FBI, the mob, and 9/11

[Ron Ecker]

Something like this is seen in the video? (The image is from the Purdue University study, so I'm assuming the scale is legit.)

[Len Colby]

I've watched both of the videos, one showing the nose of an approaching aircraft, and the other showing the thin blurred body. IMO they show neither the nose nor the body of a Boeing 757. But that's just me.

Ron, its not just you. I also don't see a large plane and more likely a thin white missle. But why is the whole video not released! [obviously because it shows something we are not allowed to see]. To those who have not yet may I suggest you download from the internet Loose Change 911 - 2nd edition http://www.loosechange911.com/

-A well done hour documentary on 911. EVEN if the conclusions in it are not correct [though I fear they likely are] the questions it raises are SO disturbing we all must address this issue and fast - or we may not even be allowed to in the near future. Peter

What "whole video"?

How do you explain the dozens of witnesses who saw a large pessenger jet hit the Pentagon?

Can you come up with a rational theory as to why the plotters would switch the 757 for a missile? They were able to hit the Twin Towers which were about a quater the width.

What happened to the Plane it's not that easy to land and destroy one without being noticed.

I fail to understand how anyone smart enough to use a toaster would be impressed by Loose Change it's even being debunked by people with in the so called "9/11 truth movement".

Len

Something like this is seen in the video? (The image is from the Purdue University study, so I'm assuming the scale is legit.)

What are you getting at Ron?

[Jack White]

Another nail in Jack's "No 757" coffin...

http://users.erols.com/igoddard/PentVideo.gif

Jack White’s photo analysis of LHO and the JFK Assassination has throughout the many long years been outstanding and ground-breaking. I have never found him to be anything but a gentleman and open to considering other points of view too – even that he might have erred. Sadly, all of the critics of the ‘official version’ of 11/22/63 automatically question and hold suspect (until proven otherwise) much of what the government says – with (I believe) very good reason. I think that most of us who feel this way would really rather not. We would really like to be wrong and to be living in a country who told the truth and didn’t act deceptively, covertly, and constantly undermining freedom, democracy and the truth. Assassinations foreign and domestic, government overthrows, media manipulations and lies, wars that are only for power and profit, deceptions, cover-ups, dirty-tricks and endless illegal/immoral covert operations, little to nothing for the average citizen of this earth and almost all for the the oligarchs. Why, you should be asking yourself are they not releasing all the video footage [not to mention most all other evidence on 911]?! Jack-White-bashing only makes me think you may well have another agenda that pursuit of the actual facts. I don’t know if I agree with Jack on the moon landings and haven’t myself researched that, but on JFK, and now on 911, I would put my bet down with Jack White and not the current group of militaristic neo-fascists to whom we have all but lost our nation and any hope of democracy and decentcy – let alone truth. They care not one wit about truth – only money and power, by whatever means.

Thanks, Peter. I admire your quest re the Cancellare photo, too. It is a

very valuable photo, and you recognized its importance, though pursuit

of it caused you much personal grief. The copies you "liberated" helped

the search for truth.

Jack

[Evan Burton]

Another nail in Jack's "No 757" coffin...

http://users.erols.com/igoddard/PentVideo.gif

Jack White’s photo analysis of LHO and the JFK Assassination has throughout the many long years been outstanding and ground-breaking. I have never found him to be anything but a gentleman and open to considering other points of view too – even that he might have erred. Sadly, all of the critics of the ‘official version’ of 11/22/63 automatically question and hold suspect (until proven otherwise) much of what the government says – with (I believe) very good reason. I think that most of us who feel this way would really rather not. We would really like to be wrong and to be living in a country who told the truth and didn’t act deceptively, covertly, and constantly undermining freedom, democracy and the truth. Assassinations foreign and domestic, government overthrows, media manipulations and lies, wars that are only for power and profit, deceptions, cover-ups, dirty-tricks and endless illegal/immoral covert operations, little to nothing for the average citizen of this earth and almost all for the the oligarchs. Why, you should be asking yourself are they not releasing all the video footage [not to mention most all other evidence on 911]?! Jack-White-bashing only makes me think you may well have another agenda that pursuit of the actual facts. I don’t know if I agree with Jack on the moon landings and haven’t myself researched that, but on JFK, and now on 911, I would put my bet down with Jack White and not the current group of militaristic neo-fascists to whom we have all but lost our nation and any hope of democracy and decentcy – let alone truth. They care not one wit about truth – only money and power, by whatever means.

Peter,

As far as the JFK stuff goes, that is not my baliwick and I have no firm opinion on it - though I do readily admit that Jack does have many people who, like you, hold his work in that area in high regard.

On 9/11 I have always said that the motives behind the attacks could be anything. It could have been a simple terrorist attack, it could have been a government operation, it could have been a lot of things. What is NOT in doubt though is that an airliner flew into the Pentagon, two airliners hit WTC 1 & 2, and that WTC 1 & 2 collapsed because of the damage sustained during those attacks. The evidence in favour of this is simply overwhelming. Why those attacks occured is another matter entirely.

As far as the Apollo stuff is concerned, you can imagine my frustration at trying to correct errors when Jack will not discuss his work with people who are trying to show him why he is wrong! That is my agenda - to ensure that erroneous statements are counterpointed with correct data. This is often not a matter of interpretation; it is often a simple matter of fact versus fiction; correct versus incorrect. Misidentifying various sides of the LM. Claiming impossible techniques to explain effects in images when the camera experts (Hasselblad) explain why an effect is seen. Claiming effects are impossible when anyone with a camera can reproduce them. Making simple errors in photographic theory when, based on his experience, he should know better. Not doing the research to discover why something may be so.

When Jack won't recognise his errors, won't discuss them, and won't correct them... well, he gets what he deserves. Scorn.

Edited May 20, 2006 by Evan Burton

[Ron Ecker]

Something like this is seen in the video? (The image is from the Purdue University study, so I'm assuming the scale is legit.)

What are you getting at Ron?

What do you mean what am I getting at? Do you see a plane that size in the video or not? I don't.

Can you come up with a rational theory as to why the plotters would switch the 757 for a missile?

I don't plan to play question and answer on 9/11 here. But it's interesting to me that you can ask questions that have such obvious answers. You must really enjoy wasting your own time.

Why would they switch the 757 for a missile? How about, to be sure the target got hit, instead of depending on a great aviator like Hani Hanjour to even find the place?

They were able to hit the Twin Towers which were about a quater the width.

Exactly. Which tells me that whatever kind of aircraft hit those towers were under remote control. The conspirators on something like 9/11 depending on the likes of Mohamed Atta and his boys to get the job done would be like the CIA or whoever conspiring to assassinate JFK and depending on Lee Harvey Oswald to do it. Ridiculous.

