Has anyone read this yet? I would be interested in reading some reviews.
I see that Michael Ruppert wrote an extremely glowing review - and i tend to trust his judgment - but so far i am seeing very little meat and potatoes.
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Reviews of "The Shell Game" (32 posts)
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Posted 16 years ago #
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"The Shell Game" by Steve Alten - A rough review
(Haven't written a book review since the 6th grade)
Spoiler Alert!!!
Plot
The book is centered around a conspiracy by neo-cons and corrupt military personnel to nuke two U.S. cities as a pretext to invade Iran and take out their nuclear capacity. The plot is hatched in 2007 and the attack is to take place in...you guess it, 2012. The protagonist, a petroleum scientist working for big oil, is lead to try to prevent this from happening when his ex-CIA wife is assassinated just after telling him about the false flag plot. But not before we get a lot of lecturing about peak oil.
Here, I'll skip a bunch of the details which are in place simply to add intrigue.
So our main character puts some of the pieces together with the help of clues and friends of his wife, that help him to recognize that his wife had a whole plan in effect apparently to thwart the conspiracy. That involves our hero getting a copy of Promis software into a Saudi bank so that his wife's sister can run a Robin Hood operation to steal all the money from corrupt people all over the world, and spend it on good things, like an honest candidate for President.
Our main character gets caught uploading the software and spends the next few chapters being tortured in all manner of ways. In the mean time, his wife's sister is successful in stealing all of the Saudi royal family's money, in addition to that of major US defense contractors.
During all of the above the plot to nuke the US cities is coming together with an angry US nuclear physicist, whose father was killed in Nagasaki, building two bombs from scratch within our borders while others set up patsies and a trail of clues that lead back to Iran. The patsies were once good people who have been wronged by US intervention and turned to the dark side.
So at some point in here the centrist Republican president is assassinated, and his neocon VP takes over. Meanwhile the candidate being funded and coached toward an environmental platform by the sister of the protagonists wife is becoming hugely popular and threatening to win the race. Some rogue FBI agent ends up getting wind of the nuke plot, and tips off his superiors just before he gets killed.
Then we get an extended explanation of what would happen if LA got nuked, as the bomb in Chicago is deactivated one minute before its going to go off, miraculously saving the main characters children from certain death. The result is that the neocon VP places the country under marshal law, and suspends the election, thwarting the plan to get the green candidate in office.
At this point we start to follow the military plan to bomb Iran, while our main character tries to get the attention of the press in order to indicate that the whole thing was a false flag op. We see that the plan to attack Iran includes bombing large civilian areas with VX nerve gas with the intention of eradicating the population. Our main character gets the word out before then, with the help of an honorable act of treason by a navy general, and the tip off from the dead FBI agent.
Then we get the back room deals that help the US save face in which our main character trades his future safety and that of his family for never revealing what he knows about the attack. The truth is obscured, our green candidate wins the election, billions of dollars are invested into green energy, and our main character realizes that his ex-wife was actually not trying to prevent the attack but using him as a pawn in a global game of chess with no winners.
Structure
Each of the books many short chapters begin with a page of all our favorite 'truth movement' quotes. They include the more prominent 9/11 truth quotes, many about oil and war, and a few juicy quotes from Revelations, as if one nuke going off in LA were the apocalypse. These serve as a factual counterpoint to the rest of the book which includes a great deal of fact for a book of fiction. At the end of the book the author attempts to provide some sourcing for a number of the assertions made throughout the book in order to distinguish fact from fiction.
Also, at various points throughout the book, the author includes an "excerpt" from the murdered wife's memoir. These also serve the purpose for the author of allowing for the expression of factual information. In fact many of these 'excerpts' really sound like they are adapted from the content of "Crossing the Rubicon" which was certainly the major inspiration for this book.
