Griffin: Controlled Demolition is Now a Fact, Not a Theory

[reprehensor]

Theologian Says Controlled Demolition is Now a Fact, Not a Theory

In two speeches to overflow crowds in New York last weekend, notable theologian David Ray Griffin argued that recently revealed evidence seals the case that the Twin Towers and WTC-7 were destroyed by controlled demolition with explosives. Despite the many enduring mysteries of the 9/11 attacks, Dr. Griffin concluded, "It is already possible to know, beyond a reasonable doubt, one very important thing: the destruction of the World Trade Center was an inside job, orchestrated by terrorists within our own government." On Oct. 15th and 16th, New Yorkers filled two venues to hear the prominent theologian and author of two books on 9/11 give a presentation entitled “The Destruction of the Trade Towers: A Christian Theologian Speaks Out.” Dr. Griffin has continued to blaze a trail of courage, leading where most media and elected officials have feared to tread. His presentation went straight to the core of one of the most powerful indictments of the official story, the collapse of the towers and WTC 7.

Dr. Griffin included excerpts from the firemen’s tapes which were recently released as a result of a prolonged court battle led by victim’s families represented by attorney Norman Siegel and reported in the NY Times. He also included statements by many witnesses. These sources gave ample testimony giving evidence of explosions going off in the buildings. A 12 minute film was shown for the audiences, who saw for themselves the undeniable evidence for controlled demolition.

snip

"The implications are indeed disturbing. Many people who know or at least suspect the truth about 9/11 probably believe that revealing it would be so disturbing to the American psyche, the American form of government, and global stability that it is better to pretend to believe the official version. I would suggest, however, that any merit this argument may have had earlier has been overcome by more recent events and realizations. Far more devastating to the American psyche, the American form of government, and the world as a whole will be the continued rule of those who brought us 9/11, because the values reflected in that horrendous event have been reflected in the Bush administration’s lies to justify the attack on Iraq, its disregard for environmental science and the Bill of Rights, its criminal negligence both before and after Katrina, and now its apparent plan not only to weaponize space but also to authorize the use of nuclear weapons in a preemptive strike.

" In light of this situation and the facts discussed in this lecture---as well as dozens of more problems in the official account of 9/11 discussed elsewhere---I call on the New York Times to take the lead in finally exposing to the American people and the world the truth about 9/11. Taking the lead on such a story will, of course, involve enormous risks. But if there is any news organization with the power, the prestige, and the credibility to break this story, it is the Times. It performed yeoman service in getting the 9/11 oral histories released. But now the welfare of our republic and perhaps even the survival of our civilization depend on getting the truth about 9/11 exposed. I am calling on the Times to rise to the occasion.

more@link

[mirandapriestly]

1. I wish I could have seen that. Here is his entire book online

for those who don't know, "The New Pearl Harbor". This is great, you can look up a lot of information. http://vancouver.indymedia.org/news/2004/06/141355.php

[philb]

7. shortened version of firemen statements he references

http://www.flcv.com/firemen.html regarding explosions

and he also has tapes of firemen in the buildings at time of collapse
who said there were explosions
(some of these have been posted before)

summary of his case for complicity of U.S. officials at:
http://www.flcv.com/index911.html

(this started out as summary of his book and was expanded to cover other evidence, facts, etc. as well)

[MercutioATC]

2. *cough* *cough* bullshit *cough*

Controlled demolition is a theory. So's the official version, by the way, but controlled demolition IS just a theory.

[Henny Penny]

3. You are right it is just a theory...

its just that its so much more plausible than that specially concocted pancake theory.

[Bombtrack]

4. what exactly makes this theologan "notable" ?

I wonder if ANYONE present denounced this bullshit that it's a "fact". Too many people who go to this shit WANT to believe that 9-11 wasn't an act of Muslim terrorism.

Sorry if I offend anyone, but not enough of us get offended by the carelessness with which people throw around exaggerations and occasionally outright bullshit related to the murder of 3000 people in our country.

[LARED]

5. Notable in the sense that

Benny Hinn is notable. That's my take.

[stickdog]

65. Would you please deign to criticize his body of work then?

The knee jerk QED ad hominem ridicule (he disagrees with the official version, therefore he must be nuts) gets old.

[LARED]

70. Actually QEF would be more accurate

"Q.E.F.," sometimes written "QEF," is an abbreviation for the Latin phrase "quod erat faciendum" ("that which was to be done"). It is a translation of the Greek words used by Euclid to indicate the end of the justification of a construction, while "Q.E.D." was the corresponding end of proof of a theorem (cf. Heath 1956, pp. 124-129).

[philb]

6. He's a highly respected researcher and editor; as well as well respected

theologan; has high credibility with people familiar with his work

[LARED]

8. Here's his CV

http://www.ctr4process.org/about/CoDirectors/drg_cv.pdf

Very impressive, if you want an opinion about Theology or Philosophy. May I suggest that he is not qualified to declare anything of substance regarding controlled demolition.

[petgoat]

9. Griffin's writings about science and religion have made him an

expert epistemologist--that is in the philosophy of how you know
something, how you know you know, and the limits to knowledge.

That makes him eminently qualified to examine the 9/11 facts and
claims.

Whether he himself made the claim that controlled demolition is a
fact, or whether this was Kyle Hence's interpretation of his
statements I don't know. It appears that Griffin said that in his
opinion controlled demolition was proved beyond a reasonable doubt.

Thoughtful people distinguish between conviction of a crime (beyond a
reasonable doubt) and the proposition that the defendant's guilt
is a fact. People are wrongfully convicted. But reasonable doubt is
the standard used in the real world to come to a judgement about
things that we really can't know for sure but which are too important
to allow to be obscured by our imperfect knowledge of the truth.

[LARED]

10. Brain Surgery is not his forte either

Understanding how you (or anyone) comes to know something and having specific knowledge about a subject are two different things.

If Griffin started to perform brain surgery are you going to have him operate on you?

[petgoat]

11. Griffin's surgical skills are a poor analogy.

A better analogy would be: who will you trust to tell you why Osama got
away at Tora Bora? An historian or a Pentagon flack?

[LARED]

12. That might be true, but we are not talking about

Osama's whereabouts, we are talking about the controlled demolition of the WTC's.

Plus, Griffin is not an historian; he is a Professor of Philosophy of Religion and Theology, Emeritus.

[philb]

13. You are suggesting the only courses he took in getting his PhD

were religion? That you are certain he hasn't had a lot of science and dealth with science topics before. I suspect you are wrong.

But I read his books and my whole background is science and engineering. I wasn't convinced by his credentials, but by the fact that he suppplied lots of credible documentation. His book was fully documented and his conclusions are supported by lots of credible evidence, including lots of testimony by officials to the 9/11 Commission.

[LARED]

14. No. I'm suggesting he

is not qualified to comment in a substantive way about controlled demolition.

