junk and crap, amen: I Guess I'm A Conspiracy Nut

I Guess I'm A Conspiracy Nut

Alexander Cockburn, in his latest article writing for Counterpunch, takes to task all those who believe that there is more than meets the eye concerning 9/11. He rails against the "fundamental stupidity" of conspiracy theorists.

While he raises valid and important points regarding incompetence and cronyism, his rebuke to conspiracy falls short.

His first point, that the non-existent military response to the attacks on that day was purely a result of incompetence really takes a stretch of logic to agree with. I can understand a few instances of ineptitude, but all? Nothing worked right on that day, except the civilians on flight 93 overpowering the hijackers. So the entire homeland defense system of the US military failed miserably, but a few civilians were able to show them how to do it right? While I agree with him that military history is plump with incompetence, he cites history as proof that militaries have always been incompetent and we really should expect them to fail miserably all the time, in spite of the intense, specialized, rigorous training they recieve.

He ignores the fact that all video footage of the hit on the Pentagon has been seized, with only a few blurry, inconclusive frames having been released. Eyewitnesses are great, but 100 different people are going to see 100 distinct versions of what happened. Show me the video to show me the truth.

He then brings up the JFK assasination in an attempt to further his point, saying:

Anyone who ever looked at the JFK assassination will know that there are endless anomalies and loose ends. Eyewitness testimony – as so often – is conflicting, forensic evidence possibly misconstrued, mishandled or just missing. But in my view, the Warren Commission, as confirmed in almost all essentials by the House Committee on Assassinations in the late 1970s, had it right and Oswald fired the fatal shots from the Schoolbook Depository. The evidentiary chain for his guilt is persuasive, and the cumulative scenarios of the conspiracy nuts entirely unconvincing. But of course – as the years roll by, and even though no death bed confession has ever buttressed those vast, CIA-related scenarios -- the nuts keep on toiling away, their obsessions as unflagging as ever.

This is just ridiculous. There is conclusive evidence that Oswald couldn't have acted alone, which by definition is a conspiracy. Apparently Mr. Cockburn believes in magic.

His take on the collapse of the WTC's:

The demolition scenario is classic who-moved-the-stonery. The WTC towers didn’t fall down because they were badly built as a consequence of corruption, incompetence, regulatory evasions by the Port Authority, and because they were struck by huge planes loaded with jet fuel. No, they fell because Dick Cheney’s agents methodically planted demolition charges in the preceding days. It was a conspiracy of thousands, all of whom –- party to mass murder –- have held their tongues ever since. The “conspiracy” is always open-ended as to the number of conspirators, widening steadily to include all the people involved in the execution and cover-up of the demolition of the Towers and the onsslaujght on the Pentagon, from the teams acquiring the explosives and themissile, inserting the explosives in the relevant floors of three vast buildings, (moving day after day among the unsuspecting office workers), then on 9/11 activating the detonators.

He ignores many facts. To name a few:

that no other steel framed building in history, anywhere in the world, has collapsed due to fire, in spite of some of them burning hotter and much longer than the fires on 9/11.
video evidence of demolition-type explosions occuring as the buildings collapsed, and the demolition-like speed at which they collapsed.
the steel used in the buildings could not melt in the temperature that jet fuel burns at.
that weeks after the incident, there was molten metal found deep underground on the site.
seismic evidence of numerous explosions happening just prior to the collapse.
building 7, for which absolutely no credible reason for it's collapse has ever been offered.

I certainly agree with him concerning Giuliani's corruption and incompetence, but in my view, to not consider the possibility of a conspiracy within the US government, in light of all the evidence and unanswered questions, in light of all the subsequent acts of the Bush administration, is nutty.

Labels: conspiracy, terrorism