Lewis Lapham of "Harper's" magazine is reading "Debunking 9/11 Debunking"

On Sunday June 3, Lewis Lapham was featured on a 3-hour program on C-SPAN's "In Depth" program. The program focused on Lapham's intellectual life and times, and took calls from the live C-SPAN viewership. During the course of taking calls, one caller asked about Lapham's views on 9/11 as being something other than the Official Conspiracy Theory. Here is what Lapham had to say;

"As to the question of what happened at 9/11, I am reading at the moment a book by a man named David Griffin, on the debunking of the 9/11 debunking, and he raises a number of sharp questions... which I think deserve further questioning and investigation, but I am not as yet prepared to think that the bringing down of the... trade towers was the work of the Bush administration."

Harper's magazine reflects the current political and social thinking of a segment of America's elite, namely, a segment that reads. It is also a magazine for the reading American public that consider themselves "progressives" generally. Harper's was one of the first publications to print a long critical essay about the 9/11 Commission's Final Report, that still resonates today; Whitewash as public service by Benjamin DeMott.

When a serious thinker, writer, and shaper of the American cultural soul is reading David Ray Griffin, I would have to say that progressives and Leftists who will have no truck with questions about 9/11 need to pause and reflect on this. Knee-jerk time is over. It's time to pick up Griffin's books and become familiar with them, and become familiar with the serious aspects of 9/11 skepticism. Lapham is reading Griffin. After Gore Vidal's endorsement of "The New Pearl Harbor", an open-minded Liberal really has no excuse not to give 9/11 skeptics like Griffin a fair shake anymore. This means actually reading the books, not just snarking at them.

See the stream from the C-SPAN archive - approx. 53 minute mark;
http://www.booktv.org/feature/index.asp?segid=7989&schedID=491

Big tip of the hat to "alexjonesfan" who posted a condensed version of this news item at The Randi Rhodes Message Board. Take a minute to write to Harper's and ask Lapham to review Griffin's book: letters(at)harpers.org

Thanks, dude.

Never would have heard of this if it wasn't for your report. This is significant.

C-SPAN Junkie

Benefits of being a C-SPAN junkie . . . the whole program is excellent . . . Mr. Lapham is a treasure.

The clip says 20070614 . . . it should be 20070616 . . . I admit it . . . I don't know what day it is . . . but I know what the truth is.

I'm uploading a renamed version but will leave the other in place. Same clip different name:

If you get a file not found error . . . wait a sec and try again.

Peace!

http://www.alexjonesfan.com/lewis_lapham/mp3/20070616_debunking_book.mp3

Lionel, Air America Radio, won't engage

End of the Lionel Show, (air america radio) June 14th 2007
audio clip attached below:
http://www.alexjonesfan.com/lionel/mp3/20070614_aint_gonna_happen.mp3

Lionel:
I don't get it, this Rudi Mania, what is he saying, maybe its me

Caller:
I don't believe the Rudi Mani, I think its all . . must be scripted, because I mean the guy is absolutely frightening to a lot of people and uh uh another thing lionel sorry to change the subject but uh are you familiar with a man named Alex Jones.

Lionel:
Yes, . . . he's one of those people who is in the . . . let me tell you again . . .
the 911 truth people my friends . . I just want you to know something I'm just going to say this about it . . I want you to go to google and type in . . . ah . . . 9/11 and then conspiracy and you'll see 1.7 million sites.

I'm telling you right now, nobody . . but nobody wants to hear about this. Its the kiss of death, ok . . . there's some fascinating questions, oh yea . . . and I mean I've done a lot of reading on it and it would just astound you . . here's one for example . . .

And the Washington Post said that when flight 93 hit in Shanksville . . . did you know that debris was found up to eight miles away? . . isn't that something! . . it was a bounce . . . and it was also windy that day . . . plane hits . . and then the debris just floats off . . . 8 miles away . . to New Baltimore.

Oh why even bother with it, nobody cares about this . . .nobody wants to hear about this. Oh by the way ah Indian Lake, two miles away, also found there.

My friends there are some things . . . that I have . . . I have thought about this . . . it ain't gonna happen.

Well what a week this has been . . . . .

*********************************************
My read on this is that Lionel thinks the subject is the kiss of death if he engages in it, he doesn't allow interaction with the caller after Alex Jones is brought up, but at the same time he tells us that it is a very interesting subject and that we should investigate it ourselves. At the end of this clip, he states again that he's thought about taking this on but he's decided against it.

I don't get it.

Is this guy making fun of 9/11 truth, or endorsing it? This clip is ambiguous.
------------------
"Peace comes from within. Do not seek it without." - Buddha
"What you do will be insignificant, but it is very important that you do it." - Gandhi
"The Sun never shined on a cause of greater worth." - Thomas Paine

It's pretty clear to me that he believes that his radio job

is more important than his life and he wants his "fans" to stop calling in and asking him to talk about 9/11.

I wonder what he will do when he is asked to spread outright lies instead of just remain silent?

Will he get it then?

