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Actually Paul Jay does most of the talking. It's still worth the 20 minutes.
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John Kiriakou on Why Didn't Bush/Cheney Prevent 9/11? (28 posts)
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Posted 9 years ago #
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This kind of journalism makes me uncomfortable. The host's highly-produced lectures with lots of pictures and video resources and the lack of two-shots of the host and the guest together lead to reasonable concerns that the guest's statements may have been presented in a distorted context.
Posted 9 years ago # -
I don't think there's any reason for that concern. It's a multi-part interview and RNN is legit.
Posted 9 years ago # -
The only reason for that alleged concern is because Kiriakou pointed out the "demolition" claim is BS.
I read the entire series, it was excellent and I didn't see any hint of distorting his comments. Interesting to read how he slowly shed his illusions through the years, it reminded me of Phil Agee's memoir.
Posted 9 years ago # -
The reason for the concern is the impression the reporting style gives to people (like me) who are new to RNN.
When the NYT cites anonymous sources we give them the benefit of the doubt because they are the NYT. When Veterans Today cites anonymous sources, we snicker.
You guys may have evaluated RNN's credibility and you guys trust them. Newbies have not evaluated their credibility. Yes, we can suppose that if Mr. Kiriakou did a five-part series with them he was probably satisfied with the first part before he went on to the fifth.
I listened to a recent Ray McGovern interview in which he alleged that Dr. King was murdered by government operatives. The interview was done at a Mendocino County radio station and in it the host made a number of highly incredible allegations--and Ray didn't say a peep. Obviously Ray has a policy of not challenging his host--a wise policy unless Ray wants to get himself a reputation as a difficult guest. Still, I find it quite dismaying that a guy of the stature of Ray McGovern thinks he has to grovel at the feet of a backwoods conspiracy theorist.
Posted 9 years ago # -
Well, you shouldn't trust anything an ex-intelligence officer has to say. Once CIA, always CIA. As we saw with Richard Clarke, the CIA came out of 9/11 with it's own counter-narrative that very clearly intended to lay the blame at the feet of the Executive branch. We have no reason to think anything anyone CIA affiliated has had to say is the whole truth. It's all limited hangout.
That being said, facts are facts. You take every source only on it's factual merits while accepting the fact that you can't trust any source.
Posted 9 years ago # -
"If the organizing principle is that the government lies, but there's no organizing principle to how you get to the truth, then anything is possibly the truth. People will organize around disinformation just as easily as information. The way covert operations do effective disinformation is they give the truth to the people who are discredited and they give the lie to the people who have great credibility - the way they disinform from both ends and confuse people. They put out stories - as we know from the assassinations - that will lead us down false paths, that will lead us to false sponsorships."
-- John Judge, Coalition on Political Assassinations, conference on the 37th anniversary of the assassination of Robert F. Kennedy, June 5, 2005
Posted 9 years ago # -
Great quote Mark.
Posted 9 years ago # -
I don't "trust" ex-intel people. We've all seen how credulity works out for truthjihadists and Veterans Today.
I do regard it as newsworthy when they say something surprising that's verifiable, or that jibes with what we've confirmed elsewhere. I listen. I pay attention when they identify avenues for further research.
Richard Clarke's revelations in the spring of 2004 about the warnings the Bushcists ignored got me started on my activist career. But when I went to see him at a book signing and he ended his talk by holding up the 9/11 Commission Report and recommending that everyone buy it I had to wonder if he was playing at false modesty or what. But I still take his information seriously.
Ray McGovern I first saw when he appeared with Scott Ritter and Medea Benjamin in 2005. He claimed that the CIA did not torture. I did not believe him. I think he has altered his position since then. I'm not aware that he has made any other incredible claims.
Annie Machon had an appealing ex-intel story and took a good photo. But you had to wonder why she associated herself with the nonsense Shayler was delivering in the UK and that janitor's impossible hero story. I confronted her at one of the Santa Cruz conferences saying she was much too smart to believe any of that nonsense and I was very disappointed in her. All she had to say was "Well, we all have to live with our disappointment, don't we?"