[Evan Burton]

Peter,

We may not be too far in disagreement as it might first seem, but I fear I am not making my points entirely clear for you.

It is precisely because so many of us see that the JFK [as well as RFK, MLK, covert ops and wars, etc, et al, ad nauseum] were not what they were 'officially' presented to be, that we approach 911 with some skeptacism....but only becuase the facts presented don't add up to the explanation offered by the powers that be.

This is where I feel there is some confusion. The explanation for the events can be debated. The events themselves, however, are pretty cut & dried.

It is the motives that are the point. It is the 'who gained' that is the point.

I agree - almost. Were the events government orchestrated? Did the government simply take advantage of the events? Was it a terrorist attack which the government failed to take seriously? Were government departments remiss in their responsibilities in response to a credible threat?

I don't know.

Personally, I would find it hard to accept that this was a government operation - or even 'rogue' government operation - but it could be a defendable arguement that this was the case. People can point to the Northwoods documents and say it could be a credible scenario.

The motives, in this case, are distinct from the actual events.

And it is the details of what happened that are the point.

This is where we differ. The events have been well documented. Let's go back to the Pentagon. Forget the security video; you have a massive amount of eyewitness reports. To deny them is to say that they were all "in on it". Remember the old saying? If more than one person knows a secret, it's not a secret. You could NOT keep a conspiracy of this magnitude a success with that many people involved.

The "Scholars for 9/11 truth" website, which Jack quoted (and is an associate of), uses BAD science. Much of what they have said is plain WRONG. If you find one qualified medical Doctor that says human reproduction by mating is impossible, would you believe them? Science tends to be pretty picky about the facts. If you tell porkys, a lot of qualified people say you are not supportable.

This leads me to the question of the quoted articles author.

If I tell you I am an MD, and that it is impossible for IVF to work, wouldn't you want to check my qualifications before accepting what I say? Maybe all the IVF people were paid off to promote that it works. Just because I say I am an MD, it doesn't make it true. Just because I am an MD, it doen't mean I am an expert in IVF.

If the author of the quoted letter is so adament about the validity of what they say, why wouldn't they allow their qualification to be known and verified? I am NOT saying they are NOT a mechanical engineer - but I have nothing to say that they are. I have nothing to say that they have worked in the aerospace industry, or with warhead design, or can talk knowledgebly about explosives.

Science is about proof and peer review. If the author is correct, let's subject their claims to the same standard that any other scientific claim would have to undergo.

I find it as incredible as anyone that someone inside the government structure could be behind this...but to me that is exactly what I see thus far. I was as pained and remain as pained by the firm conviction that JFK was not assassinated by a lone-nut but by a rather large conspiracy to hijack the power structure of the USA. This [911] seems to me to have been for the purpose of hijacking the citizenry and what freedoms remained. I wish I were 100% wrong and would be happy to be proven so. One can take each 'point' and argue [and one should], but if one backs up a bit and looks at the whole, there are far too many inconsistancies, hidden evidence, suppressed information, suspicious coincidences to believe [for me and I would hope eventually for most thinking and objective persons] that only a bunch of foreign 'terrorists' pulled this off. I don't claim, and I think many who don't believe the official version do not claim, to know exactly what happened. They are working to discover this - handicapped (as in JFK matter) by govenmental obstruction and secrecy. It seems to me there might have been, originally, a group from outside who wanted to pull off a terrorist attack, but they were penetrated and used, perhaps - or they were agent provocateurs - or some other more complex scenario.

Once again, the MOTIVE for the events is debatable; the events are not. How many people who involve themselves in the JFK debate say that he was NOT shot and killed? Do people maintain it was faked, and that he lives to this say in seculsion? That it was faked and he was later disposed of for whatever reasons?

Not many - if any. You debate the WHY, not the what.

I also don't believe those planes were flown by newly and poorly trained pilots. They were either flown remotely or by fighter-pilots; and the hit on the Pentagon seems in all likelihood to have been a missle or some such.

This is where I point to some facts again - the witnesses, the recovered parts. I also would ask you to accept - for the moment - my 20-odd years in aviation as a pilot, a navigator, and air traffic controller. A pilot with minimal training could have flown those aircraft. It would not have taken "fighter-pilots"; in fact, exactly the opposite. Fighter pilots are used to nimble, responsive aircraft. You would want people (in your scenario) like bomber or transport pilots; people who are used to an aircraft of that size.

The damage to the Pentagon is simply not consistint with a missile, either cruise, or air-to-ground. If you like, we can debate why in later posts.

A remote controlled aircraft introduces some problems for perpetrators of such an event. Despite Boeings statement, it would be possible to modify a 757 to operate under remote control. It would be difficult to fly it into targets - but possible, given the right circumstances. The problem then becomes the reports from the aircraft that it was being hijacked, the DNA evidence identifying all but one person on the aircraft. Why introduce such risks into the equation? Why not simply get a fanatic to hijack an airliner and fly it into the target?

The official 911 commission was another Warren Commission to shut everyone up and bury the truth - not expose it. Sorry to say...and wish with all my heart that JFK was only a lone assassin and that 911 were only a few angry terrorists. In both cases I see all too clearly and painfully the involvement of elements of the power structure within. Peter

[Evan Burton]

Peter,

We may not be too far in disagreement as it might first seem, but I fear I am not making my points entirely clear for you.

It is precisely because so many of us see that the JFK [as well as RFK, MLK, covert ops and wars, etc, et al, ad nauseum] were not what they were 'officially' presented to be, that we approach 911 with some skeptacism....but only becuase the facts presented don't add up to the explanation offered by the powers that be.

This is where I feel there is some confusion. The explanation for the events can be debated. The events themselves, however, are pretty cut & dried.

It is the motives that are the point. It is the 'who gained' that is the point.

I agree - almost. Were the events government orchestrated? Did the government simply take advantage of the events? Was it a terrorist attack which the government failed to take seriously? Were government departments remiss in their responsibilities in response to a credible threat?

I don't know.

Personally, I would find it hard to accept that this was a government operation - or even 'rogue' government operation - but it could be a defendable arguement that this was the case. People can point to the Northwoods documents and say it could be a credible scenario.

The motives, in this case, are distinct from the actual events.

And it is the details of what happened that are the point.

This is where we differ. The events have been well documented. Let's go back to the Pentagon. Forget the security video; you have a massive amount of eyewitness reports. To deny them is to say that they were all "in on it". Remember the old saying? If more than one person knows a secret, it's not a secret. You could NOT keep a conspiracy of this magnitude a success with that many people involved.

