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Pentagon Papers Whistleblower Daniel Ellsberg Says that the Government Has ORDERED the Media Not to Cover 9/11
It's big news that the Pentagon Papers have finally been released by the government.
But the statements from Pentagon Papers whistleblower Daniel Ellsberg about 9/11 have not been covered by the corporate media.
As Fire Dog Lake's Jeff Kaye writes today:
The
entire 9/11 field of inquiry has been vilified, poisoned over the
years by ridicule, sometimes fantastic conspiracy mongering, and
fearfulness by journalists of approaching the material, lest they be
branded as irresponsible or some kind of conspiracy freak. As a result,
little work has been done to investigate, except by a small group of
people, some of whom have raised some real questions ...
Similarly, Air Force Colonel and key Pentagon official Karen Kwiatkowski - who blew the whistle on the Bush administration's efforts to concoct false intelligence about Iraqi weapons of mass destruction - wrote (page 26):
I
have been told by reporters that they will not report their own
insights or contrary evaluations of the official 9/11 story, because to
question the government story about 9/11 is to question the very
foundations of our entire modern belief system regarding our government,
our country, and our way of life. To be charged with questioning
these foundations is far more serious than being labeled a disgruntled
conspiracy nut or anti-government traitor, or even being sidelined or
marginalized within an academic, government service, or literary
career. To question the official 9/11 story is simply and
fundamentally revolutionary. In this way, of course, questioning the
official story is also simply and fundamentally American.
Several months after 9/11, famed news anchor Dan Rather told the BBC that American reporters were practicing "a form of self-censorship":
There
was a time in South Africa that people would put flaming tires around
peoples' necks if they dissented. And in some ways the fear is that
you will be necklaced here, you will have a flaming tire of lack of
patriotism put around your neck. Now it is that fear that keeps
journalists from asking the toughest of the tough questions.... And
again, I am humbled to say, I do not except myself from this criticism.
What we are talking about here - whether one wants to recognise it
or not, or call it by its proper name or not - is a form of
self-censorship.
The head of CNN agreed:
Keith Olbermann said:
You
can rock the boat, but you can never say that the entire ocean is in
trouble .... You cannot say: By the way, there's something wrong with
our .... system.
Former Washington Post - and now Huffington Post - columnist Dan Froomkin wrote in 2006:
Mainstream-media
political journalism is in danger of becoming increasingly
irrelevant, but not because of the Internet, or even Comedy Central.
The threat comes from inside. It comes from journalists being afraid
to do what journalists were put on this green earth to do. . . .
There’s
the intense pressure to maintain access to insider sources, even as
those sources become ridiculously unrevealing and oversensitive.
There’s the fear of being labeled partisan if one’s bullshit-calling
isn’t meted out in precisely equal increments along the political
spectrum.
If mainstream-media political journalists don’t
start calling bullshit more often, then we do risk losing our primacy —
if not to the comedians then to the bloggers.
I still believe
that no one is fundamentally more capable of first-rate
bullshit-calling than a well-informed beat reporter - whatever their
beat. We just need to get the editors, or the corporate culture, or
the self-censorship – or whatever it is – out of the way.
The
Pulitzer prize-winning reporter who uncovered the Iraq prison torture
scandal and the Mai Lai massacre in Vietnam, Seymour Hersh, said:
"All
of the institutions we thought would protect us -- particularly the
press, but also the military, the bureaucracy, the Congress -- they
have failed. The courts . . . the jury's not in yet on the courts. So
all the things that we expect would normally carry us through didn't.
The biggest failure, I would argue, is the press, because that's the
most glaring....
Q: What can be done to fix the (media) situation?
[Long
pause] You'd have to fire or execute ninety percent of the editors
and executives. You'd actually have to start promoting people from the
newsrooms to be editors who you didn't think you could control. And
they're not going to do that."
Veteran reporter Bill Moyers criticized
the corporate media for parroting the obviously false link between
9/11 and Iraq (and the false claims that Iraq possessed WMDs) which the
administration made in the run up to the Iraq war, and concluded that
the false information was not challenged because:
"the
[mainstream] media had been cheerleaders for the White House from the
beginning and were simply continuing to rally the public behind the
President — no questions asked."