About a year ago an ex-intel guy initiated a conversation and we spent a couple of hours together before an event with which he was associated. Nice guy, interesting talk. It creeped me out when he decided he didn't need to appear on the panel after all (after he'd flown out to CA from VA or MD or somewhere)--and when I realized that he looked enough like me to be my cousin.
Speaking of ex-intel guys, William Binney has signed the AE911Truth petition.
Posted 9 years ago # -
Veterans Today seems like current intel, not ex.
Clarke has made some useful disclosures, although he doesn't connect the dots to intentionality (as in deliberately allowing the attacks). He seems to have evolved in his understand and willingness to say things.
McGovern recommends "JFK and the Unspeakable," which gets an A+ from me.
I never took Machon seriously.
I'm disappointed Binney would sign that truthiness petition.
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Phil Agee, perhaps the most famous intel whistleblower, had amazing material in his memoirs. But he never, ,as far as I remember, mentioned November 22, 1963 as relevant to the history of the Covert Intervention Agency. Nobody's perfect.
Posted 9 years ago # -
Hey, do you guys think we could find maybe two or three more people who would like to talk about this stuff without trolls. It seems like it's 4-6 people here for the past year or more. Anybody know anyone else interested?
Posted 9 years ago # -
Great idea, I would love to have a little more active discussion on here. I'm not always the most consistent poster, but I'll have a lot more time to participate than I've had in the last two years starting in about six weeks.
With the next presidential election coming up and a likely economic downturn, it might be a good time to have some conversations going.
Posted 9 years ago # -
I've got an idea. Why don't we just make a viral video to bring people to this site? :>)
Posted 9 years ago # -
We were never good at attracting the numbers. We could ask We Are Change to help us put together a hard hitting video that will appeal to all the disaffected truthers out there.
Regarding ex-intel/military/government guys, what was the final word on Bob Bowman and Paul Craig Roberts. Oh, I just remembered Morgan Reynolds for the first time in years.
I was skeptical of Edward Snowden when he first appeared and knocked Bradley Manning out of the news. I haven't followed the details that well, but I did see the movie. He seems pretty legit, but who knows. It's sad how much cynicism resulted from being part of the 9/11 movement.
Posted 9 years ago # -
I have no final word on Dr. Bowman or Dr. Reynolds or Dr. Roberts.
I much admired Dr. Bowman for his courage, his positions on the demilitarization of space, his very inspiring State of the Union fantasy suggesting that the President could outlaw imperialism, and his pithy position on 9/11: "The truth about 9/11 is that we don't know the truth about 9/11, and we should!" I was baffled by his association with Dr. Barrett, and supposed that he must have just taken a liking to the poor guy and tried to do what he could through constructive engagement to straighten him out.
Dr. Reynolds made an extremely poor impression on me when he first surfaced with his claims that there was something wrong with the airplane impacts in the towers. As I recall, he thought there was evidence that the holes in the towers were caused by explosives inside the towers. I was not impressed by his claims.
Dr. Roberts has written some insightful and courageous essays on 9/11. I don't know anything bad about him. Haven't heard much out of him lately.
Whatever happened to SnowCrash? He seemed to be one of the smarter guys around and then he took over the truthaction site and created a lot of tension when after a general agreement not to discuss the physical evidence of the towers he deliberately instituted a campaign to discuss it. Then truthaction shut down and SnowCrash disappeared. What was that all about?
Aiming at disaffected truthers is an excellent idea. Their numbers are vast, and they are dissatisfied and underserved.
An alliance with We Are Change could potentially be very productive. Surely some of them have grown intellectually in recent years.
Cynicism is pretty pervasive in the Opposition generally--not just among truthers. I think the prevalence of cynicism is the single most destructive political force today. The people who can see what's going on and who care are being convinced that cultivating their own individual gardens is the only satisfying course--that we can't make any change in an inevitably corrupt world.