The book, like many action and intrigue novels, jumps around between several plot lines. This makes it easy to read as the chapters are rather short. In a similar manner, this book seems to jump back and forth between plot and thinly veiled factual presentation. For people who know many of these facts, that can seem a bit obvious, and distract from the story line. But this mix is quite obviously a central strategy of the book, intending to fool the audience into reading some history.
The book is not very well edited. It contains a high number of spelling errors, and could quite easily have been fifty pages shorter. The length of the book, 450 pages, I would attribute to the amount of factual information the author injected into the book. He faced the dilemma in the end of cutting story or cutting fact, and it seems he just couldn't do either. If the intent was to keep the average reader interested, its a bit long winded at times.
Content
The book does something that while strategically savvy, is also somewhat objectionable to me. It pushed all our buttons and is rather manipulative of the audience. One might argue that in a society so used to acting on the basis of our fears, that one would have to play on fear in order to get a message across. But one could also argue that people acting out of fear do not act rationally.
The book pressed three topics really hard. First that a nuclear attack in this country is totally inevitable, whether by terrorist hand or false flag operation. Second that the Saudi royal family is the most corrupt group of people in the world next to the neocons. And third, that peak oil implies the need for our civilization to immediately change course.
That last point was the books strongest, and definitely the most rationally presented. The problem was well described and solutions were offered. Unfortunately the author seemed to have missed reading any research that suggests that ethanol requires more calories of petroleum to produce than calories of energy that result, despite the fact that the petroleum requirements for farming were clarified elsewhere in the book.
The concept that a nuclear attack in the country was inevitable was the biggest fear tactic used in the book. It seemed at times that the author was suggesting that if we didn't wean ourselves of dependency on oil, that we would get nuked. I suppose that's possible, but that's not necessarily what motivates me to act.
And the treatment of the Saudi royal family, while likely fair, seemed to include some measure of bias. In fact, the portrayal of people from the middle east in the book was perhaps stereotypical in places. There were no significant characters in the book of middle-easter descent that were portrayed in a positive light. Only bad people who used to be good but were done wrong by the West. In fact, if this were made into a movie, I think all the actors would be White good guys, and bad Arabs. I'm not sure that the author intended for this to be the case, but I get a sense of some typical anglo-centrism.
The author over-simplifies US intelligence operations with an FBI good, CIA bad theme. There is little mention of the NSA, or DIA. This is problematic for me because of books I've read like Richard Clarke's "Against All Enemies" which was quite apparently an attempt to bolster the reputation of the CIA in order to counter the Bush administrations claim 9/11 was due to intelligence failures. In writing this book he claims to have consulted with private sources. I doubt strongly that these sources were without their own biases, and I have a concern that these biases may be apparent in the book. This is, unfortunately, very difficult to tease out of the content.
Finally, the main character spends a good portion of the middle of the book in a torture chamber having his testes electrocuted and his nails pulled out. The book gets rather Stephen King during this segment, and I've had a difficult time trying to figure why. Was this supposed to represent how difficult it can be for each of us to pursue the truth? Was this supposed to simply remind us that torture is happening, and its bad? Or was this meant to increase our sense of fear making us more receptive to the messages in the book. Personally I don't find torture to be engaging reading, nor do I think that it serves to draw in the reader. It makes you identify with the main character in sympathy, but in this case it appears highly excessive. I almost get the impression that the author just couldn't figure out what to do with the main character for a few chapters and so decided to keep him in the jail until he was relevant to the plot again. I think this would possibly cause many readers to put down the book and not pick it up again.
Final thoughts
The book is a mix of fact and fiction that will leave people who prefer either a bit frustrated. Its a bit preachy for fiction and a bit too Hollywood for fact. Those who already know about most of the facts in the book, and enjoy Tom Clancy and Stephen King books might get a bizarre thrill out of reading a work of fiction tailored to their particular interests. While many are excited at the potential for this book to bring 'truth movement' information into the mainstream arena, I'm not sure that its quite capable of that feat.
