http://www.consortiumnews.com/2011/011511.html

By Robert Parry
January 15, 2011

It seems that I have upset some folks on the Left again, this time by mentioning – deep inside a story about Sarah Palin’s proclaimed victimhood over the Tucson massacre fallout – that groups like the 9/11 “truthers” also have contributed to America’s crazed political environment.

(Last October, I angered some on the Left by noting that the four previous examples of progressives trying to punish Democrats by sitting out elections or supporting third parties – 1968, 1980, 1994 and 2000 – didn’t work out very well, either in the short- or long-term. I meant the piece to be a historical review of these tactics but it apparently touched some raw nerves.)

Similarly, my brief criticism of the “truthers” prompted a wave of angry e-mails and blog postings. In part, I was accused of showing inadequate respect for the “truther” research and was scolded for not delving deeply enough into the intricate arguments behind their claim that 9/11 was an “inside job.”

(Letters to the Editor: letters@mcweekly.com. Be sure to include name, email, phone, and city, state. Only name and location will be published)

The Truth, Only Censored: The list of Project Censored stories for 2009-10 comes during a weird media moment.

By Rebecca Bowe

http://www.montereycountyweekly.com/archives/2010/2010-Oct-28/the-list-o...
(or go to http://www.montereycountyweekly.com and click on "browse this weeks issue")

The world was a different place in 1976 when Carl Jensen, a professor of communications at Sonoma State University, founded Project Censored to highlight important national news stories that were underreported or outright ignored by the mainstream press.

Comments are permitted here: http://www.cbc.ca/canada/montreal/story/2010/05/04/montreal-911-conferen...

UQÀM staff denounce 9/11 Truthers speech
Last Updated: Tuesday, May 4, 2010 | 11:56 AM ET Comments1Recommend10
CBC News

Administrators at the University of Quebec in Montreal (UQÀM) say they will develop a formal policy for outside groups renting campus space for events after a controversial lecture about 9/11 drew fire by academic staff.

But the French-language university defended its right to have contentious speakers lecture on campus as part of free speech, saying it was appropriate to debate ideas, as long as events don't incite riots.

The Monday night lecture, hosted by World for 9/11 Truth, drew about 700 people who came to hear from two U.S. academics who deny the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks were carried out by terrorists.

The researchers – David Ray Griffin and Richard Gage – believe the U.S. government played a major role in orchestrating the deadly attacks on New York City's Twin Towers and the Pentagon in Washington, D.C.

Griffin and Gage are lobbying for an independent inquiry into the attacks, which killed 3,000 people. Their theories – part of the self-titled Truthers movement that formed after Sept. 11 – have been repeatedly discounted by scientists and civil engineering experts.

Griffin is giving a second lecture on the same topic at UQÀM on Tuesday night.
U.S. experts at UQÀM upset

Some professors at the school argue conspiracy theories have no place at UQÀM.

I was reading the following hit piece against Jesse Ventura by Fox News, and as I was thinking that this has got to be the most ridiculous hit piece I've ever seen (so over-the-top that it almost reads like something out of the Onion, such as when he says he was there and saw with his own eyes WTC7 fall "silently"), I did a major double take when I read this part:

Shortly before the building collapsed, several NYPD officers and Con-Edison workers told me that Larry Silverstein, the property developer of One World Financial Center was on the phone with his insurance carrier to see if they would authorize the controlled demolition of the building – since its foundation was already unstable and expected to fall.

Now, of course, the author's claim is that the building just so happened to collapse before any controlled demolition could actually take place.

I don't think the 911blogger community needs to be reminded that a controlled demolition could not have been set up in the few hours after the attack.

I'm reminded of how the halls of academia were poisoned with pseudoscientific propaganda in Nazi Germany. This guy also defends the official JFK story. Fortunately this guy leaves us his e-mail address. Let's blitz him folks!

Wacky theories show poor judgment

By Nathan Mitzer, Staff Columnist, nmitzner@smu.edu

Published: Tuesday, February 23, 2010

Updated: Tuesday, February 23, 2010

One week from today, Texas voters will select the Democratic and Republican party nominees for governor, concluding a seemingly endless primary campaign. The contest has been noteworthy in several respects, especially for the bitter battle for the Republican nomination between the sitting governor, Rick Perry, and an incumbent U.S. senator, Kay Bailey Hutchison. In the last two weeks, however, it appears that Hutchison and her other opponent, Debra Medina, have either come down with a bad case of campaign fatigue or have proven themselves to be the proverbial “six fries short of a happy meal.”

http://www.smh.com.au/world/utzons-son-signs-up-for-september-11-conspir...