[Monkey see Monkey Do]

15. Just to add to your argument

a pretty damn comprehensive bibliography of Griffins books & articles:

http://www.anthonyflood.com/griffinvitabrief.htm

[philb]

16. He's authored/edited lots of books on science/physics/etc. (n/t)

He obviously has a background and interest in science

[Monkey see Monkey Do]

19. Philosophy of science - he's not a scientist.

[LARED]

21. Actually he has author a one book that is related to science

and edited a number of other about the philosophy of science, not hard science.

I'm sure he's a bright articulate guy, with lots of interesting stuff to say about scientific thought, but he is not the guy I'm going to ask about controlled demolition, or any issue of hard science.

[stickdog]

71. Yes, for that sort of thing one needs government approval

concerning whom to ask. To understand what happened on 9/11, you need an expert on trees, not forests.

[Bouvet_Island]

22. This principle,

it aint a good standard to put many famous scientists up to. It is rather the norm than the exception that great scientists made finds and contributed in sciences they didn't have a background in. For Social scientist to cross into nature science and vice versa, it is only the last few decades we are seeing such a high level of specialization that scientists often have to pick just a single field to be able to keep up with the development.

Though I see how it is common with references to authority that one doesn't necessesarily have in the 9/11 discourse, I think that attacking this fella for it misses the point.

He sources his everything, he aint a selfmade expert in controlled demolition making final statements and so those sources should be your target if you are to hack away at this man. I think he also keep to certain standards, he doesn't see his sources as always telling the truth and the opponents as always lying, doesn't cut out testimony that contradicts his pieces etc. etc. I am not saying I approve of his methods or even that I know his work very well, only that from what I read and heard from him his stuff is put together in a reasonably sound way. I maybe have problems with the quality of some of the ingredients to the cake, but the recipee seems good. Creationism, that is a very bad cake recipee that will taste nothing no matter how good the ingredients.

I think braing surgery is a good example, people think it is insanely complicated, while in fact as a friend of mine that is a brain surgeon like to put it most of it is just carpentry with gray pulp and blood vessels. Mr. Griffin as an example would likely be able to do different kinds of brain surgeries after a lot less time spent on study (and training) than he gave 9/11. He maybe wouldn't be on top of unexpected complications, the same way he maybe wouldn't be on top of managing a large controlled demolition project on a schedule etc. But I think if he wanted, he could without taking an education make a building come down in a nice pile, hard to distinguish from professional work. He could also with some study likely be able to come up with the correct solution to a certain complication in a brain surgery, on paper. There are many parts of a science where you don't need specific skills to be able to sort good and bad, it is much easier to pick stuff apart than to build them up and so if you know about how you establish facts and how not to it is possible to detect cheating like he says he have on Nist's and the 9/11 commissions behalf.

What I think he lacks experience with is politics and propaganda. The timing of this seems to me to be invalid, if he is not addressing himself to someone other than us or representing more than himself. If you are going to change a paradigm, trying like him to move it all at once with "the proof" is the story of every scientist that became famous after their deaths. If you don't possess something not less revokable than Galileos iron balls, you will have to make do. Eg. You have to force small pieces into the media/scientific journals, injecting them into debates or other 9/11 stories etc so you can provide a soft landing to the audience and the opportunity of people to be able to make the conclusion themselves outta their own will. Eg. his second mistake after the timing is to say that this proves government conspiracy, which makes his finds a lot less usable to the press, it is completely irrelevant what kind of coverage he has for his case if he can't make mass communication of it.

I mean to a certain degree there exist a public record and the process is underway. But it can't be rushed, he'll also risk setting his followers up for disappointment communicating that history will happen easily like that, I doubt it is fit to put them in a productive mode.

Eg. them saying "it is now a fact" is entirely not useful, it is bad communication that doesn't "work".

Then there are a lot all of us doesn't know, he really makes me curious.

[StrafingMoose]

20. If you'd actually took time to read and listen Griffin

"carelessness" is not what I would attribute to him. Whether is right or wrong, the man lays out his thesis with incredible articulation -- nothing suggesting "carelessness".

[philb]

17. video of squib explosions at WTC & claim of major media coverup at WTC

http://www.the7thfire.com/Politics%20and%20History/DemolitionWTC.htm

[philb]

18. video of squib explosions at WTC & claim of major media coverup at WTC

video of squib explosions at WTC & claim of evidence of major media coverup at WTC

http://www.the7thfire.com/Politics%20and%20History/DemolitionWTC.htm

[Jon Gold]

23. I'm about to post something regarding Dr. Griffin

But I need a few more posts.

[pberq]

24. The bottom line is that

the official conspiracy theory of 9/11 is not supported by the facts as widely reported.

I suggest that everyone read Griffin's two books, and especially "The 9/11 Commission Report: Omissions and Distortions".

It does not take an expert to understand that the official story is bogus and the 9/11 Commission Report is a whitewash.

Here is a small sample of what Griffin reports about the omissions and distortions of the 9/11 Commission Report:

1. Issues regarding the alleged hijackers:
a. no investigation into the reports that six of the 19 alleged hijackers turned up alive after 9/11;
b. no investigation into the reports of boozing and whoring by hijackers who were supposedly devout Muslims;
c. no investigation into the reports that clues about Atta were planted.
d. no investigation into the reports that Hani Hanjour, supposedly the pilot of AA 77, was totally inept as a pilot
e. Most importantly – there is little publicly available evidence that the 19 alleged hijackers were actually on the flights.

2. The WTC collapses – all I can say is read Griffin’s chapter on this and decide for yourself. At the very least, the official story is full of holes, especially regarding WTC7.

3. The Pentagon strike – two points:
a. What about the Pentagon’s anti-missile system? Either the aircraft that hit the Pentagon had a military transponder, or somebody disabled the system.
b. What about the videos? Why did the FBI confiscate the videos?

4. The behavior of Bush and the Secret Service on 9/11
a. no investigation into the failure of the Secret Service to protect the President while the country was under attack. Did they know he was not a target?

5. Advance warning of the attacks
a. The Commission basically ignored most reports that there was widespread and specific advance knowledge about the attacks – including insider trading, FBI reports, warning to Ashcroft to stop flying commercial planes, the many warnings from foreign governments, etc, etc.

I hope Mr. Griffin doesn’t mind me posting a few paragraphs from p. 51 of his book:

“Ashcroft and David Schippers

“This is, moreover, not the only omission about reports suggesting that the FBI had rather specific advance information about the attacks. Two days after 9/11, Attorney David Schippers publicly declared that over six weeks prior to 9/11, FBI agents had given him information about attacks planned for "lower Manhattan." This information, Schippers claimed, was highly specific, including the dates, the targets, and the funding sources of the terrorists. Schippers said further that the FBI field agents told him that their investigations had been curtailed by FBI headquarters, which threatened the agents with prosecution if they went public with their information. Finally—to get to the part of Schippers' claim that is most relevant to our present concern—he reported that six weeks prior to 9/11, he tried to warn Attorney General Ashcroft about the attacks, but that Ashcroft would not return his calls.