I do get the sense that the author means well, and don't think that this book is any kind of attempt at disinformation. However, the book does contain a number of biases and machinations that I think detract from the audiences reception of some of this facts and important themes.
Bottom Line
Instead of reading this book, read the first few chapters of "Crossing the Rubicon", and then go pick up the latest Tom Clancy or Stephen King novel.
Posted 16 years ago # -
This is all very disappointing.
If your review is accurate, which i trust it is, i would have to say that - from a 9/11 Truth standpoint - i would have to give the book a 'thumbs down.'
My impression from the advanced PR was that this was going to be a work of fiction - a story with fictional characters - imbedded in the real events of 9/11 - reflecting a higher truth.
i was expecting a Tom Clancy type story involving a 'good cop' who stumbles on FACTS associated with 9/11. I expected a fictional mystery/suspense story built around the events of 9/11 itself - perhaps with a wide cast of characters who stumble across the various inconvenient truths about 9/11 that we all have been studying.
Instead - it appears we have a fictional story revolving around a fiction event - set in the future - that perhaps SOUNDS like 9/11 - but proves NOTHING.
This sounds like another V for Vendetta - which also created fictional events to draw parallels to 9/11. while i appreciate the effort - it proves nothing.
very disappointing.
in fact - it sounds like quite a bit of neo-conservative philosophy has somehow made its way into the book. I have read quotes elsewhere that are very troubling.
and yes - i find the torture scene you described and troubling.
i suppose i will have to read it for myself before passing judgment. but it sounds like two big 'thumbs down'
Posted 16 years ago # -
I'm getting a copy (mostly due to Ruppert's praise):
Steve's absolute genius is in his ability to make the unpalatable irresistible. It lies also in his ability to separate research "ice cream" from research "bs". "Children", hucksters and some with more sinister motives have hijacked the so-called 9-11 "truth movement." That clear thinking is what makes "The Shell Game" slice through consciousness and reach the soul like a hot scalpel through butter. http://www.amazon.com/review/RCQPMXOH2PLAY/ref=cm_...
I'll write a review as soon as I finish it in a week or so possibly.
Posted 16 years ago # -
Thanks very much for taking valuable time to independently review this book.
Posted 16 years ago # -
I plan to read it.
What would be the best way to measure its effect?
Posted 16 years ago # -
Alten made a point on Michael Wolsey's radio show about the false and destructive division that is frequently and intentionally forced upon the 9/11 truth movement.
I transcribed this from Wolsey's radio interview because I thought it was an important and accurate criticism of the 9/11 truth movement.
Michael Wolsey: "Do you personally believe that the attacks were allowed to succeed... or do you believe that there was participation... 'inside job'... and if the latter is the case, did you intentionally tone that down to invite other people in who might be hostile to that idea?"
Steve Alten: "...My take on this is that if a real investigation were to happen--a real one, that the trail of evidence would lead directly back to the white house... they would be found guilty of treason. For me to say "let it happen" versus "made it happen"... my objective is to stay above the fray of the 9/11 truth movement.... the 9/11 truth movement, for the terrific work it has done is fragmented. That doesn't help anybody... We need to spread this information out to the masses... let's put it this way. A crime happened. The biggest crime in the history of the world. The perpetrators got away with it so far. The trap has been placed within the movement... I've had people email me and... I've been attacked on blogs... 'Alten doesn't believe in this and Alten doesn't believe in that, so how could we possibly support his book?'... That's a trap.
Michael Wolsey: If you don't agree with everything I say, you must be bad... I've been attacked ruthlessly for that, so I can relate.
Steve Alten: ...it doesn't solve anything to force your opinion on one group or another where you have to accept everyone's opinion... A crime happened. There was a reason for that crime.... http://www.911blogger.com/node/13469
The 9/11 truth "it must be bad because you don't agree 100% with what I believe, therefore you are a shill" syndrome is very apparent in some quarters. Ultimately, if the book can get people asking questions and doing research (along with presenting credible facts of its own), I think that would make it successful for what it is. Ultimately, we need many types of media getting people to look at the facts for themselves and get educated.