Utzon's son signs up for September 11 conspiracy theory

AS CONSPIRACY theories go, it is up there with the CIA assassination of president John Kennedy and the faked moon landings. The terrorist attacks on the World Trade Centre on September 11, 2001, have spawned a cottage industry devoted to questioning whether they were the work of al-Qaeda and hinting that it was ''an inside job''.

Now a lead figure in the self-described ''9/11 truth movement'', an American architect, Richard Gage, has revealed one of its most high-profile adherents to date: Jan Utzon, son of the world-famous designer of the Sydney Opera House, Joern Utzon.

In a video posted on YouTube during his current visit to Sydney, Mr Utzon is interviewed by Mr Gage and endorses his call for a new inquiry into the September 11, 2001, attacks.

The Denver Post would be well served to consider the fate of printed propaganda as it relates to the demise of the now defunct Rocky Mountain News. KBDI has really rattled a lot of cages to be so resolutely attacked by the Denver post here, and now in this bitter and lopsided hit piece by well known Denver columnist Vincent Caroll. Let Mr. Caroll and the Denver Post hear from you in the most articulate and polite way possible. -Michael

The Ombudsman Column
PBS, Yes and No
By Michael Getler
September 25, 2009

What follows is more of a grab bag rather than an ombudsman's mailbag.

Included are a couple of unusual but not widely known episodes that unfolded last week that I thought might be of interest more broadly to PBS viewers. They can be seen to have at least some association with PBS in the way they were presented or appeared to the public. Yet PBS, as an enterprise, didn't have anything to do with them.

Has anyone have any knowledge regarding these claims made in a comment by poster "Henry Kissinger" on a hit piece in the examiner ( http://www.examiner.com/x-17336-Midland-County-Public-Policy-Examiner~y2... ):

"Henry Kissinger says:
Todd Beamer's memorial service was held on 09/16/01 at the Princeton Alliance Church in Plainsboro, New Jersey. Todd Beamer's wife, Lisa Beamer, a grieving mother of two and four months pregnant with her third child, registers TODDBEAMER.ORG four days later on 09/20/01, incorporates The Todd M. Beamer Memorial Foundation eight days later on 9/24/01 and then applies for the trademark "Let's Roll" ten days later on 9/26/01. Instead of acting like a wife and mother who should be experiencing untold grief, shock, and loss, her behavior turns a catastrophic personal tragedy into a cold and calculating cheap publicity stunt. But then the U S Government's propaganda machine needed heroes as well as villains paraded through the media for their 9/11 conspiracy theory.

In addition to this absurd conflation, Ben Cohen blames the 9/11 Truth Movement for not getting Bush and Cheney impeached.
________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

Ben Cohen: Why the Birthers Matter

[Beneath a Youtube embed of an Obama Birther passionately making her case at a conference, Ben Cohen writes:]

It's easy to dismiss the woman as a half baked lunatic and lump her in with other conspiracy theorists on the fringes of society. She is of course, and belongs with the fake moon landing idiots and 9/11 Truthers. But the fervor with which she states her case, and the extraordinary reaction of the audience is indicative of a far, far greater problem.

The Obama Birther Movement claims that Barack Obama was born in Kenya, and is not a United States citizen. At a National Press Club session, New York preacher James Manning declared Obama "the most notorious criminal in the history not just of America, but of this entire planet."

"Ghost Group"... yet another truth group I've never heard of. Of course, the korporate media brings them front-and-center.

I wonder if we should have a blog entry continuously updated with a list of hit pieces from the media. - kam

Some Suspect Conspiracy in Holocaust Museum Case

WASHINGTON (CNN) -- To most, the evidence against alleged Holocaust Museum shooter James von Brunn may seem overwhelming.

Surveillance camera video.

Eyewitness accounts.

Von Brunn's red Hyundai parked outside.

Ballistics.

But to some people in Von Brunn's e-mail chain and Web circles, there's a darker truth.

They say the June 10 shooting at the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum may be a "false flag" operation. The incident could have been staged by one group, perhaps what they describe as the Jewish-controlled U.S. government, to make it appear to be the actions of another group -- in this case, von Brunn and others who believe Jews exercise too much control in the United States.

In other words, von Brunn could have been set up, they contend.

The inner worlds of conspiracy believers

Those who subscribe to 9/11 conspiracy beliefs are generally suspicious and inquisitive, a new study suggests.

