READER COMMENTS ON

"We Must be Insane"

(41 Responses so far...)





COMMENT #1 [Permalink]

... harvey said on 1/3/2010 @ 9:23 am PT...





Well our leaders are insane. They think they can stampede us into begging for a fascist, militaristic government by repeatedly staging "terrorist" attacks on their own people (9/11, the shoe bomber, the underwear bomber, etc.).

COMMENT #2 [Permalink]

... BlueHawk said on 1/3/2010 @ 9:33 am PT...





Pieces like this are why I frequent bradblog....Outstanding Ernest... I've heard that Obama is playing high stakes chess...I call bullshit on that. You don't play high stakes chess by doubling down on insanity. Obama was bought off early on. His eloquence and image of decency during the campaign now seems to just another world class psychological mind fuck by the banker-military elite... Only bare knuckles truth pieces like this have a chance of breaking the hypnotic spell that the M.I.C./MSM and religious right have on the minds of Americans...Fear is a powerful spell maker...and Obama is using fear as his policymaking American Express card now.

COMMENT #3 [Permalink]

... Ernest A. Canning said on 1/3/2010 @ 9:46 am PT...





"Doubling down on insanity." Outstanding, BlueHawk! What an apropos description of escalation of the War on Terror.

COMMENT #4 [Permalink]

... sunnysteve said on 1/3/2010 @ 10:07 am PT...





I daresay few of us following this blog disagree with any of your arguments regarding where we are and why it is neither just or nor beneficial to stay there. But the nasty question is not what happened, but rather, what happens next? Our new president faces reality: the mess his predecessors got us into (and not just the Bushies). But he has to begin where we are, not where we should have been. The dilemma is how to stop what we have been doing, not whether. Do we stop completely and instantly? How do we disengage? What residual responsibilities do we have, in Iraq and Afghanistan, to cite the more recent examples? Ironically, one of our greatest challenges is that we still have a somewhat representative government, meaning that Obama has to achieve some political consensus for whatever policies he adopts; and if he tries to change course too fast, he will definitely lose all ability to change at all. It is a very tough and probably long term task. I still believe he has the right read on what international policies work best in the long run; and he seems to take a world view, recognizing that we are humans more than we are Americans, and that that outlook is also parallel with our long term interests. If our populace were more aware and more united, it would be easier for Obama to actually change policy and to communicate to the rest of the world that we are on a different course. The world is still as tribal as it has ever been. We are, for now, the most powerful tribe. The dilemma is not how to be a better tribe, but rather how to end tribalism. How do we actually get there?

COMMENT #5 [Permalink]

... Obfuscate said on 1/3/2010 @ 10:19 am PT...





It is all enough to make one wonder why we resist at all? Dr. King's Vietnam speech is so important to us today. I'd like to submit what I think is a better link to Dr. King's speech (sorry, but I get annoyed when people center everything) which includes audio. http://www.americanrheto...katimetobreaksilence.htm

COMMENT #6 [Permalink]

... inflamethemasses said on 1/3/2010 @ 10:25 am PT...





How do we stop what the bankster/military elite have been doing? We never stop pointing out the treason of the corrupt MIC, which includes the various officers corp. Our corrupt Generals poison our own troops with DU munitions, treat vets like trash and much more in their traitorous quest for position, power and wealth. They seem to desire being strutting pseudo-Roman proconsuls in the vast military empire most Americans are not even aware of. This lack of knowledge is due to the equally traitorous MSM. The wealth of all generals, serving (particularly in drug growing theaters) or retired (it seems the vast wealth may come after moving through the revolving door into the MIC industries), should be investigated.

COMMENT #7 [Permalink]

... Richard Rogers said on 1/3/2010 @ 10:43 am PT...





You make solid points, and I agree with the main premise. But in fairness to the current president, he did not try to "bring the ongoing wars of choice in Afghanistan and Iraq within the concept of 'just wars' and war as a 'last resort,' as you said. Yes, he did that for Afghanistan, with *some* justification, but he explicitly did NOT include Iraq in that judgment. I think the cause of peace is well served by accuracy.

COMMENT #8 [Permalink]

... Ernest A. Canning said on 1/3/2010 @ 10:44 am PT...





With all due respect, sunnysteve (comment #4) the fallacy of your reasoning lies in your belief that Obama actually intends to change policy. I would direct you to a couple of my earlier pieces, "Progressives of America - Unite!" and "Wing-Nut Mobs Provide Cover for Obama/Baucus Health Care Betrayal," as well as David Swanson's well-written "Will We Win?" I am inclined to agree with Noam Chomsky, John Pilger and other progressive intellectuals who believe that Obama is nothing more than a "marketing creation;" that the President's real constituency is Wall Street, the military-industrial complex and corporate America; that, as denoted in "Progressives of America - Unite! a greater percentage of [corporate campaign] funds [now flow] to Democrats because, in Barack Obama's enchanting eloquence, corporate America has found an individual who could best take from the poor and give to the rich while convincing us all that he intends otherwise. As to options, the way you end an occupation is to leave. It would be nowhere as difficult as the proponents of perpetual war would have you believe. I am quite sure that in Afghanistan, for example, the Taliban would be more than willing to enter a cease fire for the purpose of permitting a total withdrawal of U.S. forces --- including CIA and private mercenaries. I'm sure the same method could be applied to what is left of the insurgency in Iraq. Recall that President Nixon had no problem with negotiating with the North Vietnamese. Candidate Obama spoke of negotiations, but President Obama has made no effort to meet with the Taliban, even at the urging of the U.S.-designated puppet Karzai regime. Of course, to engage in withdrawal may require that we relinquish our desire to control the flow of oil from the Caspian Sea states and from the massive oil fields in Iraq, and that is a price which Empire is not willing to pay.