Posted 16 years ago # -
Alten, so far, appears sincere. i suppose we can't fault him for not writing the book that we would have written. but - if he continues to talk in this candid way about 9/11 - it goes a long way towards making up for the book's shortcomings.
it doesn't sound like his book is disinfo. just a work of fiction that is probably not the best approach to educating people on 9/11.
what will be interesting is to see if it makes the best-seller list. (which - for some reason - i doubt) if it does, he could have a platform for media attention.
Posted 16 years ago # -
A couple of comments about my review and the movement's present attitude toward Alten
First of all, I did not allow myself to be swayed by any pressure to like or support the book. And when one writes a book review, he or she should be focusing on the book itself and not on the author's public persona. If I wrote a similar book and any of you were highly critical of its content, I would not expect that you would do anything more than be polite about it when pointing out all its flaws. And I certainly wouldn't expect you to go soft on the book because of my previous activism.
Alten is not a celebrity. Alten has not been an activist. Alten is not well known for his clear thinking or investigative rigor. Alten is an author of fiction, and his books are his contribution to the cultural landscape. Alten may have a platform for promoting important issues while he promotes the book. But the result is people reading his book, which brings us right back to its reviews.
I understand that Alten has a clear view of the movement being infiltrated by fanatics and those attempting to divide us. He sounds like a nice guy to me, and I can tell that he means well. But that has little to do with the quality of his book. Its certainly not inherently divisive to write a negative review of the book. That being said, I know there are some very divisive reviews.
As much as I an frustrated by pointless or intentional division within the movement, I also am very sensitive to the 'big tent' mentality. And so while I might support the intentions and actions of the author outside of the book he wrote, I'm not going to write a positive review of his book because he's 'on our side.'
I'd like to point out an objection to the book that has taken me some time to come to after absorbing its impact for a few days. The book proposes that world events are controlled by powerful people with big secrets, and does little to suggest that the public can change our course. For as inspiring as I found many passages in the book, I also felt at its end a sense of hopelessness. The book left me depressed. It left me feeling like my activism was not likely to have an impact. So Alten can tell me all he wants in interviews that he supports activism, but he wrote a book that left me uninspired.
My review is obviously based in my observation, education, and ideology. While its possible to write a very nearly objective review of a book, that's a fairly academic process and would have taken me a week to write. I'm certainly not trying to shut down debate or be the arbiter of truth or quality. If you want a positive review of the book, there are many to find at this point. But I found the book to be culturally biased, manipulative, and draining.
I'd be very interested to hear what people who had little experience in our movement would have to say about the book. Its possible that the target audience will have a very different response than me. But then what is the target audience?
Posted 16 years ago # -
Jan,
Thanks for the supportive comment. I felt like I was going out on a limb having a critical attitude toward the book. Thankfully, reviews exist in a sea of others. I always find it helpful to look up and read more than one when I'm trying to find out what people thought about a book. Each reviewer has their own biases, and reveals different things about the book that caught their attention.
I certainly had no reason to write a negative review outside the content of the book. But I certainly felt pressure to write a positive one. TruthMove keeps me honest.
Posted 16 years ago # -
truthmover,
Whether one agrees with your conclusions or not, sincere independent reviews of all media should be encouraged and respected with gratitude. Sometimes social intimidation pressure seems to nearly cross a fine line into controlling or limiting free speech and valuable public relations perspectives. Truthmove has set an example by foremost remaining true to individual conclusions based on your unique perspectives and experiences.
A friend loaned me a copy of The Shell Game, but I have a longstanding policy to steer clear of dark media such as you describe. (caveat: I am a non-fiction reader and haven't read a fiction book for ages).
BTW, I'm probably late to the game in discovering it, but Carolyn Baker's website is a pragmatic, educational treasure trove of useful resources and spiritual guidances for facing difficult new realities. Check it out and pass it along, especially to female activists.
