburb) noticed and called them on it.
Just two days later, KDBI – public broadcasting in Boulder, CO ran a fundraiser during prime time featuring a video entitled, 9/11 Press For Truth, which presents a completely one-sided screed against the Bush Administration, claiming that (it) knew the 9/11 attacks were coming and did nothing to prevent them. The program neglects to interview any senior Bush White House personnel or to even mention the relevant intelligence that was made available to the Clinton Administration.
Executive Producer Kyle Hence, Director Ray Nowosielski, and family member Bob McIlvaine – who lost his son Bobby in the attacks on New York – were in the KBDI studios and extolled their film throughout the evening. Additionally, volunteers from Colorado 911 Visibility were on hand to answer phones, although they appeared without their trademark tin foil hats.
Truther Confab to Feature Sheehan, Rowley, Shaffer
The latest sign that all three are well-past their sell-by date:
Master of Ceremonies (MC) - Jon Gold Cindy Sheehan, Mother & Activist Richard Gage, AIA (Architects & Engineers for 9/11 Truth) Lt. Col. Anthony Shaffer (Able Danger) Coleen Rowley, Former FBI Agent & Whistleblower, Time Magazine Person of the Year, 2002 Jack Blood, Radio Host (Deadline Live, American Freedom Radio) Jon Gold, 9/11 Researcher & Writer Dylan Avery, Filmmaker (Loose Change series) Korey Rowe, Filmmaker (Loose Change series) Daniel Sunjata, Actor (F/X, Rescue Me) Sander Hicks, Writer & Activist Jonathan Elinoff, Filmmaker (Core of Corruption series) Manny Badillo, 9/11 Family Member Bob McIlvaine, 9/11 Family Member Kyle Hence - Filmmaker & Activist [TENTATIVE]
Note that Gold mentions himself twice in there; not too much doubt about who's behind this effort. With all the bad-mouthing of Sander Hicks over at Truth Action I'm surprsed he's not persona non grata. I believe, but I'm not certain, that this is the first large-scale confab of Troofers since the disaster in Chandler three years ago.