COMMENT #9 [Permalink]

... Ernest A. Canning said on 1/3/2010 @ 10:48 am PT...





Obfuscate, I appreciate your additional link to MLK's historically imperative "Beyond Vietnam" speech. Thanks.

COMMENT #10 [Permalink]

... Ernest A. Canning said on 1/3/2010 @ 11:46 am PT...





Richard Rogers said (comment #7): But in fairness to the current president, he did not try to "bring the ongoing wars of choice in Afghanistan and Iraq within the concept of 'just wars' and war as a 'last resort'...

__________________________ With the dyslexic George W. Bush, it was always easy to spot the B.S. With the articulate, Harvard educated, Barack Obama, one has to parse his words, looking for the subtle means by which he obfuscates reality. The President said, I am the Commander-in-Chief of the military of a nation in the midst of two wars. One of these wars is winding down. The other is a conflict that America did not seek; one in which we are joined by 42 other countries --- including Norway --- in an effort to defend ourselves and all nations from further attacks. This was a blending of two wars with one (Iraq) easily set aside as "winding down" while the other (Afghanistan) subtly linked to 9/11 --- a war which Obama now claims he has escalated "to defend ourselves." Obama then added: The concept of a "just war" emerged, suggesting that war is justified only when certain conditions were met: if it is waged as a last resort or in self-defense. and: The world rallied around America after the 9/11 attacks, and continues to support our efforts in Afghanistan, because of the horror of those senseless attacks and the recognized principle of self-defense. Likewise, the world recognized the need to confront Saddam Hussein when he invaded Kuwait --- a consensus that sent a clear message to all about the cost of aggression. The President adroitly evaded mention of the fact that Saddam's "aggression" against Kuwait (which may have actually been encouraged by U.S. Ambassador April Glaspie), served only as justification for Gulf War I. It had absolutely nothing to do with the unprovoked 2003 invasion of Iraq. Why mention Iraq twice in paragraphs designed to justify our presence in Afghanistan, where the President directly claims we waging war as a last resort --- as an essential means for self-defense? The President, of course, also subtly ignored the fact that the U.S. was not attacked on 9/11 by Iraq, Afghanistan or the Taliban. What Obama was really implying is that the so-called "Global War on Terror" is a war of last resort that is essential to our self-defense, a point alluded to when he described al Qaeda as on par with Nazi Germany, adding: Negotiations cannot convince al Qaeda's leaders to lay down their arms. While I, for one, do not propose "negotiating with al Qaeda" for anything other than their possible surrender to the World Court, the fact is that no one has ever tried to "negotiate with al Qaeda. As I urged in this piece, the logical response is to treat al Qadea as a criminal enterprise that must be brought to justice before the World Court under the auspices of the UN and international law --- as opposed to escalation of an irrational war which will increase rather than decrease the number of people desiring to attack us out of revenge. But Obama makes no reference in his Nobel Peace Prize acceptance speech to any means of dealing with al Qaeda short of "war." Instead, he repeated the Bush/Cheney appeal to fear, referencing nuclear weapons and stating: Terrorism has long been a tactic, but modern technology allows a few small men with outsized rage to murder innocents on a horrific scale. The gist of the President's remarks are clear. While ostensibly accepting a Peace prize, he was clearly advocating a perpetual "Global War on Terror" as the only rational means for dealing with a deadly threat of an amorphous, stateless enemy who must be attacked “anywhere at any time, or everywhere all the time.” Obama is Big Brother. War is Peace.

COMMENT #11 [Permalink]

... Obfuscate said on 1/3/2010 @ 11:54 am PT...