Of course, the corporate media is always pro-war.
Since 9/11 provided a justification for the wars in Afghanistan, Iraq,
Yemen and elsewhere, the mainstream media doesn't want to question the
government's version of events.
As Tom Brokaw notes:
All wars are based on propaganda.
What Does Ellsberg Say?
Ellsberg says that the government has ordered the media not to cover 9/11:
Ellsberg seemed hardly surprised
that today's American mainstream broadcast media has so far failed
to take [former FBI translator and 9/11 whistleblower Sibel] Edmonds
up on her offer, despite the blockbuster nature of her allegations
[which Ellsberg calls "far more explosive than the Pentagon Papers"].
As Edmonds has also alluded, Ellsberg pointed to the New York
Times, who "sat on the NSA spying story for over a year" when they
"could have put it out before the 2004 election, which might have
changed the outcome."
"There
will be phone calls going out to the media saying 'don't even think of
touching it, you will be prosecuted for violating national security,'" he told us.
* * *
"I am confident that there is conversation inside the Government as to 'How do we deal with Sibel?'" contends Ellsberg. "The
first line of defense is to ensure that she doesn't get into the
media. I think any outlet that thought of using her materials would go
to to the government and they would be told 'don't touch this . . . .'"
He supports a new 9/11 investigation.
He says that the case of a certain 9/11 whistleblower is "far more explosive than the Pentagon Papers". (Here's some of what that whistleblower says.) He also said that the government is ordering the media to cover up her allegations about 9/11.
And
he says that some of the claims concerning government involvement
in 9/11 are credible, that "very serious questions have been raised
about what they [U.S. government officials] knew beforehand and how
much involvement there might have been", that engineering 9/11 would
not be humanly or psychologically beyond the scope of those in
office, and that there's enough evidence to justify a new,
"hard-hitting" investigation into 9/11 with subpoenas and testimony
taken under oath (see this and this).
Alternative Media Is Not Much Better
It is not just the corporate media.
I
have had the owners of highly-regarded alternative media companies
confide in me privately that they don't believe the government's version
of 9/11, but that are scared of discussing it publicly because they
don't want to be tarred-and-feathered for discussing "conspiracy
theories".
Even writers like Glenn Greenwald - who are good on so many issues - won't touch it.
Of course - as Ellsberg points out - "Secrets ... can be kept reliably ... for decades … even though they are known to thousands of insiders”. Indeed, the whole label "conspiracy theory" is just an attempt to diffuse criticism of the powerful.
People used to understand this. As the quintessential American writer Mark Twain said in a more rational age:
A conspiracy is nothing but a secret agreement of a number of men for
the pursuance of policies which they dare not admit in public.
Of
course, as thousands of top American military officers,
counter-terrorism officials, intelligence officers, congressmen,
structural engineers, and others have publicly said, the government's
story about 9/11 makes absolutely no sense. See this, this, this and this. And family members of people who died on 9/11 - and many New Yorkers - want a new investigation.
But you'll never hear that in the corporate media.
»
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It's sad/amusing to watch American exceptionalism die on the pages of Zero Hedge.
... or the dueling non-sequiturs. It's okay, I 'do' schadenfreude as well as the next guy.
It's tough realizing the US is just another country that does what it feels it must moment to moment. Why the surprise? The US sold itself down the river for some crack cocaine ... back in 1948 or so ... We're lucky, Curtis LeMay might have convinced Jack Kennedy to 'preemptively launch and where would we be?
Now, we obsess about penises and Gaga. Compared that, 9-11 is ... something that happened, that's all.
Who cares?
Attack on the USS Liberty June 8, 1967 was a failed false flag, quickly covered up.
http://www.usslibertyveterans.org/
http://www.gtr5.com/
"Fifteen years after the attack, an Israeli pilot approached Liberty survivors and then held extensive interviews with former Congressman Paul N. (Pete) McCloskey about his role. According to this senior Israeli lead pilot, he recognized the Liberty as American immediately, so informed his headquarters, and was told to ignore the American flag and continue his attack. He refused to do so and returned to base, where he was arrested.