Posted 16 years ago # -
Another SG review that I thought was interesting is here (although he wants to reconsider his positions with a little more time he says) --
http://911blogger.com/node/13669#comment-176161
For the record, here are the weblinks in his list of recommended websites at the back of the book:
That's it. Not one 9/11 truth site. The page is otherwise blank.
And the only recommended book on 9/11 is Crossing the Rubicon, a good book as far as it goes but as much a peak oil book as a 9/11 book.
Overall, the message is that our oil under their sand is running out, the Muslims want to kill us, Iran wants to nuke us, and misguided but well-intentioned secret agents decided that the only way to save Western civilization is to do a false-flag nuke. Kind of like the 9/11 he briefly mentions, but on a larger scale. Except that he doesn't mention the most important part - the part that killed most of the people: the destruction of the buildings. All he talks about are unprovable claims about things that ultimately had nothing to do with most of the deaths, and have already been "explained" by the 9/11 Commission. War games, stand down, put options. Good luck proving any of that was other than as explained. Why didn't Alten write about the demolition of the buildings, when that was the most deadly criminal act, and when the criminal act is obvious and the evidence is preserved on video Even from a literary standpoint, the demolition of buildings and the nuking of a city are similar in quality though not scale. First they blew up a city block, then they blew up a city. But he can't bring himself to mention that in his book? I don't get it.
So on balance, too much fear- and hate-mongering, and too little reference to the facts of 9/11. Just subtle justification for 9/11 - peak oil and radical Islam.
Posted 16 years ago # -
What interests me, mainly, is this part --
Overall, the message is that our oil under their sand is running out, the Muslims want to kill us, Iran wants to nuke us, and misguided but well-intentioned secret agents decided that the only way to save Western civilization is to do a false-flag nuke.
Posted 16 years ago # -
So on balance, too much fear- and hate-mongering, and too little reference to the facts of 9/11. Just subtle justification for 9/11 - peak oil and radical Islam.
...
Overall, the message is that our oil under their sand is running out, the Muslims want to kill us, Iran wants to nuke us, and misguided but well-intentioned secret agents decided that the only way to save Western civilization is to do a false-flag nuke.Well, that sucks... it's half true: the oil is running out and 9/11 was designed to launch a new phase of imperialism to "save Western civilization", but the whole clash of civilizations, "Muslims want to kill us" stuff is crap.
When of course it's "Western civilization" which is the real problem facing the planet: http://www.indymedia.org.uk/en/2008/01/388961.html
Posted 16 years ago # -
Thanks for posting this Vic.
Overall, the message is that our oil under their sand is running out, the Muslims want to kill us, Iran wants to nuke us, and misguided but well-intentioned secret agents decided that the only way to save Western civilization is to do a false-flag nuke.
That might be a bit unkind to the intentions of the author, but as I said above, we don't review a book by excusing its content based on the authors intentions.
In contrast we have this story which is the subject of that thread.
Green Party Presidential Candidate Recognizes "The Shell Game"s Importance. http://www.911blogger.com/node/13669
Bleh. McKinney trusts Ruppert. Ruppert is very well known for being shamelessly self-promotional. And so it would be no surprise that he might support a book very directly based on much of his research. We know that he cares a great deal more about peak oil than 9/11 truth at this point.
Now, peak oil is important. And TruthMove is concerned with this issues. And...Alten's book, as I indicated above, at the very least does a fairly good job outlining that problem. But not without all the rest pointed to above. So even if we appreciate his concern for and attention to this issue, we should still ask if he has done the peak oil movement any favors by presenting the issue along with all the rest.
Well, I got excited about the book. I read it. I feel let down.
Gotta deal with it. Keep moving.
Posted 16 years ago # -
Another interesting take from blogger, from someone talking about the thread, "September 11th Advocates Comment on the Impending Release of Philip Shenon's Book" --
"We Know this book wont be hard hitting. With that being said It will way better then the Shill Game. ( At least its not a fiction)" http://www.911blogger.com/node/13710#comment-17638...