“One might suspect, of course, that the Attorney General's office was receiving all sorts of crank calls and that people in the office ignored the calls from Schippers because they assumed that it was one more of these. David Schippers, however, had been the Chief Investigative Counsel for the US House of Representatives' Judiciary Committee in 1998 and its chief prosecutor for the impeachment of President Clinton in 1999. He should have, accordingly, been both well known and well respected in Republican circles.

“We would assume, then, that the Commission would have asked Ashcroft about the claims publicly made by Schippers. Did Ashcroft know about his calls? If so, why did he not return them? But we find no sign in the Commissions report that these questions were asked.”

Griffin goes on to note that there is not one reference to David Schippers in the The 9/11 Commission Report.

5. What about the special relationship between the Bush administration, the Saudi royal family and the bin Laden family?
a. no investigation into the reports of OBL’s visit to the American Hospital in Dubai in July 2001.
b. no investigation into the reports of Saudi advance knowledge of 9/11.
c. no investigation into the reports of Saudi funding of al-Qaeda

6. What about allegations that FBI headquarters blocked investigations that might have prevented 9/11 or, post 9/11, shed light on who carried out the attacks. Here the Commission clearly engaged in damage control, distorting or omitting important parts of this issue.

7. What about the considerable evidence pointing to involvement of Pakistan and its ISI in 9/11?
a. The report makes no mention of General Mahmoud Ahmad’s visit to Washington from Sept. 4 to several days after 9/11, or his breakfast meeting with Porter Goss and Bob Graham on the morning of 9/11. Most important is that is makes no mention of reports that Ahmad ordered one of his ISI agents to wire $100,000 to Mohamed Atta.
b. There are several other important issues invovling Pakistan that are reported in Griffin's book.


The above is only a small sample of some of the points raised by Griffin in his book on the 9/11 Commission. Again, it does not take an expert in engineering to see that, at the very least, there has been a large coverup of who was behind 9/11 and of what really happened that day.

[philb]

25. Documentation of coverup by Admin. & their 9/11 Commission

http://www.flcv.com/coverup.html

[pox americana]

26. Bold words!

I'll bet they wish they'd put him on the DHS payroll long ago.

[Frederik]

27. Griffin is a doofus

at best. What's his contribution to "9/11 Truth"? He doesn't do any research on his own. He never presents any original arguments or theories or facts. As for his statement on the certainty of controlled demolition, he doesn't have the expertise needed to make that judgment (those who do, incidentally, usually come to the opposite conclusion). So it ain't worth much.

[realFedUp]

28. Going after the messenger?

It seems to be the case for those who don't
want to look at the message. Calling someone
a doofus really just reflects on you.

[Frederik]

31. The messager and his message

A man like Griffin, who knows a lot about the philosophy of science and epistemology, should know that none of the available evidence allows him to make that statement about controlled demolition. So why is he saying it?

[petgoat]

35. "none of the available evidence "?

Griffin cites this evidence:

The firemen's tapes, and statements of witnesses about explosions.

The sudden fall without indications of collapse, the straight-down
collapse, the speed of collapse, the lack of any indication that the
plane crashes or the fires could cause collapse--let alone the
shredding.

He notes that the core columns were severed at 30 foot lengths.
He says only explosives can explain the pulverization of the concrete.
He notes the ejection of the debris for hundreds of feet in all
directions, and the squibs preceding the collapse. He notes that news
people and firefighters spoke of explosions and controlled demolition on
the day of 9/11.

http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=viewArticle&code=20051021&articleId=1129

[Frederik]

54. Evidence schmevidence

None of which is reliable evidence of controlled demolition. Explosions in a burning building? It would have been strange if there weren't explosions. Besides, how do explosions that occur long before the collapse contribute to a controlled demolition (such as the alleged explosion in the basement, and the explosions reported by firefighters inside the buildings).

Griffin obviously doesn't agree with the NIST report (if he's even read it), but he doesn't even address their findings. He simply states that controlled demolition is a "fact, not a theory", and then cites his "evidence", cut and pasted from various researchers in the "9/11 Truth Movement". And an academic like Griffin should know, and probably knows, that it's nonsense. His arguments are demagoguery, not reasoning. For instance, he hasn't consulted anyone with knowledge of the relevant fields (structural engineering, controlled demolition, etc.). Academics rarely make such unambiguous statements about something so far removed from their own area of expertise, without even soliciting a second opinion from someone with more knowledge of it. If he were a serious researcher, he would have interviewed some of the people who contributed to the NIST report, and confronted them with the anomalies he cites. He could have tried to find a structural engineer who agrees with him (maybe he tried, but couldn't find one). He could have consulted fire engineers about the explosions heard in the buildings etc. Just because the firemen at the scene interpreted an explosion as a bomb at the time (which wasn't that far-fetched, as they were at the scene of a terrorist attack) doesn't necessarily mean it was a bomb. He could have tried to track down the firefighters and interview them. I mean, if he actually wanted to make a case and not just sensationalist statements.

Is there one single individual who has any actual experience with structural engineering or controlled demolition, who supports the controlled demolition theory? And I don't mean anonymous posters on a message board, but someone with a name and verifiable credentials.

[petgoat]

55. Controlled Demolition

Van Romero is one expert (New Mexico Tech) in explosives and
controlled demolition who said the collapse looked just like a
controlled demolition and that it would not take a lot of explosives
in very many places to do the job.

NOVA says that most structural engineers were surprised when the
towers fell. Obviously FDNY was surprised.

http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/wtc/dyk.html

Explosions that occur long before collapse contribute to the collapse
in that they ensure that when the building collapses it collapses all
the way down, rather than the top simply falling off the building.
Detonating these charges early means the explosions are assumed to be
fire-related, removes the risk of the charges' discovery, and avoids
the suspicion of explosions in the basement just before the collapse.

Griffin didn't need to interview the firemen; they've already been
interviewed. Video from the TV news reports at the time shows report
after report of secondary explosions.

The reason to ignore the NIST report is because it is not worth
addressing. Like the 9/11 Commission report it assumes what it
purports to prove. It claims that high temperatures weakened the
steel, but it can provide not one piece of core steel showing heating
above 250 degrees Centigrade. NIST's computer model is truncated both
in space and time--it stops under the impact zone and it assumes that
collapse initiation means total progressive collapse.

Until the blueprints are made public, even structural engineers'
opinions on the collapse mechanism would be speculation. The
prevailing dogma for three years, MIT's "zipper" and "pancake"
theories, was obviously concocted not to answer "Why did the towers
fall?" but to answer "How did fire bring the towers down?" Any
intelligent expert can mount a theory for or against any proposition,
as expert witnesses in court trials show. Note that NIST rejected
MIT's theory. Now instead of weak perimeter truss clips unzipping
we get truss clips so gosh-darned strong that sagging floors were able
to buckle the perimeter columns.

