False Flags

As we learn more about the attacks in London, a disturbing, albeit familiar, pattern is emerging.

For nearly an hour after the blasts, the authorities were saying that they were caused by "power surges". As survivors began to stagger out of the tunnels and report what had actually happened, the news quickly filtered out that there had instead been some sort of explosives. Minutes after that the wires and all the Mainstream Media begain issuing missives that an "al-Qaeda style attack" had been perpetrated in the city of London. For the remainder of that day and all of the next, endless talking heads spouted their expertise about the "hallmarks of an Islamic fundamentalist attack", and how this had "al-Qaeda written all over it." Somber journalists began referring to them as the "7/7 attacks", and intoning "We are all Britons today..."

But let me back up to the events preceding these bombings.

The day before, a British paper had run a story based on leaked documents that their government was drawing up plans to withdraw most of its forces in Iraq by the end of the year, regardless of the strenuous objections of Tony Blair. The G8 summit was about to begin, with an agenda heavy on Aid to Africa and overcoming world poverty and famine, and very, very light on the Global War On Terrorism. President Bush's flagging support for his execution of both that war and the war in Iraq was being bandied about aross most of the op-ed columns in the US. To make matters worse, Newsweek had just published a story fingering the president's chief advisor, Karl Rove, as the source of the politically motivated payback leak exposing the identity of an undercover CIA operative who had the misfortune of being married to a diplomat that had publically embarrassed the administration during the run up to the Iraq wr.

If ever there was a time when the US and UK governments needed a diversion/reminder of the "dangers of terrorism", this was it.

A "false flag" operation is one carried out by one party (or nation) in such a way that it casts blame on a different party (or nation). These sorts of ploys have a rich and frequent history. Hitler had the Reichstag set ablaze then blamed the Polish communists, thereby whipping the German populace into a war fervor and granting him emperor-like powers. Israel's Mossad bombed their own embassy in London in 1994. Here in the US Operation Northwoods was a plan put in place by the Joint Chiefs of Staff in the mid 60's to blame Cuban saboteurs if John Glenn's Mercury 6 capsule blew up. Another interesting facet of Northwoods was a plan to take a plane that had departed from Miami, secretly land it at Homestead Airforce Base to offload the people, then let it continue on over Guantanimo Bay, where it would be detonated. The official prepared story was that it had been destroyed by the hostile Cuban Air Force. Here is the actual declassified document outlining Northwoods, and it makes for fascinating reading, especially for those of you who find it hard to believe that our own government was capable of pulling off 9/11 to further their own aims. Pay close attention PDF pages 10-14 where the actual ideas are outlined...

But let's get back to London.

2 days after the bombings, the BBC ran a story featuring an interview with a passenger aboard the destroyed bus who was lucky enough to get off a few stops before the explosion. He claimed in no uncertain terms to have seen the bomber. He said that the man was in an agitated state and "he was standing next to me with a bag at his feet and he kept dipping into this bag and fiddling about with something. I was getting quite annoyed with this because it was a crowded bus. Everybody is standing face-to-face and this guy kept dipping into this bag..." While this is certainly interesting, what struck me about the interview is what was not said: there was no physical description of the bag-dipping man. No "he was an Arabic gentleman" or "he looked like he was from the Middle East" or anything. So that most likely means that either A) the witness failed to mention the appearance of this man while being interviewed (highly unlikely if he was Arabic), B) he did mention the description but it was something like "white guy in a suit" and doesn't fit the current theory so it wasn't printed, or C) his appearance whas so wholly unremarkable (white guy in a suit) that the witness didn't mention it at all. Overall it doesn't smack of a rabid jihadist... This could certainly be examined further by reviewing the security tape from the camera that was on the bus, but alas, "The camera on this bus was not functioning on this particular day." Okay, I thought, surely there must be other witnesses, or security cameras at the subway stations...

Well, it turns out there were. And what they revealed has caused as slight, um...., shift in the theories. Today brings word that the investigators are pursuing the idea that "Al-Qaeda hired a group of white mercenary terrorists to execute the bombings..." I don't think that I need to point out that if witnesses and tape have corroborated enough facts to necessitate this theory, then things are most certainly not as they seem. As I write this, Reuters is reporting that those inside the investigation have identified the explosives used as military in origin, which they say is "very worrying".

