What does it take to be a "9/11 conspiracy nut"?

[Nikki Stone 1]

Does it take:

1. Believing MIHOP: that the Bush administration planned and executed it with the help of allies in Pakistan and Saudi Arabia (or others)



2. Believing LIHOP: that the Bush administration knew the attack was coming and allowed it to happen


3. Believing that gross incompetence was exhibited on every level of government


4. Believing that the 9/11 report is inaccurate and seriously flawed.


5. Believing that way too many odd or suspicious things have occurred to totally buy the Bush administration's story. These might include:
* The shutting down of the first 9/11 investigation by Cheney
* The choice (shot down) of Henry Kissinger for head of the 9/11 inquiry

* The mysterious absence of the American military in Washington DC after it was clear from NYC that we were under attack

* The "My Pet Goat" reading circle after Andy Card informed Chucklenuts of the second plane hitting the WTC complex.

* The wiring of money by the ISI to Mohammed Atta in Florida


(And I'm sure you can think of many others...)



If #5 is a conspiracy nut, then count me in.

[Fox Mulder]

1. How about believing that all five of those choices are possible?

I must be the biggest 9/11 Conspiracy Nut of all then.

[cspanlovr]

2. If you think Martians did it, your a nut. Otherwise, you're right on the

$.

[Warpy]

3. IMO, suspending the laws of physics and/or

relying on Superman, prescience or malevolent fairies capable of doing several months' worth of work in less than 20 minutes in a burning building being evacuated.

There are rational cases made for both LIHOP and MIHOP, though.

[brentspeak]

4. Believing the first two

[Warren Stupidity]

5. 5 implies 2.

I think the case for LIHOP is more reasonable than the case for the NTDWI (nothing to do with it). The NTDWI coincidence nuts really crack me up. The official narrative is bullshit.

[whiterabbit76]

6. 100% Full - Fledged

Conspiracy NUT here too!

[OneBlueSky]

7. don't forget the inaction of the Secret Service . . .

when they and Bush were informed that "America is under attack" . . . either they just plain didn't do their jobs that day (HIGHLY unlikely), or they KNEW Bush was in no danger whatsoever . . .

if they knew that, I'd like to know HOW they knew, and WHO told them . . .

[Nikki Stone 1]

9. Good one!

I had forgotten about the secret service

[LoZoccolo]

8. Wikipedia actually had some good criteria.

It's since been removed for being unsourced, but here's the old edit.

http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Conspiracy_theory&oldid=67776844#Features

[Nikki Stone 1]

11. Some of those "features" tend to contradict each other

#13 and #14 for example.

[LoZoccolo]

20. Not necessarily so.

To begin with, not all the features have to be true of the same conspiracy theory.

And the idea that the conspiracy is initiated by, or "centers" on a group which allegedly initiated other conspiracies (#14), doesn't preclude other people from being auxilliary. The point of #13 is to describe the tactic taken when disinterested groups are cited as providing evidence that the conspiracy theory is not true; when this is pointed out, they are then, after the question arises, implicated in the conspiracy theory. It's not that everyone is involved, it's that anyone is liable to be incorporated into it if it serves the conspiracy theory under duress.

[Nikki Stone 1]

22. The way they are listed makes it seem as if they are all included

If there are options, that should be stated. Also, how many of these factors do you need to be a conspiracy theory? Clearly not ALL since you can't have #13 and #14 at the same time. So do you need 10? 8? 2? And who judges some of those factors?

The problem I have with the whole notion of "conspiracy theory" is that sometimes there ARE conspiracies (like Watergate for example) and every investigation of a conspiracy at some point produces a theory; otherwise, there'd be no guide to the investigation.

The notion that conspiracy theory equals urban legend is faulty for this reason. Perhaps, there should be a subset of urban legend designated for conspiracy "beliefs".

I can tell you that I think some suspicions about 9/11 are more well-founded than others. The idea that the Pentagon was NOT hit by a plane seems less likely to me for the simple reason that there were some eyewitnesses who actually saw the plane and that planes had just been used as weapons in NYC. The French theory that there was no plane just doesn't hold water for me.

