The Lies of the Truth Movement

American Raj = More of Margolis’ BS

2011-02-13T19:00:00.006-05:00

As I documented earlier Margolis has given mutually exclusive accounts of his contact with the world’s moat terrorist 1) as of 1996-7 he had not met OBL, 2) he met OBL 1992 (or perhaps the late 80s). But he has given more takes on this. In the second edition of War at the Top of the World (2002) he wrote:

“I encountered bin Laden towards the end of the war near Jalalabad in the walled residence of a Pushtun warlord. We were a score of men in a large empty room…Bin Laden sat at the far end of the room from me. I noticed him I noticed him because of his stature. He was dressed as a simple fighter and spoke softly to the men around him. There was nothing else exceptionable about the man. In fact, I forgot about the encounter until the late 1990's when bin Laden burst upon the scene as the world's leading Islamic menace...Bin Laden survived the war and returned in late 1989 to Saudi Arabia.”

So he didn’t exactly meet OBL but rather they were “at the far end(s) of” a “large…room” from each other with about 20 other men. Though OBL “spoke softly to the men around him” there was no mention of him speaking with Margolis. This doesn’t qualify as having met OBL so it fits with his statement in the earlier edition that they “had not met” the date was in or before “late 1989”

By 2008 in his latest book American Raj the story had grown legs and a tail, from page 169:

I crossed paths once with bin Laden. It was during fighting outside Jalalabad, the Afghan city that commands the route from Peshawar to Kabul. I had been in battle with mujahedin against Afghan Communist troops, backed by armour and artillery. As is the Afghan custom, the battle ended before dusk and all sides repaired to their homes or camps. I was taken to the sprawling, mud-walled compound of my host, local warlord Hadji Abdul Qadeer, who later became vice-president of U.S.-occupied Afghanistan and was assassinated in Kabul in 2002.

AFTER THE BATTLE

We were about 20 men in a long, rectangular room covered in colourful Persian and Afghan carpets, reclining on round bolsters set against the wall. After about 30 minutes of smoking, drinking tea, and chatting, we all rose and prepared to go our various ways. I later recalled one man from the group because he was much taller than the others, remarkably thin, even gaunt, and did not look Afghan. He exuded an aura of profound calm and dignity, as well as an almost religious solemnity. The warrior smiled at me gently. He offered me traditional greetings in Arabic and I replied in the same tongue.

Strange that if Margolis really had exchanged words OBL he made no mention of this in 2001 when he wrote that he suspected the audio of the videotape had been faked [see more below] and only mentioned the terrorist speaking “softly to the men around him” in his 2002 book.

Stranger still is that in his 2002 article about Qadir’s assassination Margolis wrote about being in the presence of “tribal elders and mujihadin” in his friend’s home but made no mention of OBL being there and the date has been moved to “the early 1990's” (probably April 1992 when Jalalabad was retaken)

“In the early 1990's, civil war was raging across Afghanistan following the Soviet pull-out. I had just come from a fierce battle against communist Afghan forces at Jalalabad. Hadji Qadir, southern Afghanistan's most important warlord, gave me the hospitality of his large, walled tribal compound near Jalalabad. I stayed with him as an honored guest and joined him in audiences with tribal elders and mujihadin fighters. As governor of one of the nation's richest provinces - thanks to legal and illegal trade - Qadir commanded great influence and large numbers of tribal fighters.”

As he did in his infamous 2010 column Margolis expressed doubt in American Raj that the man in the famous “smoking gun” video really was OBL on page 178 he wrote:

In one 2004 tape “discovered” by U.S. forces in Afghanistan which I believe used an imposter to represent bin Laden he is seen chortling over the attack and showing with his hand how one of the planes dove into the World Trade Center tower. Having met the real Osama bin Laden I am convinced that the man in the tape, who was far heavier and broader of face than bin-Laden was a fake. The purpose of the tape was to convince American audiences of bin Laden’s guilt.

Besides the fact that it’s doubtful he really met OBL there are a couple problems with this:

1) The tape was found not long after the US invasion and was first played on air December 13, 2001 when very few American’s had any doubts about “bin Laden’s guilt.” I’m not sure if he described it as a “2004 tape” because he was careless of because the later date better fit his fake tape scenario but the latter seems more likely. He wrote about the tape four days after its release (December 17) and two days later spoke about in on CNN.

2) In his Dec. 17, 2001 column though he indicated that he thought the AUDIO might have been faked he expressed no doubt that the images were of OBL:

But two other Arabic experts say the tape's audio quality is so poor that almost nothing bin Laden says on it can be verified. To my ears, well accustomed to Arabic, half of bin Laden's words were inaudible. The translation was sometimes out of sync with the action on screen. Bin Laden's statements looked cut up and edited.

Cynics suggest the tape was a forgery made by Russian intelligence or the U.S. government, with incriminating statements spliced into an otherwise boring exchange of pleasantries between bin Laden and a visiting admirer.

Note that he did not claim to have spoken to or met OBL

Margolis is an intelligent and talented writer with the insight of being a Moslem who lived and studied in Egypt for several years and spent decades covering the Middle East thus it very unfortunate that he can’t be counted on to tell the truth but rather makes up fact to fit his thesis and/or tell a ‘sexier’ story.

More on Margolis

2011-02-11T16:15:00.001-05:00

Yesterday I forgot to say that though Margolis didn’t make clear who would be responsible for the “Eruption on the Nile” after Mubarak he seemed to indicate it would be Islamists rather than secularists:

Egypt’s secular political opposition barely exists. The regime’s real opponent remains the relatively moderate, popular, Islamic Brotherhood, which predates World War II. It would win a free election hands down. But the Brotherhood’s leadership is old and tired. Younger, more dynamic leaders have all been jailed or bought off. Half of Egyptians are under 20.

What a confused paragraph! The first three sentences clearly indicated he thought the Islamic Brotherhood would be at the forefront of the ‘eruption’ but the next (and last) two portrayed them as emasculated.

Margolis lies again

2011-02-10T18:32:00.004-05:00

In a series of posts a few months ago I pointed out that former Toronto Sun columnist Eric Margolis has told a number of lies over the years including that he met OBL, that he consistently questioned who was responsible for 9/11 and about what happened during a hijacked flight he was on. Unfortunately he has not stopped bending the truth. In his latest Lew Rockwell column he wrote:

President Barack Obama reportedly scourged CIA for not predicting the revolt on the Nile. Maybe CIA did, but no one in the White House was listening.

An impending explosion in Egypt was obvious to old Mideast hands like myself. Last 26 April, I wrote a column, "Eruption on the Nile," predicting Mubarak’s rule would soon end and that the US had already selected intelligence chief Gen. Omar Suleiman as his successor. CIA could save a lot of time, money and error by simply reading LewRockwell.com each week.

However it is simply is not true that Margolis “predict[ed] Mubarak’s rule would soon end” in the column. Quite to the contrary he twice indicated that he expected the dictator to die in office:

“President Husni Mubarak, the US-supported strongman who has ruled Egypt with an iron hand for almost 30 years, is 81 and in frail health. Amazingly, he has no designated successor. No one knows who will take over Egypt when he dies.”

“Now, as Mubarak’s health fails, the US and Israel are increasingly alarmed his death could produce a political eruption in long-repressed Egypt.”

Technically one could argue Margolis’ claim was accurate because he “predict[ed] Mubarak’s rule would soon end” but that was due his “frail health” rather than popular revolt. Thus Margolis was further off the mark than pundits who indicated the president would retire this year. What he predicted was turmoil over Mubarak’s succession.

While it’s true he said “Gen. Omar Suleiman, an ally of the US and Israel, is another possible strongman” he also mentioned Mubarak’s son Gamal and “another army or air force general” as strong possibilities and said “Washington would do well to back el-Baradei”.

But Margolis not the first person, by a long shot, to predict turmoil over Mubarak’s succession or cite Suleiman as a strong candidate. Almost 10 years before his column “Egypt: Stable, but for How Long?” by Jon B. Alterman appeared in the Autumn 2000 edition of the Washington Quarterly (Volume 23, Number 4, , pp. 107-118). In the section `Configuring Stability: But What About the Succession?’ [pg. 114, PDF pg. 4] Alterman wrote that while Gamal and some army generals were possibilities, “Publicly attuned Egyptians and other astute observers, however, put their money on domestic intelligence veteran Omar Suleiman.”

Alterman MIGHT have been the first person to write that Suleiman was a leading candidate, but he was definitely not the last one before Margolis. Below are few examples of hundreds of such articles that appeared from years to days before "Eruption on the Nile":

“Speculation has centered on two people: intelligence service chief Omar Suleiman, and Mubarak’s dashing 39-year-old banker son, Gamal”

Washington Report on Middle East Affairs, December 2002

“Apart from [Gamal Mubarak], speculation has swirled around the country's intelligence chief, Omar Suleiman, who came into the international spotlight recently as Egypt's go-between in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict”

Boston Globe - Sep 28, 2003

“Now, finally, he seems to be grooming an heir in each camp: one a general, the other an entrepreneur; the first arguably his closest aide, the second his son…Until not so long ago few Egyptians even knew who Lieutenant General Omar Suleiman, Egypt's powerful chief of intelligence, was.

The Atlantic Monthly - October 2003

“[Gamal Mubarak’s] main rival is one of Mubarak’s best friends, General Omar Suleiman, 69, the spy chief”

The Sunday Times - June 12, 2005

“The other name most commonly raised is Omar Suleiman, the longtime head of intelligence”

NY Times - October 31, 2007

“[Omar Suleiman], believed to be the second-most-powerful person in Egypt and a potential successor to the 80-year-old [Hosni Mubarak], has been entrusted with the "Israeli file."”

Jerusalem Post - Jan 15, 2009

"Egyptian Regime Worried by Increasing Pressure on President Mubarak To Select Security Services Chief Colonel Umar Sulayman as his Successor”

Al-Quds al-Arabi website, London - June 24, 2009

“Mubarak’s politician son Gamal, widely tipped as a possible successor. But others too have their eye on the top job, notably intelligence chief Omar Suleiman”

Euronews – Oct. 31 2009

The first is Omar Suleiman, Egypt's intelligence chief and long-rumored successor to Mubarak…Suleiman is the most likely candidate for vice president, who would succeed the president in the event of the president’s death or incapacitation.

STRATFOR - April 21, 2010

Note that the last one came out just 4 days before Margolis’ column and discussed the possibility “another army or air force general” might get the nod.

So there is no reason for the CIA to “[read his column in] LewRockwell.com each week” why should they waste their time with a liar who has shown no signs of being ahead of the curve?

Worst 9/11 Book of All Time?

2011-01-25T09:19:00.002-05:00

Recently I read, Planes without Passengers: the Faked Hijackings of 9/11 by Dean Hartwell. The only thing preventing me from declaring it to be the worst "book" ever about 9/11 is that since I haven't seen them all it's possible that there is a worse one I'm not aware of. I debated his essay length self-published "book" with him on the Education Forum. He gave the following "outline" of his "ideas":

What happened to each of the planes?

Flight 11 allegedly struck World Trade Center 1 (North Tower)
Flight 11 – There was no such flight
Flight 11 Decoy (“11D”) – Took off from Boston Logan airport and was identified as Flight 11
Where did 11D go? – It flew toward the World Trade Center and got within one-half mile of it
What happened to 11D? – It landed safely
What happened to WTC 1? – Another aircraft struck it

Flight 175 allegedly struck World Trade Center 2 (South Tower)
Flight 175 – It took off from Boston Logan Airport
Where did 175 go? - It flew west, switching its flight # to 89 and doing a hijacking simulation
What happened to 175? – It landed safely in Cleveland
Flight 175 Decoy (“175D”) – Took off from Boston Logan Airport and was identified as 175
Where did 175D go? – It flew toward the World Trade Center and got within one-half mile of it
What happened to 175D? – It stayed in the air (unidentified) and then served as a decoy for 93
What happened to WTC 2? - Another aircraft struck it.

