9/11 Truthers insist the US Government is lying about the September 2001 atrocities, but how do their own witnesses and self-styled truth-seekers stack up?
Earlier this week, David Ray Griffin appeared on TV to endorse a claim that some of the 9/11 hijackers are still alive, albeit in guarded terms. He also promoted the time honoured false flag nonsense as well as his new book on 9/11, specifically Building 7, and was not challenged by the smiling presenter.
One claim some self-styled truthers make is that anyone who doesn’t accept their own particular screwball and often labyrinthine conspiracy theory is either a denialist or a globalist shill in the pay of the Illuminati or who knows who. Most of these so-called theories are not in any case theories in the proper sense of the word but lurid, sensational, and most often scurrilous, gossip, but it is difficult if not futile to argue with this grand conspiracy mentality, although that doesn’t mean we shouldn’t attempt to set the record straight for other, rational human beings.
Having said that, we should not fall into the same trap as the Truthers by dismissing everything they say about anything as unworthy of belief. It would be impossible to deal with all the major Truthers comprehensively with anything less than a book length study, so let us confine ourselves to the following, in not quite alphabetical order:
David Icke – author and presenter
David Ray Griffin – theologian
Alex Jones – radio host
Steve Jones – scientist
Susan Lindhauer – anti-war activist
Veterans Today – a website, and a major and influential peddler of conspirianoia
William Rodriguez – a 9/11 survivor
David Icke
Whatever else you say about the bloke, you have to admit he’s brave. It takes real courage to stand in front of the world and pronounce yourself a Son of God.
Icke’s career had a very non-controversial beginning, and under other circumstances he might have flourished as a professional soccer player then moved into training, managing, and so on. He did indeed become a professional soccer player, but he is one of those very unfortunate people who develop arthritis – an old person’s degenerative disease – at a very young age. His playing career over at the age of 21, he became a sports journalist and TV presenter, then moved into politics.
Then, while seeking relief from his arthritis, he began investigating so-called New Age mysticism and associated beliefs. Like so many otherwise highly intelligent people, Icke threw out the scientific method for revealed truth; to call him gullible is a class understatement. Here are some quotes from his earlier works:
Truth Vibrations, Revised Edition published by Gateway Books, Bath, (1993).
Page 13: he joined the Green Party and within six months he had been elected “a national spokesperson” which prompts him to say that “I was being led by forces beyond my understanding.”
Page 27: “Cot deaths have never been explained by medical science. Some at least are connected with karmic patterns and decisions.”
Page 56: “It is a cosmic law that when two forces, male-female, positive-negative, unite, a third force is created.” He should have worked that out long time since; his first child was born in March 1975.
Page 105: “There are many souls who have lived on earth over thousands of years who originate from other planets. I am one of them, and so are Linda and my children. We came from a planet called Oerael (pronounced Oreal) in another solar system...”
Page 129: A communication to Deborah Shaw revealed that “the African elephant, the blue whale, the osprey and the panda will not be with us beyond the end of the decade. Their species are going out of evolution and their souls will return in other species.”
Er, wrong, David.
In The Light of Experience: The Autobiography of DAVID ICKE, published by Warner Books, London, (1993). This was somewhat premature considering all he has not achieved since.
Page 3: “The real us never dies...” ie we are reincarnated.
“No experience is wasted” – only if you back the winning horse.
Page 128: Icke says he became a vegetarian because he felt it was wrong to kill animals: “if you wring the neck of a chicken that’s fine, but if you strangle a dog it’s a criminal offence.” He has a point!
Page 216: Icke’s spiritual relationship with a fellow mystic took a materialistic turn. “I was being told that I had to have a physical relationship with Mari. It was part of the plan...The [automatic] writing said that it was something to do with the effect on energies.” At least, that was what he told his wife.
IT DOESN’T HAVE TO BE LIKE THIS: Green politics explained, published by Green Print, The Merlin Press, London, (1990).
Page 26: the New World Order seeks to introduce a world government, a world bank, a world army, and “a microchipped population connected to a global computer.” – Laugh at your peril.
Pages 43-4: “I believe that researchers over the years who have blamed the entire conspiracy on the Jewish people as a whole are seriously misguided...” – My Rabbi agrees.
Page 264: Oswald was killed by Ruby who later died “very conveniently”.
Page 265: he says in all seriousness that the man who drove JFKs limousine may have been the reincarnation of the driver of Archduke Ferdinand.
Pages 266-7: he blames the “conspiracy” to kill Kennedy on the Mafia, the Mossad, Lyndon Johnson, Earl Warren, J. Edgar Hoover, Gerald Ford and Uncle Tom Cobbley and all. All these men were 33rd degree Freemasons. Except Uncle Tom Cobbley.
Okay, that’s enough! Icke does have some good ideas; he advocates a Basic Income for all, and he certainly understands the scam and Ponzi scheme that is the world financial system. There is no doubt whatsoever both that he is totally sincere, and that he means well, but, he is extremely gullible, and it is hardly surprising that he swallows whole almost any conspiratorial garbage peddled to him about the rich and powerful, and of course the perfidious American Government.