The "Scholars for 9/11 truth" website, which Jack quoted (and is an associate of), uses BAD science. Much of what they have said is plain WRONG. If you find one qualified medical Doctor that says human reproduction by mating is impossible, would you believe them? Science tends to be pretty picky about the facts. If you tell porkys, a lot of qualified people say you are not supportable.

This leads me to the question of the quoted articles author.

If I tell you I am an MD, and that it is impossible for IVF to work, wouldn't you want to check my qualifications before accepting what I say? Maybe all the IVF people were paid off to promote that it works. Just because I say I am an MD, it doesn't make it true. Just because I am an MD, it doen't mean I am an expert in IVF.

If the author of the quoted letter is so adament about the validity of what they say, why wouldn't they allow their qualification to be known and verified? I am NOT saying they are NOT a mechanical engineer - but I have nothing to say that they are. I have nothing to say that they have worked in the aerospace industry, or with warhead design, or can talk knowledgebly about explosives.

Science is about proof and peer review. If the author is correct, let's subject their claims to the same standard that any other scientific claim would have to undergo.

I find it as incredible as anyone that someone inside the government structure could be behind this...but to me that is exactly what I see thus far. I was as pained and remain as pained by the firm conviction that JFK was not assassinated by a lone-nut but by a rather large conspiracy to hijack the power structure of the USA. This [911] seems to me to have been for the purpose of hijacking the citizenry and what freedoms remained. I wish I were 100% wrong and would be happy to be proven so. One can take each 'point' and argue [and one should], but if one backs up a bit and looks at the whole, there are far too many inconsistancies, hidden evidence, suppressed information, suspicious coincidences to believe [for me and I would hope eventually for most thinking and objective persons] that only a bunch of foreign 'terrorists' pulled this off. I don't claim, and I think many who don't believe the official version do not claim, to know exactly what happened. They are working to discover this - handicapped (as in JFK matter) by govenmental obstruction and secrecy. It seems to me there might have been, originally, a group from outside who wanted to pull off a terrorist attack, but they were penetrated and used, perhaps - or they were agent provocateurs - or some other more complex scenario.

Once again, the MOTIVE for the events is debatable; the events are not. How many people who involve themselves in the JFK debate say that he was NOT shot and killed? Do people maintain it was faked, and that he lives to this say in seculsion? That it was faked and he was later disposed of for whatever reasons?

Not many - if any. You debate the WHY, not the what.

I also don't believe those planes were flown by newly and poorly trained pilots. They were either flown remotely or by fighter-pilots; and the hit on the Pentagon seems in all likelihood to have been a missle or some such.

This is where I point to some facts again - the witnesses, the recovered parts. I also would ask you to accept - for the moment - my 20-odd years in aviation as a pilot, a navigator, and air traffic controller. A pilot with minimal training could have flown those aircraft. It would not have taken "fighter-pilots"; in fact, exactly the opposite. Fighter pilots are used to nimble, responsive aircraft. You would want people (in your scenario) like bomber or transport pilots; people who are used to an aircraft of that size.

The damage to the Pentagon is simply not consistint with a missile, either cruise, or air-to-ground. If you like, we can debate why in later posts.

A remote controlled aircraft introduces some problems for perpetrators of such an event. Despite Boeings statement, it would be possible to modify a 757 to operate under remote control. It would be difficult to fly it into targets - but possible, given the right circumstances. The problem then becomes the reports from the aircraft that it was being hijacked, the DNA evidence identifying all but one person on the aircraft. Why introduce such risks into the equation? Why not simply get a fanatic to hijack an airliner and fly it into the target?

The official 911 commission was another Warren Commission to shut everyone up and bury the truth - not expose it. Sorry to say...and wish with all my heart that JFK was only a lone assassin and that 911 were only a few angry terrorists. In both cases I see all too clearly and painfully the involvement of elements of the power structure within. Peter

[Len Colby]

Something like this is seen in the video? (The image is from the Purdue University study, so I'm assuming the scale is legit.)

What are you getting at Ron?

What do you mean what am I getting at? Do you see a plane that size in the video or not? I don't.

I think I must be confused Ron. I get the impression you are comparing a frame from a computer animated simulation of the Pentagon crash with blurry out of focus frames from a surveillance camera meant to capture license plate numbers. But I must be mistaken a smart guy like you wouldn't make such a silly comparison.

Can you come up with a rational theory as to why the plotters would switch the 757 for a missile?

I don't plan to play question and answer on 9/11 here. But it's interesting to me that you can ask questions that have such obvious answers. You must really enjoy wasting your own time.

Why would they switch the 757 for a missile? How about, to be sure the target got hit, instead of depending on a great aviator like Hani Hanjour to even find the place?

You said you believe they had the capability to remote control two Boeing passenger jets into much smaller targets, why not use the same technology to guide another into the Pentagon?

Finding the Pentagon would not be difficult all Hanjour had to do was program the autopilot to fly the plane to Washington National Airport (I refuse to uses its new name LOL). It's coordinates can easily be found on the Internet [ http://www.airnav.com/airport/KDCA ] The Pentagon is very close to the airport.

The photo below is from Google Earth at the beginning of the red dash line (bottom right) is a runway..

http://www.911myths.com/assets/images/Pentagon_Flight_Path.jpg

Each wall is 921 feet long thus the end of the runway is 3000 - 3500 feet from the Pentagon. Obviously once the plane was close to the airport the "Puzzle Palace" would be plainly visible. Or he could even have set the coordinates for the target itself.

Hanjour was not as bad a pilot as made out to be: he had a commercial pilot's license and about 600 flight hours and had trained on a Pan Am 737 simulator and 757/767 PC simulators. http://www.911myths.com/html/flight_school_dropouts.html

They were able to hit the Twin Towers which were about a quater the width.

Exactly. Which tells me that whatever kind of aircraft hit those towers were under remote control. The conspirators on something like 9/11 depending on the likes of Mohamed Atta and his boys to get the job done would be like the CIA or whoever conspiring to assassinate JFK and depending on Lee Harvey Oswald to do it. Ridiculous.

Each tower was 206 feet wide, they were not exactly hard targets to hit. Runways are only 150 feet wide (see airnav link above). Like Hanjour, Atta and Shehhi had commercial pilot's licenses and trained on simulator to fly large jets (see link above). Obviously if they could land planes well enough to get private pilot let alone commercial licenses (There are only three types: private, commercial and air transport. You can fly small numbers of passengers with a commercial license.) they could hit a building 40% wider that a runway let alone one as big as the Pentagon.

Ron find me ONE airline pilot in good standing (not the nut who got fired from Continental in the 80's after failing psychological exams) who says Atta, Shehhi and Hanjour weren't good enough to have done what that did.