Later, a dual-citizen Israeli major told survivors that he was in an Israeli war room where he heard that pilot's radio report. The attacking pilots and everyone in the Israeli war room knew that they were attacking an American ship, the major said. He recanted the statement only after he received threatening phone calls from Israel.
The pilot's protests also were heard by radio monitors in the U.S. Embassy in Lebanon. Then-U.S. Ambassador to Lebanon Dwight Porter has confirmed this. Porter told his story to syndicated columnists Rowland Evans and Robert Novak and offered to submit to further questioning by authorities. Unfortunately, no one in the U.S. government has any interest in hearing these first-person accounts of Israeli treachery. [Washington Report] "
http://whatreallyhappened.com/WRHARTICLES/ussliberty.html
To give an idea of what our government is capable with respect to our own troops: the initial attacks on the ship took out many of the antennas and extensive jamming was used by the attackers as well. A voice distress signal was finally gotten out and a US aircraft carrier in the Med launched jets to defend the crippled and defenseless Liberty. The captain was ordered by the white house to call back those jets while the attack continued. Think about that.
GW. I'd like to send you something you are sure to post. Specific pages of the book, Creature from Jekyll Island specifically details 'the plan'. The plan is how they control the monetary policy and so forth. They specifically denote in this 'playbook' that when insolvency occurs they must convince and scare congress that bailouts are good for the people and so forth. ALl the shit that's happened in the last 5 years is in this book written 20 years ago. I have a scanned attachment of one of the pages that denotes what I'm speaking about. If anyone knows how I can contact GW, the author of this article please let me know.
For those having difficulty grasping how the (captured) corporate media operates here in the USSA:
Into the Buzzsaw: Leading Journalists Expose the Myth of a Free Press
http://www.amazon.com/Into-Buzzsaw-Leading-Journalists-Expose/dp/1573929727
1,000
George,
How about a follow-up that details the media outlets and journalists that have covered this topic in good faith? I know the foreign media coverage has been extensive.
Please consult with "chindit13" in advance to make sure only those journalists that he pre-approves of are included in the article. This is his favorite topic and it's upsetting to see how shrill his posts are becoming. We wouldn't want him to blow a gasket, and we all know how important his approval is to all of us. ;-)
And this is news?
Great report GW...
911 was the tipping point. Anyone on ZH that does not understand the need to re-open the 911 investigation needs to read and research the vast available information which is at your fingertips. It is up to each of you to discern what's true or false. Trust your gut.... research.
What did it for me was one situation that I watched live on TV the morning innocent Americans died on 911.
George Bush..... sitting in a Emma E. Booker Elementary School classroom.
Do yourself and your children a favor and simply watch the following 2 short videos. The first is Andrew Card explaining when he told Bush about the 2nd plane. (replay at 1:45 into the video) Remember Card's words.
http://youtu.be/ntAebtRS9zc
The 2nd video is your Commander and Chief being told "The America is under attack" while sitting in a room full of kids. Watch his face and eyes. (Card tells Bush at 1:00 into the video)
http://youtu.be/Rg5NvKpJfKE
Now if you really give a shit... think about what you just saw. Next if you were the President would you just sit there after your Chief of Staff told you "America was under attack".
Do you really care?
the Bush reaction defies logic. First he just sits there, like nothing is happening. Then he gets in his airplane and flies as far from the action as he could get (Nebraska).Any other President would have flown back to DC immediately. THe only reasonable conclusion is that someone is telling him what to do, (which seems reasonable unless you think about the big picture, which is consistent with his role as Manchurian President. He signed Chinas WTO a week later, the document which led to the demise of the American middle class and the endless recession (except of course for the multinational corporations)
They didn't want to lose all their work, so they flew Georgie out of harms way.
He knew, or rather they knew, this was a coordinated attack. He couldn't have possibly known much more than we did. And of course he could have just stayed on the ground in FLA for a few hours. I find it remarkable that he found the way to sign a trade agreement with a Communist government which had stolen his spy plane a few months before, a week after 9/11?
There was also the ongoing genocide in Darfur, Arab militias using Chinese money and weapons to committ atrocities against Christians. WOuld have though Bush might have a moment of light in his dim brain about that time. Instead he rolls up Iraq.
and it continues, right through and including his successor. like nothing happened in 2008, except one mask was changed for another.
