'EXCITED DELIRIUM OF KNOWINGLESSNESS'

9/11 truth: An American enigma

Prof Peter Phillips

9/11 has become an American enigma. For many, 9/11 remains a puzzling, inexplicable, phenomenon that defies understanding in its complexities and misinformation. Most people doubt the full truth of the 9/11 Commission's report, but are unable to accept that people inside the government could be so evil as to allow the deaths of 3000 Americans.
   In a study published in the journal Sociological Inquiry, sociologists from four major research institutions focused on one of the most curious aspects of the 2004 presidential election: the strength and resilience of the belief among many Americans that Saddam Hussein was linked to the terrorist attacks of 9/11. The study calls such unsubstantiated beliefs "a serious challenge to democratic theory and practice" and considers how and why so many people linked Hussein to 9/11. Co-author Steven Hoffman, Ph.D., from University at Buffalo, says, "Our data shows substantial support for a cognitive theory known as 'motivated reasoning,' which suggests that rather than search rationally for information that either confirms or disconfirms a particular belief, people actually seek out information that confirms what they already believe.
   "In fact," the study reports, "for the most part people completely ignore contrary information. "The argument here is that people get deeply attached to their beliefs. Over the course of the 2004 presidential campaign, several polls showed that majorities of respondents believed that Saddam Hussein was either partly or largely responsible for the 9/11 attacks, a percentage that declined very slowly, dipping below 50 percent only in late 2003."
   The research concludes that people deeply hold on to their beliefs, and that they form an emotional attachment that gets wrapped up in their personal identity and sense of morality-irrespective of the facts of the matter. So given that many people in the US believe that we are the world's best democracy it is likely that many will tend to seek self-serving justifications for wars and American misadventures and to ignore contradictory information. Therefore, it is at present cogitatively unlikely for many people to even consider that 9/11 was an inside job, or that our government allowed 9/11 to happen.
   People can and do change their minds, but this often only happens with repeated continuing factual information being made available from multiple sources. Glen Beck said on national television that 9/11 Truthers were happy about the killing at the Holocaust museum and labelled us hate mongers. Beck's statement, while completely without factual merit, reinforces emotional misinformation held by many people. These lies make it even more difficult for 9/11 truth seekers to effectively change minds.
   So what are the strategies that we need to build to convince people of the validity of our factual research on 9/11?
   
   Factual research
   First, we need to be aware that conspiracies tend to be actions by small groups of individuals rather than massive collective plots by governments and corporations. However, small groups can be dangerous, especially when the individuals have significant power in huge public or private organizations. The Manhattan project aside, it is very unlikely that conspiracies can be interlinked in a macro way, bridging the gaps between dozens of corporations and government bureaucracies. There are just too many opportunities for leaks and exposures.
   Nonetheless, small groups of people like corporate boards of directors do meet in closed rooms to plan to how best to maximize profit. If they knowingly make plans that hurt others, violate laws, undermine ethics, or show favouritism to friends, they are involved in a conspiracy. Conspiracies exist everywhere, and yes, people do sit in rooms and conspire all the time. Micro-plots may well be the answer to some of the famous conspiracies, however, without accurate complete investigations we can only stew in our distrust. Critical thinking and accurate, transparent investigative research is needed to counter the emotional fraud and propaganda of speculative ideas, fear mongering, and groupthink.
   Secondly we need to understand that 9/11 truth critics do not operate in a rational manner. The first thing that critics of investigations on 9/11 do is to link all the questions-including some of the most hair brained ideas-together in a crazy hodgepodge of irrationality that undermines legitimate investigations. There is often a series of logical fallacies used by critics of controversial issues, including personal attacks, red herring and straw person distractions, and false dilemmas. Because many people are taken in or confused by these irrationalities, most journalists are fearful of being labelled conspiracy theorists. To protect their careers journalists-especially those in corporate media-will steer their inquiries to safer stories.
   