Edited May 21, 2006 by Len Colby

[Ron Ecker]

you have a massive amount of eyewitness reports. To deny them is to say that they were all "in on it".

I just want to point out that only some of those eyewitnesses said they actually saw the plane hit the building. And even then, what did they actually see? Did they see a 757, or did they see some other aircraft painted to look like an airliner, and after hearing it was a 757 that hit the Pentagon, they naturally assumed that's what they saw, perhaps having no idea how close or far they actually were from the aircraft they saw to accurately judge its size.

Perhaps what they saw was indeed a 757, actually hitting the building. But to say there is a "massive amount of eyewitness reports" is not the proof that it may sound like. (Particularly when the only photographic evidence of the event provided by the government, the parking lot video, does not support the eyewitnesses, in my opinion and that of others.)

Despite Boeings statement, it would be possible to modify a 757 to operate under remote control.

Has Boeing denied this? If so, it is a very interesting statement.

I think I must be confused Ron. I get the impression you are comparing a frame from a computer animated simulation of the Pentagon crash with blurry out of focus frames from a surveillance camera meant to capture license plate numbers. But I must be mistaken a smart guy like you wouldn't make such a silly comparison.

http://signs-of-the-times.org/signs/editor...ldHaveShown.php

Edited May 21, 2006 by Ron Ecker

[Michael Hogan]

Len Colby challenged Ron Ecker to: "find me ONE airline pilot in good standing (not the nut who got fired from Continental in the 80's after failing psychological exams) who says Atta, Shehhi and Hanjour weren't good enough to have done what that did."

Russ Wittenberg makes that claim during an interview on Wing TV (Whatever that is). Here are his claimed credentials:

Russ Wittenberg has numerous FAA certificates ranging from Airline Pilot and Flight Engineer to Ground Instructor and Aircraft Dispatcher. He is certified to fly an incredible range of aircraft including Boeing 707s, 727s, 747s, 757s, 767s and 777s. The supposed aircraft used on 9/11 were Boeing 757s and 767s.

At the beginning of the interview, Wittenberg says: "I started out in aviation as a graduate of the University of Miami, Florida, a Hurricane and I went through Air Force ROTC. And received my commission in the Air Force as a second lieutenant. Afterwards I went through Air Force flying schools and Air Force fighter pilot during the Vietnam Era. A hundred combat missions in Vietnam. And there I got out of the Air Force and I got a job with the airlines, airlines up in Miami, and I flew with them for a short time then I went with Pan American World Airways for twenty years. Then in 1986, Pan Am sold its Pacific division to United Airlines for 750 million dollars and 430 of us pilots went from Pan Am to United. So the reason I tell you that is because I have a unique position of having been with two different airlines. I flew the Pan Am 747 that went down in Lockerbie. Scotland sixteen years ago and I also flew the two United airplanes that were involved in 9/11. Those two actual airplanes."

"Well you can...you can simulate the flight in the simulator but what I'm talking about is they're saying this airplane was flown at around 500 knots which is beyond the speed envelope. The VMO/MMO speed of a 757 that down low is around 320 knots. So it was exceeding it's design speed envelope well over a hundred knots. Now when you start doing that and you start pulling high speed turns the airplane's going to start what they call high speed stalls and it's going to fall out of the sky. These...the only vehicle that could do that would be a missile or a jet fighter."

For anyone interested in the subject, I urge them to read the interview in its entirety and judge Wittenberg's credibility for themself.

http://letsroll911.org/ipw-web/bulletin/bb...opic.php?t=4565

Here is another extensive article by Joel Harel, a member of Physics 9/11, which purports to be the "Scientific Panel Investigating Nine-Eleven." For his qualifications and others, see their member list. Harel claims to be an aeronautical engineer and pilot. He says:

"There are some who maintain that the mythical 9/11 hijackers, although proven to be too incompetent to fly a little Cessna 172, had acquired the impressive skills that enabled them to fly airliners by training in flight simulators.

What follows is an attempt to bury this myth once and for all, because I’ve heard this ludicrous explanation bandied about, ad nauseam, on the Internet and the TV networks—invariably by people who know nothing substantive about flight simulators, flying, or even airplanes.

A common misconception non-pilots have about simulators is how "easy" it is to operate them. They are indeed relatively easy to operate if the objective is to make a few lazy turns and frolic about in the "open sky". But if the intent is to execute any kind of a maneuver with even the least bit of precision, the task immediately becomes quite daunting. And if the aim is to navigate to a specific geographic location hundreds of miles away while flying at over 500 MPH, 30,000 feet above the ground the challenges become virtually impossible for an untrained pilot.

I shan't get into the aerodynamic impossibility of flying a large commercial jetliner 20 feet above the ground at over 400 MPH. A discussion on ground effect energy, vortex compression, downwash reaction, wake turbulence, and jetblast effects are beyond the scope of this article....

Let it suffice to say that it is physically impossible to fly a 200,000-lb airliner 20 feet above the ground at 400 MPH."

Harel claims to have a letter from a senior airline captain currently flying with an airline involved in 9/11 containing the following statement:

"Regarding your comments on flight simulators, several of my colleagues and I have tried to simulate the hijacker's final approach maneuvers into the towers on our company 767 simulator. We tried repeated tight, steeply banked 180 turns at 500 mph followed by a fast rollout and lineup with a tall building. More than two-thirds of those who attempted the maneuver failed to make a "hit". How these rookies who couldn't fly a trainer pulled this off is beyond comprehension."

Once again, I urge the interested reader to examine Joel Harel's article in its entirety.

http://physics911.net/harel.htm

Ironically, I found this information at the very website Len Colby used to buttress his claim that: "Finding the Pentagon would not be difficult all Hanjour had to do was program the autopilot to fly the plane to Washington National Airport...."

and:

"Hanjour was not as bad a pilot as made out to be: he had a commercial pilot's license and about 600 flight hours and had trained on a Pan Am 737 simulator and 757/767 PC simulators. http://www.911myths.com/html/flight_school...outs.html"

Interestingly, the link that Mr. Colby provides for his claims provides all sorts of conflicting information at to the training and capabilities of Hanjour. I think people often find a website, pick out excerpts that tend to support their view, and post the link as if somehow it proved their assertions. Often, visiting the website actually offers evidence which refutes the very point they were attempting to make. If the reader doubts this, just visit the website supplied by Mr Colby (link above).

According to reports from CBS:

http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2002/05/10/...ain508656.shtml

(CBS) Months before Hani Hanjour is believed to have flown an American Airlines jet into the Pentagon, managers at an Arizona flight school reported him at least five times to the FAA, reports CBS News Correspondent Vince Gonzales.