That is your "proof"? No doubt Bush also deserves an Academy Award for that deer-in-the-headlights look, since he must have been in on the grand conspiracy.
Never liked Bush and had no opinion about Andrew Card, but his explanation of what he did and why, and the manner in which Bush handled the news is exactly the way I would have liked the situation to have been handled had I been Card. Before the rush of reporters and the panic set in, get all the logistics in line to get Bush out of there and have ready as much information as possible.
You are grasping at straws. Pretty soon you'll be saying that debris can fall faster than a "freefalling" building. Where's Galileo when you need him?
You mean that: "So this is why The Dick wanted me to read some stupid shit to a bunch of Florida kids on prime time news!" look? Plausible deniability, eh? Too stupid to have a clue, eh? Didn't want me underfoot at the Command Center, eh? Afraid I'd say one of those Bushisms, eh?
Well, fuck you Dick!
...and the explosions under the towers?
3 buildings imploding perfectly........
The Vegas odds of that happening would be ? a million to one?
you tell me.........
et tu junk man?
trying to figure out why so many right thinking ideas are being junked, and usually only short, offhand remarks are allowed to pass, but i think they are among us, subverting free and open thought, and rewarding casual dismissal of the facts, or at reasoned discourse. but dont fool yourselves ducklings, anyone can come on here, and it feels oddly that a computer program is assigning junk mentions. its come to my attention that the best replies often gather the most junk respondents, and the junkers never justify themselves.
GW, I'm glad to see TD is relisting your article at the top today. It's a good article. I was sorry to see it bumped off the map this morning by the volume of news articles posting today.
Thanks, TD.
It took 100 years to prove the sinking of the Maine was an internal explosion and not a provocation from spain. Patience.
What, no mention of operation mockingbird?
Down-thread.
Better get Spitzer on this - he's awesome!
arsenal of hypocracy
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=4773590301316220374#docid=-48359...
Yawn........c'mon George, get a life already.
What keeps members of the foreign news media from investigating and reporting on the 9/11 attacks, the Osama killing, or any other U.S. story? How many newspapers are published in the country, or radio and TV stations that aren't owned by Mr. Murdoch?
I can see where the major prime-time networks don't want the controversy, and become labeled as un-patriotic, but there is a world of journalists, detectives and investigators that aren't all under the threat of death from former VP Cheney.
According to a survey conducted by TNS Emnid, one of the largest polling institutes in Germany, nearly 90 percent of Germans do not believe the U.S. government explanation of what happened on September 11, 2001.
According to a random sampling of ZH commentators they can't believe German banks would be stupid enough to continually loan the German peoples labor/money to a bankrupt Greek government.
I guess its all a matter of perspective ;-)
That Oswald killed JFK with a rifle that couldn't even function properly is the most perverse joke of all time. When you examine the before and after, there was a huge alternate conspiracy theory that it was the Mafia, seeking to punish Bobby for using the DOJ to wage war against the crime syndicates. I never bought this and it was only after reviewing all of Kennedy's proposed legislation and policies that a more likely candidate emerged: the Creature from Jekyl Island. But we may never know, will we?
According to official Dallas Police Department reports, Oswald was not on the sixth floor when the shots were fired. His fingerprints were not on the murder weapon. And a paraffin test revealed he had not shot a rifle that day.
Dan Rather is the absolute pinnacle of virtue & ethics, as is Olberman, Froomkin or anyone from Fire Dog Lake...nuff said ;-)
Cue up DP with his ritualistic 911moron algo...ROTLF!!!
How 'bout it - Rather, Olbermann, Huffpo - bastions of free thought there! George needs to get a life. And, let the junks flow..........
What a trip huh?
Ole Dan Word.doc Rather...LOL.
9-11MORON:
Are you and your new butt buddy, 'minipenis flaccidi', tag teaming each other tonight and "ROTLF"* together ?
...................................................
*Reaming On The Lavatory Floor
#1373214
....................................................
