[We interrupt this blog with some breaking news: Muslim Marine Vet Truther Targeted in Massive DHS Raid. Muhammad Abdullah will be discussing this attempt to silence him tomorrow on Fair and Balanced–stay tuned to my radio schedule for details.]
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Michael Morrissey: Controlled Demolition as Limited Hangout
In my dialogue-gone wrong with Noam Chomsky, I was shocked when Chomsky argued that controlled demolition doesn’t mean anything, because that would just mean Bin Laden did the demolitions.
Obviously nobody with a three-digit IQ, much less a four-digit one like Chomsky’s, could fail to realize that only high-level Western insiders would have the access, expertise, and high-tech explosives to take down the three tallest skyscrapers ever intentionally demolished. Even more obviously, Bin Laden, a terminal (circa 2001) kidney patient in a cave, was hardly in a position to order NIST, FEMA and the FBI to cover up the demolitions.
From a public relations perspective, however, Chomsky may be on to something. My own dear mother recently admitted during her ten-second guest appearance on my radio show: “Yes, I think it was a controlled demolition, but I don’t know who was behind it.” Leaving aside the issue of my mother’s IQ, which is actually quite respectable even though it took her almost a decade to figure out controlled demolition…I think her take on this is consistent with the way a lot of Americans will react as they gradually and rather foggily accept the evidence for demolition.
In his new essay Controlled Demolition as Limited Hangout, Michael Morrissey explains why the fairly obvious fact that there were no passenger airliner crashes on 9/11 is…well, important.
My only quarrel with Michael is his making Kevin Ryan and Steven Jones the bad guys. They are not. They are scientists who are tunnel-vision, laser-focused on the demolitions…and they have every right to be as clueless about public relations as Jim Fetzer is, which is saying a lot. As scientists, they naturally tend to study one topic at a time. (We humanists are the only people who do everything at once). And they have no expertise in aviation issues and crash forensics.
Crash forensics expert Col. George Nelson wrote more than four years ago that there was no evidence that any of the four airliners allegedly used on 9/11 crashed where we were told they did. And now Pilots for 9/11 truth has videos out that thoroughly debunk the government’s stories of passenger airliners doing what we are told they did at the Pentagon and World Trade Center.
Anybody who believes the government’s line about a 767 hitting the South Tower at 510 knots, a sea-level speed that is not just impossible but downright ridiculous, should listen to my recent interview with Ralph Kolstad…and anyone with a good counterargument should contact me at kbarrett(at)merr.com to set up an interview. I’d love to hear your case.
Kevin, your dialogue with Chomsky went wrong in its first half-sentence when you claimed you were "lost a tenured or tenure-track job due to questioning the official story of 9/11."
This is not true. You never had a tenure-track job. You lied to Noam Chomsky.
Your belief that al Qaeda is off the hook for the demolitions is silly. Dr. Van Romero said a few charges in key locations could have brought the buildings down. Dr. Eagar's zipper-pancake theory was conventional engineering wisdom for three years. If that were true a couple of suicide-metalworkers with cutting torches could probably have cut enough floor trusses in half an hour to bring the buildings down. Your belief that the coverup need be orchestrated by al Qaeda is also silly. That somebody smuggled explosives into the building would be highly embarrassing to Marvin Bush's security company–this fact alone is sufficient to explain the coverup. You're also ignoring the fact that if Osama bin Laden was wearing his CIA hat while organizing an attack with planes and explosives, coordination of the al Qaeda attack with the government coverup was easy.
I don't know what the evidence is that no plane hit the WTC, but if you're inferring from NIST's exaggerated speed estimates that there was no plane you're just being irrational.
Kevin, your facile opinions are based on lazy analysis and lousy research. Your misinformation does enormous damage to the truth movement.
Thanks Kevin. I would listen to your recent interview with Ralph Kilstad.
snug.bug is off base, big time! Kevin was easily the best-qualified among three candidates a tenure-track position in Arabic/Islamic studies on the UW-Whitewater campus, The other two withdrew from consideration because they had taken positions elsewhere. Instead of hiring Kevin, they decided not to fill the post. The area of specializartion is uncommon. The campus just happens to be in the district of Rep. Steve Nass, who has a powerful position affecting educational institutions in Wisconsin. No one familiar with higher education and the history of Nass's attempts to have Kevin denied reappointment at the UW-Madison campus would have any doubts about what happened here. This case is the most blatant example of political interference in an academic appointment that I have encountered after spending 35 years teaching across a broad range of colleges and universities. That this person would make such an irresponsible suggest and seek to defend Chomsky in his efforts to suppress the search for truth in one of the great atrocities of American history is despicable. And it is not the first time that Chomsky has played this role. You can find my comments about him by visiting YouTube and entering "Fetzer on Chomsky", where, in two brief interviews, I lay out the case against him for dereliction of duty in relation to JFK and 9/11 both. You need to take a look. You just might learn something.