Flight 77 allegedly struck the Pentagon
Flight 77 – There was no such flight
Flight 77 Decoy (“77D”) – It flew west and was identified as 77
What happened to 77D? – I don’t know; I speculate it flew over the Pentagon

Flight 93 allegedly crashed in Shanksville, Pennsylvania
Flight 93 – It took off from Newark Airport
Flight 93 Decoy (“93D”) – No
Where did 93 go? – It flew west
What happened to 93? It went toward Cleveland, then flew back to Pennsylvania and landed safely

In other words he is a particularly whacky brand of no planer. What follows is my Amazon review of the book:

---------------------------------------------

One thing that potential buyers should be aware of is that this not really a 144 page book because it is set in extra-large type. It is just over 15,000 words (i.e. a little more than 5x longer than this review), if normal size type had been used the “book” would be only ¼ - 1/3 as long. So for $10 plus shipping you’ll get a 40 or so page essay that the author had to self-publish, by contrast 350 – 700 page commercially published books by Griffin, Tarpley and Ruppert (which I think are crappy too) go for $12 - $18.

The author claimed “I use the large font so my wife can read it.” [1] I find that hard to believe because as noted above the use of jumbo size text increased the page count 3 - 4x and thus increased his publishing costs by a similar proportion [2]. Obviously he knows that he can easily change type size on the computer screen or print out a large type copy for his ‘significant other’. Presumably then the real reason was that he knew people would be unlikely to spend over $10 for a 30 – 40 page “book”.

But it’s like the Groucho Marx’s joke about one old lady complaining that a restaurant’s food is bad and her friend not only concurring but adding “and the portions are small too”. The book is a good example of why even within the “truth” movement ‘no planers’ are considered crackpots. ‘Debunkers’ repeatedly point out that ‘truthers’ rarely explain what exactly they think happened that day; Mr. Hartwell to his credit tries to do so but his account is marred by tortured logic and factual errors.

=== FLIGHTS 11 AND 77 AND THE BTS ===

One of his central theories is that Flights 11 and 77 never took off Logan and Dulles and were never even scheduled to fly because they did not show up on a Bureau of Transportation Statistics webpage [pg 11]. He further went on to speculate that they were replaced by decoy planes [pgs 12, 44, 57] which he believes took off from the same airports despite there being no sign of them in the same BTS database. He also chose to ignore that the theory spelled out above is patently absurd. As I pointed out to him on an Internet forum:

The amount of people who would have to be “in on it” or otherwise silenced is prohibitively large and would have included all the AA ticket agents at Logan and Dulles and the ones for feeder flights at other airports (and probably for the entire US since the systems are linked), dozens or more flight controllers, baggage and security crews at Logan and Dulles, the people claiming to be next of kin of those on the flights as well as personnel from the NYC Medical Examiner’s offices as well as any travel agents or users of sites like Orbitz who happened to look up flights from Logan or Dulles to LAX that morning etc etc. The idea that the PTB/CIA/ONI/PNAC/MIBH etc would put together this elaborate plot to murder thousands, involving hundreds of people etc, etc would be unwilling or able to fake a BTS list is mind boggling.[3]

=== PASSENGER AND CREW PARTICIPATION IN THE PLOT ===

Hartwell repeatedly demonstrated that he will rationalize away any compelling evidence which contradict his fantasies. He did so in a particularly repulsive manner regarding the calls from Flight 11:

There are two reported calls from Flight 11, from Betty Ong and Madeline Sweeney. Their calls are reported as starting at 8:19 A.M. and 8:25 A.M.

Regardless of what types of phones were used, Ong and Sweeney could have made or had their calls made from another location (perhaps the actual Flight 11 plane on the ground) and continued until word came that the South Tower had been struck at 8:46. [pg 86]

In other words they were 'in on it', they were perpetrators not victims. He didn't limit this offensive speculation to the heroic stewardesses, he declared that he concluded that the “passengers” (use of 'scare quotes' his) were part of the plot and left “their family and friends...[and] agree[d] to participate in [the] plot...[because they saw 9/11 as] an opportunity to change United States policies and fight what they perceive as a greater evil...Some passengers could have been blackmailed into participating” he admited that, “this conclusion comes not from eyewitness or other solid evidence, but rather logic.” [pgs 92 – 3] unfortunately all manners of lunatics think their beliefs are logical.

=== FLIGHT 1989 ===

Another of his theories is that two flights made emergency landings in Cleveland rather just Delta 1989 as per the official version. The basis for this are some discrepancies between media accounts regarding the landing time, number of passengers aboard and other details. Some said 10:10 and others 10:45, some said about 200 PAX other about 70. This ignores that it is common for mistakes to be made in breaking news accounts [e.g “Dewey Wins”, “Giffords Killed”].

- Landing Time:

He assumes that the ‘earlier’ flight was 1989 and dubbed the latter “an unidentified plane” and speculates that it was really United 175. However he neglected to inform his readers that the media accounts he cited referring to BOTH landing times described it as being a Delta flight or specifically Delta 1989. For example:

“Delta Flight 1989 made an emergency landing at Hopkins about 10:45 a.m”

“There also was uncertainty and fear for several hours at Hopkins while authorities searched a Delta airliner forced to land there for signs of terrorist sabotage…The scene inside the air traffic control tower yesterday morning at Hopkins was sober and calm as controllers brought down the Delta, a 767 from Boston, that was feared to have been sabotaged…The flight to Los Angeles landed at Hopkins at 10:45 a.m.”

He can not claim he was unaware of this because 1) I pointed it out to him on the aforementioned forum back in November [4]. 2) the 1st quote and the underlined portion of the 2nd appear on a webpage he cited [5]. Additionally the 9/11 Timeline, which he cited several times, said it landed at 10:18 but “other accounts will say it lands at between 10:33 a.m. and 10:45” and provided links to an FAA document (10:33) and two AP articles which reported that Delta “flight 1989” a 767 from Boston to LA “landed about 10:45 a.m.” [6]

- Number of Passengers:

Most accounts said there were “about 60 passengers” or 69 PAX and nine crew members but Hartwell pointed out that, “early press reports said a plane at the [Cleveland] airport had 200 passengers” [pg 61]. However he failed to inform his readers that with one exception the reports attribute or seem to attribute the number to “Cleveland Mayor Michael White” speaking at a press conference, [7] none of the accounts mentioned his location so it is doubtful he was at the airport. The exception was a reporter for a Cleveland radio station who said, “A few hours after Mayor White's first news conference, FBI Special Agent Mark Bullock confirmed that the Delta jet with 200 people aboard had landed safely and had not been in danger” [8] but the number seems not to have come from the FBI agent because:

1) A 11:37 AM 9/11 forum post (cited by Hartwell’s source) said “The mayor of Cleveland has announced that an airplane containing 200 passengers has been sequestered at the Cleveland Hopkins Airport” (i.e. the number was cited less than 90 minutes after the plane landed not hours after the mayor’s news conference) [9].

2) A 9/11 article from AP which cited Bullock reported “78 passengers aboard” [that was a minor error, there were 78 people {PAX and crew} on it] [10]

- 1989 or 175:

Hartwell thinks that the “2nd plane” was probably flight 175 because it, “had the capability and the opportunity to take Flight 11 passengers (to make 157) and its whereabouts were reasonably in question” [pg 17]. There are a few problems with this absurd theory.

1) There is absolutely no evidence passengers from another flight, let alone another airline, being transferred to 175. I have never heard of passengers from one airline being transferred to a competitor's flight except in the case of mechanical problems.

2) Flight 175 took off at 8:14 [11]and flight time from Logan to Cleveland is only about 68 minutes [12]. By 10:45, 2 ½ hours later if the plane had not been hijacked it would have been half way to LA [13] Probably over Iowa or Nebraska [14]

3) The flight's “whereabouts were NOT reasonably in question”, its transponder was only turned off for 30 seconds before being reset it was tracked from Boston to NYC air traffic controllers at NY Center and Newark Airport, the latter of whom also see it through their windows for its last few minutes [15].

4) It was also tracked by several workers at United's crisis center in Chicago. [16]

5) 27 of the passengers and crew had their remains identified (26 via DNA) by the NYC Medical Examiners Office [17]. Hartwell knows this but made contradictory claims about it in his “book” (more on this below).

- Flights 175 and 93 Wheels -off Times:

Because the FAA and NTSB said Flight 175 took off at 8:14 but the BTS said it did so at 8:23 Hartwell speculated that the first was “a decoy” and the second carried the passengers [pgs 54 -7] and due to a similar contradiction between the BTS and press accounts regarding the take off time for Flight 93 [pgs 58 – 60] he speculated there might have two of the latter as well. Hilariously he added “but I cannot prove it” as if he offered anything approaching evidence (let alone proof) there were two 175s. Nor does ever offer a coherent explanation as to why the conspirators would not only make the plot complex but leave traces in the official record.

=== IDENTIFICATION OF PASSENGER REMAINS ===

In his conclusion Hartwell wrote “I have offered evidence...that no independent expert has ever confirmed the identification of remains of any of the passengers at any of the sites. ” [pgs 117 – 8].

That is yet another example of the utter rubbish in this “book” because most passengers (and crew) from all four flights were IDed but Hartwell seemingly only defines people who do not work for any government agency as “independent”. This is ludicrous because the vast majority of forensic pathologists in the US are city, county, state or federal employees and private ones would only be called in if the next of kin hired them. So Hartwell set an impossibly high standard so as to rationalize his dismissal of evidence which refutes his lunatic theories.

He obviously dismisses out of hand the DNA identifications made by the Armed Forces Medical Examiner of most of the flight 93 (Shanksville) and all of the Flight 77 (Pentagon) victims any one working for the federal government, especially the military is assumed to be compromised. But many victims from Flights 93, 11 and 175 (WTC) were IDed by local coroners.

NYC Victims:

Earlier he rationalized his dismissal of the identification of the victims of Flights 11 and 175:

Dr. Robert Shaler, former director of the Forensic Biology Department at the New York City Office of the Chief Medical Examiner, wrote the book Who They Were: Inside the World Trade Center DNA Story: The Unprecedented Effort to Identify the Missing. He writes mostly of his staff’s efforts to identify those who had worked in the World Trade Center buildings.

He says that he met with families of passengers, although this was late in the investigation. And although he mentions a few matches made with passengers and shows a chart of the number of passenger matches, he does not specify anyone.

The information above gives sufficient basis in fact to reject the official story and start anew….[pg 30]

So he rejects the passenger and crew identifications made by Shaler and his 100 plus subordinates because he didn't mention any of their names? This is nonsenscial, if he was lying he could easily claim he had IDed people he had not. Hartwell failed to mention Shaler did not name any of the 265 Flight 587 victims by name and only two of the over 2600 tower occupants who died [18]. Despite Hartwell implying he only IDed“a few” of the people on the planes the DNA expert reported he identified 77 of the 147 passengers and crew aboard the flights [19]. Worse Hartwell's rationalization was based on a false premise. On page 310 of his book Shaler discussed identifying the remains of Flight 11 passenger Daniel Lewin [20]. But Shaler worked for the City of NY while Giuliani was mayor and thus presumably in Hartwell's mind is not “independent”.

- Shanksville Victims:

Not all of the victims of the Pennsylvania crash were identified by the DoD, “[Somerset County coroner Wallace E.] Miller and his team identified 16 of the 44 passengers and crew aboard Flight 93 through fingerprint and dental records.” [21] Hartwell didn't mention Miller, I doubt this was an oversight. Presumably it would be harder to dismiss the funeral homer owner who only made less than $36k a year for his part time work for rural Somerset County [22] as not being “independent”.

=== Flight 1989 “Transcript” ===

Towards the middle of his “book” the author cited and obscure source:

“In an article on the site “Bravehost,” a writer details transcripts purportedly from Flight 1989 and Flight 93 and notes the similarity in a message from “hijackers” on each plane about a bomb on board. The controllers contacted and received a response from the 1989 pilot, who agreed to land in Cleveland, but got no response from 93” [pgs. 64 – 5]
The source for the ‘transcript’ was a USAToday article which he previously cited as a source that pinpointed 10:10 as the landing time for the Delta flight. Certainly citing an article with named authors in a well known newspaper would have given his claim more credibility than an anonymously written article from an obscure website, why then did he use the latter rather than the former? It turns out that “Bravehost” misunderstood the article, there was only one message but the air traffic controllers thought mistakenly at first it came from 1989 (emphasis mine):

Now about 9:30 a.m., controllers hear words that seem to confirm their worst fears. They hear shouting as Flight 1989 approaches the Ohio border. Then they hear a voice: "Get out of there!" Then what sounds like a scuffle.