Better check for hidden webcams next time!
http://e-gallery.guelman.ru/images/doc/c21434-fucking-fascism-1999--2-.jpg
Or cue up Vic Vinegar with Miss CJ Miles links. Unlike Dan Rather, she is the absolute pinnacle of perfect tits on a small frame.
http://misscjmiles.com/
9/11 was an inside job...my passport was NOT found in the ashes of those buildings but Mo Atts' was...NWO here we come and here we are.
I bet on it and some still bitch - or "fight the good fight" on Zero Hedge.
ROTFL
In the weeds and up to my nipples in moonbats.
You guys are hysterical...where ever the goal posts wind up I'm sure you'll say...yup, just like we said...lulz.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OMAIsqvTh7g&feature=related
See round the pound ;-)
Nice tune dude. I just wish you wouldn't feel the need to fight the truth re: 9/11 so often. I am feeling the need to fight for the truth less and less.
Shit man, I'm now reduced to betting that your kids, mine and the rest of the Zero Hedge commenters' kids will be eating only GMO food, with just a select few hanging on in the end. If that makes me hysterical, then I hope I end up reinvesting those dividends back into Monsanto.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O1OAkWGUMKY
"Nice tune dude. I just wish you wouldn't feel the need to fight the truth re: 9/11 so often. I am feeling the need to fight for the truth less and less."
Thanks...they don't make em like that anymore.
I don't have a problem with the truth...I have a problem echo chambers borne of half truths...I have a problem with Alex Jones types putting shit out there for ratings...I have a problem with pre-planted thermite nano explosives placed exactly where amatuer pilots flew into, its unlikely once, impossible twice...most of all, I have a problem with a lot of this stuff starting from the Arab media.
"Shit man, I'm now reduced to betting that your kids, mine and the rest of the Zero Hedge commenters' kids will be eating only GMO food, with just a select few hanging on in the end."
You see...I don't look at it that way at all. What we say here has impact. Just a few Joe's talking.
Even now "mainstream" people who never paid attention are beginning to question...not just 911, but everything...the banks, government, social order, natural law...the gamut.
Its all good my man.
Always remember, they need us, we do not need them...once you recognize this simple fact your life is easier, the stress is theirs ;-)
Seeya
This is why wikileaks scared the shit out of them and had to be stopped.
I wonder why Sibel Edmonds hasn't gone to wikileaks? I wonder why she's still alive...
I had my head in the sand for many years regarding 9/11 being a false-flag operation. When one of my best friends confronted me about it back in 2006, I called him a paranoid idiot and I spent the next 4 1/2 years making the same arguments that some folks on this thread are making against such a "conspiracy theory". The problem is that there is a tremendous amount of sensational dis/misinformation on the net about the whole thing, and it's difficult and time consuming to sift through the BS. Missiles, remote-controlled planes, Mossad plots, blah blah blah. I don't claim to know what really happened, but I've come to accept that the official story doesn't wash. Was it a grand orchestrated conspiracy from within the government? I don't know. Perhaps not. There was definitely a massive cover-up, however. Were they covering up their own incompetence? My better instincts say no. The Neo-conservative agenda had everything to gain from 9/11, and it was all written in black and white long before the first plane hit. Coincidence? Maybe, but I would appeal to all the conspiracy doubters to please just do some research, cross-check the information, and rely on your own common sense. No reasonable critical-thinking adult human being who has looked at the information objectively could possibly conclude that NOTHING suspicious happened or that it's crazy or anti-American to want a real independent investigation. The kicker for me was that as the years passed and I watched video of the WTC7 collapse over and over again, I could no longer accept what I was being told. Just look at it. Burning skyscrapers do not fall into their own footprint in a matter of seconds. Two plus two simply does not equal five, regardless of what any government investigation concludes. Once I admitted to myself that something was drastically wrong with the explanation for WTC7, I started exhaustively researching the various other anomalies, curiosities, policies, and players. I was shocked by how much I DIDN'T know, and regretful about how arrogant I had been towards my 'truther' peers. I believe that as time passes more and more people will wake up and demand answers to some serious questions regarding 9/11. That is, unless there is another massive terrorist attack that scares the shit out of everyone, stimulates hyper-patriotism and willing submission to authority and surveillance in the name of 'security', and a subsequent crushing of any voices of question or dissent. That's what I'm worried about more than anything.