Surely an element in Griffin's opinion is that the evidence was
destroyed--over the protests of Fire Engineering magazine and members
of Congress--when each piece of steel had a stamped identification
number that should have made pulling the heat-damaged impact-zone core
column pieces out of the pile easy. So what was the hurry to ship the
steel to China?

Another peculiarity is that the FEMA metallurgical report, Appendix C,
which showed structural steel eroded to swiss cheese and scrolls of
foil. The metallurgists called for further study to determine the
source of large amounts of non-native sulfur. AFAIK no later study
was done. NIST pretends that the FEMA WTC7 steel sample does not
exist, and they did no tests for explosives' residue.

[Frederik]

58. There is no evidence

that points to controlled demolition, if viewed objectively. There are no one with any experience of controlled demolition who supports the CD theory.

Romero made his comments after having seen the collapse on TV, saying that "It would be difficult for something from the plane to trigger an event like that", but he later retracted (And don't tell me he retracted under duress, that's baseless speculation. He recently said he was really tired of his name getting dragged into "controlled demolition" theories).

BTW, Romero didn't really have the kind of experience that would be the most relevant (structural engineering or with controlled demolition), he's former director of the Energetic Materials Research and Testing Center at the New Mexico Institute of Mining and Technology, which studies explosive materials and the effects of explosions on buildings, aircraft and other structures, and currently vice president for research at New Mexico Institute of Mining and Technology. He probably didn't know all that much about how the WTC towers were construced etc (but he seems to have realized rather quickly that they didn't fall due to explosives).

Saying that "the NIST report is not worth addressing" just shows that you've made up your mind and you're not willing to be challenged. NIST's explanation is much more satisfying to me than any of the alternative theories I've read.

"Note that NIST rejected
MIT's theory. Now instead of weak perimeter truss clips unzipping
we get truss clips so gosh-darned strong that sagging floors were able
to buckle the perimeter columns."

That's how science works. When new evidence comes to light, theories are revised. That's how you get progressively closer to the truth.

Look at a video of the collapse, of either tower. It is clear that the collapse is initiated in the crash zone, with the floor that presumably suffered the most destruction and that received the most jet fuel. Just as one would expect if, you know, no explosive charges were involved. Once initiated, the collapse progresses one floor at the time, each floor being crushed after the other. The explosive pressure wave created as the air is compressed violently ejects dust and debris. What additional explanatory power are those phantom explosives supposed to add?

Edited to add:
"Explosions that occur long before collapse contribute to the collapse
in that they ensure that when the building collapses it collapses all
the way down, rather than the top simply falling off the building."

How could the top fall off the building?

From "The Collapse: An Engineer's Perspective", interview with Dr. Thomas Eagar, professor of materials engineering and engineering systems at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology:

"NOVA: The Twin Towers collapsed essentially straight down. Was there any chance they could have tipped over?

Eagar: It's really not possible in this case. In our normal experience, we deal with small things, say, a glass of water, that might tip over, and we don't realize how far something has to tip proportional to its base. The base of the World Trade Center was 208 feet on a side, and that means it would have had to have tipped at least 100 feet to one side in order to move its center of gravity from the center of the building out beyond its base. That would have been a tremendous amount of bending. In a building that is mostly air, as the World Trade Center was, there would have been buckling columns, and it would have come straight down before it ever tipped over.

Have you ever seen the demolition of buildings? They blow them up, and they implode. Well, I once asked demolition experts, "How do you get it to implode and not fall outward?" They said, "Oh, it's really how you time and place the explosives." I always accepted that answer, until the World Trade Center, when I thought about it myself. And that's not the correct answer. The correct answer is, there's no other way for them to go but down. They're too big. With anything that massive -- each of the World Trade Center towers weighed half a million tons -- there's nothing that can exert a big enough force to push it sideways."
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/wtc/collapse.html

[petgoat]

59. There is evidence

Van Romero is called a "demolition expert" in Popular Mecganics.

http://www.popularmechanics.com/science/defense/1227842.html?page=4&c=y

He said the collapse looked just like a controlled demolition, and
that a few charges in key spots could do it. Even when he changed his
opinion that fires could not have brought the towers down, he did not
retract these points.

James Quintiere, Professor of Fire Protection Engineering at the U of
MD, said the jet fuel fires did not bring down the towers.

http://www.newworldpeace.com/coverup5a.html

Did burning office contents bring down steel highrises when they
had never done so before?

Other evidence:

reports of secondary explosions from firemen, janitors, news people
reports of flashes of light in lower floors just before the collapse
squibs
the energetic ejection of material and dust
the pulverization of the concrete
the speed of the collapse
no steel high rise had ever been brought down by fire before
destruction of the core structure
correction of WTC2's tilting top violates law of conservation of angular momentum

Circumstantial evidence:

closing of upper floors in weeks before 9/11 per Scott Forbes
the destruction of the steel
restricting access of FEMA researchers to the site
lack of steel samples showing heating
mysterious collapse of WTC7 throws doubt on the collapse mechanism of the towers

The tilting top shows that Eagar's assertion that *nothing* can push
the towers sideways is an overstatement. One might as well argue that
a A-380 is too big to fly. Note the kinking of the upper part on the
left side. Enormous forces are at work.



The core was built to take the entire weight of the structure, and
presumably overbuilt by the usual factor of five. How is a
disorganized mass of steel and lightweight concrete going to bring
that down? The core should have penetrated the falling mass like a
screw going into a brillo pad, pushing the debris aside so the lower
part of the core remained standing.

You seem to confuse the lack of definitive proof with a lack of
evidence. There is no definitive proof that the fires brought down
the buildings either. The assumption that because the planes hit the
towers therefore the planes brought down the towers is not logical.
Had the steel been retained for study, we would have had evidence, and
answers. Since the evidence was destroyed, we'll never really know.

[Frederik]

61. Tilting

I don't agree that any of what you posted is reliable evidence of explosives. For instance, I'm pretty sure the explosions reported by the janitors were caused by jet fuel traveling down the elevator shafts (Rodriguez claims that the explosions happned "seconds before" the plane hit, but he was in the basement and I don't see how he can be so sure about that). In any event, it's not exactly unusual to have explosions in a burning building.

"The tilting top shows that Eagar's assertion that *nothing* can push the towers sideways is an overstatement. One might as well argue that
a A-380 is too big to fly. Note the kinking of the upper part on the
left side. Enormous forces are at work."

Huh? There are indeed enormous forces at work, such as gravity. The top tilts because of the damage wrought to the south and east side by the plane impact, combined with the weakening of steel due to heat. All explained by NIST:
http://wtc.nist.gov/pubs/NISTNCSTAR1-6DDraft.pdf

The top is not pushed sideways. And it doesn't tip over, does it? Collapse is initiated at floor 82, right where the plane hit, as the floors above tilt towards the south-east, and progresses downwards from there one floor at the time. You may postulate explosives at the core, but I don't see how explosives could account for the onset of collapse.