So that brings us up to date, and I have not made up my mind yet. I'm sure that there will be more revelations one way or another in the days ahead, but one thing is for sure: much like 9/11, the official story that was immediately put out into the news is not borne out by the susequent discoveries.

And as always, don't forget to apply the "Law & Order" question: who benefits from this crime?

More to come...

Know Your Enemy

As I've watched the images from London pour across the Television Landscape today, I am filled with an odd sense of reassurrance.

Our sworn terrorist enemies are indeed destined to lose in this ideological war, and lose badly. Because for all their technical bomb-making prowess, and dastardly planning skills, they quite obviously have absolutely ZERO grasp of overall strategy and tactics, and that shall be their ultimate undoing.

For example, today's attack on the London subway comes only one day after the announcement that Britian was drawing up plans to withdraw from Iraq. This critical removal of support would have shattered any remaining vestige of a "coalition of the willing" in Iraq and would have undoubtedly led to the rather hasty follow-suit of the Americans. But by detonating 4 largely ineffective explosives (when compared to, say, the Twin Towers or the Madrid bombings) in the heart of Britain, they have instead given proponents of the war a powerful weapon to argue for continuance. What a tremendous strategic blunder!

Or look at the G8 summit that started just today! Leaders of several other major countries were all lining up for their chance to give President Bush a truckload of grief about the "overreaching, disastrously managed, and largely fruitless Global War On Terror". But then comes this poorly timed strike on the subways... what can they say now? Nothing, that's what! Take that terrorists, you blew it again!

Or how about the President's sliding domestic poll numbers concerning all things terroristic? By their ineptly chosen attack, the terrorists have provided the American Media a cornucopia of fresh images with which to assail the viewing public, constant reminders of how dangerous the times are and how much "those who hate our freedoms" really just want anybody that they can kill quite, quite dead. These are just the kind of reminders the President could use right about now, so, nice going, Osama!

For that matter, what about the catastrophically conceived 9/11 affair? The Project for the New American Century, which claims as its board members many members of the current administration such as Donald Rumsfeld, Dick Cheney, and Paul Wolfowitz among others, stated quite publicly in September of 2000 that the proper course of Americas future was to radically beef up the military and then use it to stifle and/or crush any other countries on the globe that did not fit into the concept of a "New American Century" Then, they included the caveat that getting the American people at large behind this idea was quite unlikely, barring "some catastrophic and catalyzing event - like a new Pearl Harbor..." You terroristic morons, not only did you play right into their hands, but their manifesto had been available in book form and on the internet for a year before you handed it to them! Plus, what did you think was going to happen? Didn't it occur to you that the US would swat Afgahnistan first, and then anybody else it felt like until it was sure it had gotten you all??

See what I mean? These terrorists have absolutely no grasp of strategy when it comes to the big picture. It's like, everything they pull off actually tremendously aids the agendas of their sworn enemies, and brings nothing but reasons for the continuation of pain and suffering upon them! Hahaha, stupid terrorists!

So, since we are obviously facing complete tactical idiots, it is only a matter of time before they make enough bumbling blunders to cause their own destruction or something, and then everybody can come home and go shopping!


-end sarcasm.

The Conscience of Corporations

During a recent rant discussion, I was lamenting the current situation of the members of our government being largely beholden to corporations. My main point was that corporations are not people. They don't feel sorry for individuals, or mercy, or a desire to help, because they can have no conscience. A conscience is only of the human domain. Well, most humans anyway. My secondary point was that corporations exist for a single reason: to make more money. That is it. The advertising can preach about "improving the quiality of your life" or "improving the environment for the good of us all" or some such, but that is merely the means to the end. Even if a company's service or product does improve your quality of life, the improvement is not the reason for the distribution of that service or product. They put it out there so that you will buy it, and people tend to buy (usually, but certainly not always) what actually works for them.

I frequently tend to pontificate (as you might have noticed), but it is a rare occasion when my random spoutings are so quickly backed up by cold, hard facts.