Brad wrote: "Military-industrial complex and a U.S.-led, corporate Empire whose core purpose is to feed the insatiable greed of the privileged few." This makes me think about a very interesting document submitted to Congress in 1940 by a Senator from Montana, J. Thorkelson. Many people find the document offensive (myself included, but it is, I believe, an important one to read). http://www.jordanmaxwell...tish-israel-world-$1.pdf It is long and he certainly didn't escape the fears and prejudices of his day, but he was warning us about "foreign intrigue" (which George Washington left office hoping we'd think about). So many leaders, King, Washington, and Eisenhower echoed by Brad above, and Kennedy have tried to get us to listen, so why don't we? Sunnysteve wrote "Ironically, one of our greatest challenges is that we still have a somewhat representative government, meaning that Obama has to achieve some political consensus for whatever policies he adopts; and if he tries to change course too fast, he will definitely lose all ability to change at all." I've, to my amazement actually, found that consensus is not what we need. We need to return to the Constitutional Republic we were and are meant to be. Consensus is simply mob-rule really. I've been reading (Gilded Age to present) rhetoric, speeches, documents, etc., with the purpose of trying to ascertain when we drifted out to sea and what ordinary citizens can do to help. An idea I am going with is that our ship is drifting closer and closer to an island of colonialism with the military industrial complex owned by the 'privileged few' at the helm. Dramatic I know, but it's how I work! One of our greatest challenges if we wish to avoid the island will be to listen to one another. The people must come together, sift through what we instinctively know is happening to us and leave our anger and love intellectualism at the door. In reading all of these speeches, documents, books from Twain to Obama, the only thing I know for sure is that the privileged few love it when we fight one another. An idea I am not sure about (but terrified its true) is that American ideas about freedom and liberty are sinking into oblivion (and we have some really good ideas). John F. Kennedy understood, too, what we are facing (in another little known speech as Dr. King's Vietnam speech). http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_hXSRS7L1xU and http://www.jfklibrary.or...erPublishers04271961.htm In this speech he refers to dangers that I believe are essentially the same as Thorkelson's (go figure!) For example: "The very word "secrecy" is repugnant in a free and open society; and we are as a people inherently and historically opposed to secret societies, to secret oaths and to secret proceedings. We decided long ago that the dangers of excessive and unwarranted concealment of pertinent facts far outweighed the dangers, which are cited to justify it. Even today, there is little value in opposing the threat of a closed society by imitating its arbitrary restrictions. Even today, there is little value in insuring the survival of our nation if our traditions do not survive with it. And there is very grave danger that an announced need for increased security will be seized upon by those anxious to expand its meaning to the very limits of official censorship and concealment. That I do not intend to permit to the extent that it is in my control. And no official of my Administration, whether his rank is high or low, civilian or military, should interpret my words here tonight as an excuse to censor the news, to stifle dissent, to cover up our mistakes or to withhold from the press and the public the facts they deserve to know."

John Fitzgerald Kennedy, April 27, 1961. Let us please listen to one another. We bradbloggers and prisonplanet followers (as just one example)need to listen and try to hear each other. The “complex” cares not for us, perhaps we can care for one another. I think we're all we've got.

COMMENT #12 [Permalink]

... Ernest A. Canning said on 1/3/2010 @ 11:59 am PT...





Obfuscate said: Brad wrote: "Military-industrial complex and a U.S.-led, corporate Empire whose core purpose is to feed the insatiable greed of the privileged few."

_______________________ Actually, Obfuscate, I wrote that. I write for The Brad Blog, but I am not Brad.

COMMENT #13 [Permalink]

... Obfuscate said on 1/3/2010 @ 12:08 pm PT...





Sorry Ernest A Canning, my mistake.

COMMENT #14 [Permalink]

... Louis said on 1/3/2010 @ 12:21 pm PT...





They were not Reagan's mujahideen in Afghanistan, they were Jimmy Carter's under the direct strategic design of Zbigniew Brzezinski - but why let facts get in the way of your 'story'.

COMMENT #15 [Permalink]

... Agent 99 said on 1/3/2010 @ 1:19 pm PT...





God knows Brzezinski never did....

COMMENT #16 [Permalink]

... BlueHawk said on 1/3/2010 @ 1:46 pm PT...



COMMENT #17 [Permalink]

... Ernest A. Canning said on 1/3/2010 @ 2:10 pm PT...





Actually, Louis (comment #14), if you had bothered to follow my link to my earlier piece, "Beyond Afghanistan," you would have found the following paragraph, which I did not repeat in this article: Covert CIA intervention in Afghanistan began in 1979 in response to the Soviet invasion when, per Trento, President Carter struck a Faustian bargain. Carter reversed an earlier decision to cut off aid to Pakistan in response to that nation's refusal to abandon efforts to acquire nuclear weapons. The CIA not only intervened on behalf of the Afghan mujahideen, but began pouring money into Pakistan's intelligence service, the ISI, which diverted much of these U.S. taxpayer funds into the development of "the Islamic bomb. The Reagan administration not only greatly expanded covert assistance to the Mujahideen, whose ranks were swollen by foreign Muslim Jihadists, including one Osama bin Laden, but it was President Reagan who personally dubbed the Afghan Jihadists as "freedom fighters." The fact that Carter preceded Reagan in providing covert assistance to the Afghan Mujahideen no more absolves Reagan of his expansion of that covert assistance than the fact that George W. Bush initiated the so-called "Global War on Terror" absolves Obama for his decision to escalate that irrational war. Of course, your comment does reveal how, if I fail to bring out every fact in every article I write, I will be accused by some Reagan or Bush or Obama apologist of "letting the facts get in the way of the 'story.'" The truth is that CIA-support of the Mujahideen under Carter was relatively brief as compared to that under Reagan. Your suggestion that Reagan's "freedom fighters" were not "Reagan's Mujahideen" is either uninformed or intellectually dishonest. But nice try!

COMMENT #18 [Permalink]

... Ernest A. Canning said on 1/3/2010 @ 2:23 pm PT...