This is what Romero says to PM:
"Demolition expert Romero regrets that his comments to the Albuquerque Journal became fodder for conspiracy theorists. "I was misquoted in saying that I thought it was explosives that brought down the building," he tells PM. "I only said that that's what it looked like." "

I have to disagree with Romero on that - see photos and videos of controlled demolition here:
http://www.implosionworld.com/

James Quintiere merely called for an investigation, back in january 2002. He got what he wanted:
http://wtc.nist.gov/pubs/NISTNCSTAR1-6DDraft.pdf

"mysterious collapse of WTC7 throws doubt on the collapse mechanism of the towers"

Why? Specious logic. Anyway, considering the presence of 42,000 gallons of fuel in WTC7, in tanks supplying generators through a pressurized piping system, I don't think the collapse of WTC7 is that mysterious. The generators were on the fifth floor, which also had critical columns carrying large loads. Furthermore, in a 1997 facility condition survey, fireproofing was observed to be prominently missing on fifth floor framing above the main lobby, and it's not confirmed whether it was refurbished (which I take to mean that it wasn't). And directly above that, you had a transfer truss. A recipe for disaster.

From Paul Thompson's timeline:
"WTC Building 7 appears to have suffered significant damage at some point after the WTC Towers had collapsed, according to firefighters at the scene. Firefighter Butch Brandies tells other firefighters that nobody is to go into Building 7 because of creaking and noises coming out of there. According to Deputy Chief Peter Hayden, there is a bulge in the southwest corner of the building between floors 10 and 13. Battalion Chief John Norman later recalls, “At the edge of the south face you could see that it was very heavily damaged.” Deputy Chief Nick Visconti also later recalls, “A big chunk of the lower floors had been taken out on the Vesey Street side.” Captain Chris Boyle recalls, “On the south side of 7 there had to be a hole 20 stories tall in the building, with fire on several floors.” The building will collapse hours later."
http://www.cooperativeresearch.org/timeline.jsp?timeline=complete_911_timeline&startpos=1050#a1042andrews

[petgoat]

60. "NIST's explanation is much more satisfying to me"

Of course it is. It was designed to be plausible and comforting.

The problem is, it lacks evidence to support its conclusions--and
isn't even honest enough to express regret that the steel was
destroyed before it could be examined.

I am offended by the false specificity shown in the graphic
color-coding the (hypothesized) temperatures of the fires. You'd
think they had an array of sensors. It's as if I said "Officer, your
radar must be miscalibrated. I was driving at 35.8764444 mph."

They have not one piece of core steel to support their assertion that
the steel was overheated.

The computer models are flawed by the fact that they are truncated in
space and in time. They stop just under the impact floors, and they
stop at the inception of collapse. The study thus attempts to prove
that fires caused complete progressive collapse not only by assuming
the high temperatures needed to weaken the steel, but by assuming that
collapse initiation equals total progressive collapse.

"When new evidence comes to light, theories are revised."

The truss-clip controversy demonstrates the sloppy and incredible
nature of the investigation. Does NIST actually present any
information about the truss clips? Are we allowed to evaluate their
strength for ourselves? How come Eagar's flimsy-clip theory was
allowed to hold sway for three years if the clips weren't flimsy? Did
Eagar not have access to the blueprints? Why not? Why can't we have
the blueprints? What's the big secret about a building that already
fell down?

Bottom line: NIST assumes what it purports to prove. It's bad science.

[Frederik]

62. Plausible and comforting

"It was designed to be plausible and comforting"

Oh give me a break. That's ridiculous.

"The problem is, it lacks evidence to support its conclusions"

As opposed to the con-men of the "9/11 Truth" cottage-industry? I'd say NIST has a lot more evidence to support its conclusions than those who conclude that there were explosives in the towers.

"NIST assumes what it purports to prove."

Again: As opposed to the con-men of the "9/11 Truth" cottage-industry? If you mean that they assume there were no explosives in the towers, yes they do, because no evidence exists of these phantom explosives. I'm not sure what you think they "purport to prove". But I know of many who purport to prove that the towers were brought down with explosives, and who also start out assuming that they were.

[stickdog]

74. What a wholly absurd comparison.

NIST was the official federal agency charged with investigating the collapse of the WTC towers. Yet they didn't use a single scrap of hard evidence to buttress their often strained and sometimes downright absurd conclusions.

And this does this not disturb you IN AND OF ITSELF? Do you REALLY find comfort in the fact that you believe that NIST's report is a slicker piece of pseudoscience than some of those presented by individual citizens who question 9/11's official conspiracy theory?

[Christophera]

64. Free Fall And Pulverization Cannot Be Collapse. Process Of Elimination

Will do.

Free Fall And Pulverization are the major events of the day, besides the deaths of innocent Americans.


Are you suggesting we should not seek explanations?

[philb]

29. Its obvious you haven't read his books; and he has very high

credibility among his peers and those who know him and his work.
I read his books and agree with him because he documents the case,
not that I would believe anyone because of his expertise.
You can obviously find an expert to say anything you want if you will pay him enough money. All sides of all lawsuits have experts; same with any major subject.

[Make7]

30. What do you mean; he doesn't do any research on his own?

What about this from The New Pearl Harbor:

...As Meyssan points out, at a press conference that began at 6:42 PM on 9/11 itself, Rumsfeld, now Secretary of Defense, used the attacks to browbeat Democratic Senator Carl Levin, who was then chair of the Senate Armed Services Committee (during the brief period of the Bush administration during which Democrats had control of the Senate). Before live camera, Rumsfeld said:

Senator Levin, you and other Democrats in Congress, have voiced fear that you simply don't have enough money for the large increase in defense that the Pentagon is seeking, especially for missile defense, and you fear that you'll have to dip into the Social Security funds to pay for it. Does this sort of thing convince you that an emergency exists in this country to increase defense spending, to dip into Social Security, if necessary, to pay for defense spending --increase defense spending?

http://vancouver.indymedia.org/

He gets this from a secondary source: Meyssan, Thierry, 9/11: The Big Lie, p.152. The problem with using this source, for this quote of Rumsfeld, is the fact that Rumsfeld never asked that question. Perhaps it was too much work to actually verify this by watching the live footage. Of course, it works for him so much better when he credits the question to Rumsfeld. For example, from his speech at the University of Wisconsin at Madison:

In any case, earlier that evening, Secretary of Defense Rumsfeld was on message. We might assume that he would have been disoriented by the fact that the Pentagon had just, on his watch, suffered an unprecedented attack. Instead, he was ready to use the attacks to obtain more money for the US Space Command. In front of television cameras, Rumsfeld berated Senator Carl Levin, then chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee, saying:

Senator Levin, you and other Democrats in Congress have voiced fear that you simply don’t have enough money for the large increase in defense that the Pentagon is seeking, especially for missile defense. . . . Does this sort of thing convince you that an emergency exists in this country to increase defense spending . . . ?