I should add that snug.bug understands the physics and engineering of the demolition of the Twin Towers no better than he does academic politics. These were masssive concrete-and-steel reinforced 500,000 ton buildings. They were not amenable to collapse and jet-fuel based fires could not have affected them. The melting point of steel is 2,000*F. UL certified the steel used in the buildings to 2,000*F for three or four hours without incurring any adverse effects. The highest temperature a jet-fuel based fire can acquire is 1,800*F when it is fed pure oxygen under controlled conditions. That was not the case here. The billowing black smoke is an indication of an oxygen-starved fire. NIST studied 236 samples of steel taken from the buildings and found that 233 had not been exposed to temperatures above 500*F and the other 3 not above 1,200*F. Those fires could have burned forever and not caused the steel to weaken, much less melt. A massive fire in the North Tower occurred in 1975, which burned around 2,000*F for some three to four hours. It enveloped most of the 11th floor and did substantial local damage. But the steel remained undamaged and none of it had to be replaced. I am afraid that criticism of one of our most prominent advocated for 9/11 truth based upon what appears to me to be willful ignorance is inappropriate conduct from anyone who claims to support it. snug-bug does not even appear to have read "Why doubt 9/11?", which is the first piece archived on the home page of Scholars for 9/11 Truth. I suggest that s/he get up to speed or resist the temptation to address issues about which s/he lacks knowledge. Kevin is right on all counts–and I applaud his new-found appreciation for the apparent absence of Boeings on 9/11, which appears to be the key to understanding how this was done. Quite a lot of substantiating evidence can be found on the Scholars' forum at http://911scholars.ning.com. Check it out!
Lola, I'll be interested to hear your reaction to Commander Kolstad's program. I found it very disappointing because he was so mealy-mouthed he said virtually nothing except "we know the official story is not true". He did recommend "In Pland Site" as an authority on aircraft. He also claims that Pilots for 9/11 Truth advocates no theories, which was news to me as its founder Rob Balsamo has been vociferously and belligerently defending the Citizen Investigation Team's absurd flyover theory.
Dr. Fetzer, thanks for proving my point about Dr. Barrett's lie. He was not offered the position. He thus never had a tenure-track position to lose. My dealings with Dr. Barrett have given me the impression that he was quite capable of disqualifying himself from consideration without any political considerations at all. In my experience Dr. Barrett has been negligent in his fact-checking, an attention-seeker given to extreme and irrational remarks, evasive, and gutless. When I questioned him about his advocacy of Willie Rodriguez's impossible hero stories two years ago Barrett refused to answer my questions–and refused to defend his friend Willie. He has done extremely destructive things such as alienating Chomsky, Goodman, and who knows who all else. A series of his credibility-killing stunts in 2007 hurt Carol Brouillet's credibility so severely that it has not recovered to this day. He has done nothing to make up for the damage and has not even acknowledged the damage he has done.
Trying to make Chomsky out the bad guy is pointless. Right or wrong, he enjoys a prestige in the left that will probably never be achieved by any truther, and attacking him only hurts us.
Dr. Fetzer, your misreading of my remarks as a denial of the controlled demolition hypothesis was careless. Nothing I said contradicted anything in your boilerplate screed, all of which is information that's been familiar to me for years. I was not disputing controlled demolition; I was disputing Dr. Barrett's insertion into his version of it obvious misinformation which, if repeated by his admirers, will discredit both them and the controlled demolition hypothesis. Only the mechanical floors were "hugely strong". Most of the floors were built for normal office live loads. The claim of faster-than-free-fall collapse can not be proven. I'd like to know from what authority Barrett got the idea.