Oh, Louis, here's another little tidbit from "Beyond Afghanistan" that I left out of this piece: "By the mid-80's, Reagan's Afghan "freedom fighters"...with the aid of Pakistan's ISI intelligence agency, turned Afghanistan into the world's single largest exporter of opium and the source of half the heroin consumed in the US. "According to P. Scott & J. Marshall's Cocaine Politics (1991), the Bank of Credit and Commerce International (BCCI) would "go out of its way to attract [Afghan] drug money, facilitate arms transactions, and cater to the CIA, all the while enjoying an extraordinary, if still unexplained, degree of immunity from prosecution." In Prelude to Terror (2005), Trento revealed that BCCI's immunity derived from the relationship between George H.W. Bush and Sheik Kamal Adham, the former Director of Saudi Intelligence. "With the official blessing of George Bush as the head of the CIA, Adham transformed [BCCI] into a worldwide money-laundering machine, buying banks around the world in order to create the biggest clandestine money network in history." "Opium production would drop off dramatically under the Taliban only to return with a vengeance following the late 2001 U.S. invasion. By October 2006 Afghanistan produced 87% of the world's opium. "Ahmed Wali Karzai has been on the CIA payroll for the past eight years. He is linked to the Afghan heroin trade. Ahmed is the brother of Afghan President Hamid Karzai." In again referring to the Mujahideen as Reagan's "freedom fighters," in this piece, it was no more my intent to absolve the role played by George H.W. Bush than it was to absolve Carter/Brzezinski.

COMMENT #19 [Permalink]

... Dana J. said on 1/4/2010 @ 9:29 am PT...





Insanity? Insanity is asking the same silly questions while trying to explain behaviors and actions of leaders who are apart of the criminality which has made you insane in the first place. I can see that Brad is asking for some more money again. Good for you. Brad....my offer still stands so let me repeat. I will provide you or ANYONE on the planet ONE MILLION DOLLARS in US currency CASH.....if you can provide ONE single piece of verifiable debris from ANY of the 4 planes from ANY of the 4 locations on 9/11. Sounds like easy money huh? Especially when over 5 Billion people already "believe and saw" that the planes of 9/11 have physically been verified in ANY WAY?! Its been over 9 years and not ONE single piece of debris has EVER been physically verified in any way shape or form from any of the "planes" of 9/11. Not one single piece! (In shanksville, authorities piled thousands of pieces of debris into a rusty dumpster....NOT ONE SINGLE PIECE COULD BE IDENTIFIED IN ANY WAY AS HAVING COME FROM FLIGHT 93....even though there are 2 million+ pieces PER PLANE....which can instantly verify a plane through a standard serial number?!) Insanity is contiuning to try and analyze events and behavior when all your pre-concieved notions about reality and truth are based completely and totally on lies of the highest caliber. There were no commercial plane crashes on 9/11. This truth will explain ALL the behaviors and actions since that very day by the US government, military, and military owned corporate US media outlets. Of course Barack wants to continue illegal wars.....he knows all the lies and continued murder from 9/11. Understanding why criminals committ crimes drives the sane insane?

COMMENT #20 [Permalink]

... BlueHawk said on 1/4/2010 @ 9:58 am PT...





JANUARY 4, 2010Marianne WilliamsonPosted: January 2, 2010 09:00 AM Where Does A Democrat Go From Here? It's hard to own the disappointment I feel over our moderate corporate Democratic President. The whole Obama phenomenon brings up memories from my distant past: the good-looking guy who talks real good, whose line you don't buy immediately but whose charm is so dazzling that he gradually convinces you that this time it will be different.

Yeah. Right. Really different.

What the current administration is giving us is minimal change. And not because the President hasn't had the time to do better; if he had truly wanted to make fundamental change, he would have gone in there fast and done his own version of shock and awe in the first hundred days. And not because he didn't realize how mean all those Republicans can be, either; Obama knew what he was getting into, and if he didn't, then he was as unprepared for the job as his opponents said he was. I see so many people now --- many of them men, interestingly enough --- tangled up in an almost school-girlish, co-dependent, apologetic relationship with this President. As though "poor baby" should be tacked onto the end of every description of his failures.

I see all things political in light of the immense unnecessary suffering in the world. Republicans see it and say, "Wow, it's sad about all that suffering, but the government has no proper role in assuaging it. Hopefully the private sector will do something. That would be nice." The Democrats --- not all of them but enough of them, and definitely this President --- see all that suffering and say, "Wow, it's sad about all that pain people are going through. Let's try to assuage it."

And yet they're refusing to do anything to challenge the underlying forces that make all that suffering inevitable.

I remember Bobby and I remember Martin. I remember when there was a moral force

at the center of the Democratic Party. I see it sometimes still, in a Sherrod Brown, a Dennis Kucinich, an Anthony Weiner. But they're not reflective of the general tenor of the Democratic Party anymore, and I think we would all do well to wake up to that fact. We elected Obama and then he sort of became someone else. He's doing a lot of good things in various areas, but he's certainly not changing the new bottom line: that corporations get to run the world.

He bailed out the banks, but he didn't stipulate that they had to start lending again. He got us health care, but he wouldn't say a word about single payer and he wouldn't raise a finger for the public option. He won the Nobel Peace Prize, but accepted it with a speech that was an apologia for war.

Democrats seem to have no idea what dark wave is rushing towards them in the form of the 2010 mid-terms. They have no idea how many people will be too depressed to go vote, who'll be thinking, "We tried so hard last time, and what did it get us?" They have no idea how many people are thinking, as I am, that it's time to face the facts, no matter how painful they are. If Obama doesn't retrieve his spine and retrieve it soon, then his Presidency will go down in the history books as one of the biggest disappointments in American history.

