>> ^dannym3141:

>> ^marbles:
You know what's funny is @MycroftHomlz, @hpqp, and few others love making "rude and trollish" comments on my sifts.

But how would you regulate to stop someone posting meaningful information?


I wasn't saying that I cared, just pointing out that some people are ignorant to what trolling is. If it bothered me what someone was posting, I'm pretty sure putting that person on ignore would solve my problem. But evidently some people are bed-wetting crybabies that think the sift revolves around them.

>> ^MycroftHomlz:

And damn straight, I want @dag to look at his comments and consider hobbling him for 1) making profane and inappropriate comments not in jest 2) posting ridiculously long "copy and paste" walls of text.
I don't like it when anyone does it. And it has nothing to do with your beliefs. This is the crap that makes people want to leave the sift. It is time to call people on it.


I've thought about wading in here for 10 minutes, but hey, I'm bored

Wrt 1.: you are aware of how that ridiculous statement makes you sound? (Hint: Prudish old lady who is shocked, nay, dismayed at that loutish language!)

2.: FWIW, I wouldn't consider quoting/pasting information relevant to the video at hand trollish. On the contrary, according to the urban dictionary definition of a troll, I'd say your comments on this page are a lot closer to that definition.

I can't really see why you're getting so worked up over this - if you don't like what marbles has to say, there is that little 'ignore' link next to his comments that you can click. Problem solved and no bruised egos anywhere

http://videosift.com/video/NORAD-on-9-11-What-was-the-U-S-military-doing-that-day

>> ^marbles:

You know what's funny is @MycroftHomlz, @hpqp, and few others love making "rude and trollish" comments on my sifts.


But how would you regulate to stop someone posting meaningful information?

Case in point: congratz on going bronze!






>> ^marbles:

You know what's funny is @MycroftHomlz, @hpqp, and few others love making "rude and trollish" comments on my sifts.

>> ^MycroftHomlz:

It is trollish to cut and paste from websites huge walls of text.

What, you actually expect this inbred to form original thoughts of his own?

@marbles:

First you need to acknowledge what a conspiracy is. When two or more people agree to commit a crime, fraud, or some other wrongful act, it is a conspiracy. Not in theory, but in reality. Grow up, it happens.

Thanks for the vocabulary lesson, but I used the term conspiracy theory, not conspiracy. Conspiracy theory has a separate and more strongly suggestive definition (this one from Merriam-Webster): "a theory that explains an event or set of circumstances as the result of a secret plot by usually powerful conspirators."

I openly acknowledge that the government of the United States has and does commit conspiracies, as you define the word. (You mentioned Operation Northwoods in a separate comment; a post on Letters of Note from few weeks ago may be of interest to you, too, if you haven't already seen it: http://www.lettersofnote.com/2011/08/possible-actions-to-provoke-harrass-or.html.) The actions described therein, and other such actions, I would aptly describe as conspiracies (were they to be enacted).

Definitions aside, my problem with posts like that of @blastido_factor is that most of their so-called conspiracies are easily debunked. They're old chestnuts. A few minutes' worth of Google searches can disprove them.

It may be helpful to distinguish between what I see as the two main "conspiracies" surrounding 9/11: (1) that 9/11 was, to put it briefly, an "inside job," and (2) that certain members of the government of the United States conspired to use the events of 9/11 as justification for a series of military actions (many of which are ongoing) against people and countries that were, in fact, uninvolved in the 9/11 attacks. The first I find no credible evidence for. The second I consider a more tenable position.


The Pentagon is the most heavily guarded building in the world and somehow over an hour after 4 planes go off course/stop responding to FAA and start slamming into buildings, that somehow one is going to be able to fly into a no-fly zone unimpeded and crash into the Pentagon without help on the inside?

Once again, much of what you mention can be attributed to poor communication between the FAA and the government agencies responsible for responding to the attacks (and, for that matter, between the various levels of government agencies). And again, this is one of the major criticism levied by the various 9/11 investigations. From page forty-five of the 9/11 Commission: "The details of what happened on the morning of September 11 are complex, but they play out a simple theme. NORAD and the FAA were unprepared for the type of attacks launched against the United States on September 11, 2001. They struggled, under difficult circumstances, to improvise a homeland defense against an unprecedented challenge they had never before encountered and had never trained to meet."

Furthermore, it seems to me that one of the biggest mistakes made by a lot of the conspiracy theorists who fall into the first cateory (see above) is that they judge the events of 9/11 in the context of post-9/11 security. National security, on every level, was entirely different before 9/11 than it is now. That's not to say that the possibility of this kind of attack wasn't considered within the intelligence community pre-9/11. We know that it was (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/September_11_attacks_advance-knowledge_debate). But was anyone adequately prepared to handle it? No.