It gives me great joy to present to you Exhibit A:

Excerpts from an interview posted today on Wired.com, titled "Credit Chief Slams Free Reports":

"

Equifax's chief executive says he opposes federal legislation that lets consumers obtain a free copy of their credit report to help them monitor financial accounts for fraudulent activity.

CEO Thomas Chapman called the legislation unconstitutional and un-American because it cuts into profits that Equifax and two rival credit reporting agencies -- Experian and TransUnion -- earn from selling credit reports and monitoring services. Equifax maintains credit data on 220 million Americans. The company earned $1.27 billion in revenue last year.

"Our company felt, and still does ... that it's unconstitutional to cause a public company who has a fiduciary responsibility to return profit to shareholders to give away the product," Chapman said to reporters following a speech at the Commonwealth Club of California in San Francisco on Monday. "Most of my shareholder group did not think that giving away our product was the American way."

Chapman was referring to the Fair and Accurate Credit Transactions Act, which since last December has required credit agencies to provide consumers with a free copy of their credit report every 12 months to check for inaccuracies and fraudulent activity. Chapman said that viewing a credit report once a year wouldn't protect consumers against fraud.

"That's like turning on the smoke alarm once a year," he said."

He went on to say that he will always oppose legislation that "shuts down our economy"...

I think that the evidence pretty much stands on its own and doesn't require much more analysis from me. Although I am rather fond of the part where he says that it is "unconstitutional to cause a public company who has a fiduciary responsibility to return profit to shareholders to give away the product", especially when the product in question is your own information that they collected about you. Never mind the fact that this information, if in error, can cause you no end of problems in your daily life.

This is what I'm talking about. When corporations can effectively use the Constitution as a shield for the sole purpose of making more money, then the battle is already lost.

Dangerous Thinking

I keep coming back to the central pillar of Mr. Bush's speech Tuesday night. I think we can all agree that the reasons we got into the Iraq war have been shifting like the very desert sands it has been fought upon since day one. The President initially told Congress in his formal letter as required by their resolution that Iraq posed a significant threat to the US through the use of of huge stockpiles of Weapons of Mass Destruction, with a little "aiding and abetting the terrorists who attacked us on 9/11" thrown in for good measure. By the time it became obvious that there were no such weapons or links to 9/11, we were already waist deep in the conflict, so talk of justification was dropped in favor of redefining the "mission". Since the mission of removing Saddam from power was accomplished in about 6 days, we needed another mission definition. It became, in a nutshell, spreading the light of democracy and freedom and liberty to the oppressed Iraqi people. Well, since the elections there have already happened and things have gotten substatially worse, the mission must be redefined yet again. Now it is to "deal with terrorism and extremism abroad, so we don't have to face it at home."

Forgetting for the moment that, according to the CIA's recent report, our invasion of Iraq has itself created more terrorism and extremism in the region than there ever was before, I have elected to examine this new "mission" more closely. When asked to define the make up of the terrorist insurgency we face in Iraq, Sec. of Defense Donald Rumsfeld identified 3 groups:

Former elements of Saddam's regieme ("the Ba'athist Dead-enders")
Criminal elements ("Remember, Saddam emptied the prisions right before we rolled into town....")
Foreign Fighters (Jihadists)

If we are to take this as accurate, then I highly doubt that the terrorists and extremists we must deal with before they come to us are members of the first 2 groups. It seems to me that Saddam's former pals' main goal must be to regain power, something that will certainly not be achieved by coming to the US and blowing themselves up in a food court. And the criminal element we are to believe is fighting merely because they are a criminal element. If that is true, then it is surely much easier to pull off whatever turns them on within the chaos of Iraq itself.

That leaves the Jihadists. So let's restate the mission using what we have learned:

"We are in Iraq because if we don't fight the jihadists there, we will have to fight them here."

The intelligencia among you will surely spy numerous problems with the mission when it is stated this way. It requires that we believe the jihadists would much rather pour into Iraq and fight our well equipped military rather than strike our relatively unprotected citizens spread all across the globe. While this in itself is certainly a stretch, it also flies in the face of the President's own reasoning. From his speech:

"The terrorists who kill innocent men, women, and children on the streets of Baghdad are followers of the same murderous ideology that took the lives of our citizens in New York, Washington, and Pennsylvania."