Minutes later, a new voice, this one with a heavy accent: "Ladies and gentlemen, here it's the captain. Please sit down. Keep remaining sitting. We have a bomb aboard."
No one who hears those words believes they are coming from Werner. Not with such a heavy accent. No way. Rather, the transmission seems to be from a hijacker who unwittingly spoke over the radio when he meant to address passengers.

Officials at Cleveland Center rush word to Washington: Hijackers have another flight.
At the Federal Aviation Administration's command center in Herndon, Va., Delta Flight 1989 joins a growing list of suspicious jets.

[…]

MISTAKE REALIZED

Silence.

Controllers at Cleveland Center can't raise United Flight 93, a Boeing 757 flying over Ohio.

Perhaps the strange radio transmissions — the reference to a bomb and the heavy accent of a "captain" — hadn't come from the Delta flight. Maybe Capt. Werner's Flight 1989 is fine after all.

At least, that's the way it seems to the controllers. The United flight had been just 25 miles ahead of the Delta flight when the radio transmissions came through — close enough to account for the confusion.

Then, at 9:35 a.m., the United jet had climbed unexpectedly and turned back, over Ohio, toward the Delta flight. Then ...

Silence. The United flight stopped talking.

It must be United that's hijacked.

When controllers ordered Werner to change course to avoid Flight 93, he had complied quickly. Yes, Delta Flight 1989 must be fine. [23]

Hartwell did not cite the original because it not fit with cockamamie theory i.e. he intentionally mislead his readers. I could go on and on but I have wasted enough time on this poorly researched, offensive garbage, take a look at the Index which only includes 10 items, this is indicative of the lack of Hartwell's care. The text is not even original being largely derivative of “Woody Box” who at least isn't trying to make a buck. One can read much of the book on Amazon Reader if after read this review, the available pages and Box's 'research' you still want to buy this crap you'll be proving the adage about fools and their money.

NOTES:

1] http://educationforum.ipbhost.com/index.php?showtopic=17254&view=findpost&p=217992

2] See for example this page about page count affects publishing costs and buyer's perceptions of books http://money.howstuffworks.com/self-publishing4.htm CreateSpace uses multiples of 24 pages
3] http://educationforum.ipbhost.com/index.php?showtopic=16899&view=findpost&p=211015 post 12
4] http://educationforum.ipbhost.com/index.php?showtopic=16899&view=findpost&p=211551 post 39

5] http://911review.org/inn.globalfreepress/Cleveland_Airport_Mystery.html cited on page 62

6] http://www.historycommons.org/context.jsp?item=a1018deltalands#a1018deltalands

7] http://911review.org/brad.com/Woodybox/JET-93_land-Ohio.html
8] http://www.wcpn.org/spotlight/news/2001/0912cleveland-reacts.html

9] http://911review.org/inn.globalfreepress/Cleveland_Airport_Mystery.html cited on page 62

10] http://thepost.baker.ohiou.edu/archives3/sep01/091101/brief16.html

11] http://www.ntsb.gov/info/Flight_%20Path%20_Study_UA175.pdf pg 1 , http://www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/NSAEBB/NSAEBB196/doc07.pdf pg 4

12] http://www.travelmath.com/flight-time/from/BOS/to/CLE , http://www.airrouting.com/content/TimeDistanceForm.aspx

13] http://www.travelmath.com/flight-time/from/BOS/to/LAX , http://www.airrouting.com/content/TimeDistanceForm.aspx ,

14] http://www.gpsvisualizer.com/map?airport1=bos&airport2=lnk&format=google&units=metric&convert_format=&gc_segments=&gc_altitude=&show_wpt=3&trk_colorize=track

15] http://www.ntsb.gov/info/Flight_%20Path%20_Study_UA175.pdf pg. 2 , http://www.historycommons.org/timeline.jsp?timeline=complete_911_timeline&day_of_9/11=ua175 , http://newsmine.org/content.php?ol=9-11/air-traffic-controllers-recall-events.txt

16] http://www.usatoday.com/news/sept11/2002-08-12-clearskies_x.htm

17] http://books.google.com/books?id=eI1pVWM38wEC&printsec=frontcover&dq=Who+They+Were:+Inside+the+World+Trade+Center+DNA+Story&hl=pt-br&ei=cJ87Td_oNMT48Aaaz9zMCg&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=1&ved=0CC4Q6AEwAA#v=onepage&q=175&f=false pg 302

18] http://books.google.com/books?id=eI1pVWM38wEC&printsec=frontcover#v=onepage&q&f=false , the two victims he mentioned were James Marcel Cartier (IDed) and Rita Blau (not IDed) http://forums.randi.org/showthread.php?t=198580

19] http://books.google.com/books?id=eI1pVWM38wEC&printsec=frontcover&dq=Who+They+Were:+Inside+the+World+Trade+Center+DNA+Story&hl=pt-br&ei=cJ87Td_oNMT48Aaaz9zMCg&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=1&ved=0CC4Q6AEwAA#v=onepage&q=175&f=false pg 302

20]http://books.google.com/books?id=eI1pVWM38wEC&printsec=frontcover&dq=Who+They+Were:+Inside+the+World+Trade+Center+DNA+Story&hl=pt-br&ei=cJ87Td_oNMT48Aaaz9zMCg&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=1&ved=0CC4Q6AEwAA#v=snippet&q=lewin&f=false pg 10

21]http://www.newsweek.com/2009/01/02/remains-of-the-day.html

22] http://www.post-gazette.com/headlines/20011015newsmaker1015p2.asp

23] http://www.usatoday.com/news/sept11/2002-08-12-hijacker-daytwo_x.htm

My e-mail exchange with Duff

2010-11-04T09:50:00.004-04:00

I sent Duff the link to the post above. The following e-mail exchange ensued. Other than correcting 1 typo and redacting our e-mail addresses I changed nothing. The times are my time, i.e. 1 hour ahead of EST and 3 hours behind GMT:

From: Gpduf@xxxxxx

Subject: Re: Gordon Duff another truther whack-a-loon and coward
To: lenxxxxxx
Date: Tuesday, November 2, 2010, 6:12 PM

Hey Len

We have 400,000 subscribers. THEY HATE YOU

Live with it or go back to...wherever it is that traitors live.

You make my day. Keep squirming

============================

Tuesday, November 2, 2010 8:01 PM

From: "len" xxxxxx

To:Gpduf@xxxxxx

You think, they hate me Duff? Most don't know who I am because you keep censoring my posts. What are you afraid of? Them finding out that you make stuff up? I do not believe you really have direct knowledge of Abdulmutallab dad's ties to the Mossad because if you did you would have said so rather than cite articles that didn't back your claims.

So I wonder if you lied about that what else have you lied about? As for your claim to have regularly appeared on TV what else is there besides being interviewed once by Russian TV and another time by a Pakistani station? How much of your claimed bio is true? I have a challenge for you spell out you bio in detail including the dates, ranks and units of your service and the dates, titles and locations of your post military career and provide some documentation.

Oh and I don't believe your claim to "have 400,000 subscribers" even at the height of the truther storm 9/11 Blogger only claimed to be "getting about 5,000 unique hits a day," and a newspaper selling that many print copies would be 12 in US circulation.

And why exactly am I a traitor? Is it just because I question your dubious claims?

==========

Tuesday, November 2, 2010 8:04 PM

From: "len " xxxxxxx

To:Gpduf@xxxxxx

Oh and one more thing I consider the content of our e-mails fodder for my blog, i.e. I might post all or part of their contents.

==========

Tuesday, November 2, 2010 8:10 PM

From: "Gpduf@xxxxxx"

To: lenxxxxxx

Please do

but first you should get an education

go to the yellow pages

look under schools

find one near your home

very near as you might become frightened or lost

contact them and see if you qualify to attend

have a nice day, i certainly will

==========

Tuesday, November 2, 2010 8:20 PM

From: "Gpduf@xxxxxx"

To: lenxxxxxx

Oh, you are that idiot.

You have had your 1 minute.

You are a time waster with bad manners. You simply don't matter. The world is full of people with problem like yours.

The rest of us don't have time for you.

==========

Tuesday, November 2, 2010 8:38 PM

From:"len"

To:Gpduf@xxxxxx

Actually I was polite till you started censoring me. You think I need to go back to school? You crack me up, you seem to have serious reading comprehension problems or did you post those links knowing they did not back your claims?

Gordon Duff another truther whack-a-loon and coward

2010-11-02T13:50:00.008-04:00

Gordon Duff a truther blogger who thinks he is a journalist but makes little effort to hide his anti-Semitism claimed in a recent post on his site Veterans Today that Israel was behind the package bombs from Yemen . Typically he provided close to zero citations and when he did they didn't back his claims. Referring to the "crotch bomber" he wrote:

Worse still, the “terrorists” father, described by the press as a “Muslim banker” turned out to be a partner in an Israeli managed defense company and a close friend of the CIA

He provided no citations but did in an earlier post

We do know a couple of things. Dad, back in Nigeria, ran the national arms industry (DICON) in partnership with Israel, in particular, the Mossad. He was in daily contact with them. They run everything in Nigeria, from arms production to counter-terrorism. Though Islamic, Muttalab was a close associate of Israel

According to the first embedded link

He started his working career in 1965 as a Management Accountant with Fuller Jenks Beecroft & Co in London.

He also served as Chief Accountant/Acting General Manager, Defence Industries Corporation in Kaduna. He was also the Financial Controller of the company.

He rose to become the General Manager, New Nigeria Development Company Limited (NNDC) from 1968 to 1975.

The article never said he "ran" the company or that it was "the national arms industry". According to this article it only produced ammunition at the time. Since he was only 25 - 28 I doubt he held such a powerful position.

Here is the 2nd linked article in its entirety:

Nigeria: Lawmakers Divided Over Mossad - FG Link

Tashikalmah Hallah and Francis Okeke 5 September 2008

Members of the National Assembly have expressed different opinions on the alleged invitation of Israeli intelligence agency to train the country's security operations under a secret security pact.

Former Chairman House of Representatives Committee on National Security and Intelligence, Rep Abdullahi Farouk (PDP, Kebbi State), said Nigeria does not need Mossad or any foreign intelligence organisation to train the country's security agents because Nigeria has the best security training institution in the country.

Note that:

· this was 40 years after Mutallab left DICON

· Neither he nor the company were mentioned

· The proposal was described as an "alleged invitation"

· It did not sound like it would be approved

· There was no mention of any actual collaboration between Nigeria and the Mossad.

I posted the above to Duff's website except I removed the parts about him being a loon, pseudo journalist and anti-Semite and changed it to 2nd person. I was very polite I even addressed him as "Mr. Duff". He replied

Academics use citations. Journalist use sources. If you have sources, tell me what year I began advising the government of Nigeria in areas of security? My experience with all you discuss is personal and first hand.

According to his bio on his site:

Gordon Duff is a Marine Vietnam veteran, and Senior Editor at Veterans Today. His career has included extensive experience in international banking along with such diverse areas as consulting on counter insurgency, defense technologies or acting as diplomatic officer of UN humanitarian groups. Gordon Duff's articles are published around the world and translated into a number of languages. He is regularly on TV and radio, a popular and sometimes controversial guest.

So I replied:

Well if what you claim were true why didn’t you cite your “personal and first hand” knowledge of what you wrote about rather than articles that did NOT support you claims? Fill us in prey tell on your supposed experience “advising the government of Nigeria in areas of security”, when and for whom did you work? Did this experience give you direct knowledge of Mutallab running “the national arms industry (DICON) in partnership with Israel, in particular, the Mossad”? If he ran the company after 1968 why did the article indicate otherwise? On and now that we are on the subject of you bio, care to provide any specifics? Dates, locations, units and ranks for the USMC, companies/organizations, locations and dates for your post military career.

