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Here is a collection of stories from what most people would consider reliable sources. You might want to print them off to give to a friend.
"Political Dynamite" Fails to Explode
Extreme proposals of Treasury's O'Neill mostly unreported
Fairness & Accuracy In Reporting -- June 13, 2001
http://www.fair.org/activism/o'neill.html
When a high-level government official calls for drastic changes in U.S. law, it ought to be big news. But in an interview reported by the Financial Times' Amity Shlaes (5/19/01 & 5/22/01), treasury secretary Paul O'Neill called for sweeping changes in U.S. tax and social policy, and some three weeks later, those statements have made hardly a ripple in the U.S. media. Most Americans have probably not heard a word about them.
In the interview, O'Neill called the current U.S. tax system "an abomination" that required changes to its "very structure." His preferred changes? O'Neill "absolutely" supports the elimination of taxes on corporations-- and the shifting of the tax burden to individuals, saying government would work better if it "collected taxes in a more direct way from the people."
He also called for the abolition of Social Security and Medicare, on the grounds that "able-bodied adults should save enough on a regular basis so that they can provide for their own retirement, and, for that matter, health and medical needs." In fact, O'Neill believes the U.S.should reconsider the whole purpose of taxation: "National defense is a federal responsibility," Shlaes paraphrases O'Neill as saying, "but all other outlays need review."
And O'Neill assured Shlaes he was not speaking only for himself: "Not only am I committed to working on this issue, the president is also intrigued about the possibility of fixing this mess."
The Financial Times described O'Neill's comments (approvingly) as "radical" and "political dynamite." Yet the story has so far failed to take hold in the U.S. press.
Three columnists at New York's Newsday noted O'Neill's remarks: Robert Reno (who said the Treasury Secretary "comes across as a man who has paid a lot of taxes and clearly resents it"-- 5/27/01) Marie Cocco (5/31/01) and Paul Vitello (5/24/01). An obviously irked Vitello took it the furthest, actually calling O'Neill's spokesman at Treasury to confirm that these were not "made-up quotes":
"The secretary didn't really mean to say that no matter how old, no person who has paid into the Social Security system all his or her life would be entitled to benefits until he or she is physically no longer able to work? He didn't really mean to say that ExxonMobil and Time Warner should be treated as we treat the church-- as tax exempt?"
"'Yes,' said the spokesman, 'that is our position. The quotes were all accurate.'"
Thomas DeFrank of New York's Daily News also reported O'Neill's comments (5/22/01), but he apparently got a different response from the Treasury Department. "Treasury spokesman Rob Nichols said O'Neill's comments on Social Security reflected his personal views, not the Bush administration's," he noted.
Outside of local New York papers, the story was harder to find. Cox wire service reporter Scott Shepard filed a story (5/20/01), which noted only O'Neill's description of the tax system as an "abomination" and the claim that the president was "also intrigued" about major changes, including cutting corporate taxes. A short piece in the May 22 Investor's Business Daily ("A Whiff of Reform in the Air") did the same, and was echoed in its approving tone by a column in the May 23 Washington Times ("Signals for Tax Repair?").
O'Neill has made several television appearances since the Financial Times interview, but a search of the Nexis.com database turned up just two TV references to the remarks, neither on a Big 3 network. The Financial Times' own Robert Thomson teased his paper's interview at the end of a May 18 appearance on CNNfn's "The N.E.W. Show" whose main subject was the Lucent/Alcatel merger. And Fox News Sunday host Tony Snow asked O'Neill about the idea of "getting rid of the corporate income tax" on June 3. (O'Neill declined to answer, saying only that "we need to fundamentally look at the way our tax code works.")
What about the country's major outlets, the place one would look for a story of such import? So far, O'Neill's radical statements have made it into the New York Times only in an op-ed by Democratic partisans James Carville and Paul Begala (5/27/01). USA Today ran an Associated Press column (5/22/01) that placed O'Neill's calls for eliminating taxes on corporations at the end, after discussion of estate taxes and "simplification" of the tax system, and noted only that the Treasury Secretary has plans for "reform" of Social Security. (AP's original headline on the piece: "O'Neill: Further Tax Relief Coming," 5/21/01.)
Washington Post columnist John O. Fox used O'Neill's "abomination" quote to shore up his own argument about the U.S.'s "monstrously complicated" tax code, but ignored the rest of his statements. And the Post's David Broder made no reference to the Financial Times interview in his June 6 column, which referred to Bush administration plans to "open [Social Security and Medicare] up to market forces."
Broder did note congenially that "as Treasury Secretary Paul O'Neill...reminded me the other day, what makes the task so difficult is the need to educate people about the current system, before they can be persuaded that it needs to be changed as the administration proposes."
Indeed, the American people could use "educating" about just what the Bush administration and its Treasury Secretary propose. But where will they get it if not from the mainstream news media?
* * *
ACTION: Please write to national and local media outlets and ask them why Paul O'Neill's calls for eliminating corporate taxes and
Social Security were not a major news story.
Some suggested contacts include:
ABC World News Tonight
Anchor and Senior Editor
Peter Jennings
PeterJennings [at] abcnews.com
NBC News
DC Bureau Chief & Host, "Meet the Press"
Tim Russert
mtp [at] msnbc.com
New York Times
nytnews [at] nytimes.com
Toll free comment line: 1-888-NYT-NEWS
Washington Post
Deputy National Editor (Domestic Policy)
Leonard Bernstein
bernsteinl [at] washpost.com
Los Angeles Times
DC Bureau Chief
Doyle McManus
doyle.mcmanus [at] latimes.com
American Morning with Paula Zahn:
Explosive New Book Published in France Alleges that U.S. Was in Negotiations to Do a Deal with Taliban
http://www.cnn.com/TRANSCRIPTS/0201/08/ltm.05.html
PAULA ZAHN, CNN ANCHOR: Time to check in with ambassador-in- residence, Richard Butler, this morning. An explosive new book published in France alleges that the United States was in negotiations to do a deal with the Taliban for an oil pipeline in Afghanistan.
Joining us right now is Richard Butler to shed some light on this new book. He is the former chief U.N. weapons inspector. He is now on the Council on Foreign Relations and our own ambassador-in- residence -- good morning.
RICHARD BUTLER, FMR. U.N. WEAPONS INSPECTOR: Good morning, Paula.
ZAHN: Boy, if any of these charges are true...
BUTLER: If...
ZAHN: ... this...
BUTLER: Yes.
ZAHN: ... is really big news.
BUTLER: I agree.
ZAHN: Start off with what your understanding is of what is in this book -- the most explosive charge.
BUTLER: The most explosive charge, Paula, is that the Bush administration -- the present one, just shortly after assuming office slowed down FBI investigations of al Qaeda and terrorism in Afghanistan in order to do a deal with the Taliban on oil -- an oil pipeline across Afghanistan.
ZAHN: And this book points out that the FBI's deputy director, John O'Neill,* actually resigned because he felt the U.S. administration was obstructing...
BUTLER: A proper...
ZAHN: ... the prosecution of terrorism.
