Demolition Expert On WTC 7

[Predator1]

I think all the conspiracies are BS, personally. The government would never be competent enough to hold it together.

[DirtyPete]

Originally Posted by Predator1

I think all the conspiracies are BS, personally. The government would never be competent enough to hold it together.

This is a common argument, however you need to understand it's not really the government. It's a few select people, in key positions, who are extremely wealthy. Governments are big and sloppy and can't do shit because of beurocracy, but a private organization can do amazing things, and when the people in that private organization hold extremely powerful positions within the governement, well they can do extraordinary things.

[Eckolaker]

Damn! Some of you guys are extremely informed.


I really don't need to say much, you guys have this place on lock down!

[sky dog]

Originally Posted by MelT

They began to withdraw civil liberties and even went to the extent of openly shooting kids on campus for daring to protest. Our own police, shooting us??? People who just wanted to stand up and say that things weren't right in the world, being openly killed in the land of the free?

Kent State? That's a total exaggeration! They didn't send the National Guard in to mow the students down. There had been protests and demonstrations for three days before the final, tragic one. The ROTC building on the campus had been burned by arsonists, and when the fire department responded, the rioters slashed the hose!

The final demonstration was supposed to be broken up (and that decision was upheld by the Court of Appeals), the soldiers started using tear gas, but the students threw the canisters back at them. It was in this confusion that people started firing, unclear whether or not it was accidental or not...but these protesters weren't putting daisies in the soldier's guns, they were unruly and violent. Protest is a right only when it's nonviolent.

It's comments like these that make me really doubt all the conspiracy arguments I hear. How can you come across as objective when events like this can be taken grossly out of context and presented as an established fact?

[Rasta_Man]

Originally Posted by sky dog

It's comments like these that make me really doubt all the conspiracy arguments I hear.

That is where you fail.

To those that have to ask, no answer can suffice.

[DirtyPete]

Originally Posted by sky dog

It's comments like these that make me really doubt all the conspiracy arguments I hear. How can you come across as objective when events like this can be taken grossly out of context and presented as an established fact?

What does that have to do with 9/11 at all? And why would one person's comments make you doubt all information pertaining to a certain subject? I fail to understand how a comment like that would make you feel anything at all about the arguments set forth by the 911 truth seekers.

How can you come across as objective when comments that have nothing to do with the argument at hand make you question it?

[sky dog]

Originally Posted by DirtyPete

What does that have to do with 9/11 at all? And why would one person's comments make you doubt all information pertaining to a certain subject? I fail to understand how a comment like that would make you feel anything at all about the arguments set forth by the 911 truth seekers.

How can you come across as objective when comments that have nothing to do with the argument at hand make you question it?

I wasn't the one who brought it up. The person I was quoting was saying that Kent State was a government plan to end the anti-war movement by killing exactly four students. Contrary to everything history says, all the investigations and trials after the fact, this is the argument. I have to assume that he's going to be more likely to see a conspiracy.

My basic problem with the whole 9/11 argument is that you have to accept that there is an elite group that is inherently evil and runs everything. Without that giant leap of faith, the entire argument falls apart. The government might be greedy and unethical, but it's a stretch to argue with a straight face that they've organized all of the worldwide events that have been offered as evidence.

I'm going to go through the evidence presented by Lil Loko and argue against it

1) There was prior knowledge because the CIA knew the name of one of the hijackers, the Taliban made threats, and SF Mayor Willie Brown got tips about not flying.

The CIA has files on thousands of terrorists. The article itself says that the info they had on him was his name and phone number, and really doesn't mean anything without the benefit of hindsight.

Yes, the Taliban was threatening us. They bombed the Cole a few months before. They make threats all the time. Hardly any of them come to anything. There was a report that said 'Bin Laden Determined To Strike U.S.'. This points to government stupidity for overlooking it, but hardly that they knew exactly what was going to happen.

The article about Mayor Brown getting a security tip makes it a point to stress that such warnings are routine, and only seemed out of the ordinary when you look back on it with what we know now. If he was going to get a warning, don't you think it would be something more specific, because if such warnings were truly routine, then why would he pay attention to this one more than another one?

2) An intelligence agency was planning a drill on 9/11 where a plane hits their agency building. Also, NORAD didn't intercept the planes.

Easy once you look at the article, and not just the headline. They planned to simulate a small corporate plane hitting their building due to an accident, not terrorism. It's a weird coincidence, but aside from that it doesn't say a lot.

What sense would it make to shoot down a plane that's flying into NYC or Washington D.C.? It hits the building, it kills people...you shoot it down, it hits another building, killing people. It's lose lose.

3) They said ______ was a hijacker, but the BBC is reporting he's still alive

The articles posted are from about a week and a half after 9/11. The research had barely begun at the point. It's about the same guy, who said he lost his ID while in Denver. It's weird, but not like eleven days later we knew everything about the attackers.