   Laws of physics
   For example, in 2007, Project Censored covered research into the events of 9/11 by Brigham Young University physics professor Steven E. Jones. Dr. Jones concluded that the official explanation for the collapse of the World Trade Centre (WTC) buildings was implausible according to laws of physics. Jones called for an independent, international scientific investigation "guided not by politicized notions and constraints but rather by observations and calculations." David Ray Griffin has just completed a new book on this subject. To support this theory, Jones and eight other scientists conducted chemical research on the dust from the WTC. Their research results were published in a peer-reviewed scientific journal. The Open Chemical Physics Journal, Volume 2, 2009, entitled, "Active Thermitic Material Discovered in Dust from the 9/11 World Trade Centre Catastrophe." In the abstract the authors write, "We have discovered distinctive red/grey chips in all the samples. The red portion of these chips is found to be an un-reacted thermitic material and highly energetic." Thermite is a pyrotechnic composition of a metal powder and a metal oxide, which produces a thermite reaction and is used in controlled demolitions of buildings.
   Additionally, architect Richard Gage, founder of Architects and Engineers for 9/11 Truth, has to date amassed nearly 700 scientific professionals in the fields of architecture, engineering, and physics who have signed a petition calling for a new investigation of the events of 9/11. Gage and Jones' empirical research suggesting the possibility of controlled demolition at the WTC has moved many thousands of others to question the events of 9/11. The factual arguments clearly establish the possibility of controlled demolition of the WTC buildings on September 11, 2001, yet, there is almost zero coverage in the corporate media in the US. This is top down corporate censorship pure and simple. Even if other scientists can be found to disagree with the study, the policy of ignoring the topic inside the corporate media is relatively absolute. It seems unlikely that corporate journalists are unaware of the research, as it is listed on hundreds of websites worldwide. Perhaps the mainstream science journalists left their critical thinking skills at home and gave the scientific method the day off. Or maybe the real conspiracy exists within the boardrooms of the corporate mainstream media.
   
   Media blackout
   The corporate media in the United States ignore many valid news stories, based on university level quality research. It appears that certain topics are simply forbidden inside the mainstream corporate media today. To openly cover these news stories would stir up questions regarding "inconvenient truths" that many in the US power structure want to avoid. For example, current research indicates that public schools in the United States are more segregated today than they have been in more than four decades. According to a new Civil Rights report, published at the University of California, Los Angeles, schools in the US are 44 percent non-white, and minorities are rapidly emerging as the majority of public school students in the US. Latinos and blacks, the two largest minority groups, attend schools more segregated today than during the civil rights movement forty years ago. Millions of non-white students are locked into "dropout factory" high schools, where huge percentages do not graduate. The most severe segregation in public schools occurs in the Western states, including California-not in the South, as many people believe. Most non-white schools are segregated by poverty as well as race. Schools in low-income communities remain highly unequal in terms of funding, qualified teachers, and curriculum.
   Other taboo stories include civilian death rates in Iraq. Researchers from Johns Hopkins University and a professional survey company in Great Britain, Opinion Research Business (ORB) report that the United States is directly responsible for over one million Iraqi deaths since our invasion over six and half years ago. In a January 2008 report, ORB reported that, "survey work confirms our earlier estimate that over 1,000,000 Iraqi citizens have died as a result of the conflict which started in 2003... We now estimate that the death toll between March 2003 and August 2007 is likely to have been of the order of 1,033,000." A 2006 Johns Hopkins study confirmed that US aerial bombing in civilian neighbourhoods caused over a third of these deaths and that over half the deaths are directly attributable to US forces. Iraqi civilian death levels in the fall of 2009 likely now exceed 1.2 million.
   Each of these taboo news stories, like the 9/11 research on the WYC dust, is based on solid scholarly work. These stories represent the failure of the corporate media in the US to keep the American people democratically informed on important issues. This lack of coverage of critical news stories is what many thousands of people in the US are now calling a Truth Emergency.
   