BUTLER: Yes, yes, a proper intelligence investigation of terrorism. Now, you said if, and I affirmed that in responding to you. We have to be careful here. These are allegations. They're worth airing and talking about, because of their gravity. We don't know if they are correct. But I believe they should be investigated, because Central Asian oil, as we were discussing yesterday, is potentially so important. And all prior attempts to have a pipeline had to be done through Russia. It had to be negotiated with Russia.
Now, if there is to be a pipeline through Afghanistan, obviating the need to deal with Russia, it would also cost less than half of what a pipeline through Russia would cost. So financially and politically, there's a big prize to be had. A pipeline through Afghanistan down to the Pakistan coast would bring out that Central Asian oil easier and more cheaply.
ZAHN: (UNINTELLIGIBLE) as you spoke about this yesterday, we almost immediately got a call from "The New York Times."
BUTLER: Right.
ZAHN: They want you to write an op-ed piece on this over the weekend.
BUTLER: Right, and which I will do.
ZAHN: But let's come back to this whole issue of what John O'Neill, this FBI agent...
BUTLER: Right.
ZAHN: ... apparently told the authors of this book. He is alleging that -- what -- the U.S. government was trying to protect U.S. oil interests? And at the same time, shut off the investigation of terrorism to allow for that to happen?
BUTLER: That's the allegation that instead of prosecuting properly an investigation of terrorism, which has its home in Afghanistan as we now know, or one of its main homes, that was shut down or slowed down in order to pursue oil interests with the Taliban. The people who we have now bombed out of existence, and this not many months ago. The book says that the negotiators said to the Taliban, you have a choice. You have a carpet of gold, meaning an oil deal, or a carpet of bombs. That's what the book alleges.
ZAHN: Well, I know you're going to be doing your own independent homework on this...
BUTLER: Yes.
ZAHN: ... to see if you can confirm any of this. Let's move on to the whole issue of Iraq. The deputy defense secretary, Paul Wolfowitz, at one time was considered one of those voices within the administration...
BUTLER: Yes.
ZAHN: ... that was pushing for moving beyond Afghanistan. He seemed to back off a little from that yesterday.
BUTLER: Yes.
ZAHN: What do you read through the tea leaves here?
BUTLER: A very interesting report that the administration will focus on the Philippines, Yemen, Somalia as places where there are al Qaeda cells. But the word Iraq wasn't used by the man who was the chief hawk -- used as a, you know, as a future target. So what I interpret from that is this: That very likely our allies have been saying to us, this is too hard. This is really serious. Be careful. Saddam is essentially contained at the moment. Don't start, you know, a bigger problem either in the Arab world or in the coalition by going after him. And Wolfowitz, it seems, has probably accepted that.
ZAHN: A quick thought on the Israelis intercepting this latest armed shipment? What that means? You've got to do it in about 15 seconds.
BUTLER: It's extraordinarily serious, because it seems to have been tied to Yasser Arafat himself. It needs to be further investigated, but you know, Paula, the potentiality that this could once again prove an impediment to resume peace negotiations is really quite serious.
ZAHN: Thank you as usual for covering so much territory. Richard Butler, see you same time, same place tomorrow morning.
BUTLER: (UNINTELLIGIBLE).
ZAHN: We appreciate your insights.
TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT http://www.fdch.com.
*Note: John O'Neill, 49, was hired as chief of security at the World Trade Center following a 25-year career with the FBI and died on Sept. 11, the first day of his new job. O'Neill reportedly died after reentering the building to assist others. See the New Yorker article "Counter Terrorist" by Lawrence Wright:
http://www.newyorker.com/FACT/?020114fa_FACT1
$elling Out the Investigation
By Bill Manning, editor in chief, Fire Engineering
http://fe.pennnet.com/Articles/Article_Display.cfm?Section=OnlineArticles&SubSection=Display&PUBLICATION_ID=25&ARTICLE_ID=131225
Did they throw away the locked doors from the Triangle Shirtwaist Fire? Did they throw away the gas can used at the Happyland Social Club Fire? Did they cast aside the pressure-regulating valves at the Meridian Plaza Fire? Of course not. But essentially, that's what they're doing at the World Trade Center.
For more than three months, structural steel from the World Trade Center has been and continues to be cut up and sold for scrap. Crucial evidence that could answer many questions about high-rise building design practices and performance under fire conditions is on the slow boat to China, perhaps never to be seen again in America until you buy your next car.
Such destruction of evidence shows the astounding ignorance of government officials to the value of a thorough, scientific investigation of the largest fire-induced collapse in world history. I have combed through our national standard for fire investigation, NFPA921, but nowhere in it does one find an exemption allowing the destruction of evidence for buildings over 10 stories tall.
Hoping beyond hope, I have called experts to ask if the towers were the only high-rise buildings in America of lightweight, center-core construction. No such luck. I made other calls asking if these were the only buildings in America with light-density, sprayed-on fireproofing. Again, no luck-they were two of thousands that fit the description.
Comprehensive disaster investigations mean increased safety. They mean positive change. NASA knows it. The NTSB knows it. Does FEMA know it?
No. Fire Engineering has good reason to believe that the "official investigation" blessed by FEMA and run by the American Society of Civil Engineers is a half-baked farce that may already have been commandeered by political forces whose primary interests, to put it mildly, lie far afield of full disclosure. Except for the marginal benefit obtained from a three-day, visual walk-through of evidence sites conducted by ASCE investigation committee members- described by one close source as a "tourist trip"-no one's checking the evidence for anything.
Maybe we should live and work in planes. That way, if disaster strikes, we will at least be sure that a thorough investigation will help find ways to increase safety for our survivors.
As things now stand and if they continue in such fashion, the investigation into the World Trade Center fire and collapse will amount to paper- and computer-generated hypotheticals.
However, respected members of the fire protection engineering community are beginning to raise red flags, and a resonating theory has emerged: The structural damage from the planes and the explosive ignition of jet fuel in themselves were not enough to bring down the towers. Rather, theory has it, the subsequent contents fires attacking the questionably fireproofed lightweight trusses and load-bearing columns directly caused the collapses in an alarmingly short time. Of course, in light of there being no real evidence thus far produced, this could remain just unexplored theory.
The frequency of published and unpublished reports raising questions about the steel fireproofing and other fire protection elements in the buildings, as well as their design and construction, is on the rise. The builders and owners of the World Trade Center property, the Port Authority of New York-New Jersey, a governmental agency that operates in an accountability vacuum beyond the reach of local fire and building codes, has denied charges that the buildings' fire protection or construction components were substandard but has refused to cooperate with requests for documentation supporting its contentions.
Some citizens are taking to the streets to protest the investigation sellout. Sally Regenhard, for one, wants to know why and how the building fell as it did upon her unfortunate son Christian, an FDNY probationary firefighter. And so do we.
Clearly, there are burning questions that need answers. Based on the incident's magnitude alone, a full-throttle, fully resourced, forensic investigation is imperative. More important, from a moral standpoint, for the safety of present and future generations who live and work in tall buildings-and for firefighters, always first in and last out-the lessons about the buildings' design and behavior in this extraordinary event must be learned and applied in the real world.
To treat the September 11 incident any differently would be the height of stupidity and ignorance.
The destruction and removal of evidence must stop immediately.