Posted 16 years ago # -
I read the book. The book has a lot of good info in it. It's far from perfect, but better than what I expected. It's definitely not what I would write. Perhaps it will reach a wide audience. Perhaps it will be snared by the large amount of junk on the Shell Game website (links to websites promoting false claims about 9/11). If I'd seen the website before the book, I would not have read the book.
It does get the point that 9/11 was allowed to happen and provided technical assistance to ensure that it did happen, and points out the key role of the war games.
It's one of the very few 9/11 anything efforts to tie together 9/11 and Peak Oil - something that most 9/11 truthers and most people aware of Peak Oil don't want to do. Deal with it, the connections are inseparable.
Ruppert's book is one of the very few that made any effort to do verifiable research - and it's why the peddlers of the scientology type claims attacked him so much (the empire wants to keep the 9/11 and the Peak Oil aware people separate and unaware of each other's best work).
Yes, the 9/11 Commission did mention (sort of) a war game, but they definitely did not mention them in any detail. No mention of the "plane into building" exercise. No mention of the suppressed investigations into flight schools. No mention of the multiple warnings from US allies about what, when, where the "attacks" would happen.
The most important part of the 9/11 story is not the buildings falling down after being smacked by a heavy object traveling close to the speed of sound, but the decisions made to intentionally allow them to happen in order to justify wars to control the oil fields as we pass Peak Oil. It would be nice to see 9/11 "truth" play a role in social change, but given the massive media counterattack and association of "truth" with the nuttiest claims it seems unlikely that "truth" about 9/11 will lead to positive social change. And 9/11 was in the past, while Peak Oil will shape the future. They are inseparable, but perhaps it's best to understand what happened to the truth movement since similar tactics are being used against understanding environmental limits and problems.
As for the criticism that the book avoids demolition theories, that is a plus in many ways, although the shell game website links to lots of websites promoting this. If there was truth to the demolition claim, it would be unlikely that the corporate (and alternative) media would claim that this was the key aspect to the 9/11 counter narrative. Arguing about this claim, however, is likely to be similar to the arguments for decades about ballistics in Dealey Plaza on November 22, 1963 - with the exact same result (the conspiracy people marginalized with little impact on the broader society).
It is interesting that there was never any real effort to peer review the demolition claims, even the best of them, and there are some serious problems with this perspective - but those problems are probably moot at this point.
Summary: Shell Game is OK, not perfect, could use a much better website / promotional campaign. It's unfortunate that the best efforts in the 9/11 truth and the Peak Oil awareness efforts have been kept separate. The real goal is to use these awarenesses to figure out how we all - 6 and a half billion of us - can use the remaining oil for transformation to a peaceful civilization.
Posted 16 years ago # -
mark said:
If there was truth to the demolition claim, it would be unlikely that the corporate (and alternative) media would claim that this was the key aspect to the 9/11 counter narrative.
The buildings were blown up, some people in the alternative media do see this as a key fact to use to convince people that the official story is a fabrication, for example Chris Burnett on LA IMC radio a couple of days ago:
http://www.indymedia.org.uk/en/2008/02/390707.html
It was the blowing up of the buildings that got me seriously questioning the official story, it does the trick with a lot of people.
However I can appreciate that this does nothing for some people, and I think the work of people like Michel Chossudovsky, Nafeez Ahmed an Peter Dale Scott on the geopolitics of the "war on terror" are invaluable -- people that do not spend time of the nature of the structural failure of the buildings.
I agree that peak oil must have been the prime motivation but clearly there has been a considerable overlap with other agendas as well.
Man made global warming and the mass extinction of other forms of life cannot be left out of this either, Nafeez Ahmed's talk last November did a good job on imperialism, climate change and peak oil, but, this time, he left 9/11 out: http://www.truthmove.org/forum/topic/790
Posted 16 years ago # -
"It was the blowing up of the buildings that got me seriously questioning the official story, it does the trick with a lot of people."