If we follow this line of logic then to these terrorists, killing the citizens of Iraq is just the same as killing Americans. If this is true, then just how is it that these men, women, and children came to be seen on par in the jihadists' eyes with Americans? Or is the jihad now to "just kill anyone you can find?"

Clearly the shifting reasons/circular logic ploy creates significant problems for itself when questions are asked.

Furthermore, if our mission is now to fight jihadists overseas before they come to our shores, what about all those clever jihadists that aren't pouring into Iraq? 15 of the 19 hijackers that allegedly perpetrated 9/11 were from Saudi Arabia. What about all the jihadists there? Or in Syria? Or Egypt? Or Iran? Or is our mission merely to defeat the ones who obligingly traveled to Iraq to get blown up by a US tank?

My point is that by outlining our mission in such mind-bogglingly vague language we have allowed the President to set for us an impossible goal. It is absolutely inconceivable that our armed forces could possibly defeat all of the "terrorists" abroad. Not only are they spread throughout dozens of countries, but each one we kill creates a recruiting opportunity for bringing in many more. The War on Terror, much like the War on Drugs, is not a war that any sane person would think could be won with any finality. It is merely a pretense to funnel monies and power to certain areas without requiring further justification.

I also submit to you that by intentionally setting up an impossible goal for our military forces, President Bush has deliberately undermined (through the inevitable demoralization of soldiers fighting a war they cannot win, a war without end) our war on terror. O'Reilly, Hannity, and Limbaugh all agree that anyone who undermines our war on terror should be labeled a traitor and treated as such.

Well......?

Ouch!

Gary Kamiya over at Salon.com rips FOX News a new one in a manner of which I can only dream. This is a must read.

http://www.salon.com/news/feature/2005/06/29/aruba/


You may have to get a "Salon Pass" to read the entire article, but it only consists of having to sit thru a 30 second commercial for a new show on Comedy Central. The brilliance of the article is well worth the 30 seconds spent.

Be Very Afraid, Redux

Hot off the AP wire:

2 men were just apprehended by Mexican border agents near the border of California. No big deal, you say? This must happen all the time, you say? Well, what if I were to tell you that the 2 men in question just happen to be.... Iraqi??? Are you afraid now? No? That proves nothing, you say? Let's hear their side of it, you say? Just because they are from Iraq doesn't necessarily make them a threat, I mean after all most of the "terrorists" we are currently fighting in Iraq are called "foreign fighters" because they aren't even from Iraq, you say????

Well, my overly complacent friend, just take a gander at the transcript of a conversation that just occurred on that Beacon of Truth, FOX News, right after it hit the AP wire:

"Host Martha MacCallum: We have General Scales back with us for some analysis. General Scales, what does it say to you that these 2 Iraqis have been taken in?

Maj. General Bob Scales, US Army (Ret.): Well, Martha, I think what it says is, it reinforces what the President said last night. That this is a global war on terrorism. There are no borders, there are no front lines, no peaceful or secure areas... I mean, who knows what the motives of these 2 were? I don't think their motives were terribly peaceful or benign. And what it tells us is that certainly the insurgents, the bad guys, consider us to be their global enemy, and they're going to do everything they can to strike us anywhere they can, even if it's in our own country. People should be very aware that this is not just a diversion from the Middle East. This is the Middle East taking the war to our own country."

Well if that insightful analysis based on absolutely no information other than "2 Iraqi nationals apprehended by Mexican authorities near California border" doesn't instill the required terror in you, then you might as well go back to giving Osama a foot rub because the terrorists have obviously already won.

Count de Money!

I sat down to watch the President's speech last night with a great deal of anticipation. This speech had been touted as an opportunity for Mr. Bush to give us the straight facts about Iraq, the situation on the ground, and the strategy for success and withdrawal. It was also advertised as an arena for the President to speak to and possibly convert those Americans who have begun to feel and express (rather vocally) doubts and misgivings about the war's justifications, costs in treasure and blood, and management from the get-go. I count myself as one of those people, so you can imagine my excitement: the President was going to be speaking to me!