In the meantime, we should be looking at our options. In "Healing the Soul of America", I wrote about Ghandi's notion of soul force in politics and why it matters to stand on your truth. Should we re-brand the Green Party perhaps, or draft another Democrat to challenge Obama in the primaries in 2012? I don't know what we should do, but I know one thing that we shouldn't do: pretend to ourselves that this man is delivering on what he promised when he first won our hearts.

COMMENT #21 [Permalink]

... NYCartist said on 1/4/2010 @ 1:23 pm PT...





I like the article very much, except for the title, using "insane". My point about ableist language is made by comment #1. And it's not clear to me who is the "we...insane" of the title. Calling political opponents or those with whom we disagree, as does comment #1 is an old American political gambit that is ableist language. It uses disability to characterize negative behavior, in this case, "insane".

COMMENT #22 [Permalink]

... NYCartist said on 1/4/2010 @ 1:26 pm PT...





P.S. Is the title a reference to Dr. King's comment?

And I worked for LCDC in NOLA, 1965-67 (artist, research and general anything-needed-to-be-done).

COMMENT #23 [Permalink]

... BlueHawk said on 1/4/2010 @ 2:45 pm PT...



COMMENT #24 [Permalink]

... Ernest A. Canning said on 1/4/2010 @ 3:07 pm PT...





Very perceptive, NYCartist. The title is derived from MLK's "Beyond Vietnam" speech in which he observed: "Somehow this madness must cease." That was in 1967 --- nearly 43 years ago, yet, as I set forth in detail within this article, the madness has not ceased. It has expanded. The "we," somewhat tongue in cheek, refers to American citizens, as a whole. Oh, I know that there are volumes of material, such as Norman Solomon's War Made Easy, which discuss the extent to which governments, corporations and corporate media have deployed effective propaganda with which to convince us in each instance that the current war is the "good war;" that the U.S. is simply a bulwark of democracy, tirelessly and selflessly policing the world against evil organizations and states who desire to destroy democracy --- restated in its most befuddled form by George W. Bush as they attack us "because they hate our freedom." But then there is Johann Wolfgang von Goethe: We are never deceived; we deceive ourselves. Whether through lack of effort, a failure of civic responsibility, or simply when we act out of fear, we, as a people, have permitted the madness to continue. We have permitted our leaders and pundits to sell us an irrational "Global War on Terror." Some of us, myself included, who understand the corrupt, dysfunctional and deadly nature of our capitalist Empire and the military-industrial complex it has spawned, have failed to communicate that understanding in a sufficient manner so as to pierce the corporate media fog that clouds the minds of so many of our fellow citizens. Like our fellow Americans who fail to meet the responsibility of citizenship by failing to actively seek out the fundamental facts that are readily available through the internet; via sites like Democracy Now, our failure to adequately reach out to those fellow Americans reflects that we are all, in some measure, responsible for the failure to bring an end to the "madness" which MLK admonished us, "must cease." Hence, the title, "We Must be Insane" What else explains how easy it was for the Bush regime, for example, to convince so many Americans that a nation whose military forces (Iraq) had been decimated by Gulf War I, 13 years of devastating economic sanctions and near continuous air assaults in the "no fly zones" constituted so grave a danger to the nation (the U.S.) which possesses by far the most destructive military arsenal ever known to man, that the only logical course was an immediate, preemptive strike? In George Orwell's 1984 there was the "three minutes of hate." We get the three minutes of hate 24/7 courtesy of Rush Limbaugh, Glenn Beck and the Tea Bag Express. Sounds insane to me.

COMMENT #25 [Permalink]

... Dana J. said on 1/4/2010 @ 5:08 pm PT...





Ernie wrote: "actively seek out the fundamental facts that are readily available through the internet; via sites like Democracy Now" First google Amy Goodman and WTC 7. She's there listening to the controlled demolition countdown of WTC 7. Publically never revealed that she was there on 9/11 and then years later once the video surfaces makes snide comments like "Well I didnt do it"?!!! Without 9/11 Amy doesnt have a war and peace report.....it would just be a peace report?!! Better luck next time Ford Foundation? Ernie writes: "Some of us, myself included, who understand the corrupt, dysfunctional and deadly nature of our capitalist Empire and the military-industrial complex it has spawned, have failed to communicate that understanding in a sufficient manner so as to pierce the corporate media fog that clouds the minds of so many of our fellow citizens." Though the mere SUGGESTION that there were no commercial plane crashes on 9/11 and that all of 9/11 was a staged lie ROCKS this poor Ernie to the core of his being with denial and disbelief. The media fog? The US media corporations are owned BY the US military corporations. What do you think you will see? Stories of terrorism from GE and NBC news? Or new ways to travel aboard and create jobs? Underwear bombers....or ways to lower child obesity? Its amazing to read such a paragraph from Ernie the lawyer/author....and to then read his reply when you inform him that there were no commercial plane crashes on 9/11 staged by these EXACT CRIMINALS in government, media, and corporations that he is describing???

COMMENT #26 [Permalink]

... Soul Rebel said on 1/4/2010 @ 5:51 pm PT...