   'Knowinglessness' delirium
   A truth emergency is predicated on the inability of many to distinguish between what is real and what is not. Corporate media, Fox in particular, offers news that creates a hyper-reality of real world problems and issues. Consumers of corporate television news-especially those whose understandings are framed primarily from that medium alone-are embedded in a state of excited delirium of knowinglessness.
   To counter knowinglessness, progressive activists need to include 9/11 Truth and many other issues as important elements of radical-progressive political efforts. We must not be afraid of corporate media labelling and instead build truth from the bottom up. Critical thinking and fact-finding are the basis of democracy, and we must stand for the maximization of informed participatory democracy at the lowest possible level in society. We will continue to openly discuss, research, and validate our issues. As 9/11 Truth activists we see ourselves as an important component of building a new non-exploitative world based on democracy, openness, and human rights.
   Peter Phillips is a Professor of Sociology at Sonoma State University, President of Media Freedom Foundation, Board member for 9/11truth.org, and recent past director of Project Censored this article was presented at the 9/11 Truth Film Festival Oakland Grand Lake Theatre (September 10, 2009)
   -Global Research

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'International law versus the law
of the jungle'

Stuart Littlewood in UN

Attempts by outgoing UN General Assembly President Miguel d'Escoto Brockman to ease the sufferings of the Palestinians were futile in the face of resistance from "highly influential members" of the UN. He said he was obstructed by leading UN members from trying to improve the lives of Palestinians in the Gaza Strip.
   "My greatest frustration this year has been the Palestine situation," he told the 192-nation assembly in his final address on 14 September before handing over the one-year presidency to Libyan diplomat Ali Treki.
   He found it "disgraceful" the way influential members of the UN Security Council had shown "passivity and apparent indifference" about the long and cruel Israeli blockade of Gaza.
   Fr Miguel is not your usual time-serving career diplomat. In 1961 he was ordained a priest in the Catholic Church. In 1962, he obtained a Master of Science degree from Columbia University's School of Journalism (Pulitzer Institute). He served for over a decade as Nicaragua's Minister for Foreign Affairs, during which he spearheaded his Government's claim in the International Court of Justice against the United States for supporting military and paramilitary actions against his country. The Court ruled in Nicaragua's favour. Not only a man of words, then, but a man of action.
   
   UN's lack of commitment
   Palestinians in particular, and those concerned about foreign affairs in general, will find the unedited version of his parting speech, where it relates to the Holy Land, well worth reading:
   "My greatest frustration this year has been the Palestine situation. The Question of Palestine continues to be the most serious and prolonged unresolved political and human rights issue on the agenda of the United Nations since its inception. The evident lack of commitment for resolving it is a scandal that has caused me much sorrow.
   "I promised a proactive Presidency, and sincerely believe that I did everything I possibly could in this regard, requesting and attempting to persuade those who should have been most closely involved to call for the convocation of the General Assembly to consider the Palestine situation. However, whether at the time of the three-week invasion of Gaza that began on 27 December or now, all I received was advice to give the process more time, because things were always on the point of being resolved and we should do nothing that could endanger the success that was always just beyond our reach.
   "Faced with this situation, I sincerely did not know what to do. I wanted to help Palestine, but those who should supposedly have been most interested denied their support for reasons of "caution" that I was incapable of understanding. I hope that they were right and that I was wrong. Otherwise, we face an ugly situation of constant complicity with the aggression against the rights of the noble and long-suffering Palestinian people.
   "A just resolution of the Question of Palestine must be based on the content of international law, and will only be attained when the unity of the Palestinian people has been achieved and the international community speaks with all its representatives who enjoy credibility and have been democratically elected. In addition to the withdrawal of the Israelis from all territories illegally occupied since 1967, international law demands that all Palestinians displaced during the creation of the State of Israel, their children and grandchildren, be permitted to return to their homeland of Palestine.
   "My chief consultant on humanitarian affairs, Dr. Kevin Cahill, was sent to Gaza from 17 to 22 February to prepare a report on the humanitarian situation in Gaza immediately after the aggression. Dr. Cahill's report was issued on Wednesday 19 August, on the occasion of World Humanitarian Day commemorating the sacrifices of United Nations staff in conflict zones; it had originally been intended for release at a Special Session on Gaza, but that did not take place for the reasons mentioned.
   "I find disgraceful the passivity and apparent indifference of some highly influential members of the Security Council to the fact that the blockade of Gaza has continued uninterrupted for two years, in flagrant violation of international law and of the resolution of the Security Council itself, causing immense damage and suffering to the Palestinian population of Gaza. This situation threatens to become even more serious if immediate measures are not taken, now that winter is approaching. Now is the time to demonstrate, with actions and not simply words, a true commitment to the concept of the Responsibility to Protect."
   I hope Fr Miguel will tell us the names of those "highly influential members" who showed "disgraceful passivity and indifference" in the face of such appalling human suffering. The world needs to identify and dispose of these contemptible deadbeats in high places.
   Were any of them British? We in the UK are well aware that our Foreign Office, and indeed the whole fabric of our government, is infected with Israel's stooges and others with no moral fibre. These snivelling people mouth words of condemnation and wring their hands but never take firm action. They disgrace us all.
   