4) WTC Building 7

Already been debunked on the first page

Then there's a long section about PNAC and the Hegelian similarities...which is valid about government greediness, but by no means conclusively proving this theory

5) Chilling images of the attacks in the playing cards

Oh no! They thought the WTC could be attacked? All the way back in 1995? Wait...it's not because they were attacked in 1993, was it? And they were not "nuked" like it says on the card...so it appears a bit stupid to say "Funny how they got both of these elements of the attacks right and didn't make any mistakes six years before the attack, perhaps someone had advanced knowledge of it."

The argument goes on to say that the company who made the games was raided (ooh!) in 1990. So their computers were confiscated five whole years before this game was made, making prophetic, but inexact suggestions about an event that was to happen a full six years after that!

6) So-and-so has spoken out

I see a list of 9/11 whistleblowers who do not really have the background for them to make such a claim. A 'billionaire activist'? A UK environmental expert? The FBI agent article only has him accusing the bureau of laziness, which is a common accusation being leveled by many people. Other links are the same, nothing damning...a lot of links in the piece aren't even valid URLs anymore.

These are the arguments I'm providing as a skeptic. Dispense with the Eastern philosophy and tell me why I'm wrong. These are reasonable conclusions that a person could make, refuting the allegations. Don't point out to me how the buildings fell...none of us here are engineers who know that kind of stuff. I've seen demolitions of buildings, and you can see where the explosives go off, especially if it were an office building with glass windows everywhere.

[MelT]

Originally Posted by sky dog

Kent State? That's a total exaggeration! They didn't send the National Guard in to mow the students down. ?

I didn't say that the Guard were sent in to mow anyone down - but that they did.

?[/quote]It's comments like these that make me really doubt all the conspiracy arguments I hear. How can you come across as objective when events like this can be taken grossly out of context and presented as an established fact?[/quote]

That's not really a good argument against conspiracy theories. That some of our arguments here are presented badly doesn't negate the fact that there are conspiracies. How about when the US lied about North Korea and nuclear material? A conspiracy, an outright admission of a lie, and of spin being put on the facts to directly influence allies and world opinion for their own ends. Conspiracy, found out, admitted to.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn...2005Mar19.html

A conspiracy doesn't have to be a dark and mysterious plot, it's just as valid when it's openly misappropriating trilions of dollars in funds, or making millions through arms deals from wars it starts, or withholding our civil liberites - or lying to us about what they've done in ANY situation. Any. They're our government and should have full transparency and accountability. It all shows that they aren't working for us, but through us for their own ends.

But back to Kent, poor example as it may have been. It's hard not to get emotive about this stuff and I agree I may have gone over the top, but - The Guard didn't go there to shoot anyone, but they did. That our own government officials could even consider giving the order to shoot teenagers is the problem, it does not matter what the circumstances were. You go in to break up a riot (which it was not at first) with water cannon and batons, as they had done elsewhere. That they had brought guns and were actually prepared to use them is what is wrong with this. That is not democracy.

MelT

[MelT]

quote -

I wasn't the one who brought it up. The person I was quoting was saying that Kent State was a government plan to end the anti-war movement by killing exactly four students.
quote -

Oh come on. That's one hell of a leap. Where did I say it was a government plan? I wasn't using it as evidence of conspiracy, but of the fact that our government is quite prepared to do what it has to do, even against its own people.

You can't justifying killing people for slashing fire hoses and arson and say that they deserved it. And it was 'only four' people, so it doesn't matter?

MelT

[MelT]

Hi Sky. I'm just trying to step back from this debate, and I'm wondering if the term 'Conspiracy Theory' gives totally the wrong impression of what's going on and what the Theorists are saying? It gives the impression that, as you say:

quote "My basic problem with the whole 9/11 argument is that you have to accept that there is an elite group that is inherently evil and runs everything. Without that giant leap of faith, the entire argument falls apart. The government might be greedy and unethical, but it's a stretch to argue with a straight face that they've organized all of the worldwide events that have been offered as evidence."quote

Nobody here as far as I know thinks this is down to just one 'elite goup'. Conspiracy isn't just about 9/11 but tens of other smaller events too, many of which have been proven or admitted. Nobody has said either that they're responsible for all world wide events. I personally think that the Bush family have a large hand in just about anything that will make them money, no matter how corrupt, but I don't think that they're running the world. Conspiracy isn't out to prove that it's all just Blair and GWB though.

You don't need organised groups doing any of this, you can get away with anything by having just one or two corrupt officials in positions of power. For example, where I used to live in the UK there was massive international fraud carried out by a bank. It was set up to steal tens of millions from investors over a period of 7 years and conned thousands our of life savings. All the work of just two men, who in the end escaped prosecution and are at present in the Caymans living off the money. Just two men fooled governments worldwide, lawyers, auditors, and in the end, even the legal system itself. You don't need a large base of confederates to pull a con, you just have to know how to twiddle the humbers and call in favours from time to time.

So, maybe calling the people on my side of the debate 'Conspiracy Theorists' is giving us a bad image, as it does tend to conjour up ideas of the very kind you mentioned, a world elite and common conspiracy? Maybe we should just be called....hell....no idea


MelT