To those that call in, be kind but be persistent, WE do want to talk about this as 9/11 truth is the single most important issue of our time.

The truth shall set us free. Love is the only way forward.

I am a Lionel Fan

Lionel is very bright guy. He was more aggressive talking about 9/11 at his last gig at WOR. I'm not advocating beating the guy up. No man is an Island and he has a new job. He is part of the Air America establishment which limits the range of his dialog but vastly increases his reach. He did ask alot of people to google "9/11 Conspiracy" and take look for themselves.

ALEX JONES FAN

Can you please spare me with your ALEX JONES merchandising.

I can't hear that name anymore.

Don't try to make the whole movement your own.

For then selling cups and t-shirts.

Nope

I link to the "911 Was an Inside Job" T-Shirt that I'm wearing at the moment. I don't make any money off of this, it links directly to the Infowars Store. I am an Amazon associates member and receive a small commission on books which are only books that I have read, am reading, or have ordered. I state this clearly on my website (about us link).

Alex is linking to an audio clip that is hosted on my site.

http://www.jonesreport.com/articles/200207_ebersole.html

http://www.truthcult.com/dz/christine_ebersole.mp3 - I originally hosted this for DZ here and then Alex Jones placed it on his homepage for almost 2 weeks.

(truthcult.com = alexjones.com)

Tens of thousands of people have downloaded it. Hosting large files can become expensive.

2007 P&L for Alexjonesfan:

Costs: $200.00 (+)
Profits: $5.00

Bandwidth costs money so there has to an "income component" in the operation to facilitate scaling. Otherwise, you start getting lots of traffic, your site goes down and then you have to move to more expensive hosting which you can't afford.

I wish I could feed my kids without it (worthless green paper), but until I find another way to do it, I have to try and minimize my losses with alexjonesfan.com.

Don't look now, but if you move your eyeballs a little to the left, you'll see sponsored links. 911 Blogger also has to have an income component so that they can continue to grow.

Google offices with the NSA and has been caught rigging the rankings of 9/11 truth videos. The real world is filled with strange compromises.

In Addition to Gore Vidal..

Howard Zinn has also endorsed Griffin's books. In fact he has given a new testimonial on the cover of "Debunking 9/11 Debunking." It seems that his opinion would and SHOULD carry some weight with progressives, since he actually works for Progressive Magazine! Can't these people at least read the books instead of being condescending elitists?

Kiss of Death

They consider it the Kiss of Death. The problem is, when this really goes mainstream, which it is, they will instantly become irrelevant. If you lose your credibility as a journalist . . . well I guess you can always work for Fox.

Spooks in the Family

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/11/14/AR200611...

Much as I enjoy Harper's, I don't find it odd that Lewis Latham is not yet ready to condemn the Bush regime for 9/11. His father was a spook (former general counsel at the C.I.A.), afterall. Blood is thicker than water, as they say. I'm encouraged that he's mentioned DRG, but I doubt he'll do much more than that. He seems like a good man.

Former CIA General Counsel, Environmentalist Anthony Abbot Lapham, 70
By Joe Holley
Washington Post Staff Writer
Wednesday, November 15, 2006; Page B05

"Anthony Abbot Lapham, 70, a former general counsel at the Central Intelligence Agency and a dedicated environmentalist, died of a heart attack Nov. 11 while trout fishing with his son on the Cane River near Asheville, N.C.

Mr. Lapham was the third general counsel in the agency's history and the first brought in from outside..."

One thing to remember...

One thing to remember is that ordinary people also work at the CIA, DIA, FBI and so on. Most of them are normal and OK people, don't you suppose? By itself, working at one of those places need not say so much about a person's motives.

Often they probably have similar goals and ideals as most people we know. I would bet it will be very few indeed who are NWO types, and only at the top levels. There too, once in a while, I will be we have had good folks at the top. Perhaps not now however.

I have no idea about Anthony Lapham, or Lewis. So far they seem fine to me, from what little I have read.

But I do happen to know a fellow who works as an FBI agent -- believe it or not. He is definitely a good person, with good ideals. He likes his job and does well at it -- I think it mostly has to do with watching business practices in his area of the country.

I hope we can we those sorts of people, in the military, CIA, DIA, FBI, and so on. I hope some of them visit this website.

yes, by itself its not such

yes, by itself its not such a big deal. but taking into account things like project mockingbird etc. and the CIA's history of co-opting the media i would say noting that Lapham is connected is important. JFK wanted to end the CIA for a reason. because its out of control and the leadership is almost always corrupt, and sadly, by extension almost anyone with any real sway in the agency is as well. as far as good folks at the top, i would suggest that the man in my signature might have been doing the right thing, as there were reports that he was talking with former Senator DeCamp about the franklin cover-up and was later found dead floating near his residence. but even if Colby was a good man(which i dont believe,even if he did find a conscience near the end), hes an anomaly for sure.

"The Central Intelligence Agency owns everyone of any significance in the major media." ~ William Colby, Former Director, CIA

.

Right.