As I pressed play on my DVR (I had recorded the actual broadcast, both so my wife could watch it with me, and so I could back up and listen to importants parts a second time - just to make sure I'd heard it right.), I also took up pen and paper. On the pad I had written 4 entries: terrorist(or terror), Freedom, Liberty, and 9/11. My plan was make a tick beside each entry every time it was mentioned in the speech. If I were still in college, I would have made a drinking game out of this idea and I hope to God that on some campus someone did.

Here are the final tallies from the 28 minute speech:

"Terrorist(s)" or "Terror": 34

"Freedom": 21

"9/11": 6

"Liberty": 2

Now I'm not sure what the results of my non-scientific sociopolitical pseudoexcersise actually mean, but I do know this: the "terrorists" are who we're supposed to be afraid of. That is the whole reason for calling them terrorists. They are the reason for the Patriot Act, the TSA, the Dept. of Homeland Security, the war in Afgahnistan, the war in Iraq (apparently), and thousands of other minute and nuanced changes in our lives. The President's speech was 3,695 words long. Trust me, I know. That means every 108 words (or once every 49 seconds) Mr. Bush reminded us (covertly or overtly) of those that should scare us. No other word of substance (disregarding conjunctions, pronouns, and the word Iraq(i)) came even close to that count.

These speeches are carefully crafted, especially this one. Some pundits were proclaiming at the beginning of the week that this was the "most important speech of the Bush presidency!" The overwhelming use of these fear-inducing reminders can only indicate that this "opportunity for the President to speak to the American people" was never intended to give us straight facts, or explain to us what the real situation was, or answer any of the questions that have been raised throughout this war's execution.

It was intended to scare us back into our holes.

The boogeymen are still out there, and they mean to do us harm, and you better have some plastic sheeting and some duct tape ready because the terrorists hate your freedoms. Well that's a swing and a miss, Mr. President. I really don't think that tact will work anymore.

One more telling statistic before I dutifully go make sure my duct tape hasn't hit its expiration date: out of 3,695 words....

"victory" was only used once.

A Memory Hole 2-fer!

I came across some very interesting quotes today:

"Victory means exit strategy, and it's important for the president to explain to us what the exit strategy is."

"I think it's also important for the president to lay out a timetable as to how long they will be involved and when they will be withdrawn."

These were spoken back in 1999, regarding President Clinton and our then 2 month old adventure in Kosovo. The bold and insightful speaker of these quotes? It was none other than presidential hopeful George W. Bush!



"People lack confidence in the credibility of our government. Even our allies are beginning to suspect what we say. It’s a difficult thing today to be informed about our government even without all the secrecy. With the secrecy, it’s impossible. The American people will do what’s right when they have the information they need."

“Accurate judgment is predicated on accurate information. Government has an obligation to present information to the public promptly and accurately so that the public’s evaluation of Government activities is not distorted. Political pundits speak of the ‘credibility gap’ in the present administration. Indeed, this appellation is so widespread that it has become a household word.”

This one goes alllll the way back to the early 1970's, and was spoken regarding the then current Vietnam debacle. The speaker? A much younger and far more naive Donald Rumsfeld!

Props to DailyKos and The Voice of Reason for digging up these pearls of wisdom!

The Overlooked Throng

While discussing my recent musings, someone asked me why I was so down on the coverage of the missing girl in Aruba. I felt that my reasonings deserved some further explorations, and those explorations will be be regurgitated forthwith.

Acccording to the White House Conference on Missing Children in 2002, more than 258,000 children go missing each year in the US. Of that number, around 200,000 are "abducted by family members who are seeking to interfere with a parent’s custodial or visitation rights." I'll eliminate them from my calculations for the purpose of this rant essay. That leaves 58,000 or so that are "are abducted by non-family members, often in connection with another crime." Some quick division reveals a number of 159 kids that are abducted each and every day. The girl in Aruba disappeared on May 31. Can you see where I'm going with this?

Allow me to do the math for you. 4,452 children have disappeared in the US since May 31. During that time, I have seen news reports on 6 missing children. However, the kid Brennan Hawkins was known to be "lost in the woods" and therefore does not count towards the 4452 number, which concerns abductions only. Neither does Luke Sanburg who winesses saw fall into the Yellowstone River. And the 3 kids in New Jersey, as it turned out, locked themselves in a trunk and were not abducted either. So that leaves one. One abduction (and I think we can safely assume by this point that the girl in Aruba has been abducted or worse) out of 4452 that is even covered by the national media. On to my point.

