The 9/11 intersections get more noisy, messy and disquieting when we consider the face-off between writers for Popular Mechanics and Dylan Avery's Loose Change franchise. I watched the latest iteration of Loose Change: Final Cut (2017) recently. It's still, after all these years, compelling stuff. There is plenty of footage of the MSM worrying and deliberating and speculating live and loud either on site at the Ground Zero or in studios answering tough questions -- every once in a while someone wondering why GW Bush hasn't been found and hasn't weighed in with some leadership or rah-rah-mah-tazz.
Lots of these media types were hearing explosions themselves or passing on first hand reports of explosions in the towers, skin hanging off: Were they deluded?. You could see in their beady MSM eyes that they, too, smelled a rat, but blamed it on "Chinatown," and were clearly relieved when an investigatory committee was assembled -- mistakenly led, at first, by Henry Kissinger, a red flag if there ever was one, and he had to be replaced. In 1973, Kissinger had wondered aloud, "I don't see why we need to stand by and watch a country go communist due to the irresponsibility of its people. The issues are much too important for the Chilean voters to be left to decide for themselves." They didn't stand by and there was a 'smoking gun':
Of course, appointing him to lead the 9/11 Commission doesn't mean that Herr Dr. K was part of any conspiracy, if there was one, only that the Nobel Peace Prize-winning war criminal (Hi, Barry) would have been prepared to quash leads -- and people, if need be -- and it's likely that more than 28 pages would have gone missing from the final report.
In any case, Loose Change has a catalogue of 'unresolved' issues not satisfactorily covered by the 9/11 Commission, including The Planes, World Trade Center, the Pentagon, and Flight 93. And the debunkers from Popular Mechanics had answers. For instance, Loose Change found it hard to believe some of the piloting skills involved in the days operation, particularly at the Pentagon, where it seemed preposterous that an amateur pilot, essentially on a maiden run, was able to circle as he did and then cruise into the side of the building without hitting the ground. But, in Debunking 9/11 Myths, the debunkers have a response:
While it's true that none of the hijacker pilots had ever flown a commercial size airline jet and had logged far fewer than the 1,500 hours required for FAA airline pilot's licenses, they were, in fact, certified pilots. And the equipment they encountered in the Boeing cockpits on September 11 was similar to the simulators they had trained on in the months before the attacks.
This is a logical and rational response, but is it adequate? Or does it just even out? After all, the debunkers are merely debunking debunkers of the official story provided to the public. It's all bunk to me.
Another example, and more passionately debated, is the collapse of WTC 7. Conspiracy theorists (not necessarily a pejorative) claim that data is missing from NIST's report, including evidence of the use of thermate. The conspiracy fearists scoff at this and maintain it was all a result of hours-long fires and damage caused by debris that fell from a tower. They just can't find a way to agree. It all came to a head when staff from Popular Mechanics met with Dylan Avery and his researcher for Loose Change on Democracy Now on September 11, 2006, five years after the attacks. Check it out:
Testicular or what? Not much resolved. The PM staff owned that they are not experts but merely journos like the Loose Changers, but that they sought out experts and presented scientifically vetted information -- unlike the young theorists. Hulsey would seem to be the answer to that rebuke. Also, on a conspiratorial note, who's to say that PM isn't just another cover for the CIA -- just like Paris Review was? What do you think? Did I manipulate you?
A couple of weeks ago, I reviewed the film, 9/11: Inside the President's War Room. I panned it. The president's war room described in the title was Air Force One. Dubya didn't make any significant decisions that day, by his own admission in the film, because all day long they had "communication problems" that prevented them from following the unfolding events on TV or keeping in touch with the bunker in which Dick Cheney, the acting president on 9/11 under Continuity of Government laws. Cheney would later back up Bush's claim that he gave the order to shoot down Flight 93 before it could reach Washington and take out the Capitol building or the White House. "You gotta project leadership," said the president, once accused of going AWOL from the Air National Guard. Flight 93 didn't get shot down, as far as we know. But if it did, he wants credit. The one and only tally mark on the ex-pilot's fuselage.
At the same time, we're told, the command bunker in which Cheney was ensconced with warriors (although surprisingly few uniforms are seen) and advisors began to see its oxygen level grow "dangerously low," resulting in people starting to fall asleep, literally. Cheney, too, complains, in the film, that they were having "communication problems" which made their understanding of the days events murky. (F*ckin day's not gonna remember itself guys.) Condi is brought to make the only mention in the film of the unknown whereabouts of Donald Rumsfeld on the day. This is curious to the viewer, since he was seen outside the blast area at the Pentagon helping out. (If it was him,*wink.*)
But seriously, the film brings together the same cast -- Condi, Colin, Turd Blossom, Cheney -- that gave us The UN Bullshit Story: All Smoke No Gun: We Fight Back With Shock and Awe and Think It's Worth It just before invading Iraq. And this time the ensemble pitches us, paradoxically, that they knew nothing of what was going on; they weren't really sure who did it. They looked around at each other and shrugged helplessly in high-pitched voices resembling the 'loveable' clown Willie Whistle, who here is caught with his pants down and trying take out the snake. So, to recap, after 9/11 they were all slam dunks about whodunnit, but before and during they were just information punks. Borat punching bags.
The point is, a film put together by the Gunsmoke Gang 20 years later, when they coulda clarified what happened that day, and spoke to foreign policy postures at the time and rued its regrets with sanguinity, was just more theatre to con the viewer with. It felt, literally, like a sequel to their UN farce. 20 years later, having discovered where Rumsfeld was that day, they couldn't have inserted that knowledge into the film?
So lame was the film, they took to adding in a wannabe murder mystery theme. One message received by the pilot terrified the AF1 escapees into thinking that one of them was a killer out to take down the plane. Everyone looked at Turd Blossom at the same time. Turned out to be a miscommunication. No killer on board. (Indicted.) This is so lame, you have to wonder whether they aren't just laughing their asses off at how gullible the American public is. Sit-com ahead? Another thing about the film that thawed my chilblains was Bush's media knob Aryan Flusher telling us that on that day the media had more answers because their cameras were everywhere. Newsflash, moron: They, the media, kept talking about secondary explosions coming out of the towers and interviewing people who were there. Aye, aye, aye. Finding: GW Bush was AWOL on 9/11.
Coincidentally, at another intersection of Venn and When, and related to the above, top investigative reporter, Seymour Hersh, wrote a piece for the New Yorker on September 30. titled "What Went Wrong: The C.I.A. and the failure of American intelligence." The great revealer of so many nasty military and government secrets over the years, including the My Lai Massacre, the Final Days of Nixon, Flight 007, Abu Ghraib, and the Syria gas red line, was here telling us that nobody, on the day, seemed to know a goddamned thing about whodunnit. He tells us, "There is consensus within the government on two issues: the terrorist attacks were brilliantly planned and executed, and the intelligence community was in no way prepared to stop them." Then he goes to say that the FBI seemed totally flummoxed, quoting one investigator who said,
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