They reported him not because they feared he was a terrorist, but because his English and flying skills were so bad, they told the Associated Press, they didn't think he should keep his pilot's license.

"I couldn't believe he had a commercial license of any kind with the skills that he had," said Peggy Chevrette, the manager for the now-defunct JetTech flight school in Phoenix......

Chevrette said she contacted Anthony (FAA Inspector) again when Hanjour began ground training for Boeing 737 jetliners and it became clear he didn't have the skills for the commercial pilot's license.

"I don't truly believe he should have had it and I questioned that," she said.

Other Arizona flight schools he (Hanjour) attended also questioned his abilities.

And finally from the Washington Post in an article entitled Hanjour an Unlikely Terrorist:

http://www.whatreallyhappened.com/hanjour_history.html

While in Oakland, he enrolled at the Sierra Academy of Aeronautics. He attended a 30-minute class on Sept. 8 and never came back. Dan Shaffer, the academy's vice president for flight operations, speculated that Hanjour was intimidated by the school's two-year training regimen and $35,000 price tag.

The next month, he turned up in Arizona, a magnet for aspiring pilots because of its clear weather and relatively affordable flight schools. Hanjour paid $3,800 by check and $1,000 in cash for lessons at CRM Flight Cockpit Resource Management in Scottsdale.

During three months of instruction in late 1996, Duncan K.M. Hastie, CRM's owner, found Hanjour a "weak student" who "was wasting our resources." Hanjour left, then returned in December 1997 - a year later - and stayed only a few weeks.

Over the next three years, Hanjour called Hastie about twice a year, asking to come back for more instruction.

"I would recognize his voice," Hastie said. "He was always talking about wanting more training. Yes, he wanted to be an airline pilot. That was his stated goal. That's why I didn't allow him to come back. I thought, 'You're never going to make it.' "

The last time Hanjour called, sometime last year, he was asking to train on a Boeing 757, the kind of aircraft he is believed to have crashed into the Pentagon.

Rebuffed by Hastie, Hanjour went elsewhere. In 1998, he joined the simulator club at Sawyer, a small Phoenix school known locally as a flight school of last resort. "It was a commonly held truth that, if you failed anywhere else, go to Sawyer Aviation. They had good instructors," said Fults, the former simulator manager there.

and:

That plot was in high gear by the second week of August, when Hanjour arrived in the Washington area for what appears to have been his final preparation - this time, at Freeway Airport in Bowie, Md. Instructors once again questioned his competence. After three sessions in a single-engine plane, the school decided Hanjour was not ready to rent a plane by himself.

Its 43 years after the murder of John Kennedy, and people still debate whether or not Oswald possessed the skills and the weapon to do what the Warren Commission claimed. Anyone can post a link to some "expert's" testimony and make a case for either side.

It's just a shame the 9/11 Commission failed to do a proper job of investigating, relegating the search for the truth in the hands of internet websites. I don't claim to know what happened. I wonder how others can be so sure.

Mike Hogan

Edited May 21, 2006 by Michael Hogan

[Jack White]

The above posting is very confusing.

It is impossible to tell when "Burton" is talking

and when Peter is talking.

Please do something to differentiate between original

posting and responses.

Jack

[Len Colby]

The above posting is very confusing.

It is impossible to tell when "Burton" is talking

and when Peter is talking.

Please do something to differentiate between original

posting and responses.

Jack

Well this is might be the first time ever but "White" actually said something that makes sense. Peter please reformat you post so that the reader can distinguish between Evan's comments and yours.

Len

[Evan Burton]

Peter,

Sorry to have to say this again but we are kinda moving off track. HOW it happened, WHY it happened.. is up for debate. If you believe the US government planned the events of 9/11, then okay, we could talk about that - later. The FACTS of 9/11 are simply irrefutable.

- Witnesses to the airliner flying into the Pentagon

- Parts of the aircraft being found

- DNA evidence of the people killed (bar one)

- The calls from the aircraft saying they were hijacked

Lots of stuff!

Did the government arrange for people to hijack the aircraft? I don't know.

The official version is enourmously flawed...

You'll have to say which parts are flawed so I can address them. If you are talking about the WHY (CCTV footage of the people going through airport security, links to organisations, etc) then that is a different matter. You'll have to tell me why you do not believe a 757 hit the Pentagon (and similar for flaws in the WTC attack).

I currently live outside of the USA and here fully half don't believe the US official version of 9-11.

Many people believe the Earth is flat - so what? Belief that something is wrong does not make it so.

No 757 from what I know of physics can slam into a building [Pentagon] and fold up into a small round hole. I know some reported seeing a large plane and don't know how to explain all.

So you are saying the Purdue study is flawed? How?

Why are we not getting the full videos [i hear there are about 75 different ones - this number from a FOIA request that was denied] of whatever hit the Pentagon?!

I think the number was actually about 86 or so (IIRC - that might be wrong). There is a FOIA inquiry which was answered; I'll see if I can find the website again. It was on behalf of the victims families.

They were told that of the 86(?) tapes confiscated, only two showed the actual impact. All the others had no information of the impact, they only showed post-crash activity. They were being withheld because they could be evidence in legal action. That may have changed now. Even so, the government has no right to release tapes which it does not own. The owners who they were confiscated from must give permission.

As to the towers, their collapse is also suspicious as are many of the factors surrounding them.

Again, why? Do you believe that aircraft were not flown into the buildings? Could you give me specifics?

...to invent a scenario of building collapse that is suspect.

Again, why? The overwhelming majority of structural engineers have no problems with it. Just saying it is suspect is not enough; you have to say WHY it is suspect and give an alternative scenario that accounts for the observations.

Sorry for cutting out so much, but your distrust of the government is not a reason to refute WHAT happened - only WHY it happened.

A previous post also mentioned a pilot who said the hijackers could not have flown into the Pentagon / WTC with the training they had.

Here is my counterpoint:

From: Bill is the new black ® 24/05/2006 7:20:01 PM

Subject: re: Chat post id: 2301896

Hey Bill:

As a 747 pilot and experienced in training student pilots, what is your take on the 9/11 pilots?

Could they have flown into the Pentagon / WTC with the training they had?

---

Yeah, piece of cake.

They didn't need as much training as what they did in fact.

http://www2b.abc.net.au/science/k2/stn/new...ost2301896.shtm

Bill is a friend of mine, and a 747 pilot with many years of experience. Here is his website so you can read about him:

http://www.billzilla.org/

One says NAY, another says AYE. If you want to add up all those with the experience to judge and tally them off against each other, you'll find that the large majority tell you it was easy.