Posted 9 years ago # -
Brian,
While I respect your position as it reminds me of my own at an earlier point, I want to suggest that my position on these people and 'the movement' is not cynical but practical and based on direct experience. You said above about someone that most of their stuff was good but some wasn't. There's something in that statement I feel you are missing and I assert that it was exactly that oversight or lack of pragmatism that cause the movement to fall apart.
In a business or even personal setting we make exactly those sorts of allowances. People get to make mistakes. We do too so it's only natural that we'd be forgiving in that way. People can also be mislead and so even big mistakes can often be forgiven.
But that willingness to forgive can be a weakness and is easily exploited. And those attempting to undermine the movement focus their attention on exactly those weaknesses. This is how poisoning the well works and why EVERY shady character in the movement advocated the 'big tent' approach, which I spent so much time contesting.
In a radical movement to reframe mainstream fallacies that faces seriously organized opposition there is no room for those kinds of vulnerabilities. Sure, give people time to adapt. For two weeks I thought 'plane pods' were super interesting. But I kept digging and found out it was crap. I'm not an 'agent' because I was fooled. But I'm definitely not an agent because I learned better.
Specifically, there is no room for a 'big tent' approach. The 9/11 Truth Movement is exclusively about truth. It's not about speculation. It's not about conspiracy hobby. It's about fighting for justice by revealing facts.
Facts aren't slippery. The Terror Timeline isn't a disputed source. The movement stands on solid ground and anyone deeply committed to the movement has most highly prioritized those facts that lend the movement the greatest credibility. Anyone who knows that in the world they are doing would also steer clear of any facts that are in dispute as those create ambiguity and are exactly the information used to undermine the movement from within and without.
TruthMove realized this right up front. We had gone through out 'plane pods' phase long before the site went up. And one thing that was entirely clear to use, in contrast to those clearly trying to undermine the movement, was that the physical evidence was a honey pot. All the evidence we needed to make the case had already been presented before any 'scholar' every said one word about controlled demolition. You might think CD has merit, but that doesn't contradict my point. Stronger evidence is more important and is never discussed by the MSM because it's most threatening.
In fact you can very specifically look at how the MSM talks about 9/11 truth to know what to focus on. The MSM talks about CD because that whole area of focus was intentionally injected into the movement to undermine it. Back in 2005 when we first got started CD was crap that WingTV was pushing at 9/11 events and being laughed at. Since that time no important evidence has come to light. You might talk about thermite, and that's interesting, but it leads nowhere and the powers that be know that. Steven Jones is a shill, as are all the 'scholars.'
Steven Jones is the perfect example of what I'm trying to get at here. He was the darling of the movement to many people, after Griffin. Nice guy who couldn't possibly have bad intent. And he apparently did a lot to support the movement.
But then some false opposition came up next to him, which is a sure sign that he's not legit either. One of the most common tactics I saw used was false opposition to bolster support. And then he pulls the whole thing down around him with a flameout, which is another classic tactic, promoting anti-physics garbage with his free energy BS.
Now, while I couldn't know for certain, the odds favor him being shady the whole time. No, he wasn't a good guy who took a wrong turn. He was a shady guy who fulfilled his purpose of undermining the credibility of the movement. We saw just about everyone who came to prominence after 2005 do exactly the same thing. And in contrast the honest sources always held their ground. John Judge never promoted stupid crap. Paul Thompson and Mike Ruppert never promoted crap.
Snowcrash. Did you interact with him before and after? I never trusted him. He was smart and made some good arguments against CIT. He seemed to be on the right side of things for a while. But then he didn't change his mind. He showed his true colors.
The people running 911blogger. Big tenters. They were perfectly willing to promote people and events that clearly undermined 9/11 truth. Why? Because they gave people the benefit of the doubt. Because of the false notion that it's better to have more people involved than the right people. Because they were listening to short sighted people telling giving them bad advice. And likely because someone had infiltrated and was steering them in the wrong direction.