The federal government must scrap the current setup and commission a fully resourced blue ribbon panel to conduct a clean and thorough investigation of the fire and collapse, leaving no stones unturned.
Firefighters, this is your call to action. Visit WTC "Investigation"?: A Call to Action, then contact your representatives in Congress and officials in Washington and help us correct this problem immediately.
9-ll: Ho-Hum, Nothing Urgent
by George Szamuely
Research & documentation by Illarion Bykov and Jared Israel
[Posted 9 January 2002]
http://emperors-clothes.com/indict/urgent.htm
On the morning of September 11, the present Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, General Richard B. Myers, was having a routine meeting on Capitol Hill with Senator Max Cleland. Just before the meeting began,
"While in an outer office, he said, he saw a television report that a plane had hit the World Trade Center. 'They thought it was a small plane or something like that,' Myers said. So the two men went ahead with the office call."
--'American Forces Press Service' 23 October 2001 (1)
The meeting went on for some time. While the two men chatted away, a second hijacked jet plowed into the World Trade Center’s south tower and a third one into the Pentagon. And still they went on with their meeting.
"Meanwhile, the second World Trade Center tower was hit by another jet. 'Nobody informed us of that,' Myers said. 'But when we came out, that was obvious. Then, right at that time, somebody said the Pentagon had been hit.'
"Somebody thrust a cell phone in Myers' hand. Gen. Ralph Eberhart, commander of U.S. Space Command and the North American Aerospace Defense Command was on the other end of the line 'talking about what was happening and the actions he was going to take.'
--'American Forces Press Service' 23 October 2001 (1)
Meanwhile, in Florida, it is clear from the public record that by the time President Bush left his hotel he knew about the attack on the first WTC tower. John Cochran, who was covering the President's trip to Sarasota told, told Peter Jennings on ABC TV:
"He [the President] got out of his hotel suite this morning, was about to leave, reporters saw the White House chief of staff, Andy Card, whisper into his ear. The reporter said to the president, 'Do you know what's going on in New York?' He said he did, and he said he will have something about it later."
--'ABC News' Special Report 11 September 2001 (2)
And then he went to an elementary school in Sarasota to read to children for half an hour.
No urgency. Why should there be? Who could possibly have realized then the calamitous nature of the events of September 11? Besides in one of the planes, the hijackers had switched the transponders off. So how could anyone know what was going on? Yet September 11 was not so unprecedented. Passenger jet hijackings have happened before, and the US government has prepared detailed plans to handle them. On September 11 these plans were ignored in their entirety.
According to the 'New York Times,' air traffic controllers knew at 8:20 a.m.:
"that American Airlines Flight 11, bound from Boston to Los Angeles, had probably been hijacked. When the first news report was made at 8:45 a.m. that a plane might have hit the World Trade Center, they knew it was Flight 11." (3)
There was little ambiguity on the matter. The pilot had pushed a button on the aircraft yoke that allowed controllers to hear the hijacker giving orders.
Here are the FAA regulations concerning hijackings:
"The FAA hijack coordinator…on duty at Washington headquarters will request the military to provide an escort aircraft for a confirmed hijacked aircraft…The escort service will be requested by the FAA hijack coordinator by direct contact with the National Military Command Center (NMCC)." (4)
Here are the instructions issued by the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff on June 1, 2001:
"In the event of a hijacking, the NMCC will be notified by the most expeditious means by the FAA. The NMCC will…forward requests for DOD assistance to the Secretary of Defense for approval." (5)
In addition, Vice President Cheney told Meet the Press on Sept. 16 that only the president has the authority to order the shooting down of a civilian airliner. "And you have to ask yourself," Cheney said, "‘If we had had combat air patrol up over New York and we’d had the opportunity to take out the two aircraft that hit the World Trade Center, would we have been justified in doing that?’ I think absolutely we would have…. It’s a presidential-level decision, and the president made, I think, exactly the right call in this case, to say, ‘I wished we’d had combat air patrol up over New York.’" (6)
The U.S. is supposed to scramble military aircraft the moment a hijacking is confirmed. Yet Myers continues to chat on Capitol Hill, Defense Secretary Rumsfeld works undisturbed in his Pentagon office and the president reads to schoolchildren. Myers’ first statement to the Senate Armed Services Committee on Sept. 13, that no fighter planes had been launched until after the Pentagon was hit, was therefore scarcely surprising. Senators were a little incredulous. And the day before, Dan Rather asked on CBS News:
"These hijacked aircraft were in the air for quite a while…Why doesn’t the Pentagon have the kind of protection that they can get a fighter-interceptor aircraft up, and if someone is going to plow an aircraft into the Pentagon, that we have at least some…line of defense?" (7)
Good question. Clearly another, more comforting, story was needed and on the evening of Friday September 14 CBS launched it:
"CBS News has learned the FAA alerted US Air defense units of a possible hijacking at 8:38 Tuesday morning, and six minutes later, at 8:44, two F-15s received a scramble order at Otis Air Force Base on Cape Cod. But two minutes later, at 8:46, American Airlines Flight 11, the first hijacked jet, slammed into the World Trade Center. Six minutes later, at 8:52, the F-15s were airborne and began racing towards New York City, but the fighters were still 70 miles away when the second hijacked jet, United Airlines Flight 175, hit the second Trade Center tower. Shortly after that blast, the F-15s reached Manhattan and began flying air cover missions over the city.
"But to the south, a new danger and a new response. At 9:30, three F-16s were launched out of Langley Air Force base in Virginia, 150 miles south of Washington. But just seven minutes later, at 9:37, American Airlines Flight 77 hit the Pentagon. The F-16s arrived in Washington just before 10:00 and began flying cover over the nation's capital." (8)
This story, which has now, with slight modifications, become the "official" NORAD version, raises more questions than it answers.
F-15s have a cruising speed of 577-mph, (9) while F-16s have a cruising speed of 570-mph. (10) . Both planes can fly much faster, though there is a rapid drop in fuel economy.
According to CBS, three F-16s scrambled from Langley at 9:30 and arrived in Washington at 10:00. The distance from Langley Air Force Base to the Pentagon is 129 miles - not 150, as CBS stated. If these F-16s took half an hour to get to Washington they were flying at 4.4 miles per minute, 258 mph. That's less than half their cruising speed. It's a fifth of the maximum speed for these F-16s, 1500-mph.
Talk about a lack of urgency!
And since Washington, D.C. is little more than 200 miles from New York, the two F-15 fighters from Otis would have had time to get to DC, intercept Flight 77 and grab a breakfast on the way.
And then of course, there is the small matter of Andrews Air Force Base. It is, after all, but ten miles from the Pentagon. As Matthew Wald wrote in the New York Times on September 15th:
"During the hour or so that American Airlines Flight 77 was under the control of hijackers, up to the moment it struck the west side of the Pentagon, military officials in a command center on the east side of the building were urgently talking to law enforcement and air traffic control officials about what to do." (11)
Why didn't they order planes from Andrews put in the air to protect Washington D.C. and to intercept American Flight 77 long before it reached the U.S. capital? (12)
***
Related Emperor's Clothes articles are listed in 'Articles on 9-11', at http://emperors-clothes.com/indict/911page.htm
Includes: (1) Articles refuting the official story on what happened 9-11; (2) Articles refuting official story on Osama bin Laden; (3) Exclusive interviews related to 9-11, including with Red Cross; (4) Other relevant issues.