[Len Colby]

Len Colby challenged Ron Ecker to: "find me ONE airline pilot in good standing (not the nut who got fired from Continental in the 80's after failing psychological exams) who says Atta, Shehhi and Hanjour weren't good enough to have done what that did."

Russ Wittenberg makes that claim during an interview on Wing TV (Whatever that is). Here are his claimed credentials:

Russ Wittenberg has numerous FAA certificates ranging from Airline Pilot and Flight Engineer to Ground Instructor and Aircraft Dispatcher. He is certified to fly an incredible range of aircraft including Boeing 707s, 727s, 747s, 757s, 767s and 777s. The supposed aircraft used on 9/11 were Boeing 757s and 767s.

I hadn't seen Wittenberg's claims before. He is listed on the FAA's Airmen Registration Database and he is indeed the well qualified pilot he claims to be, there are how ever many other similarly qualified pilots who whole heartedly disagree with him.

You can search the database here: https://amsrvs.registry.faa.gov/airmeninquiry/default.asp

One journalist who suspects Bush may have had foreknowledge interviewed airline pilots who don't think hitting the Pentagon is much of a challenge:

"Well, we did not have any difficulty finding pilots who disagreed. Ronald D. Bull, a retired United Airlines pilot, in Jupiter, Florida, told The New American, "It's not that difficult, and certainly not impossible," noting that it's much easier to crash intentionally into a target than to make a controlled landing. "If you're doing a suicide run, like these guys were doing, you'd just keep the nose down and push like the devil," says Capt. Bull, who flew 727s, 747s, 757s, and 767s for many years, internationally and domestically, including into the Washington, D.C., airports.

George Williams of Waxhaw, North Carolina, piloted 707s, 727s, DC-10s, and 747s for Northwest Airlines for 38 years. "I don't see any merit to those arguments whatsoever," Capt. Williams told us. "The Pentagon is a pretty big target and I'd say hitting it was a fairly easy thing to do."

http://www.thenewamerican.com/artman/publi...icle_1253.shtml

Patrick Smith a pilot who is a columnist for Salon also believes Hanjour could have done it,

I've explained in at least one prior column, Hani Hanjour's flying was hardly the show-quality demonstration often described. It was exceptional only in its recklessness. If anything, his loops and turns and spirals above the nation's capital revealed him to be exactly the xxxxty pilot he by all accounts was. To hit the Pentagon squarely he needed only a bit of luck, and he got it, possibly with help from the 757's autopilot. Striking a stationary object -- even a large one like the Pentagon -- at high speed and from a steep angle is very difficult. To make the job easier, he came in obliquely, tearing down light poles as he roared across the Pentagon's lawn.

He was able to find airline pilots who shared that assessment:

"They'd done their homework and they had what they needed," says a United Airlines pilot (name withheld on request), who has flown every model of Boeing from the 737 up. "Rudimentary knowledge and fearlessness."

"As everyone saw, their flying was sloppy and aggressive," says Michael (last name withheld), a pilot with several thousand hours in 757s and 767s. "Their skills and experience, or lack thereof, just weren't relevant."

"The hijackers required only the shallow understanding of the aircraft," agrees Ken Hertz, an airline pilot rated on the 757/767. "In much the same way that a person needn't be an experienced physician in order to perform CPR or set a broken bone."

That sentiment is echoed by Joe d'Eon, airline pilot and host of the "Fly With Me" podcast series. "It's the difference between a doctor and a butcher," says d'Eon.

http://www.salon.com/tech/col/smith/2006/0...6/index_np.html

You need a Salon subscription or free "site pass" to read this and the article cited below. The above is quoted here, www.911myths.com/html/flight_school_dropouts.html

People have debated whether of the use of PC simulators could have helped the hijack pilots one British Airways pilot thinks they could according to another Salon columnist, Joshua Tompkins.

Thanks to the automated design of modern airliners, however, most phases of flight -- even landing, at a properly equipped airport -- can be performed without touching the main controls. Once the autopilot is engaged, changes in course, speed or altitude can be entered with the twist of a knob. If you can set an alarm clock, you can turn a 767 in flight.

This is where simulation software shines, thanks to its faithful depiction of high-tech systems and procedures. "The threat to air travel that these sims produce," Warnick says, "is that once the aircraft is airborne, anyone entering the flight deck could program the latitude and longitude of the chosen target into the flight management computer." Then the hijacker could "engage the appropriate autopilot commands and -- unless intercepted or out of fuel -- watch as the aircraft carries out the attack completely automatically."

Retired TWA captain Barry Schiff, who says the flight deck of the Wilco 767 looks identical to the 767s he flew during his 34 years as an airline pilot, doesn't believe such programs would ever be a terrorist asset. After all, using an airplane as a cruise missile ultimately requires more fanaticism than finesse. "If you wanted to point an airplane at something on the ground and crash into it," Schiff says, "you don't have to know a hell of a lot."

http://dir.salon.com/story/tech/feature/2003/07/23/flightsim_terrorism/index2.html

So several pilots and as I will show below at least a couple of Hanjour's instructors think he could have done it but Wittenberg disagrees. I would think if the turn and approach were as impossible as he and other CTists make out many pilots from around the world would say something but so far only one airline pilot in good standing has and that is rather telling. Wittenberg is a pilot but he is also right-wing extremist.

In 1988 he attended the fifteenth annual Conservative Political Action Conference. David Corn covered the event for the Nation: " "…These people are guilty of murder," Wittenberg said, apparently referring to gays in general...The only thing worse than a Communist is a person who practices an alternative life style," said Russ Wittenberg, a delegate from Arizona..."

http://64.233.187.104/search?q=cache:zqGzU...russ+wittenberg

In 2000 he was chairman of the Buchanan for President campaign in Arizona [ www.truthinmedia.org/truthinmedia/ Speeches/RPAZ-photos/photo-album.html ] and was one of his electors http://press.azsos.gov/Election/2000/Gener...nvass2000GE.pdf.

Recently he complained that Habitat for Humanity, the non-profit group which builds homes for low – middle income families financed by no-interest loans "would bring slums to" his city.

http://www.sonorannews.com/archives/2005/2...hEditorial.html

Echoing ultra-right paranoia spelled out in APFN and the American Free Press (successor to the Spotlight) "Russ Wittenberg says America has turned into a police state with martial law on the immediate horizon."* I'm no fan of Bush but the militia types have been talking about martial law being imminent for decades. People to the RIGHT of Bush make me uneasy.

* http://www.illuminati-news.com/inside-job.htm

The fact that on top of this he is associated with a Holocaust denier (Hufscmidt) isn't comforting. Might his judgment be clouded by his extremist political views? To me his credibility is further damaged by his adherence to the crackpot "a missile hit the Pentagon" theory.