When we have truth and the facts on our side it is extremely irresponsible to exaggerate and to lie, especially when one is prominent and claims to be an advocate for 9/11 truth. Misinformation promoted by those like Barrett who seek only to achieve some notoriety among the fringe of the fringe makes life difficult for those of us who try to promote 9/11 truth in the mainstream, because the more attention a clown gets, the easier it is for mainstream people to write our movement off. Willie Rodriguez is a case in point. While truthers saw his C-Span performance as a triumph for 9/11 Truth and a validation of Willie's story, mainstream viewers saw a room full of gullible rubes who were so desperate for confirmation of their conspiracy theories that they let an obvious con man tell them that hundreds of people were trapped behind locked fire exits waiting for an angel with a key of hope to come and set them free. For someone who claims to be a tenure-class scholar to fail to fact-check Willie Rodriguez's schtick was gross negligence. Barrett either didn't know, or more likely didn't care, that Willie's story was impossible. He should take responsibility.
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I am reposting with a few necessary corrections I had overlooked.
It is difficult to take seriously smug and insidious attempts to undermine the 9/11 movement by someone who does not even have the courage to identify themselves by name. Your attempts to smear Kevin Barrett, whom I know as a pillar of courage and integrity, are, in my opinion, beneath contempt. Kevin did not "lie" to Chomsky. He was denied a position for which he was obviously well-qualified, the best among the candidates, yet they closed the position rather than hire him. You have no discernible experience with higher education of which I am aware. Anyone who knows just a little more than you about these things would conclude, as I and others have concluded, that Kevin was denied this appointment on the basis of his efforts to promote issues related to 9/11. It is not even a close call. If find your efforts to imply otherwise completely unconscionable. Since you appear to be a very dishonest person who is feigning sincerity to promote your attempts to discredit Kevin, your performance here appears to be wholly despicable .
The case of William Rodriguez is another stunning example of your duplicity. Not only do we have Willie's (in my opinion) completely credible descriptions of a massive explosion in the subbasements of WTC-1 but two 9/11 scholars, Gordon Ross and Graig Furlong, have conducted extensive studies, which have corroborated his observation that the explosion in the North Tower came before any reverberations from above that were supposed to have been caused by the impact of an airplane. Indeed, they have used FAA and radar data to fix the exact time of the purported impacts on both towers in comparison with seismological data from a laboratory maintained by Columbia University to fix the time of the events that Will reported. The found events recording .7 and .9 on the Rickter scale that preceded the destruction of the towers, which registered 2.1 and 2.3. Most importantly, they discovered that those .7 and .9 events occurred as much as 14 to 17 seconds before the alleged impacts. That not only provides a devastating indictment of the official account but vindicates what Willie has had to tell us. They have reviewed the data many times now but have been unable to alter the sequence: these explosions occurred before the alleged impacts of the planes, just as Willie has said.
Their research has been published in "Seismic Proof: 9/11 was an Inside Job", which is easy to access. You are either ignorant of their research or else are deliberately suppressing it, which suggests that, either way, at you are not trustworthy about any of these things. Kevin has clean hands and was not misleading anyone. Chomsky is a "gatekeeper" who is trying to deceive everyone. And you appear to be a fake and a fraud. If more proof were needed, your reports about the way in which the towers were constructed are beyond belief. There were 47 massive core columns and 240 external support columns. They were connected by steel trusses which were welded at both ends and onto which 4" of concrete was poured. As redundant, steel-structured buildings, they were not even amenable to "collapse", much less at the speed of free fall. John Skilling, a partner in the engineering firm that oversaw the construction, observed that the towers had the capacity to support 20 times their "live load". A new study by Charles Boldwyn, which is posted at 911scholars.org and at 911scholars.ning.com, has demonstrated that that was a very conservative estimate. If I thought you were remotely sincere, then your ignorance would be embarrassing; since it is apparent that you are not, I can only hold you in contempt. No one should ever take you seriously again.
Barrett seems to have scrubbed the article in question from the internet, so I guess Barrett doesn't want you to read "Noam Chomsky Doesn't Want You to Read This". Fortunately I took the precaution of archiving a copy.
Barrett is a gutless wonder who has refused for two years now to debate his dumbassholery with me in writing–not even when I call him out on his own blog–and refused to defend his friend Willie Rodriguez in any way when Willie was being attacked as a liar and a fraud.
Barrett's carelessness with the truth, as shown by his lazy endorsement of nearly every loony theory that comes along, is destructive to the credibility of the truth movement. Only when Barrett acknowledges the amazing stupidity of the things he has done can we be confident that he has mended his ways and will cease discrediting us.
If Willie Rodriguez's tale of the basement bombs is true, why did he not tell the tale until June, 2004? 9/11/01 he spoke only of a rumble. 9/11/02 he spoke only of fireballs in the elevator shaft. In 2/04 he spoke of explosions only in terms of jet fuel.