I've been behind the scenes for many of the more prominent things that happened in the movement since 2005. Many times I was the only person standing up for strategy that's been demonstrated to be critical for generations. 9/11 truth isn't the first movement to face subterfuge. And I was there arguing with some of the most prominent people involved about why the big tent could not work and why we can't trust people who have ever EVER advocated BS when presented with contrary facts.
Put another way, there is ZERO room for CIT because it was an intelligence operation. Anyone who can't see that fact should not hold an influential position in the movement. Anyone who gets that CIT was a poison pill and allows it to have a voice is not able to defend the movement against attack.
Basically, most people never really understood how vulnerable the movement was. Most people never learned about counter-subterfuge tactics. Most people never got that friendly people could mean to do the movement harm or do harm based on ignorance.
Posted 9 years ago # -
An alliance with We Are Change could potentially be very productive. Surely some of them have grown intellectually in recent years.
You may have realized this, but I was being sarcastic. At the same time, you're probably right about many of them inevitably growing over the years. I have an anecdotal sense that many people who were enamored with Alex Jones stopped taking him seriously.
Even if we wanted to, I don't think WAC would have anything to do with us. They probably think we are agents and elitists.
I wholeheartedly agree with truthmover that a small responsible group of activists could have accomplished infinitely more than the millions of dupes who got sucked into 9/11 truth. Maybe that is elitist, but you must realize that the real ELITES are in the business of managing their opposition.
TruthMove never offered the outlet for lazy self-righteousness and psychological displacement that those other, more popular groups did.
BTW, what's your take on Carol Brouillet? I'm amazed that they still have regular N. CA 9/11 Truth meetings.
Posted 9 years ago # -
A small group of activists cold have accomplished more, as you say.
I probably have not laid eyes on Carol Brouillet in over a year, so I can't provide any reliable commentary on her. I'm intending one of these days to attend a meeting.
Posted 9 years ago # -
Sometimes members of the NorCal911Truth Alliance copy me on group emails. Last summer I was invited to participate in discussion of a proposal to have Barbara Honegger appear at the yearly 9/11 film festival in Oakland. I did a very critical review of Ms. Honegger's contribution to the Toronto truth hearings a few years ago and as far as I know she was not invited to participate. I intended to go but found myself kind of busy and did not. Oakland is not as close as it used to be for me when I was younger, just a very few years ago.
It appears that the sff911truthalliance googlegroup is very thinly trafficked. I was an administrator there and suddenly lost not only my administrative status but my ability to post at all.
One guy who was a very responsible 9/11 researcher (Stanford degree) and in fact was the first 9/11 activist I met face to face (back in the spring of 2005) told me he had quit attending after many years. I didn't question him about it, but it appears that he objected to the group's recent sponsorship of an appearance by Christopher Bollyn. I'd intended to attend the Bollyn appearance to give the guy a fair hearing and perhaps ask him some questions, but again 50 miles seemed like a long way to drive and I didn't.
Posted 9 years ago # -
Carol Brouillet is totally big tent.
Posted 9 years ago # -
In my experience, not "totally". When I started working with Carol in 2005 she was very careful and enjoyed the demonstrated respect of Dr. Peter Dale Scott and Dr. Daniel Ellsberg. Had she advocated at that time any anti-federal reserve dogma or even any anti-fluoride stuff I would have run not walked.
By 2007 she had bought in to the Big Tent and was advocating nonsense like Barrett's sick "Vendetta" fantasies and Rodriguez's con artistry and the Portland False Nuclear Flag hysteria and Dr. True Ott's bird flu hysteria, and she sided with Tarpley in the Kennebunkport fiasco. I objected to all of this, and after I lost my status as her loyal sidekick she allowed liars like Barrett and Rodriguez and Ranke to slander me.