   Law of the Jungle
   Elsewhere in his speech Fr Miguel made this remarkable observation:
   "...(T)he whole world knows that, among many other truths, some of our most powerful and influential Member States definitely do not believe in the rule of law in international relations and are of the view, moreover, that complying with the legal norms to which we formally commit, when signing the Charter, is something that applies only to weak countries. With such a low level of commitment, it should not be surprising that the United Nations has been unable to achieve the main objectives for which it was created.
   "Certain Member States think that they can act according to the law of the jungle, and defend the right of the strongest to do whatever they feel like with total and absolute impunity, and remain accountable to no one."
   It is not recorded whether these words received the applause they deserved.
   Farewell, Fr Miguel, and good hunting. You gave it your best shot, unlike others. Please don't leave the scene altogether.
   - Third World Network Features

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Martin Khor

The working group has an opportunity to make the UN - if perhaps not the only one - venue for discussing global economic issues. This is an important step forward, because the G8 and the G20 lack legitimacy, given that they include only a small number of countries. So far, however, the industrialised world is dragging its legs. It was telling that the UN debate had little bearing on the G8 summit in Italy in July. The governments of developing countries will have to ensure that the topics that relate to the global economic crisis stay on the multilateral agenda.
   The developing countries did not cause the turmoil they are now suffering from. In 2009 alone, they face a massive shortfall in external financing of up to US$2 trillion. Many countries will soon run out of foreign exchange to pay for imports or service their foreign debts. It is therefore most urgent to provide them with additional funds.
   Rich nations have the means to borrow or create money in order to bailout banks and other companies, and to fiscally stimulate their economies. Most developing countries lack such means. It was a good sign that the final document of the UN summit called for "examination of mechanisms to ensure that adequate resources are provided to developing countries".
   The working group must act on this mandate fast. For instance, it could pick up proposals made in New York by the G77 and China. According to the proposals, the International Monetary Fund (IMF) would allocate $100 billion Special Drawing Rights (SDRs) to low-income countries at no cost to these countries; and middle-income countries would get another $800 billion in SDRs, which would have to be returned after the crisis.
   These measures make sense, and it is a pity that the UN conference did not endorse them. It is to be hoped that the working group will make haste in this respect, because the matter is urgent and cannot wait until next year.
   The conference's final document, moreover, gives the working group a mandate to tackle several other issues that must be dealt with fast to avoid further economic strife. They include the needs to prevent another debt crisis in developing countries, to explore a better system for sovereign debt default and debt workouts, and to ensure that developing countries have the necessary "policy space" to make and enforce appropriate decisions.
   The conference also acknowledged calls for reform of the current global reserve system, and spelled out the importance of "seeking consensus on the parameters and implementation" of a study on this matter, taking into account the role SDRs could play in this context. Accordingly, the door is open for the working group to discuss the reform of the reserves system.
   Moreover, the conference agreed on the necessity of expanding financial regulation and supervision with respect to all major financial centres, instruments and actors, including financial institutions, credit rating agencies and hedge funds.
   The conference also recognised the need to reform the International Financial Institutions. For instance, the governance of the IMF and World Bank should be modified in order to give developing countries fair and equitable representation. Such reforms are essential, because the conditionalities these bodies attach to loans severely restrict poor countries' policy space.
   Since the economic crisis started, developing countries have heard much reform rhetoric, particularly from the IMF. Nonetheless, the Fund's lending policies have barely changed and are still linked to rigid austerity. That is unlikely to change unless policy is made in a context that involves all parties concerned, and particularly the most vulnerable. It is therefore necessary that the UN continue to assert its authority over global economic affairs.
   -Third World Network Features

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