By Bruce Bower
Web edition : 10:39 am

Shortly after terrorist attacks destroyed the World Trade Center and mangled the Pentagon on September 11, 2001, conspiracy theories blossomed about secret and malevolent government plots behind the tragic events. A report scheduled to appear in an upcoming Applied Cognitive Psychology offers a preliminary psychological profile of people who believe in 9/11 conspiracies.

Esquire magazine takes a stab at "conspiracy theorists" in a recent piece ostensibly intended to coincide with the release of Angels and Demons.

This article is so jam-packed with nonsense, it's a veritable Hit Pieces for Dummies. The by-line reads:

"The difference between the millions obsessed with Angels and Demons and the whack jobs denying 9/11 and the Holocaust says a lot about Obama's hopes for a new era of responsibility"

Check out the first paragraph, in which 9/11 Truth is equated with antisemitism, the moon landing, and the New World Order:

http://www.alternet.org/rights/135592/did_paranoid_right-wing_media_fuel...

Did Paranoid Right-Wing Media Fuel the Pittsburgh Cop Killer's Rage?

By Max Blumenthal, The Daily Beast. Posted April 8, 2009.

Richard Poplawski, the man who allegedly murdered three Pittsburgh cops, was clearly influenced by Fox News's Glenn Beck and right-wing radio.

On April 6, two days after the 22-year-old Richard Poplawski allegedly murdered three police officers in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, a radio host named Alex Jones settled in before a microphone in his studio in Austin, Texas to do some damage control. "The mainstream media has certainly enjoyed tying me into this story," Jones complained. "They're attacking me and saying I'm delusional and there's no New World Order The Second Amendment, what the country's founded on--it's all my fault!"

Is this really "another" problem with the "conspiracy theories?" He's using the same tired talking points used by anti-truthers for years. He actually argues that everyone in the intelligence apparatus would know the whole picture. Also notice the whole "I have personally known people in the alphabet agencies and they're not evil" b.s. He just can't seem to accept that Disney-loving, apple pie eating, baseball watching white Americans of Euro descent could be so evil. Yet he has no trouble imagining that 19 Arabs could pull off such an attack.

***
http://www.opednews.com/populum/diarypage.php?did=12518

I was reading Karen Fish's poll when I realized one of the problems with these theories.

Let me preface this by saying, for those of you who do not know, that I lean rather strongly to the official government explanation of 9/11. I acknowledge some real deficiencies with that explanation, and I do not regard people who believe in the conspiracy theories as dumb or the tinfoil hat set (crazy). I simply view the conspiracy theories as several orders of magnitude worse and more deficient than the official explanation.

I just found this via someone else's blog: I don't remember it being posted here. This column is from the "sex & relationships" section of a women's website. Was written a couple weeks ago but we could still potentially reach a few people with the comments section. I just added one. I don't think this was a coordinated hit piece at the movement, just a column written by someone who happened to trash 9/11 truth in what is a larger article on relationships.

On a side note, I might as well add: As a single 30-year-old guy who occasionally feels frustration over not being in a relationship right now, I'm actually happy to have come across this column, because it reminds me of one truism: "Better to be alone than in bad company!" I'll be happy to be single for a little while longer, knowing that when I do settle with someone it'll be someone of a much more open mind than the woman who wrote this piece of trash column.

____________________________________________________________

Love Lessons: Desperately Seeking Approval

When my boyfriend suddenly decided that the U.S. government had planned 9/11 to justify a war in the Mideast, I was alarmed, but not enough to ditch him outright. After all, I told myself, his penchant for questioning everything in his path was one of the things I loved about him. Surely he'd regain his senses soon.

This is written by one of the people who debated Graeme McQueen and Michael Keefer on Toronto's "Agenda" program. You don't even need to register to post comments on this one, so let's let him have it. So far there are three comments (including mine) and all three are pro truth.

http://www.bloggernews.net/117816
_________________________________________________________________________________

When I walked across Cooper Square last Thursday just after dark, I found two columns of bluish light rising into the Manhattan night sky, an illuminated reminder of the Sept. 11, 2001 terrorist attack on the World Trade Center. The “Tribute in Light” was a sight that stirred memories of that tragic day in New York seven years ago, and all that has followed.

Source: guardian.co.uk

Charlie Brooker
The Guardian,
Monday July 14, 2008

I've got a theory - an untested, unprovable theory - that the more interesting your life is at any given point, the less lurid and spectacular your dreams will be. Think of it as a balancing procedure carried out by the brain to stop you getting bored to death.