He then deleted my replies, so I posted them again, he then deleted my posts again and his responses to them but not before I got a screen print (see below). Funny how truthers who complain about being shut out by the "MSM" shut dissenting voices out of their blogs, forums and websites, but it seems what really bothered him was my questioning his claimed credentials. So I imagine that much of his bio is Walter Mitty, the part about him being “regularly on TV and radio” is a bit of an exaggeration unless you count internet radio and public access cable. I only found two TV appearances on Google Video one was on kook friendly Russia Today and the other was on a station in Pakistan and I didn’t find any radio interviews from broadcast radio.

How many errors can a “truther” squeeze into four sentences?

2010-10-30T21:59:00.003-04:00

If you are Michael Ruppert the answer is 5 to 6. This is neither new nor directly related to 9/11 but I recently started looking into it and it relates to the credibility of a leading “truther”. The passage below comes from his book Crossing the Rubicon and previously appeared in a From the Wilderness articlehe co-authored entitled “A Career In Microbiology Can Be Harmful To Your Health, POST 9-11 DEATH TOLL MOUNTING AS CONNECTIONS TO DYNCORP, HADRON, PROMIS SOFTWARE AND DISEASE RESEARCH EMERGE”

In 1994, Jose Trias met with a friend in Houston, Texas and was planning to go public with his personal knowledge of HHMI [Howard Hughes Medical Institute] “front door” grants being diverted to “back door” black ops bioresearch. The next day, Trias and his wife were found dead in their Chevy Chase, Md. home. Chevy Chase is where HHMI is headquartered. Police described the killings as a Professional hit.

1) Trias and his wife were not scientists

The article was about the supposed rash of deaths of microbiologists thus one would presume Trias was one or at least a bioscientist / doctor, but he and his wife were both lawyers. Trias and his wife seem to be the only non-biologists amongst the “victims”. I doubt Ruppert simply forgot to tell his readers what Trias’ profession was.

2) “The next day, Trias and his wife were found dead”

Trias and Julie Gilbert, his wife, were found on Monday, May 16, 1994, they were last seen alive the afternoon of Saturday the 14th “Police estimate that they died between 9 p.m. May 14 and 9 a.m. Sunday”

3), 4)“…dead in their Chevy Chase, Md. home”

They lived in Bethesda but were found dead in their weekend home near Annapolis.

5) “Police described the killings as a Professional hit.”

This is the most significant error and the one most indicative of an attempt to mislead. The earliest newspaper articles and all subsequent ones indicated robbery was the suspected motive. Most also mentioned that one of the couples Acura Legends was missing. Police quickly identified and arrested the culprit, Scotland Eugene Williams, a cat burglar/petty thief who was photographed by security cameras using Gilbert’s bank card and in one driving her car, when he was arrested he had her watch and a two pairs of handcuffs in his possession. Despite the papers saying the Trias’ were not bound both were handcuffed. He admitted to having robbed them and forced them to give him the PIN numbers of the bank cards. He denied entering the house but was placed there by DNA and a shoe print. Additionally he had plead guilty to a previous break-in and was a suspect in various others but no cases of robbing people or stealing cars from public place were mentioned in media reports

The closest any newspapers came to saying the police thought it was “a Professional hit” were two articles which said the police considered the possibility but concluded the motive was burglary or thought the latter more likely. A May 18 article in The Capital, an Annapolis newspaper entitled “Mystery surrounds lawyers' murders” reported the following:

Although police still consider robbery the motive in the slayings of wealthy attorneys Jose Enrique Trias, 49, and Julie Noel Gilbert, 48, the circumstances of the crime raise many questions.

The killer or killers didn’t break into the home at 1624 Winchester Road, police said. Neither victim was bound, and there was no evidence of a sexual assault.

And unlike most burglaries or robberies, the house was not ransacked.

And detectives have been unable to determine what, if anything, is missing from the house near Winchester on the Severn, said Officer Randy Bell, a county police spokesman. As a result, police are wondering if Mr. Trias and Ms, Gilbert were victims of an execution-style killing.

“I’m sure that’s one of the many, many options that has run through (detectives’) heads,” Officer Bell said.

From THE YEAR IN CRIME; Few Big Cases End in Clean Getaways, a December 29 review of notable crimes in 1994 in the Washington Post:

A pair of influential Washington tax lawyers were found shot to death execution-style in May at their $725,000 weekend retreat in Anne Arundel County.

Although the slayings of Jose Trias, 49, and his wife, Julie Gilbert, 48, seemed like a professional hit, police said they were prompted by a simple burglary. When investigators released pictures of a man who used Trias's bank card at an automated teller machine, an Anne Arundel detective recognized him as Scotland E. Williams, 31, a suspect in a string of cat burglaries the previous fall.

So an honest accounting of what happened would have indicated that though the police said the murders bore traces of a professional hit they quickly concluded they were the result of a simple burglary and quickly identified arrested a suspect who is currently serving life with out parole for killing the couple.

6)? “In 1994, Jose Trias met with a friend in Houston, Texas …”

None of the news articles about the murder mention him having been to Houston or even having left town. It is unlikely he would have travelled during the work week if he did not want to attract attention at the HHMI. Since “neighbors said Mr. Trias arrived at the home about 3 p.m. May 14” he would hardly have been time for a trip on the Saturday. In theory he could have flown out on the Friday after work and returned the next day but that begs the question if he and his wife were killed to shut him up why didn’t they kill the friend in Houston as well? If the friend were killed why isn’t he (or she) cited?

Richard Gage’s structural engineers

2010-10-24T21:38:00.005-04:00

I decided to look over the credentials and statements of the structural engineers (SEs), in AE911T. There are only 30, 19 in the US and 11 in Canada, Australia and Western Europe. Anders Björkman who used to claim to be an SE is now more accurately classified as a “Naval architect & Marine engineer”

Two to four seem to not really be SE’s. Charles Pegelow is no longer listed as a structural engineer and his now expired license was for civil engineering. Apparently Rich Reed recently earned his BS, is unlicensed and left his bio (and statement) blank. Albert Arey from Chicago is listed as being “Degreed and Licensed” and “Verified” but he is in the “Other Supporters and A&E Students” group, did not provide a license number and is NOT licensed in Illinois. He claims to have a degree from Ecole Centrale Lyon, which only gives degrees in general engineering, so he might be licensed in France. Other than his education his bio gave no indication what experience, if any, he has. The only work experience William H. Russell “Architect, Structural Engineer”, of Atlanta mentioned was as an architecture professor 1973 – 2006 but failed to disclose were he taught from 1979 onward. He claims to have earned his BA in architecture and MS in architectural engineering at the University of Illinois, Urbana and to have been an “Asst Professor” there 1973 -77. He also claims to be the holder of RArch#3454(GA) and “S.Eng#4161(IL,inactive)” both issued in 1977 but a he did not turn up in the IL or GA engineers databases*, the latter of which lists inactive licensees and used 9-digit numbers and like most states neither IL nor GA issues licenses for specific types of engineers so there is no way he could have earned a “Structural Engineering Registration” in either state in 1977 or any other year. Also it is hard to believe one of the prestigious architecture programs in the US would hire an unlicensed architect as an assistant professor which is a tenure track position.

Despite truthers using the excuse that they sign up so few engineers because many are afraid of being ostracized, marginalized, fired or otherwise persecuted with the exception of a guy who moved from Belgrade to London in 1989 AE911T does not have any SEs from Moslem, Communist, formerly Communist or anti-US countries (unless you count France).

Only 14 of them claimed to have experience with buildings and only one, Steven Merritt, cited tall buildings. Paul A. Thomas claims to have designed “concrete & steel structures to 240 ft. height” but worked mostly for “Mining & Industrial clients”.

Surprisingly only 3 mentioned NIST but only one or two seem to have read the report. The aforementioned Mr. Arey from Chicago simply said “The collapse was too neat to be ascribed to the official story and what was described in NIST report. A new investigation is warranted”, so I doubt he actually read it. His inability to spell out from an engineering perspective why he thinks the towers were CDed is yet another reason to doubt he really is an SE.

Bill Boggia and Ronald H. Brookman critiqued the NIST report in ways that suggest they actually read it (or at least articles by truthers who had). Boggia’s experience however is with offshore platforms. Brookman claims to have “over 21 years experience in structural analysis, design, evaluation and rehabilitation of buildings in northern California” but makes no mention of what types of buildings. Other than forums and truther sites the only mention of an engineer named Ronald, Ronald H. or Ronald Herman Brookman was the California Board for Professional Engineers and Land Surveyors.

However like the others neither Boggia nor Brookman not Merrit nor Thomas have written a technical critique of the NIST report including calculations showing (or attempting to show) that it was flawed let alone gotten anything published in an engineering journal

To save space in the chart below I edited down most of their bios and statements, substituted numbers with numerals and used the following abbreviations: ME mechanical Engineer, CE civil engineer, BSe Bachelor Sci. Eng. (general engineering or field not specified), CD controlled demolition, BLD building, FF free fall, FTP footprint. All mentions of the NIST report and experience with buildings were included.