But I'm humble. What have I achieved? I have a great deal of respect for what Mrs. Brouillet was and could have been and still could be. She is an inspiring and enormously courageous woman who has contributed greatly to to our fight against darkness. I will always respect her, weakness, warts, and all.
Posted 9 years ago # -
When I worked with Mrs. Carol Brouillet in 2006 she was hostile as your are to the physical evidence of Ground Zero. She said it was waste of time. I said that even so, it was interesting to me because I had college training in Newtonian physics, and practical empirical experience in construction, and so I was interested in the mysteries.
Posted 9 years ago # -
I saw that transition as well. She got duped. The big tent infiltrators were able to rally people in the way they do, using appeals to inclusion and guilt trips about exclusion.
The problem I have with Carol is that there were a group of us, all thoughtful and reputable, who reached out to people like her and people like Richard Gage on a regular basis very carefully spelling out the risks of poisoning the well and how that would clearly be a tactic of infiltrators. We were also very clear about the absolutely disgusting behavior of people like Barrett. Behavior that was so bad that really, anyone who cared about the movement should clearly recognize the risk of association.
... Crickets. No response. No dialog. Just some bland statement about getting along and silence.
I don't accept that coming from anyone in a leadership position in a radical movement working against the establishment that is so subject to subterfuge. It's lazy, it's disrespectful, and it's just ignorant.
Posted 9 years ago # -
Brouillet's Deception Dollar campaign was marketing genius.
But also fatally flawed.
When I first saw them, she had American Free Press as a recommended website on the DD's. I didn't know who they were, I just thought they were a right wing effort. I had allies who agreed about the Reichstag Fire paradigm who also were anti-fascists who clued me in to the fact so-called AFP was just the new name for the Liberty Lobby, the notorious neo-Nazi Holocaust deniers. At least the DDs stopped promoting them but then promoted lots of other nonsense. There was never any editorial filter to fact check, which was a microcosm for the 9/11 Half Truth Movement.
Claiming that 9/11 was a bunch of "mysteries" helps cover up the crime of letting it happen. I recommend Vince Salandria's "False Mysteries" to see how this approach sunk the JFK research effort.
There's not really any overlap in substance between "The Complete 9/11 Timeline" and "Truth and Lies of 9/11" on the informed side and the "no planes" and "demolition" BS on the disinformation side.
Posted 9 years ago # -
tm, I agree that she got duped. In the fall of 2006 the truth movement was getting respectful treatment from TIME magazine and Mrs. Brouillet had run a respectable campaign for Congress and things were going so swimmingly that I asked myself "OK, what's going to fuck this up?"
I was at that time in denial of the fact that the super-dupers were already in place. She had already told me that Kevin Barrett and William Rodriguez were going to be "great assets to the movement". They were assets all right.
Carol asked me to write a review of William Rodriguez's DVD of his presentation in Los Angeles. I watched it and found it pretty compelling, and I drafted a favorable review. But then I dug a bit deeper than most do, and I found that he was claiming that the "hondreds" of office workers that he saved with his Key of Hope were trapped behind locked fire exit doors. I knew that was impossible because I have worked as a security guard and a janitor and I know that fire exit doors are not locked. So I told Carol that I could not recommend his DVD. I was thus utterly shocked when I heard that Willie was to be featured at a 600-seat theater in Oakland with Cindy Sheehan a year later. I proposed at the meeting approving this that the san francisco 9/11 truth alliance re-name itself as the "inter-galactic 9/11 hell of a good story alliance" but my proposal did not pass.
At the architects and engineers group I was assigned to review and adapt the statement of principles that your group adopted. Unfortunately I was so overworked I was never able to finalize the issue. I have had many disagreements with the ae group and I resigned from the board in protest over their tolerance of the bigoted and violence-mongering Kevin Barrett. But if I thought that Richard Gage was lying as I thought that Barrett, Rodriguez, and Ranke were lying, I would be protesting Gage today.
Posted 9 years ago #
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