(1) 'American Forces Press Service' 23 October 2001 "Myers and Sept. 11: 'We Hadn't Thought About This'" by Sergeant 1st Class Kathleen T. Rhem, USA. Full text posted at:
http://www.defenselink.mil/news/Oct2001/n10232001_200110236.html
backup at:
http://emperor.vwh.net/9-11backups/myersafrts.htm
(2) 'ABC News' Special Report: "Planes crash into World Trade Center" (8:53 AM ET) Tuesday 11 September 2001
To see the quotation in the full transcript, go to:
http://emperor.vwh.net/9-11backups/abc911.htm#mybust
(3) 'New York Times' Saturday 15 September 2001 "AFTER THE ATTACKS: SKY RULES; Pentagon Tracked Deadly Jet But Found No Way to Stop It" by Matthew L. Wald
Full text with quotation is at:
http://emperor.vwh.net/9-11backups/nyt915.htm#mybust
(4) FAA Order 7610.4J 'Special Military Operations' (Effective Date: November 3, 1998; Includes: Change 1, effective July 3, 2000; Change 2, effective July 12, 2001), Chapter 7, Section 1-2, "Escort of Hijacked Aircraft: Requests for Service"
Full text posted at:
http://faa.gov/ATpubs/MIL/Ch7/mil0701.html#7-1-2
(5) 'Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Instruction 3610.01A,' 1 June 2001, "Aircraft Piracy (Hijacking) and Destruction of Derelict Airborne Objects," 4.Policy (page 1)
PDF available at:
http://www.dtic.mil/doctrine/jel/cjcsd/cjcsi/3610_01a.pdf
Backup at:
http://emperor.vwh.net/9-11backups/3610_01a.pdf
(6)'NBC, Meet the Press' (10:00 AM ET) Sunday 16 September 2001.
Full transcript at:
http://stacks.msnbc.com/news/629714.asp?cp1=1
Backup transcript at:
http://emperor.vwh.net/9-11backups/nbcmp.htm
Vice President Cheney's 'Meet the Press' appearance is discussed in ''Mr. Cheney's Cover Story' at
http://emperors-clothes.com/indict/indict-2.htm
(7) CBS News Special Report (12:00 Noon PM ET) - September 12, 2001 "Aftermath of and investigation into attacks on World Trade Center and the Pentagon at http://emperor.vwh.net/9-11backups/cbs12th.htm
(8) To read the new cover story floated by CBS on 14 September go to http://emperor.vwh.net/9-11backups/changes.htm#a
(9) Website of the 88th Communications Group, Wright-Patterson AFB OH, http://www.wpafb.af.mil/museum/research/fighter/f16a.htm
(10) From 'Popular Mechanics' Website, 'The Weapons Of Enduring Freedom,' at http://popularmechanics.com/science/military/2001/9/weapons_of_infinite_justice/
(11) 'Pentagon Tracked Deadly Jet but Found No Way to Stop It,' 'New York Times,' September 15, 2001, Section A; Page 1; Column 1 http://college4.nytimes.com/guests/articles/2001/09/15/868107.xml
(12) Regarding the failure to scramble planes from Andrews Air Force Base, see 'Why Were None of the Hijacked Planes Intercepted?' at
http://emperors-clothes.com/indict/indict-1.htm
The President's reaction:
"In Sarasota, Florida, Bush was reading to children in a classroom at 9:05 a.m. when his chief of staff, Andrew Card, whispered into his ear. The president briefly turned somber before he resumed reading. He addressed the tragedy about a half-hour later."
--Associated Press, September 12, 2001
"President Bush listened to 18 Booker Elementary School second-graders read a story about a girl's pet goat Tuesday before he spoke briefly and somberly about the terrorist attacks." - Sarasota Herald-Tribune, Page A20, September 12, 2001
President Meets with Displaced Workers in Town Hall Meeting, December 4, 2001
http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2001/12/20011204-17.html
“THE PRESIDENT: Thank you, Jordan. Well, Jordan, you're not going to believe what state I was in when I heard about the terrorist attack. I was in Florida. And my Chief of Staff, Andy Card -- actually, I was in a classroom talking about a reading program that works. I was sitting outside the classroom waiting to go in, and I saw an airplane hit the tower -- the TV was obviously on.* And I used to fly, myself, and I said, well, there's one terrible pilot. I said, it must have been a horrible accident.”
(see also http://www.guardian.co.uk/bush/story/0,7369,612355,00.html)
President Holds Town Hall Forum on Economy in California, January 5, 2002
http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2001/12/20011204-17.html
“Anyway, I was sitting there, and my Chief of Staff -- well, first of all, when we walked into the classroom, I had seen this plane fly into the first building.* There was a TV set on. And you know, I thought it was pilot error and I was amazed that anybody could make such a terrible mistake. And something was wrong with the plane, or -- anyway, I'm sitting there, listening to the briefing, and Andy Card came and said, ‘America is under attack."’”
*Note: There was no official broadcast of the first airplane plowing into the World Trade Center. The broadcast seen by millions of Americans showed the second airplane's crash. However, this event had not yet taken place until the president was already in the classroom listening to children read.
Relevent web sites:
What did they know and when did they know it?
http://makethemaccountable.com/whatwhen/index.htm
The Emperor's New Clothes -- Piercing a Fog of Lies
http://www.emperors-clothes.com
Bush/Enrongate Timeline
http://www.indymedia.org/front.php3?article_id=121162&group=webcast
America's dirty Afghan secret: it's a war over oil
http://globalresearch.ca/articles/SHA111A.html
The Rise of the Fourth Reich
http://www.whatreallyhappened.com/reich.html
Some final quotes:
(taken from http://baltech.org/lederman/bush-conspiracy-11-23-01.html)
"If this were a dictatorship, it'd be a heck of a lot easier, just so long as I'm the dictator."
--GW Bush during a photo-op with Congressional leaders on 12/18/2000
"Why of course the people don't want war. Why should some poor slob on a farm want to risk his life in a war when the best he can get out of it is to come back to his farm in one piece? Naturally the common people don't want war: neither in Russia, nor in England, nor for that matter in Germany. That is understood. But, after all, it is the leaders of the country who determine the policy and it is always a simple matter to drag the people along, whether it is a democracy, or a fascist dictatorship, or a parliament, or a communist dictatorship. Voice or no voice, the people can always be brought to the bidding of the leaders. That is easy. All you have to do is tell them they are being attacked, and denounce the peacemakers for lack of patriotism and exposing the country to danger. It works the same in any country."
--Hermann Goering, Hitler's #2 Man
"I cannot say that our country could have no central police without becoming totalitarian, but I can say with great conviction that it cannot be totalitarian without a centralized national police. A national police will have enough on enough people, even if it does not elect to prosecute them, so that it will find no opposition to its policies."
--Supreme Court Justice Robert H. Jackson,
The Supreme Court In the American System of Government (1955)
"In a time of universal deceit, TELLING THE TRUTH is a revolutionary act."