This strategy worked. Congress immediately appropriated an additional $40 billion for the Pentagon.

http://www.scoop.co.nz

Why on earth is Rumsfeld berating on Senator Levin after we were just attacked? Oh, I forgot, he isn't:

Q: Mr. Secretary, there were rumors earlier in the day that the plane which crashed in Pennsylvania had been brought down by the United States, either shot down or in some other manner.

Rumsfeld: We have absolutely no information that any U.S. aircraft shot down any other aircraft today.

Q: I wonder if we could just ask Senator Levin one thing, Senator, if that's all right.

Levin: You bet.

Q: Senator Levin, you and other Democrats in Congress have voiced fear that you simply don't have enough money for the large increase in defense that the Pentagon is seeking, especially for missile defense, and you fear that you'll have to dip into the Social Security funds to pay for it. Does this sort of thing convince you that an emergency exists in this country to increase defense spending, to dip into Social Security, if necessary, to pay for defense spending -- increase defense spending?

Levin: One thing where the committee was unanimous on, among many, many other things, was that the -- we authorized the full request of the President, including the $18 billion. So I would say that Democrats and Republicans have seen the need for the request.

Q: Mr. Secretary, could you describe what steps are being taken -- defensive measures -- beyond force protection, and whether there's been any operational planning for homeland defense and as to --

Rumsfeld: Those aren't the kinds of things that one discusses.

http://www.defenselink.mil/

That was tough to find. Who would have thought you could look up the transcript of a Defense Department press briefing on the Defense Department's website?

:) Make7

[Frederik]

32. Exactly

That's just extremely sloppy "research". And using that French con man Meyssan as a source for anything is not a good idea in the first place. One has to wonder what Griffin's motives are, because he's undoubtedly a smart guy and a respected scholar in his field, so he should know that what he's saying about controlled demolition now is nonsense and not helpful to those who are actually interested in getting closer to the truth about the circumstances surrounding 9/11 2001. I mean, he's written books about the philosophy of science, he ought to know something about evaluation of evidence and about checking ones sources.

[LARED]

33. Perhaps even with all his credentials

he's just more interested in selling books than being accurate.

[petgoat]

34. Perhaps You Should Read the Books Before Impugning the

character of the author.

Dr. Griffin makes his methodology quite clear. He relies upon the
research of Paul Thompson, Nafeez Ahmed, Thierry Meyssan and Michel
Chossudovsky, and has not verified their evidence (see p. xxiii, The
New Pearl Harbor, or the paragraph under "42" online at
http://vancouver.indymedia.org/news/2004/06/141355.php).

His claim is that their prima facie case merits more investigation,
not that it is ironclad proof. His claim also is that since the
argument for complicity is cumulative (strands in a cable) rather than
deductive (links in a chain), the failure of any single strand does
not harm the argument as a whole. (See p. xxiv or the paragraph
containing "43" online.)

Meyssan screwed up. So what? General Richard Myers told the Senate
under oath that no planes were scrambled until after the Pentagon was
hit. And he still got confirmed as Chairman of the Joint Chiefs.

W. told the kids in Florida that he saw the first plane hit WTC1 on TV.

NORAD's timeline conflicted with FAA's (for TWO YEARS!) and then the
9/11 Commission rewrote both of them and still failed to make them
into a plausible story.

[LARED]

36. The fact that he considers

Paul Thompson, Nafeez Ahmed, Thierry Meyssan and Michel
Chossudovsky work as providing a prima facie case is enough in my mind to question his motives. A guy as smart as Dr Griffin know that's nonsense.

[petgoat]

37. If you haven't even read Griffin, I doubt you've read

Thompson, Ahmed, Meyssan and Chossudovsky.

You can see video of Chossudovsky, and Thompson here:

http://www.911busters.com/SanFran04/index.html

You can see Thompson video here:

http://www.911busters.com/911-Commission.html

and here: http://www.truthemergency.us/pages/VideoAudio.html

You can see Chossudovsky and Thompson and Ahmed here:

http://www.thedossier.ukonline.co.uk/video_september11.htm

Ahmed and Thompson can be seen here:

http://911busters.com/911_new_video_productions/index.html

[LARED]

39. Question and comment

Do you understand what prima facie means?

And

Meyssan and Chossudovsky have little to no credibility. Both are ardent revisionists.

[StrafingMoose]

40. I doubt Griffin...

sees Thompson, Ahmed et all as "prima facie". Maybe prima facie in the sense that they were among the first to spot inconsistent evidences with the official conspiracy theory, and he's giving them credit for it. Possibly.

I doubt he considers their theories and analysis as "Evident without proof or reasoning" and so on.

But you must know that to.

[LARED]

41. Here's his quote

Accordingly, given the principle that in general when crimes are committed, those who most benefit from them are to be considered the prime suspects, there is a prima facie case for assuming that the Bush administration was involved in this particular crime.

http://vancouver.indymedia.org/news/2004/06/141355.php#chap9notes

Outside of the stunning lack of logic behind the statement, given it comes from a Dr. of Theology, it seems to me Dr. Griffin is using the term "prima facia" in a very lose sense, or he does not understand what the term means.

As a side note after spending some time finding that quote and digesting some of what he says and reviewing the list of references he relies on for his information, he has little credibility in my view.

[petgoat]

42. He's using the term "prima facie" in its vernacular sense

to mean "before investigation". It's unfortunate that in saying "prima
facie case" he seems to be using a legal term of art when clearly that's
not what he means, as he distinguishes between a prima facie case and a
convincing one:

"I have found, as I have said, that the revisionists have made a strong
prima facie case for at least some version of the charge of official
complicity. To say that they have made a convincing case would require a
judgment that the evidence that they cite is reliable. And, although I
have repeated only evidence that seemed credible to me, I have not
independendy verified the accuracy of this evidence."

[LARED]

43. For a renowned PhD. he has some pretty low standards

He basically says he has not really bothered to check his sources throughly, and as long as they seem articulate it's ok. In other words, I'll wait for others to confirm the veracity of these sources while I collect some nice royalties.

That's my take on him.

[Bouvet_Island]

47. There are three things,

I can see problems with both his methodology as well, but it is just a silly theory to claim he is doing this as an investment into his pension. First, he gets other royalties, there is no reason to think he is in financial trouble, partly because he could afford to commit a work like his two books from the start and partly because he managed to pull of a career like his which tells us he is organised one way or the other.

He is also investing a lot more than his time into this, it seems illogical a person would sell basically his whole professional and personal persona for some royalties. Particularly a religious philosophy professor, that would understand about consequences.