Here is another extensive article by Joel Harel, a member of Physics 9/11, which purports to be the "Scientific Panel Investigating Nine-Eleven." For his qualifications and others, see their member list. Harel claims to be an aeronautical engineer and pilot.

But he doesn't even claim to be an airline pilot and there are no Joel Harels listed in the FAA database in the US, UK or Canada. This calls his integrity into question. Try contacting him and ask him to explain this discrepancy. In any case there are thousands of people with pilots licensees; I'm looking specifically for people who have experience flying 757's or other jetliners.

Harel claims to have a letter from a senior airline captain currently flying with an airline involved in 9/11 containing the following statement:

"Regarding your comments on flight simulators, several of my colleagues and I have tried to simulate the hijacker's final approach maneuvers into the towers on our company 767 simulator. We tried repeated tight, steeply banked 180 turns at 500 mph followed by a fast rollout and lineup with a tall building. More than two-thirds of those who attempted the maneuver failed to make a "hit". How these rookies who couldn't fly a trainer pulled this off is beyond comprehension."

1) I've never heard of Harel before. Accepting the word of an anonymous source from a known writer or publication is one thing but accepting it from someone with no track record esp. since he seems to have falsely claimed to be a pilot 'is a ballgame of another color'. How do we know Harel didn't make it up? How do we know if the person who e-mailed him really is a pilot?

2) He didn't say it's impossible which contradicts Wittenberg.

Ironically, I found this information at the very website Len Colby used to buttress his claim that: "Finding the Pentagon would not be difficult all Hanjour had to do was program the autopilot to fly the plane to Washington National Airport...."

and:

"Hanjour was not as bad a pilot as made out to be: he had a commercial pilot's license and about 600 flight hours and had trained on a Pan Am 737 simulator and 757/767 PC simulators. http://www.911myths.com/html/flight_school...outs.html"

It's not ironic unlike many 9/11 "truth" sites which often very selectively quote their sources to boost their claims and not provide links back to the original source debunking sites tend to tell both sides of the story.

Interestingly, the link that Mr. Colby provides for his claims provides all sorts of conflicting information at to the training and capabilities of Hanjour. I think people often find a website, pick out excerpts that tend to support their view, and post the link as if somehow it proved their assertions. Often, visiting the website actually offers evidence which refutes the very point they were attempting to make. If the reader doubts this, just visit the website supplied by Mr Colby (link above).

Obviously I provided the link with the intent that people read the page. The author fairly provides information both pro and con. Obviously the author shares my view. Obviously "Mr. Hogan's" insinuation that I was being misleading is false.

According to reports from CBS:

http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2002/05/10/...ain508656.shtml

(CBS) Months before Hani Hanjour is believed to have flown an American Airlines jet into the Pentagon, managers at an Arizona flight school reported him at least five times to the FAA, reports CBS News Correspondent Vince Gonzales.

They reported him not because they feared he was a terrorist, but because his English and flying skills were so bad, they told the Associated Press, they didn't think he should keep his pilot's license.

"I couldn't believe he had a commercial license of any kind with the skills that he had," said Peggy Chevrette, the manager for the now-defunct JetTech flight school in Phoenix......

Chevrette said she contacted Anthony (FAA Inspector) again when Hanjour began ground training for Boeing 737 jetliners and it became clear he didn't have the skills for the commercial pilot's license.

"I don't truly believe he should have had it and I questioned that," she said.

That makes it sound like she doesn't believe Hanjour could have done it but her feelings are quite the opposite as is made clear by the article from the Washington Post quoted below. Note that according to the author she didn't think he was unable to fly small planes at all (as CTists would have you think) but rather that he couldn't fly airliners safely as also indicated by the article cited by Mike above.

She said she had been "worried that he was going to hurt himself or hurt someone else because he didn't have the skills" to fly an airliner and risked causing an accident.

[…]

When she heard about the Sept. 11 hijackings, "I already knew in my heart that Hani was a part of it," Chevrette said. She recalled driving to work when she learned that a plane had hit the Pentagon after two planes had already struck the World Trade Center in New York.

"I think that's the thing that just snapped," she said, recalling her realization that it was a terrorist attack. "I remember crying all the way to work, knowing that our company helped do this."

http://www.theairlinehub.com/2006/03/emotional_testimony_at_moussao.html

Other Arizona flight schools he (Hanjour) attended also questioned his abilities.

[…]

The last time Hanjour called, sometime last year, he was asking to train on a Boeing 757, the kind of aircraft he is believed to have crashed into the Pentagon.

Rebuffed by Hastie, Hanjour went elsewhere. In 1998, he joined the simulator club at Sawyer, a small Phoenix school known locally as a flight school of last resort. "It was a commonly held truth that, if you failed anywhere else, go to Sawyer Aviation. They had good instructors," said Fults, the former simulator manager there.

This shows that Hanjour wanted to learn to fly 757's years before 9/11 how does that fit into the theory that he didn't fly the 757 that flew into the Pentagon or that no 757 hit it? This also shows that not only did he train on PC 757 flight simulators but 'real' simulators as well. Fults said "They had good instructors" perhaps they were good enough to have give Hanjour enough skill to do what he did.

Assesment of his abilities varied:

FBI agents have questioned and administered a lie detector test to one of Hanjour's instructors in Arizona who was an Arab American and had signed off on Hanjour's flight instruction credentials before he got his pilot's license.

That instructor said he told agents that Hanjour was "a very average pilot, maybe struggling a little bit." The instructor added, "Maybe his English wasn't very good."

http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2002/05/10/attack/main508656.shtml

FBI report, "Summary of Penttbom Investigation," Feb. 29, 2004, pp. 52­57. Hanjour successfully conducted a challenging certification flight supervised by an instructor at Congressional Air Charters of Gaithersburg, Maryland, landing at a small airport with a difficult approach.The instructor thought Hanjour may have had training from a military pilot because he used a terrain recognition system for navigation. Eddie Shalev interview (Apr.9, 2004). [ 9/11 Commision Report, the report does not make it clear when Hanjour completed the course but from context it seems to have been in August 2001

http://www.ibiblio.org/hyperwar/AMH/XXI/GWOT/911-Report/911-Report-7.html#cn170 ]

I haven't seen any of his flight instructors say that Hanjour couldn't have done it.

Its 43 years after the murder of John Kennedy, and people still debate whether or not Oswald possessed the skills and the weapon to do what the Warren Commission claimed. Anyone can post a link to some "expert's" testimony and make a case for either side.

True but the overwhelming majority of experts and witnesses say a 757 hit the Pentagon and that Hanjour could have been the pilot.