--George Orwell
Extreme proposals of Treasury's O'Neill mostly unreported
Fairness & Accuracy In Reporting -- June 13, 2001
http://www.fair.org/activism/o'neill.html
When a high-level government official calls for drastic changes in U.S. law, it ought to be big news. But in an interview reported by the Financial Times' Amity Shlaes (5/19/01 & 5/22/01), treasury secretary Paul O'Neill called for sweeping changes in U.S. tax and social policy, and some three weeks later, those statements have made hardly a ripple in the U.S. media. Most Americans have probably not heard a word about them.
In the interview, O'Neill called the current U.S. tax system "an abomination" that required changes to its "very structure." His preferred changes? O'Neill "absolutely" supports the elimination of taxes on corporations-- and the shifting of the tax burden to individuals, saying government would work better if it "collected taxes in a more direct way from the people."
He also called for the abolition of Social Security and Medicare, on the grounds that "able-bodied adults should save enough on a regular basis so that they can provide for their own retirement, and, for that matter, health and medical needs." In fact, O'Neill believes the U.S.should reconsider the whole purpose of taxation: "National defense is a federal responsibility," Shlaes paraphrases O'Neill as saying, "but all other outlays need review."
And O'Neill assured Shlaes he was not speaking only for himself: "Not only am I committed to working on this issue, the president is also intrigued about the possibility of fixing this mess."
The Financial Times described O'Neill's comments (approvingly) as "radical" and "political dynamite." Yet the story has so far failed to take hold in the U.S. press.
Three columnists at New York's Newsday noted O'Neill's remarks: Robert Reno (who said the Treasury Secretary "comes across as a man who has paid a lot of taxes and clearly resents it"-- 5/27/01) Marie Cocco (5/31/01) and Paul Vitello (5/24/01). An obviously irked Vitello took it the furthest, actually calling O'Neill's spokesman at Treasury to confirm that these were not "made-up quotes":
"The secretary didn't really mean to say that no matter how old, no person who has paid into the Social Security system all his or her life would be entitled to benefits until he or she is physically no longer able to work? He didn't really mean to say that ExxonMobil and Time Warner should be treated as we treat the church-- as tax exempt?"
"'Yes,' said the spokesman, 'that is our position. The quotes were all accurate.'"
Thomas DeFrank of New York's Daily News also reported O'Neill's comments (5/22/01), but he apparently got a different response from the Treasury Department. "Treasury spokesman Rob Nichols said O'Neill's comments on Social Security reflected his personal views, not the Bush administration's," he noted.
Outside of local New York papers, the story was harder to find. Cox wire service reporter Scott Shepard filed a story (5/20/01), which noted only O'Neill's description of the tax system as an "abomination" and the claim that the president was "also intrigued" about major changes, including cutting corporate taxes. A short piece in the May 22 Investor's Business Daily ("A Whiff of Reform in the Air") did the same, and was echoed in its approving tone by a column in the May 23 Washington Times ("Signals for Tax Repair?").
O'Neill has made several television appearances since the Financial Times interview, but a search of the Nexis.com database turned up just two TV references to the remarks, neither on a Big 3 network. The Financial Times' own Robert Thomson teased his paper's interview at the end of a May 18 appearance on CNNfn's "The N.E.W. Show" whose main subject was the Lucent/Alcatel merger. And Fox News Sunday host Tony Snow asked O'Neill about the idea of "getting rid of the corporate income tax" on June 3. (O'Neill declined to answer, saying only that "we need to fundamentally look at the way our tax code works.")
What about the country's major outlets, the place one would look for a story of such import? So far, O'Neill's radical statements have made it into the New York Times only in an op-ed by Democratic partisans James Carville and Paul Begala (5/27/01). USA Today ran an Associated Press column (5/22/01) that placed O'Neill's calls for eliminating taxes on corporations at the end, after discussion of estate taxes and "simplification" of the tax system, and noted only that the Treasury Secretary has plans for "reform" of Social Security. (AP's original headline on the piece: "O'Neill: Further Tax Relief Coming," 5/21/01.)
Washington Post columnist John O. Fox used O'Neill's "abomination" quote to shore up his own argument about the U.S.'s "monstrously complicated" tax code, but ignored the rest of his statements. And the Post's David Broder made no reference to the Financial Times interview in his June 6 column, which referred to Bush administration plans to "open [Social Security and Medicare] up to market forces."
Broder did note congenially that "as Treasury Secretary Paul O'Neill...reminded me the other day, what makes the task so difficult is the need to educate people about the current system, before they can be persuaded that it needs to be changed as the administration proposes."
Indeed, the American people could use "educating" about just what the Bush administration and its Treasury Secretary propose. But where will they get it if not from the mainstream news media?
* * *
ACTION: Please write to national and local media outlets and ask them why Paul O'Neill's calls for eliminating corporate taxes and
Social Security were not a major news story.
Some suggested contacts include:
ABC World News Tonight
Anchor and Senior Editor
Peter Jennings
PeterJennings [at] abcnews.com
NBC News
DC Bureau Chief & Host, "Meet the Press"
Tim Russert
mtp [at] msnbc.com
New York Times
nytnews [at] nytimes.com
Toll free comment line: 1-888-NYT-NEWS
Washington Post
Deputy National Editor (Domestic Policy)
Leonard Bernstein
bernsteinl [at] washpost.com
Los Angeles Times
DC Bureau Chief
Doyle McManus
doyle.mcmanus [at] latimes.com
American Morning with Paula Zahn:
Explosive New Book Published in France Alleges that U.S. Was in Negotiations to Do a Deal with Taliban
http://www.cnn.com/TRANSCRIPTS/0201/08/ltm.05.html
PAULA ZAHN, CNN ANCHOR: Time to check in with ambassador-in- residence, Richard Butler, this morning. An explosive new book published in France alleges that the United States was in negotiations to do a deal with the Taliban for an oil pipeline in Afghanistan.
Joining us right now is Richard Butler to shed some light on this new book. He is the former chief U.N. weapons inspector. He is now on the Council on Foreign Relations and our own ambassador-in- residence -- good morning.
RICHARD BUTLER, FMR. U.N. WEAPONS INSPECTOR: Good morning, Paula.
ZAHN: Boy, if any of these charges are true...
BUTLER: If...
ZAHN: ... this...
BUTLER: Yes.
ZAHN: ... is really big news.
BUTLER: I agree.
ZAHN: Start off with what your understanding is of what is in this book -- the most explosive charge.
BUTLER: The most explosive charge, Paula, is that the Bush administration -- the present one, just shortly after assuming office slowed down FBI investigations of al Qaeda and terrorism in Afghanistan in order to do a deal with the Taliban on oil -- an oil pipeline across Afghanistan.
ZAHN: And this book points out that the FBI's deputy director, John O'Neill,* actually resigned because he felt the U.S. administration was obstructing...
BUTLER: A proper...
ZAHN: ... the prosecution of terrorism.