Name	Loca tion	Deg ree	Lice nse	Experience	Statement
William H. Russell,	GA	MS AE	??	Architecture professor 1977 - 2006	“too much information missing and misinformation included”
Alfred Lee Lopez	MI	BS AE	yes	“48 years…all types of BLDs”	“I agree the fire did not cause the collapse of the 3 BLDs”
Antonio Arthay	FL	MS SE	SE BC	“15+ years of experience in BLD design”	“Fire and impact were insignificant in all 3 BLDs. Impossible for the three to collapse at free-fall speed.”
Charles N. Pegelow	CA	BS CE	CE exp	Offshore oil platforms	No AE911 statement previously critiqued the ASCE report but not NIST’s. Has gone on record saying he believes the towers well felled with “mini-nukes”
David Topete	CA	BS CE	CE SE	“residential, commercial and light manufacturing facilities”	“I am curious to … how [WTC7] collapsed, while no other adjacent structures suffered such fate.”
Dennis J. Kollar	MI	BS CE- SE	exp	“structural design of residential, commercial, industrial, and institutional structures”	“the most convincing aspect that the 911 collapse was a CD is the recorded explosions on the 9/11 Eyewitness DVD”
Edward E. Knesl	AZ	MS CE SE	CE SE	“35 years of experience domestic and overseas in commercial and transportation projects”	“Any tall structure failure mode would be a fall over to its side…We do not know the phenomenon of the high rise BLD to disintegrate internally faster than the FF of the debris coming down from the top”
John Charles Lewelling	TX CO	BS AE	CE SE	“35 years…hospital, office, retail, storage, industrial, airports(s)…public assembly,[schools]”	X
Kamal S. Obeid	CA	MS CE	CE SE	“Consulting structural engineer specializing in BLD and other structures design and retrofit.”	“Only recently have I begun to examine the structural collapse of the BLDs. Photos of the steel, evidence about how the BLDs collapsed,”
Lester Jay Germanio	TX	BS CE	SE	“5 years experience as bridge designer and self employed as design build contractor and SE for 20 years”	“I…have watched numerous video and films of the collapse since that time. It is and has been my opinion that the most probable cause of the WTC BLDs was CD.”
Marshall Casey Pfeiffer	CA	BS CE	CE SE	“SE in CA for 12 years designing Earthquake resistant BLDs.”	WTC BLD 1, 2, and 7 collapsed due to controlled demolitions, please investigate
Nathan S. Lomba	ID CA	BS CE	CE SE	“39 years…custom residential to heavy industrial structures …project for the USAF…Pulp Machine BLD…Natural-gas fired power plant”	How did the structures collapse in near symmetrical fashion when the apparent precipitating causes were asymmetrical loading?
Paul A. Thomas	AZ	MS Arch SE	yes	“Designed concrete & steel structures to 240 ft. height ” “Mining & Industrial clients. Design concrete & steel structures, foundations”	The 2 towers, as they collapse, appear to be a CD event rather that a "pancake" type failure…molten steel found in the wreckage of the BLDs
Ronald H. Brookman	CA	BS MS	CE SE	“21 years experience in structural analysis, design, evaluation and rehabilitation of BLDs”	“NIST, FEMA and the 9/11 Com. have all fallen short of a detailed accounting of the catastrophic collapses”
Steven F. Dusterwald	NV	BS CE	yes	“Structural analysis and design…of BLDs and other structures”	“There was not enough energy delivered to the BLDs by the impacting aircraft to destroy all the structural materials.”
Steven Merritt	CA	MS SE	CE	“I have designed steel high rise BLDs for the past 8 years.”	“There seem to be a lot of unanswered ?s and it would serve the greater good to re-open the investigation.”
Albert Arey	IL	BSe	?	????	“The collapse was too neat to be ascribed to the official story and what was described in NIST report”
Peter I. Staker	AL	BS	No	“degree in SE…worked as an Engineer for 40 years”	X
Foreign SE’s in AE911T
Rich Reed	CA	BS	No	???	X
Bill Boggia	UK	BS ME	ME CE	offshore oil, gas, wind, wave and tidal energy projects.	“NIST structural simulations - are not…to final collapse and the failure mechanisms seem to have been manually adjusted…The pulling forces on the perimeter columns by the sagging floors were adjusted”
Bill Genitsaris	Aust.	BSe	yes	“structural engineer in the residential and commercial fields.” “demolition”	“If the pancake theory is correct, then as each floor truss disconnects from the columns…the columns should have remained in 1 complete length (ie over 100m long)”
Cyrille Houdebine	Frnce	MS	yes	“working as a SE in a subsidiary of the group SNC-Lavalin in Nice”	“The crash…caused the destruction of several columns …could have created a phenomenon of buckling in chain…it is impossible that this happen at the speed of a FF approximately”
Robert T. Mote	Can	PhD	yes	“Special interest in dynamic and explosion behaviour of structural elements and foundations”	“I could never understand the 'convenient' vertical collapse at the base due to an extreme event at height. I was most concerned by the 3rd tower collapse”
Erwin De Jong	Neth	MS	no	“offshore (steel structure) and aerospace engineering”	“it is not explainable that a steel structure sinks down into its own FTP with obviously no resistance"
Graham John Inman	UK	Yes	yes	“Member Institute of CEs Member Institute of SEs”	“WTC 7 BLD could not have collapsed as a result of internal fire and external debris…the fire..was small & localized”
John Watt	UK	BS	yes	“steel framed, masonry and timber BLD designs”	“very serious ?s to be asked about how 3 robust steel framed BLDs collapsed into their own FTPs…WTC7 not struck by an aircraft…relatively minor fire”
Paul W. Mason	Aust	BSe	yes	“35 years experience designing, constructing and maintaining major structures for state government agency”	“It is simply not physically possible for a structure to collapse at near-FF speed and, at the same time, pulverize all of its concrete and steel into tiny fragments”
Jason Mewis	Can	BSe	yes	“President and Senior SE w/ Engcomp for the past 27 years” Mostly industrial	“the official story of how the WTC collapsed doesn't make any sense from an engineers perspective”
Miroslav Kurkic	UK	BS	yes	“Consulting Engineer working in the UK since 1989”	“Convinced that the BLDs are demolished in controlled manner. As a SE it is so obvious to me.”
Richard P. Hall	UK	BS	No	“25 years experience in construction and structural design"	“There is no doubt the 3 BLDs were taken down by CD. To believe otherwise is to be willfully ignorant of the overwhelming evidence”

* There’s a William J. Russell, also inactive in IL database residing in Murphysboro 4 hours from Urbana who like everyone else in it has a 9 digit number. There was no match for engineer’s license # 4161. There is a William H. Russell in GA engineer’s database but his license was issued in 1958, is # 4176 and shows an address in Mcdonough 40 miles from Atlanta the city listed in architect’s license.

Sources:

AE911Truth petition page

http://www2.ae911truth.org/signpetition.php

Engineer License Lookup

http://www.engineersguideusa.com/engineer_license_lookup.htm

Ecole Centrale Lyon engineering program English homepage

http://www.ec-lyon.fr/76957584/1/fiche___pagelibre/&RH=Programs

More on Margolis and flight 592.

2010-09-24T10:26:00.004-04:00

As I pointed out Tuesday not only has Margolis made contradictory claims about the passengers on Lufthansa flight 592 believing the hijacker was going to crash the plane into Manhattan, seemingly no other media account of the incident said anything about this and that include an article which quoted him.

Not only was I unable to find such an account but the very thorough folks at the “Complete 9/11 Timeline” who have a complete section on “The Warning Signs” were unable to as well. Though their entry on the hijacking included Margolis’ account it did not cite anyone else saying the hijacker threatened to crash plane or the passengers and crew thought he would. It did however include this “While giving television commentary on the morning of 9/11, Larry Johnson—currently the deputy director of the State Department’s Office of Counter Terrorism—will say it was feared when the plane [Lufthansa 592] was flown to New York “that it might be crashed into something.” [NBC, 9/11/2001]” and indeed the clip can be viewed on Mr. Johnson’s blog and Youtube. But national security types thinking this and the passengers thinking it let alone the hijacker threatening to do so are not the same so I contacted Mr. Johnson and asked him if he made the comment (I not seen the video clip yet):

LJ: That's not what I said. I said that when the plane was hijacked one of the concerns we had was the possibility that the hijacker might fly the plane into a building in New York.

Me: What was that concern based on? Did the hijacker say anything like that to the people on the plane?

LJ: No, we were simply looking at possibilities based on the threat. That's in part the reason that fighter aircraft accompanied the plane to the US.

Me: Is it OK if I quote you? Do you have any idea how Margolis got wind of this? My guess is that he found out intel folks though this was a possibility and claimed the hijacker said this to "sex up" the story.

LJ: You may quote me. Who is Eric Margolis?

Me: I'm surprised you had not heard of him before he has appeared as a "terrorism expert" on many of the same TV programs you have. The guy has told a few lies since 2000, I mentioned a few in my blog, I imagine there are many more I did not catch see here for more:

http://lies-of-the-truth-movement.blogspot.com/

LJ: I googled the asshole. There was absolutely no information at the time corroborating Margolis' claim that the hijacker threatened to crash the plane into a building. That scenario simply came up as one possibility we (the folks in the operations centers who were managing the response to this event) considered as the plane was inbound. The Hijacker made no demands and, when the event ended, he only had a starters pistol.// I should point out that I have firsthand knowledge about this. I was alerted by the State Department Operations Center and then spent the next several hours in the task force area.*

So Margolis gave two contradictory versions and as I suspected neither were true.

* I cobbled together 2 e-mails for simplicity’s sake they are separated by 2 slashes //.

More on Margolis

2010-09-23T13:51:00.004-04:00

He is no stranger to outlandish CTs

From the Honest Reporting website:

But Margolis (in photo at left) stands out among his colleagues by presenting outlandish conspiracy theories that have no basis in reality.

For example, in a 1998 column, Margolis repeated allegations from a Times of London article that Israeli scientists were working on an "ethnic bomb" that would kill Arabs but spare Jews. Western scientists dismissed this claim -- embraced by Arab media, anti-Israel propagandists and conspiracy theorists -- as unscientific nonsense. Yet Margolis's column, which appeared in the Edmonton Sun and Ottawa Sun, quoted “numerous reliable sources” who claimed, “Israeli scientists are attempting to engineer deadly micro-organisms that only attack DNA within the cells of victims with distinctive Arab genes.” In the same column, Margolis also re-hashed the urban legend that “an Israeli cargo plane that crashed in Amsterdam in 1992 was carrying precursor chemicals for the deadly nerve gas, Sarin.”

And now Margolis is at it again. Last week (Feb. 13), without presenting evidence, Margolis suggested in the Toronto Sun that Israel killed Yasser Arafat:

“Arafat's convenient death removed a major obstacle to U.S.-Israeli plans. This writer continues to suspect Arafat was murdered by an untraceable nerve or blood toxin. He was being held prisoner by Israel in his Ramallah compound.”

(Perhaps Margolis believes Israel used its "ethnic bomb" to kill Arafat.)

And this week (Feb. 20), Margolis implied that Israel might also have killed former Lebanese Prime Minister Rafik Hariri:

“Israel is determined to get revenge on Hezbollah, which defeated its attempts to turn Lebanon into an Israeli protectorate and drove Israeli occupation forces from Lebanon -- a small but vicious war this writer saw firsthand. Israeli PM Ariel Sharon's rightist Likud Party may be renewing previous efforts to bring Lebanon back into Israel's sphere of influence.”

Observing that “the professional expertise of the bombing strongly suggests a state intelligence agency,” Margolis named only one state intelligence agency in his column: “Israel’s Mossad.” Lebanese protesters (AP photo at right) seem to disagree.

I don't think it's fair to criticise him for plugging the ethnic bomb theory it originated after all on the pages of one of the world's most respected newspapers and the idea that such a weapon was possible was accepted by several experts. But pushing the Isreal killed Arafat and Hariri theories without evidence is crack-pottery.

Margolis update

2010-09-22T21:03:00.003-04:00

I e-mailed Margolis but got no response. I joined Twiter just to touch base with him

Margolis: "Abuse pours in re my 9/11 article(www.ericmargolis.com). One angry emailer calls me a `media whore Mossad pussy' Very creative.
12:04 PM Sep 20th via web"

ME: "The problem is you lied it that essay. E.G. You said you met OBL but in your book you said you hadn't http://tiny.cc/af8y5"

Margolis: "My first editor wanted the mention deleted. I didn't think it important at the time."

ME: "So when did you meet him? You told CNN it was in '92 but in your book you said reffering to 1996-7 "I had not met bin Ladeen" "

An open letter to Eric Margolis

2010-09-21T13:19:00.001-04:00

Mr. Margolis,

I have discovered various discrepancies between:

- claims you made in your recent column about 9/11 AND claims you made earlier
- claims you made in the column, other articles or TV interviews AND the historic record.

Unfortunately the only conclusion I can reach is that you, to put it euphemistically, have been less than truthful.

YOU WROTE:

“In 1993, I was hijacked over Germany on a Lufthansa flight bound for Cairo. The Ethiopian hijacker took us all the way back to New York City. The hijacker was threatening to crash our A310 jumbo jet into Wall Street.”

HOWEVER:

In 2000 you wrote

“I was on a Lufthansa flight out of Frankfurt bound to Cairo when a lone Ethiopian gunman seized the A310 aircraft by threatening to kill the cabin crew, then the passengers. We turned around, flew to Hanover, in North Germany, and sat on the ground for some hours. German GSG-9 commandos couldn’t get there in time before we took off on a marathon flight to New York, of all places. We were convinced the hijacker, who faced an automatic 20 years in prison under US law, intended to crash the plane into Manhattan.”

So did you and some of the other passengers become convinced “the hijacker…intended to crash the plane into Manhattan” due to the “automatic 20 years in prison under US law” or did he actually ‘threaten’ to do so?

[NOTE: I have to give credit to JREF forum member AJM8125 for pointing out this discrepancy.]

This does not even make sense the pilot by all accounts was at the controls the whole time and the hijacker made no attempts to fly the plane himself. The strange thing is that none of the other articles I read about the incident mention him making such a threat or people onboard fearing he would do so. For example in 2000 a reporter from the Guardian interviewed “the Reverend Timothy Kinahan” who was on the flight. Describing the refueling stop in Hannover and then the flight to NYC the reverand said: "Rumours were running wild as to who it was, we just didn't know the truth. But once we were in the air, we were all able to relax a bit. We were playing cards and scrabble... We were told that if we stayed calm and did as we were told, nothing would happen. The crew were superb - extremely reassuring”

Now that doesn’t sound like an account of someone on a flight where the hijacker was threatening to crash the plane and the “nothing would happen” part directly contradicts this. Kinahan even said “The beginning, the first few hours, until we were happily out of Hanover and on our way to America, were the most anxious. We didn't know if we were going to Cuba or Moscow.” Hmmm so the passengers were “most anxious” BEFORE they though the hijacker was intent on crashing the plane? Kinahan was paraphrased as indicating the storming of the plane by a SWAT team “was possibly the most terrifying time of the whole ordeal”.