If your waking life is mundane, it'll inject some thrills into your night-time imaginings to maintain a healthy overall fun quotient. So if you work in a cardboard box factory, and your job is to stare at the side of each box as it passes along a conveyor belt, to ensure they're all uniform and boxy enough - and you do this all day, every day, until your mind grows so dissociated and numb you can scarcely tell where the cardboard ends and your body begins - when your daily routine is THAT dull, chances are you'll spend each night dreaming you're the Emperor of Pluto, wrestling a 6ft green jaguar during a meteor storm in the desert just outside Vegas.

Hi everyone,

This is the first of my posts on my Kiwi blog in reaction to the BBC Doc. about WTC 7.
In my opinion it is an amazing tool to bring more people the truth. It has brought the events to the fore again in peoples minds and the testimonies and evidence we accumulated over the years is so vast that is should not be a problem to tear the BBC doc to pieces.

Here I go; really hoping that my mind would be put too rest with this BBC documentary so that I could safely go back to being a sheeple again. It was so well made, I mean I didn’t even feel the need to hide it because it seemed so complete: Clearly a lot of time and money spend on getting it just right. Lots of specialists who clearly put in a lot of time and effort to giving us the answer we needed but than those pesky little things called facts muck it all up again. Damn. LOL.

So let’s get on with the always enjoyable task of ripping yet another well made piece of garbage apart!

Problem number 1: Barry Jennings testimony.

Barry Jennings was the Deputy Director, Emergency Services Department, New York City Housing Authority. Maybe you saw him as one of the eyewitnesses on the day of 911.

hit pieces in Canada.com and The Financial Times, books like Touching History and Firefight: Inside the Battle to Save the Pentagon, etc. all in advance of the NIST WTC7 report; is this what they call a "surge"? Usual tired ad hom/strawman BS, good points in the Brinkman quotes, though.

http://www.canada.com/edmontonjournal/news/culture/story.html?id=bea2dd1...

Sept. 11 conspiracy theories provide cheap entertainment: 'Truthers' avoid the difficult problem of making the world more secure
Todd Babiak, The Edmonton Journal Published: 2:04 am

The Wire, a complex and critically acclaimed HBO television series about the ways in which human systems are doomed to fail, never found a huge audience. By contrast, the Law & Order and CSI franchises, in which a simple conspiracy is at the base of every crime, are multibillion-dollar entertainment properties. The Da Vinci Code outsold every novel ever written about the problem of faith. In recent years, the controversy around who shot John F. Kennedy has overshadowed anything he said or accomplished during his presidency.

We have evolved into beings who prefer intelligent designs to the horror of chaos.

Ludicrous Hit Piece Attacks Ventura On WTC Collapse Comments

Radio host spews outright falsehoods, cites discredited reports to smear former Governor

http://prisonplanet.com/articles/april2008/041008_hit_piece.htm

It just goes to show how strong some peoples' appeal to authority can be. People are still turning to Popular Mechanics for comfort in 2008. And the author goes on about how the Loose Change makers aren't "experts," as if Dylan and company sat in a room and dreamed up the 9/11 truth movement's arguments all by themselves, rather than drawing on other peoples' research - people who just never broke through to the mainstream like Loose Change. Caporaletti also charges that Loose Change and other truthers "ignore" the "answers" put forth by Popular Mechanics.

E-mail and add some comments!

______________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

Column: Conspiracy theories are actually laughable myths

Jacob Caporaletti, CT regular columnist
Wednesday, February 27; 12:00 AM

It's all a conspiracy. The government, big business and the Freemasons are all out to get us. They want to use their influence to control world affairs. Scary, isn't it?

Letter To The Editor,

The 9/11 Commission refused to answer 70% of the 9/11 families questions about how their loved ones were murdered. That's not a "Conspiracy Theory." That's just wrong. It's wrong, and I'm amazed that people like Bill Bradley, who've never taken the time to look into 9/11, think they know what it is they're talking about.

Jon Gold

(Attached copy of Family Steering Committee's report.)

Why the Hell Do People Believe 9/11 Conspiracy Theories?
What the hell is wrong with people? An occasional Esquire investigation into conspiracy theory-loving loonies.

http://www.esquire.com/features/man...iracytheory0108

By Bill Bradley
12/25/2007, 5:45 AM

Flaw: People believe in totally ludicrous conspiracy theories.