I just checked the top-of-the-hour Fox newscast . The girl in Aruba is still their top story. 28 days later, and with virtually no progress in the case other than a few arrests and then releases due to lack of evidence, this is still the equivilent of front page news to Fox (and CNN too, which I'll get to in a second...) Why?

The cynical side of me says it's becasue she is a pretty young blonde girl, and that if she were 300 pounds and acne-ridden we would not be seeing these endless photo montages every 15 minutes. While this is most assuredly true, I don't think it is the real reason. My conclusion is that Fox News, an obvious proponent (some might say "mouthpiece") of the current administration, finds itself with perilously little to cheer about in the current climate. A short list of items they cannot touch, due to their remarkably poor reflectivity on the Bush administration, includes:

Iraq
Social Security
The Economy
The War on Terror
Guantanamo Bay
Abu Ghraib
The Housing Bubble
The Patriot Act
Stem Cell Research
The Downing Street Memo
The Hunt for Osama
The Bolton Nomintion
Yesterday's Plutonium Decision
The National Debt

... and those are just off the top of my head. It is becoming harder and harder to put a positive spin on any of these topics. The solution? Missing cute girls in exotic locales, shark attacks, and Michael Jackson. Unfortunately the Jackson affair ended rather abruptly, and the shark attacks are not just dependable enough.

Lest you think I am engaging in FOX bashing, let me assure you that I find CNN no better. However I think that the reasoning is different at CNN. The latest figures show CNN's ratings in a serious slump. FOX currently enjoys a viewership 3 times larger than CNN. So, I'm certain that there are a couple of employees at CNN whose sole job is to watch FOX and see what they are doing, so CNN can do it too. This sort of "dog chasing its own tail" scenario helps no one, and it is to the inestimable detriment of the American people who so desparately need to know.

You want to know what is really going on? Go here. But I warn you: not only will you be required to think and digest some pretty important information, you will also become woefully uninformed on the latest events in Aruba.

The Even Newer Pearl Harbor

"It’s absolutely essential that eight weeks from today, on Nov. 2, we make the right choice, because if we make the wrong choice then the danger is that we’ll get hit again and we’ll be hit in a way that will be devastating from the standpoint of the United States."
Dick Cheney in the run-up to the 2004 election

"What the Vice President was saying was whoever is elected will face the possibility of a terrible attack. The question is whether or not we have the right policies in place to protect the country."
VP Spokesperson Anne Womack about 2 hours later


A recent survey of "experts" put the chances of a WMD attack somewhere in the world over the next 5 years at 50%. Since this survey was commissioned by the US Senate Foreign Relations Committee, I'm going to assume that "the world" means "The United States of America". I personally predict that there will be a "terrorist" attack on US soil much, much sooner than that.

After the shock of the events of September 11, 2001 wore off and I had digested and come to terms with my desire for some revenge of the ass-kicking kind, I should have felt a natural desire to more thoroughly examine the events of that fateful day. But my marked propensity to doubt & question had been buried under an avalanche of patriotism, righteous indignation, and propaganda. Well, the plucky little guy was recently excavated from his icy tomb by the snuffling St. Bernard of indefatiguable curiousity.

In the weeks since, I have devoured just about everything I could get my hands on regarding the technicalities and actual events of 9/11. I read the 9/11 commision report cover-to-cover. I tracked down and read the FEMA report on the World Trade Center. I even watched the recent NIST presentation on new Fire Saftey Regulations based on what they had learned from the collapse of the towers... I feel I have a pretty complete grasp on the official story.

But during my search for answers, I also came upon another story. A competing theory, if you will. One that stated that the current Administration either directly caused, or allowed to happen, those catastrophic and catalyzing events for their own insidious purposes. Never one to just ignore information, I began to educate myself on that theory as well. I watched "Confronting the Evidence, a Call to Reopen the 9/11 Investigation", and "Hijacking Catasrophe". I even watched "911 - In Plane Sight" one night. I also found copies of and read David Ray Griffin's 2 books "The New Pearl Harbor" and "The 9/11 Commision Report: Omissions and Distortions", and Eric Hufschmid's extensivly researched "Painful Questions: An analysis of the September 11th attack". I've also visited just about every serious website out there promoting or debunking these theories.