Continuing the discussion, I met and spoke with Dan Ellsberg some years ago. He told the group of us -- it was at a lecture/presentation, on the Berkeley campus; he lives in Berkeley -- that he'd entered employment with the CIA due to patriotism and idealism. Many of them probably do. It was his patriotism that brought him to publish the Pentagon Papers. And almost go to prison for it. He got out on a technicality.

Dan also referred to folks in the CIA that others back then called 'the animals' -- the ones into black ops as we say now, around the world.

There is absolutely no argument here. I agree with you. I am adding that some in those agencies think like us.

Yes, in most any institution there is the entire range from

great (an Ellsberg) to rotten (a Negroponte) and everything in between. One of our goals obviously should be to attempt to help and empower the good ones and to isolate and neutralize the bad ones.

An anecdote from Lapham from some years ago (maybe in one of his "Notebook" columns), to the affect that: in his youth he encountered some CIA recruiters, and was dumbfounded by the idiotic attitudes they displayed.

This is encouraging

I am always happy to hear that a progressive is ready to listen, or at the very least, not dismiss 911 out of hand.

This is my first post on the board ...I have been a reader for awhile.

Also...I wanted to thank you all at 911 Blogger for the work you do. You have certainly helped to awaken me. Seems I don't see alot of appreciation articulated on these sites. I think there should be a little more.

And Thanks to You, Herr Strauss

I have been an avid admirer of your music for years.

Welcome Mr. Strauss

Good to have you with us.

Yes, the posts here can get a little heated at times, but (almost) everyone here has the best interests of the movement at heart.

I, too, would like to see more civility, appreciation and support and less contentious debate here, but we're working our way along this very difficult path as best we can.

As long as we keep our eyes on the prize we will expose all the lies before the republic dies.

The truth shall set us free. Love is the only way forward.

Welcome Leo

i love your handle...as in:

http://www.alternet.org/story/15935

everyone should read up on this stuff, if you have not already.

Oh -- THAT Strauss!

Yes,

Those who have not read up a little on Leo Strauss should take some time to do so: a real shocker. Shadia Drury's book on him is great. The recent novel RAVELSTEIN by the Chicago novelist who died a few years ago (cant't recall his name right now) is about one of the major Straussians at University of Chicago. But there should be a lot of articles on the internet too. (If you go to the official Leo Strauss website, though, you will come away clueless as to their REAL philosophy.)

Redemption

Educated people have the capacity to change.

Interesting turn of words

"but I am not as yet prepared to think that the bringing down of the... trade towers was the work of the Bush administration."

I am not, as yet, prepared to think

Just a LITTLE more research...and you WILL be! Soon everyone will be prepared to start thinking about it.
____________________________
On the 11th day, of every month.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_Q9nRs8cu5Y&eurl=http%3A%2F%2Ftruthaction...

It is uncanny

how the Strauss vision is being played out before our very eyes.

DVD ACTIVISM

I selected the Activism tab on the Home page and noticed there was no DVD Activism listed. I believe we need to push away from our computers more often and hit the streets.

In February, I started the one dollar dvd project and have distributed over twenty thousand DVD's on various subjects.( http://www.onedollardvdproject.com ) I followed in the footsteps of Tom Tvedten, from the Action Items section.

My site was designed to make inexpensive DVD's available to those activists who may wish to give educational DVD's to friends and neighbors who do not have access to high-speed connections or, those who are not up to speed with the internet, in general. Pardon the pun.

The project is not a commercial operation. All funds support the project directly. It is just starting to pay for itself. I am a one man operation with two duplicators and five printers. My typical order is $26 though, some several hundred disc orders are becoming more common. My largest was 1,000 Ron Paul: Hope For America DVD's. One gentleman sent eight one-hundred dollar bills to me via USPS. Wow. Truth movement people are a trusting bunch. I like that. I immediately purchased another ten burn DVD duplicator.

I truly believe that this project can contribute to educating the sheep and waking them from their sleep. Now there is a good bumper sticker. WAKE THE SHEEP WHILE THEY SLEEP.

Many of us like to share the truths, we have learned, with others. In my experience, the uninformed seem to appreciate a short verbal introduction and a DVD in their hand. Any more effort than a simple conversation seems to build defenses which by the way sounds like build the fences.

If each of us would start a personal policy of introducing a video a day to a friend and neighbor soon, we would each have lots of informed friends and neighbors. It may be as simple as that. Certainly, it is grand to share wisdom with others on-line and debate issues but, the real goal is to increase our numbers. What better way to start than your own, personal circle of friends, relatives and neighbors. Besides, you would rather live on a street or, in a neighborhood that is informed.

I assure you the results will encourage you to become even more bold in spreading the truth. Unlike years past, people know there is something very wrong with our Country. Many want answers.

The feedback is usually more positive than when conversation alone is used. A video documentary on DVD can be taken home, slipped into the familiar player and watched from the comfortable couch without the sometimes intimidating one-on-one arguments.

Please, come take a look at my site and consider DVD Activism as another tool in the freedom fight.

Thank you.

Ron Neil
http://www.onedollardvdproject.com