Likewise the NYT reported that “passengers and crew members last night told of fearful hours at the mercy of a man who menaced them with his pistol and often seemed irrational, displaying flashes of anger, lapsing into brooding silences and threatening to kill hostages unless he was taken to the West” but made no mention of a threat to crash the plane or a fear among the crew and passengers the hijacker might do so.

I looked at several articles about the hijacking. They all told pretty much the same story; the passengers were most nervous at the beginning and then calmed down once the plane was en route to NY, "the most traumatic part was when the SWAT team came on” etc. None of the articles linked below, not even the first one which quoted you, said anything about a threat to crash the plane or a perception by the passengers the hijacker wanted to do so.

Toronto Sun columnist Eric Margolis said he was sleeping when the hijacking began.

"A lot of the passengers thought they were going to die. We were dealing with a madman here. He was a lunatic," Margolis said in a TV interview.

"It was either New York or he would kill everybody on board," he reported.

[Note: The 1st and last articles require purchase, the rest are free]

https://secure.pqarchiver.com/thestar/access/504141701.html?FMT=FT&FMTS=ABS:FT&type=current&date=Feb+12,+1993&author=From+AP-CP-Reuters&pub=The+Record&desc=Hijacker+gives+up+:+Ethiopian+sneaks+starter's+gun+on+jet
http://articles.lati...1_1_hijack-ends
http://articles.orla...hansa-hijacking
http://www.chron.com...n-new-york.html
http://news.google.c...hijacking&hl=en
http://news.google.c...hijacking&hl=en
http://www.nytimes.c...-his-crime.html
http://www.independe...er-1472669.html
http://www.highbeam....1P2-932433.html

YOU WROTE:
"A day after 9/11, I was asked on CNN if Osama bin Laden was behind the attack. `We have yet to see the evidence,’ I replied. I maintain this position today."

HOWEVER:
I found no traces on the internet of you being interviewed by CNN on Sept 12, 2001 or ever using the phrase “We have yet to see the evidence”. The complete programming of CNN and 5 other networks from 8:48 AM on 9/11 till 9:15 PM* on 9/13 are preserved on the “September 11 Television Archive”. Could you tell us what time you were interviewed on 9/12 so as to verify your claim?

*[the beginning and ending times for the 6 network varies]

Nor have I found any cases of you ever expressing doubt OBL was responsible till a few days ago. To the contrary on more than one occasion you accepted his guilt. For example last Jan. 11 you wrote:

Bin Laden proclaimed his grand strategy in the 1990’s. He would oust the modern `Crusaders’ by luring the US and its allies into a series of small, debilitating, hugely expensive wars to bleed and slowly bankrupt the US economy, which he called America’s Achilles’ heel.

Bloody attacks would enrage the US and lure it into one quagmire after another .

Bin Laden was dismissed by western intelligence as a crackpot and “enragé.”

But both the dim-witted President Gorge W. Bush and the intelligent President Barack Obama fell right into Osama’s carefully-laid trap.

So what exactly was “Osama’s carefully-laid trap” if not 9/11? And in 2006 the following appeared on a Canadian news site after the videotape of OBL meeting with Atta and other hijackers was made public:

Bin Laden is also seen with his former lieutenant Mohammed Atef and one of the suspected 9/11 masterminds: Mohammed Atef and Ramzi Binalshibh.

Eric Margolis, a foreign affairs consultant, told CTV Newsnet that bin Laden may not have wanted the video's release, because it seemingly shows his involvement in plotting the 9/11 attacks.

"Bin Laden has steadfastly denied being directly involved (in 9/11). [B]I think we know that he knew about it[/B], but he's denied being involved in the planning," said Margolis.

In a column about the "smoking gun tape" in the December 17, 2001 Toronto Sun you referred to "the fanatical Osama bin Laden" and wrote:

But regardless of whether the tape is real or a fake, [B]there remains little doubt that al-Qaida was behind the attacks on the U.S[/B]. But, as Prince Nayef, head of Saudi security observed last week, Osama bin Laden is largely a figurehead. Its real leaders, said the prince, echoing this column's view, remain as yet unknown and are likely outside Afghanistan.

Two of al-Qaida's leaders are in Afghanistan: its Egyptian CEO Ayman al-Zawahiri - known to all as "the doctor" - and his No. 2, Abu Zubaydah. They are still believed alive and in hiding with bin Laden…

[…]

…it's likely the operation was planned in Egypt by members of two militant groups, Egyptian Jihad and Gamma al-Islamia, with [B]Osama bin Laden serving as a symbolic spiritual guide[/B].

In this sense, bin Laden was re-enacting the role of the dreaded medieval head of the cult of the Hashishins, Hassan al-Sabbah, known as Sheik al-Jebel, or Old Man of the Mountain. From his lair in the Syrian mountains, the sheik's suicide assassins, crazed on hashish and armed with poisoned daggers, terrorized much of the Muslim world and the Crusader states of the Levant..
.

On the fifth anniversary of the attacks you wrote: “Interestingly, many Americans – one poll says 33% – believe their government is covering up facts about the September 11 attacks, or was even somehow even involved in them, though there is no evidence of this to date.”

Hmmm so its been your “position” since day two that “we have yet to see the evidence” “Osama bin Laden was behind the attack” but 5 years later said “there is no evidence” the government which blamed OBL “is covering up facts about” 9/11?

You were interviewed and wrote about OBL and AQ several other times in the days, months and years after 9/11 and though in the essays and transcripts I found you never stated as directly as above that you blamed him or them for the attacks you never showed any signs of doubting it, it seems implicit. For brevity’s sake I will provide a link to a forum post where I quoted several rather than go over them here.

YOU WROTE:

"Tapes that appeared to confirm bin Laden’s guilt were clumsy fakes. They were supposedly “found” in Afghanistan by the anti-Taliban Afghan Northern Alliance, which was created and funded by Russian intelligence."

HOWEVER:

That is of course very debatable and you, of all people, should know that the Northern Alliance was NOT “created…by Russian intelligence” but was the remnant of the government formed by the Mujahedeen after they kicked the Soviets out and whichheld the country’s seat at the UN*. Also the US said its forces rather than its Afghan allies found the tape. You notably omitted to tell your readers that you accepted the authenticity of the tape (located by Al-Jazeera) released in 2006 of bin-Laden with the hijackers [see below].

YOU WROTE:

“I had met Osama bin Laden in Afghanistan and told CNN viewers that he was not the man in the tapes.”

HOWEVER:

Interesting that you brought this up, though you were indeed interviewed by CNN about the tape on December 19, 2001 but the transcript is not online, perhaps you can post a copy? In the previously mentioned December 17, 2001 column for the Toronto Sun you accepted that bin Laden WAS “the man in the tapes” but indicated the audio MAY have been altered:

“Cynics suggest the tape was a forgery made by Russian intelligence or the U.S. government, with incriminating statements spliced into an otherwise boring exchange of pleasantries between bin Laden and a visiting admirer. This is possible. In 1990, the U.S. used retouched satellite photos to convince the Saudis that Iraq was about to invade - which it was not.”

As for your claim that you “met Osama bin Laden” on September 19, 2001 you told CNN the same thing

I met Osama bin Laden in 1992 inside of Afghanistan. And this was at a time when he was an American ally. He was considered a freedom fighter. He had been helping bring thousands of Arabs from across the Middle East to fight in Afghanistan…I met him before he became a terrorist. And he become a terrorist when he announced that after throwing the Soviets out of Afghanistan, he was next going to quote, "liberate," unquote his homeland, Saudi Arabia, from American domination.”

The date is questionable because according to most accounts bin Laden returned to Saudi Arabia from Afghanistan in 1989 after Soviets pulled out and moved to Sudan in 1991 however some sourcesincluding Lawrence Wright indicate he returned there or at least to Pakistan in 1991, 1992 or 1991 – 2. Your description however better fits the late 80’s than 1992. By the latter date OBL had not helped “bring…Arabs...to fight in Afghanistan” for three years and had not been “an American ally” since the end of the Gulf War (February 1991) when he was angered by the continuing presence of US troops in his homeland.

The problem is that mentioned OBL on four pages your 2000 book War at the Top of the World The Struggle for Afghanistan, Kashmir and Tibet and not only made no mention of this supposed meeting and even specifically denied having met him. In chapter 5 of you wrote about the period when the Taliban seized control of Afghanistan:

Further complicating this already murky situation, the militantly anti-American agitator Osama bin Ladeen had sought refuge in southern Afghanistan where he had served during the 1980s as a volunteer in the International Islamic Brigade. I had not met bin Ladeen, but knew some of his men, and the camps where they served.*

*[page 51 of the hardcover and 49 of the paperback (2001). You mentioned “the fanatical Osama bin Laden” on three other pages 37, 90, 91 of the hardcover and 36, 50 and 90 of the paperback but made no mention of ever having met bin Laden.]

The Taliban seized control of Afghanistan in 1996 and OBL moved there the same year and settled in the south of the country in 1997. To make a long story short in 2000 you wrote that as of 1996/7 you “had not met bin Ladeen” but in 2001 told CNN you’d met the man in 1992, will the real Eric Margolis please stand up?

So did you meet bin-Laden when he was bringing Arab fighters to Afghanistan and still a US (i.e. until 1989) or in 1992 or sometime after he moved to southern Afghanistan (1997) or as I suspect NEVER? Besides your contradictory accounts I think the latter is most likely because AFAIK you have never gone into the details of the supposed meeting. This would of course have been a very pertinent story after the embassy attacks and then after the USS Cole incident and especially after 9/11 but you seemingly have never elaborated on it, why not fill us in on the details?

If you can show that I am wrong I will gladly issue a retraction and apologize but if I here back from you at all I’ll expect excuses and equivocation.

Len

Gage's missing architect isn't an architect / More on Gage's numbers

2009-05-12T15:48:00.000-04:00

As I mentioned yesterday Gage claims he signed up "the AIA Chapter CEO in Virginia" there's still no sign of him or the 40 odd missing architects including one who is also a structural engineer, but I digrees.

One note about the Virginian, John W. Braymer, Ph.D. he doesn't seem to an architect.

- He is an "honorary" member of the AIA.

- No one with his last name is licensed to do anything in Virgina

- A local paper reported, "Before his work with the VSAIA and the Virginia Foundation for Architecture, Dr. Braymer served as a Senior Legislative Analyst with Virginia's General Assembly and was Assistant Professor of English at the University of Richmond."

Despite the fact Gage spent thousands of dollar to go to the AIA connvention and claims that their booth was "the busiest booth around us by far!" and that he signed up 50 new architects, the out seems to have been a misrable failure since he really only signed up 1 - 6 new architects.

Let's look at the numbers he claims that 20 - 24 thousand architects attended and that he and his group spoke to "hundreds of them", that "about 80%" were supportive and that "about 50" signed the petition but the number of architects and engineers in his group increased by 6 or less in the last 2 weeks. Thus, even assuming all the newbies were from the convention, among attendees his sign up rate was about 0.003% and of those he spoke to about 1 - 3%.

Richard Gage's trouble with numbers and other lies.

2009-05-11T21:43:00.000-04:00

One would hope that an organisation that claims to be "for truth" would make a point of being truthful but as I pointed out last year Gage's claimed recruiting success rate didn't match up with his membership. Remember the cliche about the more thing change the more they stay the same? Gage once again is making claims about recruitment that don't match up with his current membership totals.

The latest news on the group's home page is their attendance at the American Institute of Architects annual convention which took place April 29 - May 2 at the Moscone Convention Center in San Francisco. Gage claims "we spoke to hundreds of architects and must have added about 50 to our petitioners over the course of 3 days"

The problem is that there is an April 23 (2009) press release on the same page which proclaimed "More than 640 Architects & Engineers for 9/11 Truth (AE911Truth) are calling for a new, independent investigation into the destruction of the World Trade Center" and a counter at the top of the page (as of a minute or two ago) indicates the group is made up of "647 architectural and engineering professionals" In other words in the last 18 days they've added at most 6 new "architectural and engineering professionals" even assuming they all were recruited at the convention they're about 45 members short of Gage's claim.