BUTLER: Yes, yes, a proper intelligence investigation of terrorism. Now, you said if, and I affirmed that in responding to you. We have to be careful here. These are allegations. They're worth airing and talking about, because of their gravity. We don't know if they are correct. But I believe they should be investigated, because Central Asian oil, as we were discussing yesterday, is potentially so important. And all prior attempts to have a pipeline had to be done through Russia. It had to be negotiated with Russia.
Now, if there is to be a pipeline through Afghanistan, obviating the need to deal with Russia, it would also cost less than half of what a pipeline through Russia would cost. So financially and politically, there's a big prize to be had. A pipeline through Afghanistan down to the Pakistan coast would bring out that Central Asian oil easier and more cheaply.
ZAHN: (UNINTELLIGIBLE) as you spoke about this yesterday, we almost immediately got a call from "The New York Times."
BUTLER: Right.
ZAHN: They want you to write an op-ed piece on this over the weekend.
BUTLER: Right, and which I will do.
ZAHN: But let's come back to this whole issue of what John O'Neill, this FBI agent...
BUTLER: Right.
ZAHN: ... apparently told the authors of this book. He is alleging that -- what -- the U.S. government was trying to protect U.S. oil interests? And at the same time, shut off the investigation of terrorism to allow for that to happen?
BUTLER: That's the allegation that instead of prosecuting properly an investigation of terrorism, which has its home in Afghanistan as we now know, or one of its main homes, that was shut down or slowed down in order to pursue oil interests with the Taliban. The people who we have now bombed out of existence, and this not many months ago. The book says that the negotiators said to the Taliban, you have a choice. You have a carpet of gold, meaning an oil deal, or a carpet of bombs. That's what the book alleges.
ZAHN: Well, I know you're going to be doing your own independent homework on this...
BUTLER: Yes.
ZAHN: ... to see if you can confirm any of this. Let's move on to the whole issue of Iraq. The deputy defense secretary, Paul Wolfowitz, at one time was considered one of those voices within the administration...
BUTLER: Yes.
ZAHN: ... that was pushing for moving beyond Afghanistan. He seemed to back off a little from that yesterday.
BUTLER: Yes.
ZAHN: What do you read through the tea leaves here?
BUTLER: A very interesting report that the administration will focus on the Philippines, Yemen, Somalia as places where there are al Qaeda cells. But the word Iraq wasn't used by the man who was the chief hawk -- used as a, you know, as a future target. So what I interpret from that is this: That very likely our allies have been saying to us, this is too hard. This is really serious. Be careful. Saddam is essentially contained at the moment. Don't start, you know, a bigger problem either in the Arab world or in the coalition by going after him. And Wolfowitz, it seems, has probably accepted that.
ZAHN: A quick thought on the Israelis intercepting this latest armed shipment? What that means? You've got to do it in about 15 seconds.
BUTLER: It's extraordinarily serious, because it seems to have been tied to Yasser Arafat himself. It needs to be further investigated, but you know, Paula, the potentiality that this could once again prove an impediment to resume peace negotiations is really quite serious.
ZAHN: Thank you as usual for covering so much territory. Richard Butler, see you same time, same place tomorrow morning.
BUTLER: (UNINTELLIGIBLE).
ZAHN: We appreciate your insights.
TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT http://www.fdch.com.
*Note: John O'Neill, 49, was hired as chief of security at the World Trade Center following a 25-year career with the FBI and died on Sept. 11, the first day of his new job. O'Neill reportedly died after reentering the building to assist others. See the New Yorker article "Counter Terrorist" by Lawrence Wright:
http://www.newyorker.com/FACT/?020114fa_FACT1
$elling Out the Investigation
By Bill Manning, editor in chief, Fire Engineering
http://fe.pennnet.com/Articles/Article_Display.cfm?Section=OnlineArticles&SubSection=Display&PUBLICATION_ID=25&ARTICLE_ID=131225
Did they throw away the locked doors from the Triangle Shirtwaist Fire? Did they throw away the gas can used at the Happyland Social Club Fire? Did they cast aside the pressure-regulating valves at the Meridian Plaza Fire? Of course not. But essentially, that's what they're doing at the World Trade Center.
For more than three months, structural steel from the World Trade Center has been and continues to be cut up and sold for scrap. Crucial evidence that could answer many questions about high-rise building design practices and performance under fire conditions is on the slow boat to China, perhaps never to be seen again in America until you buy your next car.
Such destruction of evidence shows the astounding ignorance of government officials to the value of a thorough, scientific investigation of the largest fire-induced collapse in world history. I have combed through our national standard for fire investigation, NFPA921, but nowhere in it does one find an exemption allowing the destruction of evidence for buildings over 10 stories tall.
Hoping beyond hope, I have called experts to ask if the towers were the only high-rise buildings in America of lightweight, center-core construction. No such luck. I made other calls asking if these were the only buildings in America with light-density, sprayed-on fireproofing. Again, no luck-they were two of thousands that fit the description.
Comprehensive disaster investigations mean increased safety. They mean positive change. NASA knows it. The NTSB knows it. Does FEMA know it?
No. Fire Engineering has good reason to believe that the "official investigation" blessed by FEMA and run by the American Society of Civil Engineers is a half-baked farce that may already have been commandeered by political forces whose primary interests, to put it mildly, lie far afield of full disclosure. Except for the marginal benefit obtained from a three-day, visual walk-through of evidence sites conducted by ASCE investigation committee members- described by one close source as a "tourist trip"-no one's checking the evidence for anything.
Maybe we should live and work in planes. That way, if disaster strikes, we will at least be sure that a thorough investigation will help find ways to increase safety for our survivors.
As things now stand and if they continue in such fashion, the investigation into the World Trade Center fire and collapse will amount to paper- and computer-generated hypotheticals.
However, respected members of the fire protection engineering community are beginning to raise red flags, and a resonating theory has emerged: The structural damage from the planes and the explosive ignition of jet fuel in themselves were not enough to bring down the towers. Rather, theory has it, the subsequent contents fires attacking the questionably fireproofed lightweight trusses and load-bearing columns directly caused the collapses in an alarmingly short time. Of course, in light of there being no real evidence thus far produced, this could remain just unexplored theory.
The frequency of published and unpublished reports raising questions about the steel fireproofing and other fire protection elements in the buildings, as well as their design and construction, is on the rise. The builders and owners of the World Trade Center property, the Port Authority of New York-New Jersey, a governmental agency that operates in an accountability vacuum beyond the reach of local fire and building codes, has denied charges that the buildings' fire protection or construction components were substandard but has refused to cooperate with requests for documentation supporting its contentions.
Some citizens are taking to the streets to protest the investigation sellout. Sally Regenhard, for one, wants to know why and how the building fell as it did upon her unfortunate son Christian, an FDNY probationary firefighter. And so do we.
Clearly, there are burning questions that need answers. Based on the incident's magnitude alone, a full-throttle, fully resourced, forensic investigation is imperative. More important, from a moral standpoint, for the safety of present and future generations who live and work in tall buildings-and for firefighters, always first in and last out-the lessons about the buildings' design and behavior in this extraordinary event must be learned and applied in the real world.
To treat the September 11 incident any differently would be the height of stupidity and ignorance.
The destruction and removal of evidence must stop immediately.