Second, the writing process that we can deduct and the public documents like the radio interviews and his appearance in the local news paper argue against it, if you listen to them, I hear a believer if nothing else so for the fact that he seems unable to understand why someone don't come to the same conclusion as him after reading his book and sneak attack it at it's underbelly instead of defeating it in a real fight.

Writing those books, he talked to alot of people that was related to 9/11. And an accomplished professor, he have access to an academic network. What makes his character interesting for me is that he seems to stick to saying stuff that he can track to public record, though his conviction, at least if he is right, I would expect that to be based on personal experiences and stories that he maybe would not able to print. Eg. doing the work he does, it would seem to me that a resourceful man like him would be able to arrive at if not the right conclusion so at least at the right side of the fence. Though I think he is up against some rather manipulative fellas the one way or the other.

Third, with respect you commit about all the errors you attribute to him. Partly pure ad hominem, partly using strawmen in both directions, not sourcing yourself quoting absolute authority, implying your debate partners are idiots for not coming to the same conclusion as you though they don't have the same information, etc. It is good to have experienced people from both sides of the debate, but it is much more convincing and damning to your opponents if you would pick Griffin apart for real at his argumentation (and the one we are discussing here) rather than try and hit him from the hip.

I don't write off one theory or the other, it is always wise to be skeptical about people moving on the fringe of science. They may be completely nuts, or sociopaths, or apocalyptics, or scams or whatever. But those categories usually aren't able to be as productive or base themselves on an academic network like he does. And they usually are not what you could call accomplished professionals, so he is anyways a very interesting person to discuss these days.

[ROH]

50. Excellent points, Bouvet_Island,

particularly your third one.

[LARED]

52. Response to three things

First

I made no judgments about the financial reasons for writing his book. As the book is available on-line, it seems his primary concern is not financial. I don't think either of us knows Dr Griffin's financial status. As indicated my view is that as a PhD writing a book with so many dubious references, indicates something is amiss. So I am faced with two non exclusive alternatives.

1. It was written for financial gain or 2. It was written as clever propaganda to further an agenda.

I'd rather believe the first than the second.

Second

He may have spoke with a lot of people with an interest in 9/11. Having an interest in 9/11 should include those that argue against his speculation and those "on his side". A brief review of his references include many references of those espousing government complicity (many highly dubious) and none on the other side of the fence. As a PhD this is either sloppy to the point of negligence or purposefully done.

Third

I'll leave a response for another day, but I will say this. In the realm of engineering and the technical aspects of the collapse there are no experienced people advocating controlled demolition. In other words there are no experienced people on the CD side.

[petgoat]

56. so many dubious references

Which references are dubious?

Even if Meyssan is dubious (and I haven't read him, so I don't know)--so
what? Griffin's argument is cumulative. It rests on many legs, not on
links in a chain like a deductive argument.

For you to be reviewing a book you haven't read is highly dubious.

[Bouvet_Island]

57. That is unclear,

In other words, I'll wait for others to confirm the veracity of these sources while I collect some nice royalties.

How is this not saying he wrote the book on a financial motivation?

I don't want to nitpick, but that statement made me write what I did.

You miss one option in my opinion, that he is a fool.

I think you are making way to broad a sweep. You don't represent either the private or the public opinion of all the people in the realm of engineering. It isn't a month since I was chopping away at a professor in physics here, he reported from a seminar he held at his institute and so while you believe to have every specific expert on your team, this could be but I don't think it is accurate to say there is no debate about this in academic circles. Also, In both "hard" science or political science, the numbers of proponent for a theory doesn't necessarily matter. Large groups of clever people have always been and will always be wrong about stuff.

I think it is possible that say Putin did it as partly a revenge for the US torpedoing their Kursk and partly as a strange type of favor to Bush. After all unfortunate intelligence agency incidents there will be official coverup and whitewash, for Kursk there are very good official technical explanations for why there wasn't no other subs and how it was an old torpedo that exploded, put together by a commision like the 9/11 one. But then was a round hole through the highly reinforced double hull that was revealed when they lifted (only the good parts) of the sub, with the press present. And it was facing inwards.

But to counterquestion, would you say he fails at identifying the 9/11 commission as something that resembles what we know about coverups?

I have some problems with David griffins method, and he seems to sometimes be wrong or misleading in his presentation of facts, particular in oral version. But then the matter at hand, it would seem that if he is right matters are not as easy. Meyssan is a real scam. But that doesn't mean he couldn't have stumbled on good pieces of information along with his constructions, that it would be valuable to have in a document that is less problematic to quote. So if it can serve partly as a whitewash, what is interesting to me is the process he is managing or not to put at work.

[Bouvet_Island]

63. "I'll leave a response for another day"

What day is it?

[stickdog]

67. Griffin doesn't sound like a "believer" to me.

He sounds like a man who has become intimately cognizant of what the preponderance of the body of evidence concerning 9/11 suggests.

[Make7]

44. "I have not independently verified the accuracy of this evidence."

That statement appears to sum up the problem nicely.

How on earth does evidence that he hasn't independently verified somehow seem credible to him? Is it because it fits the case he is trying to make? Or he just feels that it is credible?

I am apparently under the misconception that researching something actually requires some effort to make sure that the information being presented to others is reasonably correct.

-Make7

[petgoat]

45. You're missing the point. His role in this matter was the same as

in writing about science and religion in "Two Great Truths: A New
Synthesis of Scientific Naturalism and Christian Faith".

He examines the implications of the ideas without having to go out and
verify the veracity of the experiments in subatomic physics that underly
the ideas.

The appeals court system does the same thing in considering its cases:
it assumes the facts presented by the underlying case, and limits itself
to the implications of those facts and the legal logic of the judgement.

If an appeals court allowed itself to make new determinations of fact
they'd never get their work done.

Of course, "The New Pearl Harbor" was published 18 months ago, before
the 9/11 Commission report was released. Now after considering the
115 major omissions in the report and considering the other evidence
his role has changed: He now espoused the ideas he only explored in
his book.

[Make7]

49. I disagree with his methodology.

He is presenting other people's research without verifying that it is accurate. I do not believe that is a proper way to make a case for, or against, anything.

You obviously think there is no problem with not verifying one's sources as long as one is upfront about not verifying them and stating that they still seem credible. To each his own.

Hopefully if he is writing about sub-atomic physics, he is at least using theories that have been peer reviewed and experimentally verified. I am not implying he has to do the experiments himself, just do enough research to be confident that the sources being used are credible and reasonably certain that the facts are correct.

He seems to go out of his way to explain that he has not done that for his sources used in The New Pearl Harbor.

I don't really think your appellate court analogy is fitting. The courts have a specific function - they are not presenting other people's ideas - they are ruling on procedure and law of previous cases.

Are you saying if Dr. Griffin actually verified his sources, he would never get any work done? I wonder how other researchers are able to do it?

:) Make7

[stickdog]

68. What exactly is unverified, and how exactly would you suggest

Griffin verify this information?