In any event, when's the last time you looked at a map of Washington, DC? If you look at a satellite photo, you'll notice that the runways at Ronald Reagan airport are, literally, only a few thousand feet away from the Pentagon. Was a no-fly zone in place over Washington by 9:37 AM? I honestly don't know. But it's misleading to suggest that planes don't routinely fly near the Pentagon. They do.


And how did two giant titanium engines from a 757 disintegrate after hitting the Pentagon's wall? They were able to find the remains of all but one of the 64 passengers on board the flight, but only small amounts of debris from the plane?

In truth, I don't know enough about ballistics to speak for how well a titanium engine would withstand an impact with a reinforced wall at hundreds of miles an hour. But, if you're suggesting that a plane never hit the building, here's a short list of what you're wilfully ignoring: the clipped light poles, the damage to the power generator, the smoke trails, the hundreds of witnesses, the deaths of everyone aboard Flight 77, and the DNA evidence confirming the identities of 184 of the Pentagon's 189 fatalities (64 of which were the passengers on Flight 77).

Regarding the debris: It's misleading to claim that only small amounts of debris were recovered. This from Allyn E. Kilsheimer, the first structural engineer on the scene: "I saw the marks of the plane wing on the face of the building. I picked up parts of the plane with the airline markings on them. I held in my hand the tail section of the plane, and I found the black box ... I held parts of uniforms from crew members in my hands, including body parts." In addition, there are countless photos of plane wreckage both inside and outside the building (http://www.google.com/search?q=pentagon+wreckage).


Black boxes are almost always located after crashes, even if not in useable condition. Each jet had 2 recorders and none were found?

You help prove my point with this one: "almost always located." Again, I'm no expert on the recovery of black boxes, but here's a point to consider: if the black boxes were within the rubble at the WTC site, you're looking to find four containers that (undamaged, nonetheless) are roughly the size of two-liter soda bottles amidst the rubble of two buildings, each with a footprint of 43,000 square feet and a height of 1,300 feet (for a combined volume of 111,000,000 cubic feet, or 3,100,000,000 liters). (You might want to check my math. And granted, that material was enormously compacted when the towers collapsed. But still, it's a large number. And it doesn't include any of the space below ground level or any of the other buildings that collapsed.) Add to that the fact that they could have been damaged beyond recognition by the collapse of the buildings and the subsequent fires. To me, that hardly seems worthy of conspiracy.


Instead we invaded Afghanistan and started waging war against the same people we trained and armed in the 80s, the same people Reagan called freedom fighters. Now we call them terrorists for defending their own sovereignty.

Here, finally, we find some common ground. I couldn't agree more. You'd be hard-pressed to find a more ardent critic of America's foreign policy.

>> ^marbles:
First you need to acknowledge what a conspiracy is ...

Please don't confuse the issue. It is trollish to cut and paste from websites huge walls of text. Period. (@dag Is there a policy on this? What about "please fuck off." comment?)

>> ^marbles:

>> ^MycroftHomlz:
@marbles massively copy and pasting stuff from websites is rude and trollish. I am fine with you having a different belief than me, I am not cool with you trolling the site. I think you can effectively state you beliefs with out being a troll. So, please stop it.

Rude and trollish huh? What's wrong... your beliefs are rational, logical and fact-based, right? Sounds like confirmation bias to me.
I think you can effectively ignore my "trolling the site" and continue to down-vote anything that challenges your unfounded preconceptions without feigning revulsion of some imaginary offense. So, please fuck off.

>> ^MycroftHomlz:

@marbles massively copy and pasting stuff from websites is rude and trollish. I am fine with you having a different belief than me, I am not cool with you trolling the site. I think you can effectively state you beliefs with out being a troll. So, please stop it.


Rude and trollish huh? What's wrong... your beliefs are rational, logical and fact-based, right? Sounds like confirmation bias to me.

I think you can effectively ignore my "trolling the site" and continue to down-vote anything that challenges your ill-founded beliefs without feigning revulsion of some imaginary offense. So, please fuck off.

The government could have intercepted the hijacked planes had they followed standard protocols.