The federal government must scrap the current setup and commission a fully resourced blue ribbon panel to conduct a clean and thorough investigation of the fire and collapse, leaving no stones unturned.
Firefighters, this is your call to action. Visit WTC "Investigation"?: A Call to Action, then contact your representatives in Congress and officials in Washington and help us correct this problem immediately.
9-ll: Ho-Hum, Nothing Urgent
by George Szamuely
Research & documentation by Illarion Bykov and Jared Israel
[Posted 9 January 2002]
http://emperors-clothes.com/indict/urgent.htm
On the morning of September 11, the present Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, General Richard B. Myers, was having a routine meeting on Capitol Hill with Senator Max Cleland. Just before the meeting began,
"While in an outer office, he said, he saw a television report that a plane had hit the World Trade Center. 'They thought it was a small plane or something like that,' Myers said. So the two men went ahead with the office call."
--'American Forces Press Service' 23 October 2001 (1)
The meeting went on for some time. While the two men chatted away, a second hijacked jet plowed into the World Trade Center’s south tower and a third one into the Pentagon. And still they went on with their meeting.
"Meanwhile, the second World Trade Center tower was hit by another jet. 'Nobody informed us of that,' Myers said. 'But when we came out, that was obvious. Then, right at that time, somebody said the Pentagon had been hit.'
"Somebody thrust a cell phone in Myers' hand. Gen. Ralph Eberhart, commander of U.S. Space Command and the North American Aerospace Defense Command was on the other end of the line 'talking about what was happening and the actions he was going to take.'
--'American Forces Press Service' 23 October 2001 (1)
Meanwhile, in Florida, it is clear from the public record that by the time President Bush left his hotel he knew about the attack on the first WTC tower. John Cochran, who was covering the President's trip to Sarasota told, told Peter Jennings on ABC TV:
"He [the President] got out of his hotel suite this morning, was about to leave, reporters saw the White House chief of staff, Andy Card, whisper into his ear. The reporter said to the president, 'Do you know what's going on in New York?' He said he did, and he said he will have something about it later."
--'ABC News' Special Report 11 September 2001 (2)
And then he went to an elementary school in Sarasota to read to children for half an hour.
No urgency. Why should there be? Who could possibly have realized then the calamitous nature of the events of September 11? Besides in one of the planes, the hijackers had switched the transponders off. So how could anyone know what was going on? Yet September 11 was not so unprecedented. Passenger jet hijackings have happened before, and the US government has prepared detailed plans to handle them. On September 11 these plans were ignored in their entirety.
According to the 'New York Times,' air traffic controllers knew at 8:20 a.m.:
"that American Airlines Flight 11, bound from Boston to Los Angeles, had probably been hijacked. When the first news report was made at 8:45 a.m. that a plane might have hit the World Trade Center, they knew it was Flight 11." (3)
There was little ambiguity on the matter. The pilot had pushed a button on the aircraft yoke that allowed controllers to hear the hijacker giving orders.
Here are the FAA regulations concerning hijackings:
"The FAA hijack coordinator…on duty at Washington headquarters will request the military to provide an escort aircraft for a confirmed hijacked aircraft…The escort service will be requested by the FAA hijack coordinator by direct contact with the National Military Command Center (NMCC)." (4)
Here are the instructions issued by the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff on June 1, 2001:
"In the event of a hijacking, the NMCC will be notified by the most expeditious means by the FAA. The NMCC will…forward requests for DOD assistance to the Secretary of Defense for approval." (5)
In addition, Vice President Cheney told Meet the Press on Sept. 16 that only the president has the authority to order the shooting down of a civilian airliner. "And you have to ask yourself," Cheney said, "‘If we had had combat air patrol up over New York and we’d had the opportunity to take out the two aircraft that hit the World Trade Center, would we have been justified in doing that?’ I think absolutely we would have…. It’s a presidential-level decision, and the president made, I think, exactly the right call in this case, to say, ‘I wished we’d had combat air patrol up over New York.’" (6)
The U.S. is supposed to scramble military aircraft the moment a hijacking is confirmed. Yet Myers continues to chat on Capitol Hill, Defense Secretary Rumsfeld works undisturbed in his Pentagon office and the president reads to schoolchildren. Myers’ first statement to the Senate Armed Services Committee on Sept. 13, that no fighter planes had been launched until after the Pentagon was hit, was therefore scarcely surprising. Senators were a little incredulous. And the day before, Dan Rather asked on CBS News:
"These hijacked aircraft were in the air for quite a while…Why doesn’t the Pentagon have the kind of protection that they can get a fighter-interceptor aircraft up, and if someone is going to plow an aircraft into the Pentagon, that we have at least some…line of defense?" (7)
Good question. Clearly another, more comforting, story was needed and on the evening of Friday September 14 CBS launched it:
"CBS News has learned the FAA alerted US Air defense units of a possible hijacking at 8:38 Tuesday morning, and six minutes later, at 8:44, two F-15s received a scramble order at Otis Air Force Base on Cape Cod. But two minutes later, at 8:46, American Airlines Flight 11, the first hijacked jet, slammed into the World Trade Center. Six minutes later, at 8:52, the F-15s were airborne and began racing towards New York City, but the fighters were still 70 miles away when the second hijacked jet, United Airlines Flight 175, hit the second Trade Center tower. Shortly after that blast, the F-15s reached Manhattan and began flying air cover missions over the city.
"But to the south, a new danger and a new response. At 9:30, three F-16s were launched out of Langley Air Force base in Virginia, 150 miles south of Washington. But just seven minutes later, at 9:37, American Airlines Flight 77 hit the Pentagon. The F-16s arrived in Washington just before 10:00 and began flying cover over the nation's capital." (8)
This story, which has now, with slight modifications, become the "official" NORAD version, raises more questions than it answers.
F-15s have a cruising speed of 577-mph, (9) while F-16s have a cruising speed of 570-mph. (10) . Both planes can fly much faster, though there is a rapid drop in fuel economy.
According to CBS, three F-16s scrambled from Langley at 9:30 and arrived in Washington at 10:00. The distance from Langley Air Force Base to the Pentagon is 129 miles - not 150, as CBS stated. If these F-16s took half an hour to get to Washington they were flying at 4.4 miles per minute, 258 mph. That's less than half their cruising speed. It's a fifth of the maximum speed for these F-16s, 1500-mph.
Talk about a lack of urgency!
And since Washington, D.C. is little more than 200 miles from New York, the two F-15 fighters from Otis would have had time to get to DC, intercept Flight 77 and grab a breakfast on the way.
And then of course, there is the small matter of Andrews Air Force Base. It is, after all, but ten miles from the Pentagon. As Matthew Wald wrote in the New York Times on September 15th:
"During the hour or so that American Airlines Flight 77 was under the control of hijackers, up to the moment it struck the west side of the Pentagon, military officials in a command center on the east side of the building were urgently talking to law enforcement and air traffic control officials about what to do." (11)
Why didn't they order planes from Andrews put in the air to protect Washington D.C. and to intercept American Flight 77 long before it reached the U.S. capital? (12)
***
Related Emperor's Clothes articles are listed in 'Articles on 9-11', at http://emperors-clothes.com/indict/911page.htm
Includes: (1) Articles refuting the official story on what happened 9-11; (2) Articles refuting official story on Osama bin Laden; (3) Exclusive interviews related to 9-11, including with Red Cross; (4) Other relevant issues.