It's just a shame the 9/11 Commission failed to do a proper job of investigating, relegating the search for the truth in the hands of internet websites. I don't claim to know what happened. I wonder how others can be so sure.

I agree the Commission did a poor job in many respects, for example they downplayed the warning signs that were missed. As to whether the Pentagon was hit by a plane or missile there is no reasonable doubt this. It is confirmed not only by witnesses but by the American Society of Civil Engineers and photos of debris. There is no reliable evidence indicating that a missile or anything other than a 757. I haven't seen any witness statements to that effect and the Purdue University study confirmed the ASCE's finding that the hole in the outer was consistent with what we'd expect.

The "a missile hit the Pentagon theory" has been effectively debunked by 9/11 CTists like Jim Hoffman

http://911research.wtc7.net/essays/pentagon/index.html

and aviation experts

http://www.aerospaceweb.org/question/conspiracy/q0265.shtml

Many 9/11 "inside job" theorists complain about how little debris was found at the 9/11 crash sites. Consider this crash site of an ATR-72, American Eagle flight 4184, which hit a wet soybean field at about 435 MPH and a 52 degree angle (*1) and thus with much LESS force of impact that the more massive 757's (*2) which crashed at over 500 MPH head on one of them into a bomb proofed wall.

1) http://aviation-safety.net/database/record.php?id=19941031-1

2) http://www.airliners.net/info/stats.main?id=42 ATR-72's have a maximum take-off weight of 48,500 lbs

Crash site and debris

http://www.planecrashinfo.com/w941031.htm

An ATR-72 like the one that crashed

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/9/9a/Atr-72.bristol.2.750pix.jpg

Len

[Michael Hogan]

Len,

You posted:

Mike – I didn't start this "xxxx fight" and if you so want it's over. I acknowledged my mistakes; do you have the courage to admit to yours?

If you want to address the points I made instead of slinging mud feel free.

Peace,

Len

First of all, if you want to call it a "xxxx fight," that's up to you. And if you want to consider my post "mudslinging" that's up to you also. Those are your characterizations, not mine. In my intitial response I said two things that could be construed as personal, although they referred to your methods of research, and not you personally.

1) What kind of "research" is this?

2) I guess its no secret I don't think much of Mr. Colby's "research" or his reasoning on these matters. If other members have been persuaded by what Mr. Colby posted, I would be interested in hearing.

Here were some of your responses:

1) Mr. Hogan's claim is totally bogus

2) it's not hard to find, my 10 year-old daughter found it. Obviously Mr. Hogan has no business criticizing anybody else's research.

3) I left out the above link inadvertently. I presume you have heard of Google, Yahoo and other search engines? With all the time you spent trying to debunk my post you could have found the article in about 5 seconds. That's doing something called 'research'.

4)Since your reply had more error and more serious errors than my original post you disparaging my research is like the "1st little pig" criticizing the "2nd little pig" for building a shoddy house.

5) I agree you post was very tediuos.(sic)

6) Do you understand the difference between ABOVE and BELOW Mr. Hogan?

7) Obviously "Mr. Hogan's" insinuation that I was being misleading is false. (I don't understand why you chose to put my name in quotation marks and I never insinuated that you were being misleading. Once again, that's your choice of words, not mine.)

My reference was only to the quality of your research and reasoning about a narrowly defined subject. (The stand down order) It is you who turned this exchange personal.

I concluded with:

In closing, I will offer the following quote from Nafeez Ahmed's well documented book The War On Truth:

Throughout the 9/11 terrorists attacks, then, the US national security apparatus systematically facilitated the attacks by implementing policies that either inexplicably delayed the response of US air defense or methodically diverted it. Both the FAA and Norad inexplicably delayed their responses for unconscionably long periods, in breach of standard procedures. Repeatedly, fighter craft were indefinitely postponed, continuously misdirected, and ultimately stood down, in such a manner that permitted the attacks to occur entirely unhindered for over one and a half hours in the most restricted airspace in the world.

Your reply:

There are published books and websites many of them full of footnotes that assert: the Holocaust was a hoax, the Moon landings were a hoax, the Zapruder film was a hoax, the pyramids and Nazca lines were made by aliens, The world is controlled by the Illuminati, Queen Elizabeth is the Worlds biggest drug dealer, the Twin Towers had reinforced concrete cores, global warming will cause the World to explode and that sex between adults and young children should be permitted.(Emphasis mine) Simply repeating someone's assertion isn't enough if Mr. Ahmed has any hard evidence cite it. Without that his opinion and your assessment of it are meaningless.

You use the tactic of linking Nafeez Ahmed's book with books that assert "sex between young adults and young children should be permitted."

You say that simply repeating someone's assertion isn't enough, and challenge me to cite his evidence. Yet you repeatedly provide links that do nothing more than repeat someone's assertion to bolster your claims.

You did the same thing with Wittenberg. You asked "find me ONE airline pilot in good standing (not the nut who got fired from Continental in the 80's after failing psychological exams) who says Atta, Shehhi and Hanjour weren't good enough to have done what that did."

After one was pointed out to you, you responded by noting:

1) Wittenberg is a pilot but he is also right-wing extremist.

2) In 1988 he attended the fifteenth annual Conservative Political Action Conference.

3) Echoing ultra-right paranoia .....

4) The fact that on top of this he is associated with a Holocaust denier (Hufscmidt) isn't comforting. Might his judgment be clouded by his extremist political views?

Shades of Michael Collins Piper. You attack Wittenberg for his right wing extremist views. The you post a link to The New American, a decidely right wing organization. The author you cite for your claims, William Jasper, also writes stuff like, "May 1st has for over a century been the most important holiday of the year for communists, socialists, and anarchists".....and other extreme right wing views.

Contrary to what you might think, Len, I make/made no claims as to whether there was a standown or not, or whether something else hit the Pentagon. To tell you the truth, what irritated me and prompted my response was your claim, "So much for stand down, LOL." without even addressing the two later flights. Or without posting information that was convincing beyond doubt. To me all the links you posted are proof to no one but yourself.

I lack the desire or energy to argue any more with you point by point. You've already told me I have no business criticizing your (or anybody's) research. You've as much as called me a mud slinger. I could go over things point by point, or link by link....but that would be more tedium than I'm willing to commit to.

And Len, despite your challenge, it has nothing to do with my courage or lack of it. I suspect you don't like me, and that is understandable. Bottom line, neither of us is going to change the other's mind, if we post links until the cows come home.

I'm willing to listen and willing to learn from others. Nowhere did I claim to have answers to what happened on 9/11. I'll close by repeating myself.

If other members have been persuaded by what Mr. Colby posted, I would be interested in hearing.

Peace.

Mike Hogan

Edited May 24, 2006 by Michael Hogan