It was the missing plane at the pentagon that got me seriously questioning the official story. but - over time i realized - i was misguided.
personally - i find the CD faction of this movement to be highly insular. Many activists, like yourself, may feel the evidence is rock-solid. But, to those on the outside looking in - it remains the easiest aspect of 9/11 Truth to summarily dismiss as outlandish and improbable. It is just the nature of the claim.
i understand your frustration.
But - i find that many who adhere to the CD theory feel that it is THE definitive smoking gun - and therefore treat it as the center of their activism.
Unfortunately - in the eyes of the public - the opposite is true. To the jaded public who are resistant to considering evidence of government complicity (in whatever form), the CD theory exemplifies tin-foil-hat-ism. I know card carrying members of the 9/11 truth movement itself who still refuse to accept it - or are agnostic on the issue.
You may not like hearing it - but - Jon Gold makes a good point when he demonstrates how often the mainstream media has used the CD theory to make us look bad.
There is a REASON why the media won't touch the Sibel Edmonds story. It is ACTIONABLE under the law. Testimony under oath - and supporting documents - could be demanded that potentially could shake the foundations of government.
CD - like the magic bullet - could be debated forever - with no resolution. Unless you have a whistleblower who claims he personally wired the building himself - you can be as rightiously indignant as you want - and claim the evidence is as rock-solid as you like - and it won't matter. The opposition can just trot out 'experts' who disagree.
recently the media has been exposing significant evidence of obstruction and destruction of evidence to the 911 Commission. therein lies an opportunity to demand hearings and investigations.
CD had its day. IT remains a very important part of the national dialogue. but - IMHO - i would not lead with CD at this point in the game.
Posted 16 years ago # -
And so we have returned to where this journey started. Ruppert making his argument why physical evidence alone isn't going to work, even if it's valid.
I'll judge myself, and ask if it applies to any of you: If the Zelikow-Rove-torture tape-Edmonds and related stories had made the corporate news reports in 2004, I would be treating them as a call to final battle, phone everyone I know including people who don't want to hear about 9/11 skepticism, and try to get the loudest biggest most colorful possible action happening at the Commission's gates, demanding their immediate resignation.
(Why didn't I then? Why didn't any of us? What collective spell were we all operating under?)
If it had come out in 2006, something similar - using a different symbol, since the Commission was defunct. I wouldn't be as optimistic about the outcome, but I imagine I'd be doing it.
But today, I don't know where to start. This movement has zero sense of how to win politically, among other problems including, I'm sorry, the earnest focus on "demolitions proof." (I am agnostic; I may be proven wrong on this. Perhaps renegades will appear from within the NIST panel. Maybe someone brings a few million dollars into it and finances an MIT study that concludes it was demolition.)
ACTIONABLE. If that word doesn't stand out for you, you should go ahead and do research, but don't pretend you're in a movement to expose the 9/11 plot, get justice and make sure it never happens again.
Posted 16 years ago # -
CD - like the magic bullet - could be debated forever - with no resolution.
Like evolution?
These things are debated for a long time and eventually the truth wins out.
Even today you find voters in Berkeley voting for a man who does not believe the "theory," as he stresses, of evolution: Ron Paul.
Nothing is as simple as it seems.
Posted 16 years ago # -
Vic
First of all, please don't employ evolutionary theory as a parallel. That's just what Shermer does! This is just abusing one of the most robust concepts ever developed by science. Evolutionary theory derives from millions of cases observed. The entire planet provides evidence, from the molecular biology to the billion-year fossil record. The mechanisms posited by Darwin have been observed historically and experimentally. Furthermore, the truth has won out, there are just a lot of religious folk who don't understand it.