But the complete lack of reaction from the military; the complete lack of reaction by the Secret Service as the Junior Bush sat and read My Pet Goat (even after he knew that two planes had hit the WTC); the 9/11 commission testimony that Cheney was, in fact, monitoring the plane headed toward the Pentagon but ordered no military jet to intercept it--all of these are just bizarre to me. Add to that Colleen Rowley's testimony (Minneapolis FBI office) about being completely stonewalled by the central FBI management in regard to a FISA warrant for Moussaoui's laptop in the summer of 2001 and the complete ignoring of the Phoenix FBI's report on the training of ME pilots around the same time, even when there was an intelligence report in August 2001 stating that Binladin intended to hit the US and the fact that the government was aware of such terrorist plans as Project Bojinka (1995, I think) which called for hijacking planes and crashing into buildings.

There are too many government irregularities. One could argue that the FBI was grossly incompetent, but that the FBI (on two separate occasions), and the US military and the Secret Service should all be thoroughly incompetent around a single event causes one to think.

[MervinFerd]

26. Evidence and Plausible Scenario.

Nikki,

Here are THREE things that make it a "Paranoid Conspiracy Theory":

1. Lack of a plausible scenario. It is believable (or conceivable) that critical people the Bush admin deliberately ignored warnings and allowed an attack to happen. Or that one or a few CIA agents planted a bomb or shot JFK. It's hardly plausible that 4 teams of military pilots and agents were willing to kill themselves (and very probably friends and relatives). It's even less probable that additional large numbers of Gov't employees stuffed several tons of explosives into three enormous buildings without anyone noticing. Or that teams of experts planted remote control devices into 4 jetliners without anyone noticing. It's utterly impossible that no airplanes hit the Pentagon and Twin Towers.

2. Lack of sound evidence. "I just knew" or "Bush profited therefore he did it" are not arguments at all. Academics who make claims that are overwhelmingly rejected by legitimate experts are not credible witnesses.

3. Repeatedly bringing up arguments that have been refuted. Never addressing the refutations.

[Rex]

10. The hatred of people who can't win an argument

to save their lives.

[Nikki Stone 1]

12. huh?

?

[thereismore]

13. a brain. nt

[wildbilln864]

14. I don't know any...

conspiracy nuts other than those who accept the commisions report! You should be watching "The Campaign For A New Investigation"! Its on cspan 2 right now, don't miss it!

[Nikki Stone 1]

16. I don't have cable.

I miss some things that way. :(

[Poppyseedman]

15. What does it take to be a "9/11 conspiracy nut"?

These days.......................

A couple of light years of distance trying to relate dots that don't connect and some Elmer's glue that holds together almost impossible constructs that defy logic and physics.

Besides that, not much

[Nikki Stone 1]

17. So you think those of us who doubt the official story are nuts?

/

[Poppyseedman]

21. There is a line between healthy doubt

and outright nutters.

There are many parts of the story that have reasonable explanations as to why the events happened as they did. People move from healthy doubt to nutter when those reasonable explanations are totally and completely disregarded because they do not fit rigidly into a pre-formed template.

I myself believe the 9-11 commission is more about spreading blame than actually truth as ALL government commissions real job is.

About 90% of what is passing for "theories" is so far disconnected from reality, I find it hard to believe intelligent people buy into it.

Will I ever get the full story, probably not, but I know no thing for sure.

Our government did not blow up the twin towers.

[Nikki Stone 1]

24. We really don't know much

including whether there was government involvement or not.

It's clear that the 9/11 commission is more about CYA than the truth, but nothing to me explains the complete lack of military response.

[Nozebro]

18. Which part of "totally" don't you buy? Please explain. EOM

nt

[Nikki Stone 1]

19. The profound incompetence of the US military in Washington DC

AFTER the second tower was hit in NYC. The 9/11 testimony (on DU today, actually) that Cheney was actually monitoring the plane that was flying toward the Pentagon but that no military were activated to intercept it.

I will NEVER understand that.

[DireStrike]

23. Any and all of those, and also

If a republican accuses you, it might be because you assert that Iraq didn't have weapons of mass destruction or wasn't allied with al qaeda.

[Sinti]

25. From my experience in the foray, all of the above except #3

Incompetence and coincidence theories are accepted by the "sane" crowd as reasonable. The rest of them qualify you as being nuttier than a Snickers. Join us, it's good company, IMO. ;)

[treestar]

27. Depends on who you ask. Ask the average Freeper and in any

way questioning the government theory makes you a "conspiracy nut."

These people think in black and white. Not only are you a CN, you "support the terrorists."