David Ray Griffin
He is considered the elder statesmen of the 9/11 Truth Movement. Even so, his ravings deserve less critical attention than David Icke’s, but because he is a theologian, and is considered a heavyweight academic, his pronouncements carry far more weight than those of a goalkeeper turned mystic.
A curious twist in Griffin’s theology is that he peddles the line that people who don’t believe in the basic 9/11 conspiracy are mentally ill or are suffering from an extreme case of cognitive dissonance. Normally it is the mainstream media and authorities that peddle this line. Anyone who has ever been “stitched up” by the police or fallen foul of bureaucratic skulduggery will also come up against this crude and often dishonest technique.
At the moment, there is a 15 minute video on his HomePage which consists of a number of statements by psychologists, one of whom gives an extremely emotional performance. All very touching, and all very dishonest, just like the government!
A critique of Griffin’s methodology can be found here.
The most notable feature of his appearance at the recent Toronto hearings is his total mockery of everyone from the people who investigated 9/11 to the Mayor of New York. Let us though examine briefly another of his works Was America Attacked by Muslims on 9/11? The answer to that question is of course, an uncategorical no, because these men were first and foremost Islamists rather than Moslems.
Not all of the criticisms made here are invalid; there has never been hard evidence that Osama Bin Laden ordered the attacks, although there is no doubt that he gloated over them. Both the American Government and the British Government lied in the aftermath of 9/11, with particular reference to the invasion of Iraq, but it is a quantum leap from claiming the government used 9/11 as a pretext to invade Iraq to the claim that it masterminded 9/11 in the first place.
One more criticism is necessary; this article claims the phone calls made by the passengers from Flight 93 were faked, and the people who received them, duped. This claim has long been refuted, so Griffin should have done one of two things: a) published an amended version of the article, preferably with a note to the effect that it had been so amended, or b) added a note to this effect either at the beginning or the end of the article, or at the beginning of the relevant section. The fact that he has not done this, but continues to peddle this fiction years after it has been so discredited speaks volumes for his academic integrity, or indeed his integrity per se.
Alex Jones
If Alex Jones isn’t the most fanatical voice of the 9/11 Truth Movement, he is certainly the loudest, literally. Like David Icke, Jones is as gullible as he is sincere, also like Icke he is a devout believer in the Kennedy Assassination conspiracy, ie that Oswald was a patsy, as the man himself claimed at the time.
The Kennedy Assassination is the litmus test of modern conspiriology because it is the single most researched and documented incident in the history of the world barring none, not just the most thoroughly documented crime, but the most thoroughly documented anything.
The murder of President John F. Kennedy took place in public, and was a truly spectacular event witnessed by all manner of people: police, Secret Service, but for the most part ordinary members of the public. It was filmed. The authorities had the shooter in custody in less than two hours, not for the murder of the President, but for the cold-blooded execution of a police officer. Oswald had built a sniper’s nest in the warehouse where he worked. His prints were all over the murder weapon, which he had purchased under an assumed name and actually posed with. He had been seen taking the weapon into work that morning wrapped up and disguised as curtain rods. We have all this evidence and more.
Unlike in Britain, where this could never happen, the Dallas police paraded him in front of the media. It was this open access that led to Oswald’s own murder by Jack Ruby.
Although it is understandable (but wrong) for people to believe others were involved, no jurist of reason who has examined all the relevant evidence can conclude anything but that Oswald murdered JFK.
As stated, this is the litmus test, no one who fails it can be taken seriously where any conspiracy theory is concerned, and Alex Jones fails with flying colours. Like David Icke, he should stick to doing what he does best; for Icke, it is explaining the iniquity of the financial system, and lobbying to do something about it; for Jones, it is lobbying against big government and the tyranny that most of necessity come with it. The unvarnished truth is grotesque enough, and his perpetuating this nonsense doesn’t simply damage the message, it totally discredits it.
Steve Jones
This gentleman is not to be confused with any other person including any other academic with the same or similar name.
Unlike that other heavyweight academic David Ray Griffin, Steven E. Jones is a scientist; he has a PhD in Physics, which means he knows – or should know – what he is talking about, so it does not suffice to treat him with the disdain most knowledgable people feel 9/11 Truthers should face.
However, as a scientist, Jones should know better than to make heavy claims based on light evidence, which is what he appears to have done with regard to the finding of thermate (also known as thermite) in the ruins of the Twin Towers. A very brief criticism can be found here. He has also been accused of being less than honest with regard to at least one of his claims, to put it mildly.