Might I suggest that you apply the same standards of verification to the protectors of the Official 9/11 Conspiracy Theory?

[Make7]

73. According to Griffin...

... the evidence in The New Pearl Harbor has not been verified by him.

From The New Pearl Harbor:

... although I have repeated only evidence that seemed credible to me, I have not independendy verified the accuracy of this evidence.

http://vancouver.indymedia.org/news/2004/06/141355_comment.php

I would suggest that he use primary sources where possible, and when they aren't available he should confirm the information from the secondary sources he is using with at least one other credible secondary source.

If he uses a secondary source that has shown that its research is thorough and accurate, independent confirmation is probably not required. (Although it's still not a bad idea to verify the information if time permits.)

You may suggest whatever you care to.

-Make7

[Bryan Sacks]

75. Griffin's methodology

I think Make 7 may misunderstand the point of Griffin's disclaimer. Griffin is merely acknowledging what all researchers who have not filed firsthand accounts must acknowledge: that they are relying on the reporting of others. There simply is no way to check every source one relies on for accuracy--no one can be expected to contact every eyewitness to the Flight 93 crash before commenting on it, for instance. You rely on reports from sources you deem to be reputable, and draw your conclusions.

'Prima facie' in this context means something like 'convincing on the assumption that the key evidence presented is true'. A truly CONVINCING case would require that the news reports that Griffin cites are IN FACT accurate. But the same can be said for the key elements of the official story: the information it relies on must ALSO be accurate.

The popint is that those who defend the official story are not in an epistemologically different position than skeptics. Both are dependent on the reporting of others. Which of the defenders of the official story has 'confirmed' the underlying claims of the NIST report on the demise of the Twin Towers, for instance? Who went and did the requisite lab test on the steel themselves? None of you, of course--you accept the findings of the NIST seeing no reason to doubt it.

That's fine. But I accept the claims of Sibel Edmonds and David Schippers, seeing no reason to doubt them, either. I accept the claims of the Time Magazine reporters who wrote that "law enfrocement and congressional sources" told them the Phoenix Memo DID reach Dave Frasca prior to 9/11, contrary to his testimony to the Joint Inquiry. I see no reason to doubt that report, meaning Frasca lied to the Joint Inquiry and that the RFU's justification for removing the key information linking Moussaoui to Chechyan Al Qaeda deserves fresh scrutiny.

I also have no reason to doubt the Asia Times and Wall Street Journal reporting to the effect that Pakistani ISI Director Mahmoud Ahmed authorized a payment of $100,000 to Mohammed Atta (one of them) via paymaster Saeed Shiekh. Do you? If not, how can the 9/11 Commission's incredible claims on page 172 that "we have seen no evidence that any foreign government--or foreign government official--supplied any funding" be explained?

As Griffin smartly points out, imagine for a moment it was not some faceless Pakistani who wired that money but Saddam Hussein. Does anyone believe that the Commission would not have seized on these reports? It would have been front page news for weeks.

Seeing no evidence of a desire on the part of governemnt officials to investigate these matters and publicize their findings, I leave open all possible explanations.

[Make7]

76. Interesting conclusion.

Bryan Sacks wrote:

I think Make 7 may misunderstand the point of Griffin's disclaimer. Griffin is merely acknowledging what all researchers who have not filed firsthand accounts must acknowledge: that they are relying on the reporting of others. There simply is no way to check every source one relies on for accuracy--no one can be expected to contact every eyewitness to the Flight 93 crash before commenting on it, for instance. You rely on reports from sources you deem to be reputable, and draw your conclusions.

How does one make a determination of whether or not a source is reputable? Like a particular book from an author for instance.

-Make7

[petgoat]

78. whether or not a source is reputable

See whether its footnotes check out

See whether it is internally consistent and recognizes the difference
between fact and inference

See whether any shifts in its story over time are reasonably explained

Examine it for possible conflicts of interest or undue outside pressures

[Make7]

80. Was this done for Griffin's sources in the New Pearl Harbor? ( n/t )

[Kevin Fenton]

77. My problem with Griffin

is not that he's dishonest - he's upfront about his methodology and says that he hasn't checked his facts at the start and all the way through the book, for example:
"The problem would be even worse in relation to the North Tower, at least if Hufschmid is right to say that it fell in eight seconds." (p. 16 of the 1st edition)
My problem is that the North Tower did not fall in eight seconds and that this can be confirmed very easily by viewing one of the many videos of its collapse. He's honest, but he's wrong. If he'd changed his methodology and done a little bit of research, NPH could have been a much more accurate and therefore better book.

My second major problem is that he takes anything that is not in accordance with the OCT as evidence of official complicity, whereas it might have a different explanation not indicative of official complicity. For example the discussion of Hanjour's flying skills (or lack thereof) in Chapter II on American 77 plays in favour of the official unofficial conspircy theory, whereas in actual fact it might just mean that the plane was being flown by a committed Islamist pilot who had boarded under a false name. Basically, he sets up a dichotomy between the OCT and the "9/11 truth movement" and deals with other arguments by ignoring them. It's a tried and tested tactic, but it's not the best way of getting at the truth.

[petgoat]

79. NPH was written before the release of the 9CR

It's not perfect, but give the guy a break. He was one guy. The 9/11
Commission had a staff of 80 and a budget of $15 million and they
thought the WTC came down in ten seconds.

[philb]

48. A strong base for his case is testimony by officials before 9/11 Commissio

and the documentation of hundreds of prior warnings to the Administration that there were plans to hijack planes and attack targets like WTC and Pentagon. Plus the obvious lies and coverup by the Administration and 9/11 Commission that is well documented
http://www.flcv.com/warnings.html
http://www.flcv.com/index911.html
http://www.flcv.com/coverup.html

much of this is documented in his books; my pages are a summary

Lets stick to discussion of facts and evidence; I think many here are mostly playing games.

[LARED]

38. Self Delete

[philb]

46. Not likely; do you really think that?

[janedoe]

51. Please state your sources.

Or are you just more interested in criticizing the work of others than being accurate yourself?

[LARED]

53. Typically one does not need to

source a personal opinion. As a professor of engineering and expert in materials sciences, I'm surprised you don't know this.

[stickdog]

69. What is it that they say about opinions again?

Something about their metaphorical relationship to anuses, IIRC ...

[Name removed]

66. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[jackieMN]

72. 9-11 Pentagon Video

See it at: http://www.freedomunderground.org/memoryhole/pentagon.php. Comments? I, personally, do think 9-11 was a set-up to give us a reason to engage in this so-called war. I think the real planes may have escorted the Bin Ladens out of the country - if you saw "Fahrenheit-9-11" you'll know what I'm talking about. If you go to the inplanesite website, you will see some additional video footage of the WTC, and the 2nd plane doesn't look like it should. I think the cylinder underneath may have been a missile, and I think the same thing regarding the Pentagon strike. I think a missile was launced from the small commuter plane.