From http://www.911summary.com/:

Director of the U.S. "Star Wars" space defense program in both Republican and Democratic administrations, who was a senior air force colonel who flew 101 combat missions (Col. Robert Bowman) stated that 9/11 was an inside job. He also said:

"If our government had merely [done] nothing, and I say that as an old interceptor pilot—I know the drill, I know what it takes, I know how long it takes, I know what the procedures are, I know what they were, and I know what they’ve changed them to—if our government had merely done nothing, and allowed normal procedures to happen on that morning of 9/11, the Twin Towers would still be standing and thousands of dead Americans would still be alive. [T]hat is treason!" (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pMYzwf01Z7I)

U.S. Army Air Defense Officer and NORAD Tac Director, decorated with the Purple Heart, the Bronze Star and the Soldiers Medal (Capt. Daniel Davis) stated:

"there is no way that an aircraft . . . would not be intercepted when they deviate from their flight plan, turn off their transponders, or stop communication with Air Traffic Control ... Attempts to obscure facts by calling them a 'conspiracy Theory' does not change the truth. It seems, 'Something is rotten in the State.' "

From www.washingtonsblog.com:

The military put out 3 entirely different stories about what happened on 9/11. Specifically, Norad was forced to give 3 entirely different versions of what happened that day, as each previous version was exposed as false, or as providing evidence that the government could in fact have intercepted the hijacked planes had they followed standard protocols.

The Senior Counsel to the 9/11 Commission, who led the 9/11 staff’s inquiry, said “I was shocked at how different the truth was from the way it was described …. The tapes told a radically different story from what had been told to us and the public for two years…. This is not spin. This is not true.”

Indeed, the falsity of Norad’s explanations were so severe that even the 9/11 Commission considered recommending criminal charges for the making of false statements.

From www.washingtonsblog.com:

... Dick Cheney was in charge of all counter-terrorism exercises, activities and responses on 9/11. See this Department of State announcement; this CNN article; and this essay.

In fact, 5 war games were scheduled for 9/11, including games that included the insertion of false radar blips onto air traffic contollers’ screens. Specifically, on the very morning of September 11th, five war games and terror drills were being conducted by several U.S. defense agencies, including one “live fly” exercise using REAL planes.

Then-Acting Head of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Air Force General Richard B. Myers, admitted to 4 of the war games in congressional testimony — see transcript here or http://www.spiegltech.com/media/McKinney2.rm">video here (6 minutes and 12 seconds into the video).

Norad had run drills for several years of planes being used as weapons against the World Trade Center and other U.S. high-profile buildings, and “numerous types of civilian and military aircraft were used as mock hijacked aircraft”. In other words, drills using REAL AIRCRAFT simulating terrorist attacks crashing jets into buildings, including the twin towers, were run. See also http://www.mdw.army.mil/news/news_photos/Contingency_Planning_Photos.html">official military website showing 2000 military drill, using miniatures, involving a plane crashing into the Pentagon.

Indeed, a former Los Angeles police department investigator, whose newsletter is read by 45 members of congress, both the house and senate intelligence committees, and professors at more than 40 universities around the world, claims that he obtained an on-the-record confirmation from NORAD that on 9/11, NORAD and the Joint Chiefs of Staff were conducting a joint, live-fly, hijack exercise which involved government-operated aircraft posing as hijacked airliners.

On September 11th, the government also happened to be running a simulation of a plane crashing into a building.

In addition, a December 9, 2001 Toronto Star article (pay-per-view; reprinted here), stated that “Operation Northern Vigilance is called off. Any simulated information, what’s known as an ‘inject,’ is purged from the screens”. This indicates that there were false radar blips inserted onto air traffic controllers’ screens as part of the war game exercises.

Moreover, there are indications that some of the major war games previously scheduled for October 2001 were moved up to September 11th by persons unknown.

Now here’s where it gets interesting … Secretary of Transportation Norman Mineta testified to the 9/11 Commission:

“During the time that the airplane was coming into the Pentagon, there was a young man who would come in and say to the Vice President … the plane is 50 miles out…the plane is 30 miles out….and when it got down to the plane is 10 miles out, the young man also said to the vice president “do the orders still stand?” And the Vice President turned and whipped his neck around and said “Of course the orders still stand, have you heard anything to the contrary!?”

[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bDfdOwt2v3Y]

(this testimony is confirmed here and here).

So even if 9/11 wasn’t foreseeable before 9/11, it was foreseeable to Dick Cheney – who had been attacking democracy for nearly 40 years – as the plane was still 50 miles away from the Pentagon.

@blastido_factor:

There's an old Jewish proverb that runs something like this:

"A fool can throw a stone into the water that ten wise men cannot recover."

Your stones, fortunately, aren't irrecoverable. I'll offer some counterpoints to a few of your claims, and I'll leave it up to you to fish for the truth about the others.


- The alleged masterminds of 9/11 have never been produced and never put to trial, despite having supposedly been captured in 2001/02

I don't know what you mean by "produced," but here's something I do know: I started a case in small claims court earlier this year (in New York City, nonetheless), and I was told I'd have to wait at least four months to appear before an arbitrator. (It's likely that I'll have to wait longer, if, for example, I opt to appear before a judge.) Simply put, trials take time. Given the complexities of a trial involving the masterminds and perpetrators of 9/11, ten years is hardly cause for conspiracy.