Am I wrong or are the words "conspiracy theory" being deliberately and aggressively trivialized in the media lately (especially since May 1st)? It seems like a day doesn't go by that I don't come across an editorial or a quote of some kind about how "conspiracy theories" are all crazy and that we shouldn't pay attention to them. That alone should make you wonder...
Right. Building 7 crimped and collapsed into its footprint like a dead casino at 5:25 PM after suffering relatively minor fire damage. No steel-frame building had ever failed until 3 did on the same day -- 9/11/2001.
Come on...
Yeah, more and more people are doubting the 9/11 Official Conspiracy Theory that OBL and 19 Arabs pulled off the attacks. It also took me several years to start to doubt. Every major institution including the press, congress, law enforcement, and the courts have failed us on this issue. That's a hard (red) pill to swallow.
"It also took me several years to start to doubt".
That's all the time they need.
And don't forget Marine General Smedley Butler, the Fighting Quaker, and two time winner of the Medal of Honor. And the great Wall Street conspiracy to depose FDR and take the USA on a National Socialist course. A good case could be made that Butler was the most important man of the 20th century. What if the USA came into WWII on the side of Nazi Germany? What would the rest of the 20th century looked like. OTOH, it probably doesn't make any difference today. They won anyway.
Smedley "War is a Racket" Butler was the real deal.
My guess is the international bankers back then learned a lot from what hitler did. And adjusted their long term profit schemes and government influence strategies accordingly.
"What if the USA came into WWII on the side of Nazi Germany? What would the rest of the 20th century looked like" Better :)
If you look at what Hitler did between 1933-1939 Germany was on it's way to becoming an enormously successful country and a global player, however read this
http://www.wintersonnenwende.com/scriptorium/english/archives/articles/j...
"Long before the Hitler government began restricting the rights of the German Jews, the leaders of the worldwide Jewish community formally declared war on the "New Germany""
"Hitler will have no war (does not want war), but we will force it on him, not this year, but soon." - Emil Ludwig Cohn in Les Annales, June, 1934
Hitler didn't want a war with the West, he was deeply disturbed that England declared war on him, Germany was forced into a war it didn't want, the economic blockade imposed by the jews on Germany forced it's expansionist policy and by extension WWII
But we agree on 1 thing they won anyway
Hitler was preparing for war in 1933 - that much was obvious to people of reasonable intelligence who were in Germany at the time, no one forced war on him.
Your link is nothing but amateur propaganda that was written as if the Fire Act and the Enabling Act never happened.
The U.S. has prepared for war with Canada for years. So fucking what? It's what those idiots do in their spare time.
Actually EVERY sovereign state has a responsibility to develop contingencies for instabilities arising in its neighbors. Given that the US is engaged in an ongoing "war on drugs" and a Mexico supplies much of the imported US oil- where are all the moonbat conspiracy theorists warning about the eminent US invasion of Mexico, to put down the evil drug cartels and secure democracy (and in the process end Mexican gold purchases and secure a supply of oil for US consumers)?
Actually, a more apt analogy to the lunacy in the linked article would have to revolve around massive US war preparations for the invasion of Afghanistan in 2000 ABSENT some buildings burning on 9/11/2001 and the passage of the Patriot Act and Public Law 107-40.
Anyone who believes the Official 9/11 Conspiracy Theory is in denial or has not been paying attention. There's a lot of evidence that contradicts the Official Conspiracy Theory.
For example, here's a critique of the Workld Trade Center Investigation. The investigators did not follow standard procedure.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uor8NhUr_90
Another piece of evidence involves the finding of explosive residue at ground zero:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4RNyaoYR3y0&feature=related
Basically, most official "facts" about 9/11 are total BS. I challenge you to state anything from the official story that isn't transparently ridiculous.
Hmm. That's easy. It all happened on September 11. I'll get back to you on another fact real soon.
Yup, you got me, it was Sept. 11. Also, planes crashed into buildings, many people died, something crashed into the Pentagon, a smoking hole appeared in Pennsylvania, Bush read a story about a goat... All demonstrably true.
How can you be so sure?
http://www.septemberclues.info/wtc_airplanes.htm