My point is, I am now probably about as well versed as you can get on both the official story and the competing theories. At the end of my journey I have found myself reaching a conclusion that I never would have expected on September 12, 2001. As much as I really want to, I'm not sure that I can buy the Government's story; and the implications of that are both tragic and horrifying.

The reason behind this piece is not to convert you to my line of thinking. You would probably need to digest the same amount of information that I have to convince yourself, and that is an undertaking you must do on your own. If you care to, the internet is a great place to start. I also highly recommend reading the books I have mentioned supporting both theories.

But that is neither here nor there.

The events of September 11th resulted in a great number of after effects. We went to war in Afgahnistan and Iraq as a direct result. We created the Department of Homeland Security, the TSA and the highly dubious & comical Color-Coded National Terrorism Threat Level Chart. But indulge me while I zero in an 2 other effects. President Bush's approval rating, which had seen a steady decline from a 65% in March of 2001, was languishing at around 50% by September of 2001. Immediately following the attacks, it skyrocketed to 90%. Higher than his dad during the first Gulf War. Higher than Harry Truman at the end of WWII. In fact, it was the highest ever recorded. The other effect was that, regardless of Karl Rove's recent assertions to the contrary, dissent utterly vanished. The American people were scared to death, the Congress was shocked numb, and it gave the President a rubber stamp and a blank check to do whatever he thought was necessary.

But those days seem awfully far away now. And with our President's current approval rating hovering in the low 40's and facing mounting dissent from both parties on the domestic and foreign fronts, I bet he truly misses those halcyon days of yore. What to do, oh what to do?

How about what worked last time?

Here's how I think it will go down, bearing in mind certain restrictions that the players have inadvertantly placed upon themselves. A so-called "dirty bomb" goes off in a relatively small town somewhere in the extreme northern part of the country. The town can't be too big because too many casualties will create too many angry families with bothersome questions and irritating demands for investigations. I think it will be a northern town because then the story can be something about slipping across the Canadian border "through a forbidding stretch of mountains" or some such. If they come in through the Mexican border then the Administraion catches even more flack about not closing it down earlier. As far as I know, nobody is complaining too loudly about the Canadian side of things.

The bomber turns out to to be a Syrian or Iraninan national, "with close ties to al-Qaeda", possibly sent with the blessing of one of those governments, and the radioactive material is traced back to a North Korean reactor. More casualties arise among the repsonding rescuers, because nobody suspects radiation yet and nobody brings a Geiger counter. By the time the hazmat guys arrive in their sealed up white suits, Fox News has helicopters and telephoto lenses on the scene to get the great video from a safe distance. Luckily the fallout is contained, because the bomb went off "in a relatively isolated area... imagine if this had been in downtown Chicago, or even New York!" they'll intone. The CIA starts reporting that they are picking up "increased chatter" about multiple other US cities. The threat level color goes to red, or purple, or whatever the highest one is. An audio tape of Osama surfaces promising that "the devastation of Mooseteeth, North Dakota is only the beginning of a new wave of terror that will sweep across the lands of the infidels!" The CIA announces that they are 100% certain the tape is authentic. Bush makes a solemn speech. Cheney and Condi do the news shows.

Then they wait for the tide to turn back their way. The President's legacy is saved, he'll go down as a "tough fighter, that stayed the course when weaker members of Congress were calling for withdrawals." The public, their thirst for revenge reinvigorated, now backs the finishing off of every terrorist in Iraq, or Syria, or Iran, or anywhere else it's necessary. This is truly a war of ideologies, us against them. "Remember Mooseteeth!!" the bumper stickers will cry...


Cynical? Yes. Effective? Highly. Scarily possible? Absolutely.

One of the first directives police follow when investigating a crime is to figure out who gained the most from it. Apply that reasoning to 9/11 and see what you think...

I have to go now, there are some nice men from the FBI at the door. My what lovely suits they ha