We have grown soft over the years, too displaced from the harsh realities of official segregation policies and the blood spilt to reverse them (on the books anyway.) I'm in my tenth year of teaching in public schools, and aside from the year spent in Cairo, I've been involved in the planning and production of the MLK assemblies throughout. This time of year reflects exactly what the problem with the Democratic party is - general spinelessness, unwillingness to target the root causes of societal ills, tacit deference to the reptilian brain for fear of offending. I see this every time I try to insert the "complete" King into the assemblies. It always focuses on racism and tolerance and what we could or should do as individuals to "play nice". Fine, well enough, I suppose, we could do worse - but the reaction I get from colleagues even when I talk to them about King's anti-militarism, anti-war, anti-class-warfare, pro-labor positions, you'd think they had either forgotten (or never learned) that this man was despised by many elements in our government, labeled Communist and traitor...and of course, eventually assassinated by (not James Earl Ray.) This is what we leave our youth to find out by themselves, if they have a care to. Who is this man whom we hold up as an ideal emblem of tolerance and free speech, without being as real as possible about why he said what he said, what the consequences of speeches like Beyond Vietnam were (or should have been.) It makes people very uncomfortable and for the most part they'd rather leave the stuff out that still challenges the powers that be - especially in the public schools ("we can't talk about that, that'd really get parents hackles up", etc.) Always "I Have A Dream", never "time to clean house." Our public "celebration" of MLK always rings hollow to me. Same as the words of Obama.

COMMENT #27 [Permalink]

... Ernest A. Canning said on 1/4/2010 @ 6:05 pm PT...





First, Dana J., the issues of Empire and the military-industrial complex neither begin nor end with 9/11. Second, the "legal" response to 9/11 I set forth in this article --- the arrest and prosecution of all who were complicit in the event --- would not exclude prosecution of anyone who was involved "from the inside" provided that "evidence" could be presented that would "prove" that 9/11 was an "inside job." Third, the issue of why WTC 7 collapsed in the span of 8.7 seconds into its own footprint is indeed significant and warrants further study, especially since it was not struck by a plane. Fourth, it's not that I am "rocked to the core" by your assertion that "no commercial planes crashed on 9/11." It's simply that you offer absolutely no "evidence" to support your claim. Simply one outlandish claim after another. You obviously have very strongly held beliefs about 9/11, but I am only interested in facts and evidence. I will no more accept your "beliefs" on faith than I would accept Sarah Palin's "belief" in End Times on faith, or for that matter, than I would accept the rants of a holocaust denier who claims that films of concentration camps were made up as well. (Especially since I knew someone who served in Gen. Patton's 4th Armor Division and entered those camps at the end of the war). Absent "proof" --- and you have provided none --- your "no commercial plane" theory suggests that you are suffering from a paranoid delusion.

COMMENT #28 [Permalink]

... BlueHawk said on 1/4/2010 @ 6:13 pm PT...





Dana J. @25 Though the mere SUGGESTION that there were no commercial plane crashes on 9/11 and that all of 9/11 was a staged lie ROCKS this poor Ernie to the core of his being with denial and disbelief. The media fog? The US media corporations are owned BY the US military corporations. What do you think you will see? Stories of terrorism from GE and NBC news? Or new ways to travel aboard and create jobs? Underwear bombers....or ways to lower child obesity? Its amazing to read such a paragraph from Ernie the lawyer/author....and to then read his reply when you inform him that there were no commercial plane crashes on 9/11 staged by these EXACT CRIMINALS in government, media, and corporations that he is describing??? Your credibility is mortally wounded there Dana J....millions...hell 10's of millions of Americans witnessed two planes crash into the WTC...now I grant you that who caused those crashes is highly speculative.

Personally I highly doubt that a squad of middle easterners, who only had some flight school training in Florida, Would be able to achieve two perfect hits on those relatively small targets...I would think it takes a highly skilled and experienced pilot to strike those buildings with that kind of accuracy...both on the first pass mind you...UNLESS!

Those planes were electronically/lasered in to target those buildings without pilot intervention at all; drone like...I would be willing to believe that their were NO middle easterners on the planes that hit those towers... As far as the dubious Pentagon and the highly nefarious plane crash in Pennsylvania fantasies....well I don't believe those events were as explained either... But your shrill attacks on Ernest Canning and his explanations...don't wash with me. You're one of the reasons that people that don't buy the MSM lies get labeled as crazy conspiracy theorists...because you sound of kind hysterical. Back off the attacks man...Read the topic of Ernie's article and you'll see where you missed the mark.

COMMENT #29 [Permalink]

... Dana J. said on 1/4/2010 @ 7:41 pm PT...





Ernie the burn writes: "Absent "proof" --- and you have provided none" This will be my last post on this thread. YOU, the US military, FBI, CIA, SS, Homeland Security....have yet to provide ONE SINGLE SPECK of verifiable debris from a single plane from a single location from 9/11. Until then...there were no commercial plane crashes on 9/11. My ONE Million dollar bounty is still there for the taking? Do you want it Ernie? Verify the debris from any of the planes from any of the locations from 9/11 and its yours. Anyone reading this at a later date will soon realize why the million dollars has never been claimed (or promoted in the media for that matter). Its to force you to investigate in great detail PERSONALLY every aspect of the supposed planes and passengers of 9/11. That is exactly what the army of gatekeepers never want you to focus on. They will use misdirection, focused questioning, personal put downs and insults, and questions of mental health and public ridicule...basically the intro-handbook handed out at military disinformation classes. Why? Because there were no commercial plane crashes on 9/11. Its essential that you never focus on that. Its essential that you feel "stupid" for even asking or questioning. The never ending US global war on terror would have to end? No terror on 9/11.....no more war on terror? This truth could put alot of people out of a job? No commercial plane crashes on 9/11 exposes 100's of other crimes.....including election fraud to make it happen the way it did in the first place. It ties into almost every aspect of government and military criminality that this site exposes everyday. Why would the lies of 9/11 be any different. There were no commercial plane crashes on 9/11. The war on terro must end. Thanx Ernie and Brad. Take care. I will not be back and will take brads suggestion of going elsewhere.