Susan Lindauer
This lady is often alluded to as a whistle blower, and a former CIA asset – not to be confused with a CIA agent. Although she sounds extremely plausible, she is cut from the same cloth as David Icke, the big difference being that Icke arrived at his New Age philosophy through study, open minded investigation, and the acceptance of revealed truth, whereas Lindauer, well, here is what a District Court judge said about her:
“Susan Lindauer is charged in four counts with conspiring to act and acting as an unregistered agent of the government of Iraq, in particular the Iraq Intelligence Service...and engaging in various forbidden financial transactions with that government during that period, apparently in connection with her alleged role as agent of that government. At least a half dozen mental health professionals, including a psychologist and a psychiatrist retained by the defense, and several psychologists and psychiatrists employed, and one psychiatrist retained, by the government, have found her mentally incompetent to stand trial, due principally to delusions of grandiosity and paranoia that make her unable to assist meaningfully in her own defense and understand the nature of the proceedings she faces. Defendant, but not her lawyer, has refused to accept the diagnosis and has refused to take psychotropic drugs that government physicians wish to administer in aid of rendering her competent to stand trial.”
The full judgment can be found here.
Suffice it to say, the people who place so much faith in her inside knowledge of the great conspiracy never mention her delusions of grandiosity, her claims of the gift of prophecy, or her claims that “the Egyptian government had made an attempt on her life [and] that the intelligence community was subverting her, including by blowing up the modem on her computer”.
Veterans Today
Susan Lindauer is a regular columnist for this website, which speaks volumes for its credibility as far as its reporting on 9/11 is concerned.
Another regular columnist for Veterans Today is Stephen Lendman; when he is writing about purely legal issues, Lendman is a formidable analyst, but like other, lesser minds, he is one of those people who can believe absolutely any perfidy of the American or other government, while taking outright rogues at face value. In the wake of the execution of Troy Davis, he published an article which as well as decrying the death penalty, affirmed the innocence of this rightly convicted murderer.
Veterans Today is run by Gordon Duff, who like many of the people who write for him is totally immersed in this extreme conspiracy nonsense. On September 10 this year he published an article by Allen L Roland called Face Of The Monstrous Lie Of 9/11 Is Dick Cheney, which points the finger directly at the then Vice President.
If a US Government official were to accuse Roland or Duff of even one murder, they would be outraged, yet they have no hesitation in accusing the man who was then a heartbeat away from the Presidency of complicity in an unparalleled act of mass murder.
William Rodriguez
The final name on this list is a person who was right at the heart of 9/11, literally. Mr Rodriguez was a janitor (caretaker) at the North Tower when the plane hit the building. He is also an authentic and proven hero, putting his own life at risk to rescue people from the building in the wake of the attacks, so unlike all the others, he speaks with moral authority, and it is difficult to challenge anything he says. Nevertheless, documented facts cannot be made subservient to moral authority.
Interestingly, when he was younger, William Rodriguez worked as an assistant to the Amazing Randi. As well as a magician, James Randi is an acclaimed skeptic and debunker of flim-flam. It is a pity that his one-time assistant did not follow in his footsteps more closely, because people with less idealistic motives than him have obviously been whispering in his ear to great effect.
In October 2004, he brought a legal action the President of the United States and no less than 155 other parties, accusing them of complicity in 9/11. Details of his allegations can be found here, but they include the claim that that members of the FDNY (who lost 343 men in the attacks) conspired with Larry Silverstein to destroy Building 7, that projectiles were fired at the Twin Towers from “pods” affixed to the undersides of the planes that struck them, and that phone calls made by some of the victims were faked by the Government.
Although his legal action was eventually struck out, it remains to be seen how he or anyone could even begin to prove something as monstrous as that.
Almost all the claims of the 9/11 Truthers are not only false but have been proven false. A few minor details and even some big ones may remain forever unknown, but just because we can’t explain everything doesn’t mean the 9/11 Truthers are right about anything.
Unless the US Government were to build exact replicas of the Twin Towers and Building 7, say in the Arizona Desert, and fly robot controlled planes into the former, we cannot say for certain how they would collapse, and it goes without saying that even a successful duplication would never convince the extreme skeptics; they can always find a “but” or a “what if ?”.
Applying that well-known scientific principle Occam’s Razor, we can safely say that the simplest explanation for 9/11 is that 19 fanatics with boxcutters took on the might of the Great Satan and won. You hear that Atta, you done beat Uncle Sam. Let that be your sole comforting thought as you burn in Hell for all eternity. That and the fact that some of these dummies believe you were either framed, or willing agents of Yankee Imperialism.
And the alternative explanation is...that the President, the Vice President, the CIA, the FBI, the NYPD, the FDNY, the Pentagon, invisible demolition experts, an unknown number of communications experts with instant voice simulators, the journalist Mike Walter, Larry Silverstein, the Mossad, the Mayor of New York and Uncle Tom Cobbley and all planned the whole thing weeks or even months in advance.
Any organisation that could engineer an efficient watertight conspiracy both that devious and complex wouldn’t need to use false flag operations to justify the invasion of Iraq, because it would already control the world. Ah, but you see, according to some, the Illuminati already does.
[The above op-ed was first published late on September 28 or in the small hours of September 29, 2011. It generated a large number of comments, including replies from me. They are included in this PDF file. I have not reformatted it. None of the links work but if you want to read a particular aricle, try running the relevant link through the Wayback Machine. All Digital Journal articles written by me have been archived and/or republished on this site.]
Back To Digital Journal Index