With CD, we are talking about models for a single, discrete, unprecedented and almost certainly non-reproducible past event, of which most of the physical evidence has been lost. Okay? It's not science, it's crime scene forensics using science, but stuck with video and stills and a few dust samples as the remaining primary evidence.
Eventually the truth wins out. Sure. Hooray.
I don't want the truth in 30 years. I want the perpetrators, now. I want the secret state exposed and abolished.
What about developing an actionable case now aiming to bring specific charges, obtain the documents, open up all questions to investigation? Do you want to best the NIST team in a debate and get props from the "truthers," or do you want to force release of the remaining steel for examination by independent teams of scientists under international overview?
Demonstrating that the 9/11 Commission Report was a criminal fraud and that Bush officials were negligent or committed perjury and other crimes--however trivial these crimes may seem to you initially compared to 9/11 as a whole--might lead to the latter within a few months. "The truth winning out" might lead to it in 30 years. Do you understand the difference?
Posted 16 years ago # -
ANYONE MIND IF...
I repost the parts in this discussion at truth action dealing with demolition and the 9/11 case beginning above with Vic's paragraphy starting
"Overall, the message is that our oil under their sand is running out..."
Posted 16 years ago # -
We've gone off topic since Mark's post. Thanks for posting Mark! This thread is about "The Shell Game". 9/11 was hardly a part of the book in any direct way other than the quotes preceding each chapter. CD had nothing to do with it.
The comments above are an interesting microcosm of the CD debate. Nick, do you really think anyone would benefit from more of this? I think that you, Chrisc, John, Vic, and Mark, all have valid points to make.
CD is a strong means to encourage people to look at the other evidence, and the better we demonstrate that the towers were demolished, the better a tool it becomes. There IS progress being made toward that end.
People who think CD has to be a part of every 9/11 promotion are not demographically savvy.
A good majority of those who get into 9/11 truth via CD are not encouraged to understand that it does not make the case for complicity. Even if we prove that it was a CD, who is implicated? No one specific. In other words, don't prove it was a CD, prove who pulled it off.
We DO need to focus on evidence that leads to potential action.
So, Nick, you can repost this if no one else minds, but I'd be interested to hear what part of it you think is benefiting someone. This has all been said by each of us before.
Posted 16 years ago # -
Evolutionary theory derives from millions of cases observed.
Science is science. If a theory is shown in millions of cases in one area, but only hundreds or just dozens in another, does that make the hundreds or dozens of cases less real?
It doesn't.
Mostly I use the analogy because it's fun for me -- people get riled up.
we are talking about models for a single, discrete, unprecedented and almost certainly non-reproducible past event
Actually, demolitions are probably conducted every day all over the world. The Twin Towers' demolition was unique in some ways, but that doesn't make them unknowable.
What about developing an actionable case now aiming to bring specific charges, obtain the documents, open up all questions to investigation?
No one is stopping anyone from working on that. I certainly don't spend all my time on CD. There's more than enough of different types of work for everyone. My own time is spent answering mail for 4 websites, keeping a 500+ person group functional, working on Green campaigns, and not burning out.
To me, when someone tells others that they can't or shouldn't work on what they are interested in working on, and that they are wasting their time, we aren't moving forward, we are treading water.
That seems to happen when one is more interested in telling people not to work on something they are inspired by, then simply going off and working on their own issue, what inspires that someone, and seeing if others will join in. Jon created his Who Is thing. That was great. Now that's permanent. We can create groups to do actionable items, organize those, invite people to participate, but we can't turn people off to what turns them on, ultimately.
If the evidence for demolition were as flimsy as the Pentagon evidence, I'd likely have been turned off by now. But instead, demolition evidence only keeps growing.
Even in the NIST teleconference notes on B7, you see people on the committee asking questions that they never would have if we hadn't asked them first. They are asking them now. But why? To go through the motions? Are they honestly wondering? We don't know. It's bizarre.
There's room enough for everyone to do something, but not all of us will do everything.
Posted 16 years ago #
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