Another problem with his numbers is that 1 - 3 minutes into this video from the 1st day of the convention he and two other members of AE911T claim that 80% of the people they spoke to were supportive. He also claimed that theirs was "the busiest booth around us by far!". As stated above on the group's home page he claims they spoke to "spoke to hundreds of architects" how exactly does 80% of hundreds come out to only "about 50" let alone the 7 or less new architects and engineers he signed up?

He also claims they had "a structural engineer who is also an architect stop by and sign our petition who has worked on 50 to 60 story buildings" and "also had the AIA Chapter CEO in Virginia sign the petition" but no people meeting this description have been added to the site

The convention took place 9 - 11 days ago which is more than enough time to check credentials and add names to their list. Live verification would be easier than over the Net signers could be asked to show photo ID and their status as architects or engineers could quickly be verified online, the Moscone Center has WiFi access.

That was not the only example of convention related dishonesty from AE911 for Truth . At 6:57 into the above video Gage starts interviewing J. Marx Ayres AE911T's CFO. About 40 seconds into the interview he said "...I'm an engineer with lots of experience and I've designed a lot of tall buildings it might add a lot of credibility to the organization". The problem is Mr. Ayres has never ever designed a building tall or short in his life.

Mr Ayres as his own website points out has "over sixty years experience in the design analysis and construction of mechanical service systems for all types of buildings and facilities. Expert in heating, ventilating and air conditioning (HVAC), plumbing and fire protection systems." His CV paints the same picture "Mr. Ayres is a nationally recognized expert in building air conditioning design and analysis, energy conservation, thermal energy storage, commissioning of HVAC systems, and earthquake damage to building mechanical structures." While Gage did introduce him as a mechanical it quite possible that viewers would have missed this or not know that mechanical engineers don't design buildings. Gage made no effort to correct him.

This is not the 1st time Ayres and Gage have confused the nature of the former's experience. In his declaration for AE911T he said:

"I am a consulting mechanical engineer with over 55 years of experience in the design and construction of all types of buildings including high-rise office towers. I am an expert in heating ventilation and air conditioning (HVAC) and fire protection for buildings..."

Previously on the same page Gage wrote:

"Mr. Ayres is a nationally recognized expert in building air conditioning design and analysis, energy conservation, thermal energy storage, commissioning of HVAC systems, and earthquake damage to building mechanical systems, with over 55 years of experience. Co-founder of one of the largest building engineering firms in Los Angeles, Mr. Ayres has been in responsible charge of the design of hundreds of major building projects, including high rise offices, commercial centers..."

This fits in with a pattern from many leading truther sites of being less than straight forward about the credentials of their supporters. Commonly they would describe...

...Kevin Ryan as a "former lab manager and scientist at Underwriters Labs, the company that tested the steel used in the World Trade Center buildings, was fired by UL when he went public with information about the cover-up" without explaining that he worked for water testing company bought by UL shortly before 9/11.

...Robin Hordon a former air traffic controller "posted to Boston Center where he worked for eleven years." [also here] without making it clear he last worked as an ATC over 20 years before 9/11.

...Jeff King as an "MIT engineer" [also here and here] without saying got a degree in electrical engineering from the school in the 1970's and a few years later enrolled in medical school and has worked as a family practitioner ever since.

Perhaps Gage should rename his group.

The Hidden History of 9-11-2001

2008-12-21T10:50:00.000-05:00

OK it been quite a while, I’ve busy with other things. I hope to be able to post here at least weekly from now on.

In 2006 a lengthy truther tome titled The Hidden History of 9-11 was published by Elsevier a respectable scholarly press based in the Netherlands. It was edition # 23 of a series of books on “political economy”. Due to the respectability of the publisher, the fact that most of the contributors were university professors and claims some the articles (chapters) had been peer reviewed the books released garnered enthusiasm on ‘truther’ websites. However due to its prohibitively high price, until recently over $ 100, almost no one read it. That changed a few months ago with the release a $ 15 paperback. It can also be read for free on Google Books.

Despite its prestigious publisher and the claims of peer review and the number of authors with PhD’s it suffers from the same poor scholarship of all other truther books, movies, websites etc and is basically yet another repackaging of the same claims previously repeated ad infinium elsewhere. Very little of it was new even in 2006.

Interestingly at least one truther agrees with me about the book.
“J.W.K” from Nagano, Japan a Amazon “Top 1000 reviewer” who has given several other “truther” books and videos 5 stars, gave it 2 stars and wrote, “The scholarship is shoddy and unfocused. The book contained nothing that wasn't already more clearly presented in THE NEW PEARL HARBOR by Professor David Ray Griffin”

As I have noted elsewhere there is something about conspiracy theories in general and 9/11 "truth" in particular that transforms otherwise rational and intelligent people into fools. Normally this foolishness is in a subject matter distant from their areas of specialty. Though not related to 9/11 Arthur Butz is a perfect example, he teaches electrical engineering at Northwestern, one of the best universities in the US, but he is a Holocaust denier. The most obvious examples relating to 9/11 are Griffen and Fetzer, respected professors emeritus of theology and philosophy who have spewed so much rubbish about events that morning that many in the movement no longer take them seriously. Though claims have been made that part of the material has been peer reviewed none of the authors are wrote about subjects related to their areas of specialty.

Getting off to a bad start - numerous errors in the 1st Chapter

The first chapter is a case in point, I only skimmed through it but that was enough to discover numerous errors including long debunked canards.The author claimed that, the “passenger lists” “released by the airlines” didn’t have any Arab names.But the lists on CNN and other media outlets were clearly labeled VICTIMS lists which obviously would preclude the perpetrators. He cited the CNN lists which even have the word “victims” in their urls. If that didn’t make it obvious enough the page the lists were linked from is clearly labeled a “memorial”.

Nothing on the CNN pages or similar ones indicates the source of the names was the airlines, CNN only cited AP, the pages contained personal information the airlines would not have. They were based on MEDIA reports not info from the airlines as the CNN Memorial “about this site” page made clear:This memorial lists those who died in New York City, Washington, D.C. and Pennsylvania when terrorists hijacked four U.S. planes on September 11, 2001. The list includes those listed as "confirmed dead" and "reported dead" by the Associated Press which defines the terms as follows:

• CONFIRMED DEAD Includes victims who have been confirmed dead by a coroner's office or the Defense Department. It also includes those a court has declared
legally dead, even if no body has been recovered. Once the court has made such a
finding, a death certificate can be issued.
• REPORTED DEAD Includes those whose deaths have been reported by family, employers, mortuaries, places of worship or by the airlines that listed them as aboard one of the four flights. Includes people for whom memorial services have been held, even if their bodies have not been recovered or positively identified. (Those identified by federal authorities as the hijackers are not included). Personal information
accompanying the individual records comes from CNN reports, newspaper obituaries
and information submitted by friends and family. The photos were submitted to
CNN by friends or family of the victims or used with permission from media
partners as noted on each photo. The site was archived in August 2004.

He claimed that the passenger manifests were never released but as reported by CBS the Boston Globe released those of the two flights that originated in their city two days after the attacks.And all four lists were released by the government for the Moussui trial either before or just after press time for the first edition but well before the supposedly revised paperback edition.

Kolar wrote:

In an early, September 12, 2001 disclosure, CNN reported being provided with a
list of 19 hijackers from the flight manifests which the FBI presumably
possessed.(15) This particular list of 19 is instructive for the kinds of errors
it contains and for the four names the FBI had quickly changed. Two of these
corrections involved the deletion of Adnan and Ameer Bukhari who were called
brothers in most press releases (for example, Allison, 2001). (16)

Adnan and Ameer Bukari it turns out weren't brothers and weren’t on either flight, one died earlier and the other was questioned by the FBI and eventually cleared but neither of the cited sources (articles in CNN and the St. Petersburg Times) said the Bukharis were suspected hijackers let alone they were on the flight manifests. They were just two of many Arabs who had pilot training in Florida 2000 – 2001 that the FBI looked into. The CNN article did say:
“We would like to correct a report that appeared on CNN. Based on information from multiple law enforcement sources, CNN reported that Adnan Bukhari and Ameer Bukhari of Vero Beach Florida, were suspected to be two of the pilots who crashed planes into the World Trade Center.”
But there is no indication their names came from the flight manifests or any “press releases” or that CNN claimed to have been “provided with a list of 19 hijackers from the flight manifests”

An earlier CNN article which said the Bukaris were suspects because they were tied to a car found at the Portland (Maine) airport said its source for the names was the Portland police not the FBI so it doesn't seem to have come from the flight manifests. According to Wikipedia (no citation) “later reports continued to suggest that Adnan Bukhari fell under suspicion because of documents found within the car” that would fit with the Portland police being the source.

Further undermining Kolar's claim is the fact that 2 "truther" esays on the Bukhari discrepancy, one by David Ray Griffin and the other on What Really Happened make no mention of such a list with their names on it. But cite several news reports from the day following the attacks, neither claims that the FBI said they were among the hijackers or that they or anyone said they were on the manifests. The sources seem to be local law enforcement as yet another CNN story indicates. The supposed FBI list including the two Saudis seems to be a figment of Kolar's imagination and poor scholarship.

The uncollaborating witneses

2008-03-09T18:43:00.000-04:00

In my previous post I showed that Amanda Keller, who claimed at one point to have been Mohamed Atta's girlfriend, contadicted herself various times. Just as her story contradicts itself the named witnesses Hopsicker cites as backing her claims contradict themselves and/or Keller. Hopsicker cites four supporting witnesses from the Sandpiper Apartments where Amanda Keller and Mohamed Atta supposedly lived together March – late April or early May 2001. Charles Grapentine the building’s manager spoke to the Sarasota Sun-Herald shortly after the attacks and was cited in an article published September 14, 2001.

“While attending flight school at Huffman Aviation in Venice, Mohamed Atta, 33, and Marwan Alshehhi, 23, lived with four other Middle Eastern students near Venice Airport at Sandpiper Apartments.

The six Middle Eastern men shared a two-bedroom, two-bathroom apartment in unit 26, said Charles Grapentine, manager of the apartments.

Huffman Aviation rented the unit at $550 a month,…The flight school then subletted the unit to its students, …Huffman Aviation charged each of the six Middle Eastern flight students $225 a month to live in the apartment, Grapentine said …Students were charged an additional $50 fee for cleaning costs, Grapentine said.

It is unknown how long the six men resided at Sandpiper Apartments before leaving in early January of this year. The complex's owner, Vicky Kyser, told the Sun she is turning the leases over to the FBI”

Grapentine wasn’t quoted as to when they stayed but the paper, seemingly citing the owner, said they left in “early January". He did however indicate that Atta had lived in apartment 26 with five other Middle Eastern men all of whom were students at Huffman Aviation. Interestingly according to Hopsicker, Keller (and Atta) also lived in apartment 26.

A few days later however Grapentine’s story changed. Hopsicker cited the following passage which he claimed at times came from “a Sept 15 AP story” and at others from a September 18 article in the Sarasota Herald-Tribune. The later scenario more likely because Hopsicker posted an image of the article, the author was a staff writer at the local paper :

“However, Atta may have been in Venice as recently as April. Charles Grapentine, he manager of Sandpiper Apartments on Airport Avenue in Venice, said he remembers seeing Atta at the complex for about three weeks in April. He said Atta was living in the apartment of Amanda Keller.”

So did Grapentine remember seeing Atta living with five other Middle Eastern students from Huffman for a few months presumably until January or did he remember seeing him staying with Keller for a few weeks in April? Or did see him in the same apartment months apart in dramatically different living situations? If that’s what happened why didn’t he say both times that Atta lived there twice? No other witnesses say he was there twice.

His wife and boss seems to have supported his original account they were interviewed for a different September 14 Sun Herald article.

"Paula Grapentine immediately recognized the face of a suspected terrorist who may have trained for the World Trade Center attacks at Huffman Aviation in Venice. He was her next-door neighbor.