COMMENT #30 [Permalink]

... Ernest A. Canning said on 1/4/2010 @ 7:57 pm PT...





I'll repeat, Dana J, one of the responses I provided on the separate thread relating to Brad's piece, "The debate NOT had about terrorism."

__________________ Dana J Ernie...I like your style of trying to keep the conversation focused on your particular argument regarding underwear bombs. _____________________ It's called "relevance," Dana J. If I ask a witness in court if the grass was green and he begins to tell me that the sky is blue, I ask the judge to strike the response and direct the witness to answer the question. Brad, in comment #6, did no more than ask for any "evidence" that supports the contention that 12/25/09 was an act of state terrorism. He did not get into issues of the cause of 9/11. Think of 12/25/09 as the green grass and 9/11/01 as the blue sky. Get the picture? Yet, your comment #7 then blasted Brad about an issue --- 9/11 --- that had nothing to do with Brad's question. You see, the problem with you self-described "Truthers" --- aside from a proclivity to ignore evidence --- is that your behavior is really quite boorish. It doesn't matter what topic we deal with, Empire, Health Care, Karl Rove, ACORN, voting irregularities. No matter the topic, you can be counted on to barge in and rudely claim that it's 9/11. It's always 9/11! And nothing else in life matters, but 9/11.

COMMENT #31 [Permalink]

... bud said on 1/4/2010 @ 8:31 pm PT...





Ernest, the litmus test of true progressives and truthseekers is 9/11 truth. You fail. Folks, we are all herd animals. Fox's job is to stampede the bellowing herd. CNN's, to stampede the meat and potato eaters. DemNow's, to stampede the progressives. They are all separate registers in the same Wurlitzer state organ.

COMMENT #32 [Permalink]

... BlueHawk said on 1/4/2010 @ 9:22 pm PT...





Bud @31 Ernest, the litmus test of true progressives and truthseekers is 9/11 truth. That's bullshit Bud

COMMENT #33 [Permalink]

... BlueHawk said on 1/4/2010 @ 9:29 pm PT...





As a matter of fact Bud...you say... Folks, we are all herd animals. Fox's job is to stampede the bellowing herd. CNN's, to stampede the meat and potato eaters. DemNow's, to stampede the progressives. They are all separate registers in the same Wurlitzer state organ. Bud aren't you 9/11 truthers trying to stampede everyone else into buying your theories...you offer no evidence...you offer no rational, reasonable discourse...everyone should just buy your line....or be smeared and lied about by you all... Isn't that what FOX news and right wingers do ? May we please be allowed to ponder what about evidence you provide and then DECIDE FOR OURSELVES.

COMMENT #34 [Permalink]

... Soul Rebel said on 1/5/2010 @ 6:28 am PT...





BlueHawk - I am a 9/11 "truther" in that I think the government's story is complete bullshit. That doesn't mean I know what happened, how, or why...but there is plenty of circumstantial "evidence" that what went down on 9/11 was planned well in advance by individuals who had key access to the buildings, control over the response, and control over the investigation. Quite frankly, the collapse of the towers without extra help does not seem at all reasonable given the history of building fires of that magnitude in the past. Anyway, there are many things that remain unexplained by other than "that's just how it happened this time", which is not at all satisfactory. Bottom line is we never got a real investigation and we never got any real answers. Until the government does some kind of real investigation, the 9/11 truth movement will never go away - nor should it. As far as not providing rational, reasonable discourse, there are plenty of websites that ask legitimate questions and provide credible testimony as to possibilities and probabilities (start with Prof. Jones from BYU and his scientific analysis of thermite presence and the physics of building collapse). If the 9/11 truthers can be accused of theorizing without evidence, then surely the government should be accused of the same, no? I mean, that Commission Report doesn't really mean anything to anybody, does it? Anyway, I wouldn't have weighed in here on this (because it is "off topic"), however the "you 9/11 truthers" barbs stung me enough that I thought a response was warranted.

COMMENT #35 [Permalink]

... BlueHawk said on 1/5/2010 @ 8:08 am PT...





Soul Rebel @34 Please excuse me for the blanket statement....it was unfair to you in particular. I too am a 9/11 truther...but 9/11 truth doesn't consume me as much the wall street/banker theft of our money, the Iraq and Afghanistan and now Yeman wars of imperial agression, the corporatocracy that has shipped American capital and jobs overseas and then blame their economic treason on the very people who've been devastated. 9/11 truth sucks the air out of any other dire discussion of critical issues... Again I apologize Soul Rebel...your comments on other topics are spot on in my book. You're a 9/11 truther (along with me) that isn't singularly consumed with it...you see the bigger picture.

COMMENT #36 [Permalink]

... Symbiont said on 1/5/2010 @ 8:21 am PT...





Well said, Soul Rebel.