Explanation by Robert A. Goldberg, author of Enemies Within: The Culture of Conspiracy in Modern America

copelandp@shns.com, tesser@scrippsnetworks.com, allenk@shns.com, johnsond@shns.com, BowmanL@SHNS.com, GayL@SHNS.com, thomassond@shns.com, sergentj@shns.com, collinsm@shns.com, shns@shns.com, Sprengelmeyerme@shns.com, LowyJ@shns.com, hargrovet@shns.com, McFeattersD@SHNS.com, lindsayj@shns.com, coppt@shns.com, reevesp@shns.com, tomasikm@shns.com, AmbroseJ@SHNS.com, PowelsonR@shns.com, brosnanj@shns.com, deibelm@shns.com, sullivanb@shns.com, wilsonm@shns.com, beckj@shns.com, DonatelliJ@shns.com, HedgesM@shns.com

Scripps Editors:

If you're going to be so obviously one-sided, why bother pretending anymore?

Your article, "Many Americans still believe in conspiracies" tells only one side of each of the topics mentioned. This is disgraceful "journalism" that is clearly nothing more than a "hit piece." Rather than examine why these views are so popular, you have insulted those who hold these views, and you have solicited analysis by psychologists in a most condescending and pretentious manner.

http://www.opednews.com/articles/genera_michael__071030_questioning_9_2f...

This article at Op Ed News takes Tarpley, Bollyn, Von Kleist and others to task, based in part on their associations with others.Get on over to Op Ed News and hit the comments section. There is a long comment quoting most of an article by Chip Berlet on conspiracism. It surely requires some response. So far, the 9/11 "official story" folks are dominating the field.

October 30, 2007 at 06:10:12

Questioning 9/11 and to Hell with Caution

by Michael Shaw Page 2 of 2 page(s)

http://www.opednews.com

Tell A Friend

As for David Horowitz, here's a guy who is promoting a rash of anti-radical Islamic events on several US College campuses and in his last outing and along with his perpetual sidekick, Ann Coulter; had invited a guest speaker who turned out to be one of Britain's biggest holocaust deniers. Isn't that a kick in the shorts!?! Frankly I see him(and Coulter) in the same light as I see LaRouche, Bollyn, Piper and Carto.

http://www.americanchronicle.com/articles/viewArticle.asp?articleID=38591
About the Author: Will Stape has written for newspapers,magazines & television, most notably for "Star Trek: The Next Generation" and "Deep Space Nine." He lives in the NYC area.
....................
The 9/11 attacks on the World Trade Center and Pentagon were brainstormed, arranged and executed by dark, shadow agents of the American government seeking to throw us into shock, horror and then rage. Their ultimate goal was US military action in the Middle East.

Theories like the above are all over. Not only do books, magazines and websites spout them, but home brewed films like Loose Change, seek to "uncover truth" about that Tuesday morning in September of 2001. Hollywood celebrities like Charlie Sheen and Rosie O'Donnell have even embraced 9-11 conspiracy theories.

[GW's Comment: The Weekly Standard is one of the main Neocon publications.]

Sonny Bunch
Tue Sep 18, 10:57 AM ET

http://news.yahoo.com/s/weeklystandard/20070918/cm_weeklystandard/thetru...

Washington (The Weekly Standard) Vol. 013, Issue 02 - 9/24/2007 - New York City
Certain events can be expected each time the 9/11 anniversary rolls around. Opinion writers will opine about how the attacks did or didn't change America. Moments of silence will take place in any number of locales. Think tanks will host panels discussing everything from the war on terror to the impact on immigration reform. And the loosely affiliated conspiracy theorists that comprise the 9/11 Truth Movement will hold rallies and conferences around the country to bring themselves attention.

For those of us who can't wait until tomorrow night for the scheduled History Channel hit piece, '9/11 Conspiracies, Fact or Fiction?' Bit torrent comes to the rescue. I have yet to see it myself, but if we all chip in and seed the torrent, the downloads should pick up speed.

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-220800737609900104

Examines the various conspiracy theories espoused on the Internet, in articles and in public forums that attempt to explain the 9/11 attacks. It includes theories that the World Trade Center was brought down by a controlled demolition; that a missile, not a commercial airliner, hit the Pentagon; and that members of the U.S. government orchestrated the attacks in hopes of creating a war in the Middle East. Each conspiracy argument is countered by a variety of experts in the fields of engineering, intelligence and the military. The program also delves into the anatomy of such conspiracies and how they grow on the Internet.

Rating: TVPG

Running Time: 120 minutes

http://www.history.com/shows.do?action=detail&episodeId=240087