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Posted by Craig Ranke on October 31, 2011

Last month, Pacifica Radio hosted a series of debates about 9/11, which were then broadcast nationwide on their radio network and affiliates as part of their 9/11 tenth anniversary special. In the debate about "the lingering questions surrounding the attack" at the Pentagon, I had a chance to go head to head with Anthony Summers, co-author of the book The Eleventh Day: The Full Story of 9/11 and Osama Bin Laden. He argued in favor of the official narrative, while I (of course) argued against it.

Besides touting it as "the first panoramic, authoritative account of 9/11," Summers' and his wife (co-author) claim in the sleeve of their book that they thoroughly consider the contentions of the '9/11 truth' movement". On page 116, they say that they "have seen not jot of evidence that anything like a false flag scenario was used on 9/11." They go on to say that "after more than four years' research" they have not "encountered a shred of real information indicating that the Bush administration was complicit in 9/11." In the debate, I demonstrate that Anthony Summers has either not "thoroughly considered" the evidence we (CIT) present, or is deliberately covering it up. I also get him to concede that he has not interviewed a single witness to the Pentagon plane for this allegedly "panoramic, authoritative" book.

We feel that this is a particularly important debate considering that Summers has been featured rather prominently by the corporate media this year as some sort of 9/11 expert and supposed debunker of "conspiracy theorists". This included an interview with Council on Foreign Relations (CFR) member Charlie Rose of PBS in July, who introduced him as "an old friend". In that interview, Summers stated that: "What we did in the end was, I hope, successfully to dispatch, for sane Americans, most of the conspiracy theorists' ideas".

The debate was "moderated" by Pacifica's Terry Kester, although it was clear that he was not neutral on this subject, and he even jumped in several times to attempt to assist Summers.