I, too, am something of a 9/11 "truther" (though i hate this fruity label) --- yet, besides the fruity label, i reject the Bush-esque "you're either with us or with them" attitude of some (the most vocal, anyway) 9/11 truthers. 9/11 is a gigantically complex issue, and I agree with Ernest (Great article, by the way) --- the problems of the military-industrial complex (et al) neither begin nor end with 9/11. 9/11 is neither the beginning nor the end of the world. 9/11 (the act itself, inasmuch as it was perpetrated by whomever; and the perception thereof, inasmuch as most all of us were fairly easily duped into rejecting our own intuitions, not to mention the laws of physics) is merely a symptom of a long-developing and persistently gathering storm.

9/11 is a spiritual problem.

Let's not attack people who don't have our exact theory of 9/11; stick to the evidence, not ideological litmus tests.

And breathe!

COMMENT #37 [Permalink]

... jacko said on 1/5/2010 @ 8:48 am PT...





To BlueHawk 1/4/2010 @ 9:29 pm PT, The issue is not evidence. The evidence is inescapable for anyone interested in finding it. The issue is whether an individual can stand the truth (sorry, I don't mean to sound trite). However, evidence can be found here: http://www.ae911truth.org/, here: http://www.911weknow.com/911-mysteries-dvd, and thousands of other sites. The MSM itself showed beyond a shadow of a doubt, for those paying attention, that no Boeing crashed into the Pentagon and no airliner disappeared into that mine in PA. How about BBC reporting WTC7 had collapsed 20 minutes before it did? Gosh, do you think they got the script a little early maybe? http://www.wtc7.net/bbc.html Here's a quandary, why did the second tower hit fall first? If you look at the smoke, it had turned black --- i.e., the fires were almost out. It seems it was take it down, or give up the game. I'm sure in Germany there were those who refused to believe or even entertain that the Reichstag fire was state terror. What's the practical difference between a Good German refusing to listen to BBC and an actual Nazi?

COMMENT #38 [Permalink]

... NYCartist said on 1/5/2010 @ 12:18 pm PT...





@Earnest Canning and reply #24:

I am looking at 7 0 at the end of next month. I have heard the ML King Jr speech many times on WBAI. (Note: There's been a coup at WBAI, my local community listener supported station, which marks its 50th birthday next weekend - when it was a gift to the Pacifica Network. I support www.takebackwbai.org) The people don't want war - which Nazi said that? And have to be propagandized. I think Fox and Chenney and Bush did that so that long after going into Iraq people seemed to be a majority in support. My opinion. The majority were opposed to staying in Afghanistan (I was in support of a police action, not invasion, bombing,etc.) (I said so on the airwaves of WBAI as a listener, when a San Fran professor said he thought it was a good idea. A couple of years later, I reminded him that he was wrong, but he still insisted it was good to invade. A progressive.) I have lived through the opposition to the war on Vietnam and think that those of us who were in our 20s lived through a vibrant, optimistic period of America. My "dream" died with the various assassinations of leaders, but the spark didn't die out. My small contributions to activism have continued, as can, as I ride out disabling illness, adding disability rights to human/civil rights/peace activism in recent decades. That's why I give you a "hard time" on use of "insane" as behavior that's "bad". Rev.Dr. King used "war as madness" which is not quite the same and it was then. Finally, to me, Dr. King was an older person, when we lived at the same time, as he was in his 30s. Yup. When there was dissention over some of his policies in "the movement", I was an observer, in my small role at LCDC, civil rights law office in NOLA. I knew he was a great leader at the time. I never met him.

COMMENT #39 [Permalink]

... BlueHawk said on 1/5/2010 @ 1:00 pm PT...





JACKO @37 I'm aware of most of the 9/11 evidence and I find it compelling....what I'm irritated about is being constantly bashed over the head with it. I've stated on another thread...I've watched 9/11 truth drive other topics off the road, topics that were just as important, just as critical to be aired and explored. Most 9/11 truth folks have been strident and dismissive to others in their statements and that gets old too...After 8 years of W Bush and a year of Obama most people here can indeed "handle the truth". It's not simply an issue of being able to -handle the truth- of what actually happened on 9/11...For me it's an issue of being able to handle the multi-faceted con job perpetrated on this country and cover it like a fog and digest it fully...9/11 truth is an element of the hijacking-coup that happended to America...not the whole of it. 9/11 truthers (alot of them) need to give people the room to decide for themselves about the evidence of 9/11...without being dismissed, called names or smeared as unworthy of respect. A lot of people's focus is on other aspects of "the truth movement" and haven't studied just the 9/11 incident... You guys could be a lot more tolerant of that.

COMMENT #40 [Permalink]

... Ernest A. Canning said on 1/5/2010 @ 2:21 pm PT...





The Nazi to whom you refer, NYCartist, was Hermann Goering, who said: Naturally the common people don't want war; neither in Russia, nor in England, nor in America, nor in Germany. That is understood. But after all, it is the leaders of the country who determine policy, and it is always a simple matter to drag the people along, whether it is a democracy, or a fascist dictatorship, or a parliament, or a communist dictatorship. Voice or no voice, the people can always be brought to the bidding of the leaders. That is easy. All you have to do is to tell them they are being attacked, and denounce the pacifists for lack of patriotism and exposing the country to danger. It works the same in any country.

COMMENT #41 [Permalink]

... SandyD said on 1/6/2010 @ 3:27 pm PT...