(1) 'American Forces Press Service' 23 October 2001 "Myers and Sept. 11: 'We Hadn't Thought About This'" by Sergeant 1st Class Kathleen T. Rhem, USA. Full text posted at:
http://www.defenselink.mil/news/Oct2001/n10232001_200110236.html
backup at:
http://emperor.vwh.net/9-11backups/myersafrts.htm
(2) 'ABC News' Special Report: "Planes crash into World Trade Center" (8:53 AM ET) Tuesday 11 September 2001
To see the quotation in the full transcript, go to:
http://emperor.vwh.net/9-11backups/abc911.htm#mybust
(3) 'New York Times' Saturday 15 September 2001 "AFTER THE ATTACKS: SKY RULES; Pentagon Tracked Deadly Jet But Found No Way to Stop It" by Matthew L. Wald
Full text with quotation is at:
http://emperor.vwh.net/9-11backups/nyt915.htm#mybust
(4) FAA Order 7610.4J 'Special Military Operations' (Effective Date: November 3, 1998; Includes: Change 1, effective July 3, 2000; Change 2, effective July 12, 2001), Chapter 7, Section 1-2, "Escort of Hijacked Aircraft: Requests for Service"
Full text posted at:
http://faa.gov/ATpubs/MIL/Ch7/mil0701.html#7-1-2
(5) 'Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Instruction 3610.01A,' 1 June 2001, "Aircraft Piracy (Hijacking) and Destruction of Derelict Airborne Objects," 4.Policy (page 1)
PDF available at:
http://www.dtic.mil/doctrine/jel/cjcsd/cjcsi/3610_01a.pdf
Backup at:
http://emperor.vwh.net/9-11backups/3610_01a.pdf
(6)'NBC, Meet the Press' (10:00 AM ET) Sunday 16 September 2001.
Full transcript at:
http://stacks.msnbc.com/news/629714.asp?cp1=1
Backup transcript at:
http://emperor.vwh.net/9-11backups/nbcmp.htm
Vice President Cheney's 'Meet the Press' appearance is discussed in ''Mr. Cheney's Cover Story' at
http://emperors-clothes.com/indict/indict-2.htm
(7) CBS News Special Report (12:00 Noon PM ET) - September 12, 2001 "Aftermath of and investigation into attacks on World Trade Center and the Pentagon at http://emperor.vwh.net/9-11backups/cbs12th.htm
(8) To read the new cover story floated by CBS on 14 September go to http://emperor.vwh.net/9-11backups/changes.htm#a
(9) Website of the 88th Communications Group, Wright-Patterson AFB OH, http://www.wpafb.af.mil/museum/research/fighter/f16a.htm
(10) From 'Popular Mechanics' Website, 'The Weapons Of Enduring Freedom,' at http://popularmechanics.com/science/military/2001/9/weapons_of_infinite_justice/
(11) 'Pentagon Tracked Deadly Jet but Found No Way to Stop It,' 'New York Times,' September 15, 2001, Section A; Page 1; Column 1 http://college4.nytimes.com/guests/articles/2001/09/15/868107.xml
(12) Regarding the failure to scramble planes from Andrews Air Force Base, see 'Why Were None of the Hijacked Planes Intercepted?' at
http://emperors-clothes.com/indict/indict-1.htm
The President's reaction:
"In Sarasota, Florida, Bush was reading to children in a classroom at 9:05 a.m. when his chief of staff, Andrew Card, whispered into his ear. The president briefly turned somber before he resumed reading. He addressed the tragedy about a half-hour later."
--Associated Press, September 12, 2001
"President Bush listened to 18 Booker Elementary School second-graders read a story about a girl's pet goat Tuesday before he spoke briefly and somberly about the terrorist attacks." - Sarasota Herald-Tribune, Page A20, September 12, 2001
President Meets with Displaced Workers in Town Hall Meeting, December 4, 2001
http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2001/12/20011204-17.html
“THE PRESIDENT: Thank you, Jordan. Well, Jordan, you're not going to believe what state I was in when I heard about the terrorist attack. I was in Florida. And my Chief of Staff, Andy Card -- actually, I was in a classroom talking about a reading program that works. I was sitting outside the classroom waiting to go in, and I saw an airplane hit the tower -- the TV was obviously on.* And I used to fly, myself, and I said, well, there's one terrible pilot. I said, it must have been a horrible accident.”
(see also http://www.guardian.co.uk/bush/story/0,7369,612355,00.html)
President Holds Town Hall Forum on Economy in California, January 5, 2002
http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2001/12/20011204-17.html
“Anyway, I was sitting there, and my Chief of Staff -- well, first of all, when we walked into the classroom, I had seen this plane fly into the first building.* There was a TV set on. And you know, I thought it was pilot error and I was amazed that anybody could make such a terrible mistake. And something was wrong with the plane, or -- anyway, I'm sitting there, listening to the briefing, and Andy Card came and said, ‘America is under attack."’”
*Note: There was no official broadcast of the first airplane plowing into the World Trade Center. The broadcast seen by millions of Americans showed the second airplane's crash. However, this event had not yet taken place until the president was already in the classroom listening to children read.
Relevent web sites:
What did they know and when did they know it?
http://makethemaccountable.com/whatwhen/index.htm
The Emperor's New Clothes -- Piercing a Fog of Lies
http://www.emperors-clothes.com
Bush/Enrongate Timeline
http://www.indymedia.org/front.php3?article_id=121162&group=webcast
America's dirty Afghan secret: it's a war over oil
http://globalresearch.ca/articles/SHA111A.html
The Rise of the Fourth Reich
http://www.whatreallyhappened.com/reich.html
Some final quotes:
(taken from http://baltech.org/lederman/bush-conspiracy-11-23-01.html)
"If this were a dictatorship, it'd be a heck of a lot easier, just so long as I'm the dictator."
--GW Bush during a photo-op with Congressional leaders on 12/18/2000
"Why of course the people don't want war. Why should some poor slob on a farm want to risk his life in a war when the best he can get out of it is to come back to his farm in one piece? Naturally the common people don't want war: neither in Russia, nor in England, nor for that matter in Germany. That is understood. But, after all, it is the leaders of the country who determine the policy and it is always a simple matter to drag the people along, whether it is a democracy, or a fascist dictatorship, or a parliament, or a communist dictatorship. Voice or no voice, the people can always be brought to the bidding of the leaders. That is easy. All you have to do is tell them they are being attacked, and denounce the peacemakers for lack of patriotism and exposing the country to danger. It works the same in any country."
--Hermann Goering, Hitler's #2 Man
"I cannot say that our country could have no central police without becoming totalitarian, but I can say with great conviction that it cannot be totalitarian without a centralized national police. A national police will have enough on enough people, even if it does not elect to prosecute them, so that it will find no opposition to its policies."
--Supreme Court Justice Robert H. Jackson,
The Supreme Court In the American System of Government (1955)
"In a time of universal deceit, TELLING THE TRUTH is a revolutionary act."
--George Orwell
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