Postal Carrier Neil Patton also recollects the names and faces of Mohamed Atta, 33, Marwan Alshehhi, 23, and four other Middle Eastern flight school students.

The lived at the Sandpiper Apartments, unit 26, in Venice until earlier this year.

[…]

But the Grapentines, who manage Sandpiper and Lemon Bay Apartments, didn't like the six men -- especially Atta.

[…]

The students reportedly smoked a strange tobacco which smelled like marijuana, [the apartment complex's owner, Vicky] Kyser said. "

Though Hopsicker cites the mailman, as a supporting witness he also indicated that the man he thought was Atta lived in apartment 26 till early January with several other Middle Eastern men, not that he lived with Keller in March and April.

The Sun obtained a handwritten list of names the FBI is reportedly pursuing Thursday: Gamil, Rami, Mukadam, Ibrahim and Mogadem. Stapled to the list FBI agents gave Patton was a special agent's business card. The FBI would not confirm or deny the pursuit of these five individuals.

Patton said he remembered all the above-mentioned names as those being used by some of the six Middle Eastern students allegedly attending Huffman Aviation.

Atta also may have gone by the name Youseff, Patton said.

He delivered no unusual mail at the Venice address, Patton said.

Only once was a 8-by-3-inch box mailed to the apartment, he said. Patton stopped delivering mail to the men at Sandpiper Apartments on Jan. 18, 2001 -- which means they probably moved out seven to 10 days before, he said.

But even Patton seems a bit unsure he seems to have told the paper he recognized both the real names and pseudonyms of the hijackers.

Hopsicker does have two other witnesses who said Atta lived with Keller, one is anonymous and supposedly a former manager at Huffman. This presents two problems one is there is no way to determine his credibility; the other is that there is no way to verify that he said what Hopsicker claims he did. As I will demonstrate in a future post Hopsicker can’t even be trusted to accurately and honestly report what local newspapers reported thus his claims as to what unnamed sources supposedly told him must be taken with a bag of salt. He claims the then flight school employee “vividly remembers her then-hot pink hair,” Which seems quite unlikely, are we to believe that Atta a known quantity at the school was seen there moths after he supposedly left with such a conspicuous companion and no one else seems to remember seeming them?

The other witness however seems credible enough, Keller’s next door neighbor, a housewife named Stephanie Frederickson. But like Neil Patton (the mail man) Vicky Kyser (the building owner), Paula Grapentine and even Charles Grapentine in his original account, she contradicts part of Keller’s story. Hopsicker cited her in a 2004 newsletter.

"Amanda moved in next door first, saying she had come from Orange Park (near Jacksonville," Frederickson says. "Then one day in the middle of March (of 2000) she brought home Atta. ‘I’d like you to meet my friend Mohamed Atta,’ she said to me. ‘He’s from France.’"

However according to Keller, that’s not the name she knew “Atta” by. In chapter 3 of his book Hopsicker quotes Keller as telling him “The name on the [rent] check was Mohamed Arajaki, the name he said was his.” Two chapters later he tells his readers “She knew him as Mohamed Arajaki, which was also the name on the [bail] check. " He said this on his site as well “The alias Atta used, we have learned, was “Mohamed Arajaki,” the same one he used with Amanda Keller while living in the Sandpiper Apartments in Venice.”

If Frederickson actually told Hopsicker that Atta and Keller moved together in March 2000, that would also be a serious discrepancy because his current theory is that they were a couple February – April or May 2001. At the time though Hopsicker’s theory was that they were together in 2000 thus he presumably put words in her mouth. Either Frederickson or Hopsicker looses credibility over this one take your pick.

The mutating tales of Amanda Keller

2008-03-07T15:33:00.000-05:00

Truther’s frequently talk about Mohamed Atta’s supposedly un-Islamic behavior. They talk of him drinking heavily, living with a pink haired stripper - “out call lingerie” model/escort named Amanda Keller and normally cite the work of “independent journalist” Daniel Hopsicker. Keller is Hopsicker’s star witness and as far I can tell is the only person who says Atta smuggled and used cocaine.

As anyone following the story already knows she said she had lived with Atta a few days after 9/11, then retracted it, then reaffirmed it to Hopsicker saying she’d been pressured by the FBI. Then in 2006 she retracted it again saying "It was my bad for lying," according to the reporter “…the former Venice stripper now says her boyfriend was another flight student not connected to 9/11”

The retraction, reaffirmation and second retraction were not the only changes in her story as Hopsicker should well be aware because all the information I cite can be found on his site or in his book.

The story that Atta lived with Keller didn’t originate with Hopsicker but rather with stories in local papers. On Saturday, September 22 (?) the Sarasota Herald-Tribune reported:

In a telephone interview late Friday, Keller said she met Atta through a friend and let him stay in the apartment with her and her then-boyfriend, Garrett Metts, because she felt sorry for him…

[…]

Payne [Keller’s mother] said Keller’s mother took Atta in because he had nowhere to stay
“Stray dogs, stray cats, stray people, she was always taught to help anybody out there when they needed help,” Payne said.

In other words she was living with Metts when she met Atta and they let him stay with them (sorta like a stray dog). Unless it was a ménage a trios he wasn’t her boyfriend.

Then on September 22 or 23 she and her family spoke to reporters for an article in the same paper subtitled “"Mohammed" slept on her couch, a Venice woman says”. Though she was now saying that he wasn’t Atta, Keller and even her mother confirmed that Mohamed stayed over while she was involved with Metts:
Susan Payne, Keller's mother, said her daughter and then-boyfriend Garrett Metts often took in strangers at her apartment.

The two were popular, Payne said, and people often stayed there after nights of partying and visiting the clubs.

Mohammed, Tammy Payne said, often went out clubbing, usually at Margarita Maggie's in Sarasota.

In an interview at her mother's house, Keller wouldn't talk about the man who stayed on her couch.

By the time she spoke to Hopsicker her story became quite a bit racier and more dramatic. Mohamed (she rarely if ever called him Atta in interviews) were live-in boyfriend and girlfriend sharing a bed until their dramatic break up on the night she met Garret. Here's how she and Hopsicker told it the first chapter of his book:
“I was up there with a whole bunch of other girls and Angelina. And this cute guy was dancing right below us, and the light was hitting him, and he had this long beautiful hair, and he looked at me, and I got real embarrassed."

The 'cute guy's name was Garret, we heard.

[…]

“He (Garret) wrapped his shirt around my legs and was dirty dancing with me”

[…]

“He [Mohamed] asked me about Garret, saying, 'Who's that?"'

"And I said, 'I guess he's the new one.'…”

That night Amanda went home with her new beau. Things were never the same between her and Atta again.

[…]

One night soon after meeting Garret, the 'hot new guy', she brought him back to the apartment. She told Atta he could deal with it. He could move out.

The hot new guy was sleeping over. The hot new guy was in the 'big bed.' Atta was on the couch. After discussing what she should do with the apartment house manager, who corroborated her story, Amanda Keller unceremoniously dumped Atta's three suitcases and Gold's gym bag onto the parking lot underneath their second floor apartment, and called him a cab.

To make a long story short she lived with Atta 3 – 6 weeks (accounts vary) then dumped him and hooked up with Garret, let Atta spend a few nights on the sofa then kicked him out.

So Keller now has three or four versions of events depending on how you count:

1st she said she let Atta stay over while she was living with her “then boyfriend” Garret Metts” (conveniently dead by 9/11).

Then she said the Mohamed who slept over wasn’t Atta but someone else named Mohamed.

Then she same back with an even juicier story, she was having an affair with Atta but dumped him to live with Metts.

Finally she went back to a variation of the 2nd version. She’d lied, Mohamed wasn’t Atta after all. AFAIK she hasn’t been heard from since. But even her retractions didn’t match, in the first one Mohamed was a guy who’d crashed on her couch in the second he’d been her boyfriend.

But those weren’t the only changes her story underwent.

Where did Keller meet Atta and where did she work at the time?

Story # 1a – She met him at the airport bar and was as an out-call 'lingerie model' / escort.

From issue 27 of the Mad Cow Morning News (Hopsicker’s newsletter)

During her year-long sojourn in Venice Amanda Keller was a willowy 20-year old bleached-blond, who met Atta at a bar at the airport, the 44th Aero Squadron), was an out-call 'lingerie model' for an escort service called Fantasies & Lace in nearby Sarasota, not far from Cheetah's, a nearby strip club Atta is known to have frequented .

From issue 29 of the Mad Cow Morning News

"She told us she met him at the bar at the 44th Aero," states Frederickson [Keller’s next door neighbor]. "They were remodeling and the 44th Aero wasn't open yet, but the bar was still doing business...

[...]

"That's when she started dressing really slutty, and dyeing her hair pink," Frederickson continues

Story # 1b – She was as an out-call 'lingerie model' / escort. Possibly met him at a strip club where she worked.

From Chapter 1 of Hopsicker’s book Welcome to Terrorland

When she 'hooked-up' with Atta, Amanda Keller was a willowy 20 year-old 'lingerie model' and stripper with spiky pink hair. She worked nights for an escort service called Fantasies & Lingerie which catered to a mixed crowd of politicians, judges, high-rollers and socialites of both sexes, just down the street from Cheetah's, a strip club Atta was known to frequent in nearby Sarasota.

He didn’t say where they met but tells us 1) she was a stripper and escort, 2) Atta frequented a strip club close to the escort service she worked for. Call me crazy me he seems to be implying they met at “Cheetah’s”.

Story # 2a – She met him at Papa John’s Pizza when she was the manager, became and escort soon after that:

From Chapter 5 of Hopsicker’s book Welcome to Terrorland :

Keller was a restaurant manager when she met Atta, she will tell us later. Before she switched to a more lucrative line of work, she managed the local Papa John's. And it is there she first met Atta, which is why -- two days after the attack -- the FBI was looking for Amanda Keller ...

It is interesting to note that Hopsicker completely contradicted himself in chapters 1 and 5 without even seeming to notice.

Story # 2b She met him at Papa John’s Pizza where she worked, was the manager at the time or was later promoted to manager with in a few months, seems to still have been the manager until shortly before 9/11.

A September 14, 2001 article in the Sun-Herald recounted that Florida state police visited Tony and Vonnie LaConca the previous day because on February 21, 2001 they rented a house for one week to Amanda Keller and “Mohamed”, they suspected that Mohamed was Mohamed Atta:

Keller, who allegedly met Mohamed while working at Papa John's Pizza in Venice, told the couple [the LaConca’s] she would translate because Mohamed spoke limited English

[…]

A Papa John's employee confirmed that Keller was a manager there, but has not been to work for some time.
Presumably she told the Laconca’s that she “met Mohamed while working at Papa John's Pizza” because they said she did all the talking.

Hopsicker could argue that versions 2a and 2b don’t contradict each other but the newspaper article seemed to indicate she was a manager there till not longer before 9/11. Hopsicker tells us she was an escort during their relationship, most of it from the sounds of it. They were together by February 21 and depending on which version you want to believe they broke up sometime in April or early – mid May. While one can’t infer too much from an indirect quote it’s hard to believe that if she hadn’t been in for 5 – 6 months the employee would still she was a manager there even if they said she had “not been to work for some time.”

But Amanda isn’t alone in making contradictory comments. All three of her named supporting witnesses contradict themselves and/or her story. But that will have to wait till next time.

Intro

2008-03-07T15:28:00.000-05:00

I admit that I have no doubts that most members of the “truth movement” sincerely believe all the nonsense that they spout. I even think that most of the “leaders” of the movement, the ones who run the sites and write the books make the videos etc believe all of what they purport. However all too many of them present the facts in a less than honest fashion: quotes are taken out of context, contrary information omitted, rumors are reported as fact etc others are too blinded by their preconceived notions to see the fallacies of their theories. I did want a blog title that would garner attention and ‘The Misconceptions of the Truth Movement’ just wouldn’t have the same ring to it.

I will address specific errors made by leading “truthers” and will erase any generic replies that have nothing to do with the entry topic. In other words if the entry is about Amanda Keller contradicting herself replies going on about the debris from flight 93 or Silverman’s “pull it comment” etc etc will be deleted.