If Willie's tale of the basement bomb is true, then his carnival act about the Key of Hope and the hundreds saved and the 22-story collapse and the 15 single-handed rescues was extremely irresponsible, because it has the effect of impugning his own important testimony, marginalizing the stories of other witnesses to basement bombs, and discrediting the truthers who are dumb enough to believe his impossible tales. Your information on the basement explosions is immaterial to the fact of Willie's blatant lies.
Kevin has filthy hands, having repeatedly initiated and supported highly discrediting actions such as disproving his own point by failing to deliver Waleed Shehri, promoting the bogus Portland Nuke hysteria, repeatedly advocating the hanging of journalists, lying to Noam Chomsky, publishing Chomsky's confidential emails, trying to stir up masked mobs in the War on War project, obvious threats of vigilantism in the Trick or Truth project, characterizing the holocaust as "toasting six million Jews" on mainstream radio, and uttering astounding errors of fact in his recent Russia Today interview.
I know the cores were robustly constructed with 6" concrete floors. Since Dr. Barrett did not specify the cores, any reasonable person would think he was talking about the trussed floors, which were very elegant but by no stretch of the imagination "hugely strong". Only the perimeter columns were rated for 20X their live load, and I can't find whether this was in compression or in tension. Obviously if the rating was for tension the compression rating would be much less. Your information on the columns is immaterial to the strength of the floors. And I note that you failed to address the issue of Barrett's claim of faster-than-freefall collapse–which is a dumb thing to claim even if you could provide evidence for it.
I read the Ross/Furlong paper years ago. Your belief that you can divine my academic experience, education, intelligence, and knowledge from afar demonstrates a lack of devotion to the habits of rationality, Dr. Fetzer. Barrett seems to be too busy shooting his mouth off to do his homework. That's what's worthy of contempt here.
The buildings were turned into dust. If they were blown into fine particles on every floor at the same time, then they would have been destroyed "faster than free fall", especially since the dust did not fall to the ground but accumulated in enormous clouds. So perhaps it is not such a "dumb thing" but instead something to which you have not given sufficient thought. You appear to be a very immature and self-centered individual who could care less about 9/11 truth. Kevin is doing more to advance the cause of 9/11 truth every day than, I would conjecture, you will ever do in your entire life, which is being spent on meaningless drivel like these nasty attempts to smear Kevin. Enough of this nonsense is enough. Give it up! Get a life!
And thanks for confirming that you are either massively ignorant if you don't know "Seismic Proof: 9/11 was an Inside Job", which vindicates William Rodriguez's reports of a massive explosion in the subbasements, or else deliberately suppressing relevant evidence, since you now admit you read their study years ago! So I think we have the answer to the question: sincere but ignorant or knowing and deceptive. I appreciate the confirmation of my suspicion that you are untrustworthy and attempting to mislead the public about 9/11. I really think the time has come to crawl back into your hole and maintain silence. That is the most respectful stance you could adopt that this point it time. You have utterly discredited yourself. Enough of this nonsense IS enough. Give it up! Get a life!
Dr. Fetzer, the buildings were not blown into dust. Many many wheatchex can be seen in photos on the ground. The concrete was blown into dust, and I acknowledge that thermite and even nanothermite are not very satisfactory explanations for how this happened. Jim Hoffman found it necessary to hypothesize powerful explosives painted onto suspended ceiling panels to explain this.
It is a dumb thing to assert that the buildings fell faster than free fall not because it didn't happen, but because you can't prove it happened, and even if it did nobody will believe it. A smart lawyer does not advance arguments simply because they are true. He advances them because they are true and they are useful.
Kevin has done enormous damage to the cause of 9/11 truth with his childish attention-seeking and his discrediting bullshit.
Once again your argument about Willie completely ignores that fact that his transparent lies about the 22 story collapse, the 15 rescues, the hundreds saved by the magic Key of Hope bring great discredit to the movement and alienate the firemen, policemen, independent journalists, and lawyers who should be our greatest allies. He was very late to jump on the basement bombs bandwagon, and his lies have discredited, not advanced, the argument.
If you don't even know who I am you have no idea what I have contributed to 9/11 Truth, or why I am committed to the cause. So lay off the crystal ball or whatever you use to generate your insights. "Get a life?" Dr. Fetzer, that is so 2004. That's what the Bush supporters used to tell me to do.
Has it ever occurred to you to ask yourself why Kevin doesn't simply delete my posts which he is obviously too cowardly to dispute? I have a theory about that. Ms. Brouillet knows what it is.