- Total failure of the air defense system. The Pentagon was struck One hour and Twenty minutes after the attacks began, yet there was no response from Andrews Air Force base, which is just 10 MILES away and supposed to be in charge of defending the capitol."

The North Tower was struck at 8:46 AM, the South Tower at 9:03 AM, and the Pentagon at 9:37 AM. By my math, the Pentagon was hit fifty-one minutes after the first plane hit the WTC and thirty-four minutes after the second plane hit. The 9/11 Commission estimated that the hijacking of Flight 11, the first plane to hit the WTC, began at 8:14 AM. It's misleading, in this context, to consider the hijacking of Flight 11 as the beginning of the attack (I assume this is what you meant); it wasn't until the second plane hit the WTC that the nature and the scale of the attacks became evident. Could the communication between the FAA and NORAD have been more prompt, and, thus, more effective? Yes. (Rightly so, this is one of the major criticisms lobbied against the agencies responsible for responding to the attacks.) Is the delay of thirty-four minutes cause for conspiracy, given the lack of precedence in handling such a coordinated attack and the confusion surrounding the events of the attack? No.


- The remains of the twin towers were quickly carried off and buried before any forensic investigations could be done.

Your use of the word forensic is categorically flawed. (The first and third definitions of forensic, according to the Merriam-Webster dictionary, are as follows: (1) "belonging to, used in, or suitable to courts of judicature or to public discussion and debate, and (3) "relating to or dealing with the application of scientific knowledge to legal problems.") NIST's reports are chock-full of forensic analyses; have a look for yourself: http://www.nist.gov/el/disasterstudies/wtc/index.cfm. Forensic investigations also led to the identification of a significant number of victims. According to Wikipedia: "Within a year, medical examiners had identified the remains of 33 victims who had been on board Flight 11. They identified two other Flight 11 victims, including the lead flight attendant Karen Martin, after body fragments were discovered near Ground Zero in 2006. In April 2007, examiners using newer DNA technology identified another Flight 11 victim. The remains of two hijackers, potentially from Flight 11, were also identified and removed from Memorial Park in Manhattan." The methods used to identify these victims (DNA testing, in many cases) were nothing if not forensic.

You're also neglecting the simple fact that the removal of debris was necessary from a health standpoint. Again, according to Wikipedia: "The thousands of tons of toxic debris resulting from the collapse of the Twin Towers contained more than 2,500 contaminants, including known carcinogens. Subsequent debilitating illnesses among rescue and recovery workers are said to be linked to exposure to these carcinogens."


- Of all the cameras around the pentagon, including the security tapes taken from local gas stations, only one blurry clip was released.

Three videos, not one, were released. According to Wikipedia: "A nearby Citgo service station also had security cameras installed, but a video released on September 15, 2006, did not show the crash because the camera was pointed away from the crash site. The Doubletree Hotel, located nearby in Crystal City, Virginia, also had a security camera video, and on December 4, 2006, the FBI released the video in response to a freedom of information lawsuit filed by Scott Bingham. The footage is 'grainy and the focus is soft, but a rapidly growing tower of smoke is visible in the distance on the upper edge of the frame as the plane crashes into the building.'"


I don't fault you, or others like you, for wanting to "think twice" about the explanations given for certain of the events surrounding 9/11. I do fault you, though, for spending so little time on your second round of thinking, and for so carelessly tossing conspiracy theories to the wind.

>> ^bmacs27:

@blankfist As far as free expression rights are concerned, they are the same thing. It is government property that has a purpose incompatible with free expression. That is, they are both government property classified as a "nonpublic forum." So what is your problem? Is it the existence of nonpublic forums? Or is it that such a designation was applied to this particular memorial?
That is, how would you change the law to be compatible with your views? If you can't articulate that, you aren't protesting anything. You're whining just like the rest of the tea party.


Ding! Ding! Ding! We have a no-prize winner. If I'm not okay with anti-dancing laws at the Jefferson Memorial I must be Tea Partier! Brilliant.

I have answered this already. I wouldn't "change the law" at all. I don't think there should be a law prohibiting dancing on public property. Period. I don't care if the government claims it's something they like to call 'nonpublic forum', because it's still a place designed for the public to visit. It was never intended to be like NORAD or the Oval Office. It was intended for the people.

I'll wait for your next strawman.

>> ^bmacs27:

@blankfist You're argument is bunk. It's not public property, it's government property. Try having a dance party in the Oval Office, or NORAD, or even a busy intersection to highlight your freedom of expression and see how far that gets you. As far as first amendment rights are concerned, they are equivalent.


I didn't know NORAD was a monument open to the public. Good to know it's exactly the same as the Jefferson Memorial.