9/11

"Having given her sleight of hand stamp of approval to the birthers, Sarah Palin is now moving on to an almost equally popular far right mythology, climate change denial."

So began MSNBC's Keith Olbermann in his number one story on Wednesday's "Countdown."

"Getting her facts wrong and misrepresenting her record as governor of Alaska, again, not enough for Palin`s latest foray into opinion piece, this one for 'The Washington Post,'" said Olbermann. "So she went into full-on denial, climate change is all political mode."

The "Countdown" host then brought on the Nation's Chris Hayes who claimed that people who don't believe in manmade global warming are like folks who "argue that 9/11 was an inside job" (video embedded below the fold courtesy our friend Story Balloon, partial transcript with commentary):

Hollywood liberalism has some strange priorities. During the last couple months, two high-profile criminals have been slated to face justice in American courts. The first drugged and raped a young girl in 1977. The second orchestrated the most deadly attack against American civilians in our nation's history.

Decisions to try them in the United States were controversial, but a petition against the extradition of the former, director Roman Polanski, garnered over 130 signatures. Included on the list were such illustrious film personalities as Woody Allen, Martin Scorcese, David Lynch, and Wess Anderson.

Shortly after, another petition circulated the hills of Los Angeles, this one protesting the Obama administration's decision to try 9/11 terrorist mastermind Khalid Sheikh Mohammed in New York City courts. This petition garnered seven names: Robert Duvall, Brian Dennehy, Jon Voight, Danny Aiello, Robert Davi, Elisabeth Hasselbeck, and Ben Stein.

Oops!

"A Nov. 26 article in the District edition of Local Living incorrectly said a Public Enemy song declared 9/11 a joke. The song refers to 911, the emergency phone number."

That's the text of a correction the Post published yesterday to amend an error made in Akeya Dickson's article, "A note of hope from voices of experience: Public enemy reaches out to homeless youth in D.C."

Here's how the corrected portion now reads:

Public Enemy has earned notoriety with more than 20 years of politically charged music about fighting the power, challenging racism and declaring that 911 was a joke.

"911 Is a Joke" was a hit rap single in 1990 and the third track on Public Enemy's 1990 album, "Fear of a Black Planet."  The song was critical of slow response times from the 9-1-1 emergency dispatch service.

Newsweek.com on Tuesday offered a bizarre, liberal fantasy that posited what would happen if Al Gore won the 2000 election. Writer David Rakoff composed the supposedly satirical article, which features Gore averting the 9/11 terrorist attacks: "An August 2001 Daily Intelligence Briefing warns, 'Bin Ladin [sic] Determined to Strike in the U.S.,' which prompts the president to authorize the strategic bombing of targets in the Khost province of Afghanistan, near the Pakistani border."

Rakoff, who has written for Salon.com and contributed to the audio version of Jon Stewart’s book, portrayed Joe Lieberman as a disloyal vice president who ultimately resigns.

He also spun Gore as a quick acting President who took action after Hurricane Katrina and kept the death count down to 17 people:

Want to understand the liberal mind?  Check out Daily Kos creator Markos Moulitsas on this evening's Schultz show . .

Why does Kos say he hates the Taliban?  Because they aided and abetted Osama Bin Laden in the murder of thousands of Americans?  Nope.  That they are actively engaged in killing American troops in Afghanistan? Guess again.  No, the Taliban's real crime—the only complaint Kos mentions— is that . . . they're not PC.  Not feminist. Not gay-friendly. Hell, they might even be opposed to stem cell research.

Oh, and for good measure, Kos calls conservative Republicans like Michelle Bachmann "the American Taliban."  What was that about dissent being patriotic?

On Thursday’s CBS Early Show, after Rudy Giuliani suggested the Obama administration was trying to “satisfy left-wing critics” by trying 9/11 terrorists in civilian court, incredulous co-host Harry Smith saw no such connection: “But Hang on. So it’s – so the idea of them being tried in open court is a left-wing political agenda?”

Smith began the interview with the former New York City Mayor by skeptically wondering: “You said yesterday that this was a political decision. How is it – do you think it’s a political decision?” Giuliani responded: “Well, it’s a political decision because I believe that this is being done to satisfy left-wing critics....After all, it was lawyers in Attorney General Eric Holder’s law firm that challenged the military tribunal, challenged the habeas corpus, fought these cases all throughout. So I think this is a political agenda.”

After Smith was taken aback by the charge that liberal politics was involved in the decision, Giuliani began to explain: “Of course. Because they could be tried in military courts. As everyone else was up until now. And it would add-” Smith cut him off: “So as the attorney general yesterday, ‘we need not cower in the face of this enemy’” Giuliani shot back: “Please let me finish what I was saying. I didn’t get a chance to complete my thought.”

In an interview published November 11 at Salon.com, titled, "Woody Harrelson on war, death, LBJ and Obama," by Andrew O'Hehir, actor Woody Harrelson, who stars in the new film, The Messenger, recounts his conspiracy theory that America invaded Afghanistan not because of the 9/11 attacks, but because Chevron wanted to overthrow the Taliban and build an oil pipeline. Harrelson:

The guys from Chevron went in and met with the Taliban and realized those guys just weren't in control enough. That's why they wanted to oust them. Otherwise it's an absurd concept: You're going to war because a guy from some other country, a Saudi, is living somewhere in the mountains?

Harrelson, known for being anti-capitalism, continued: "It's a foreign policy gone way wrong. But that's how it always is. American foreign policy has always been not about spreading democracy, but about spreading capitalism."

He also made known his concerns that Barack Obama could become another LBJ because of an unwillingness to withdraw from Iraq and Afghanistan, and opined that while JFK was "one of our last great Presidents," Jimmy Carter "was pretty great, too."

If Hillary Clinton had been any less supportive of the Obama admin's decision to try Khalid Sheikh Mohammed in Manhattan, she might have had to quit her Secretary of State job . . .

Clinton damned the decision with faint praise during her Meet The Press appearance today.

Asked by moderator David Gregory where she stood on the matter, her response was the ultra-tepid: "I'm not going to second-guess any decision the Attorney General made." Translation: I'd love to second-guess it. I pretty much just did.  But I'm not about to end my Obama admin career by saying so outright. 

There is no way the media can ignore Holder's controversial decision to try 911 conspirators in New York courts.  Don't expect them them to cover the pressure behind the scenes that made it happen though.  Don't expect them to hold Obama to his past opinions either.

Much has been written over the past 24 hours that does well to explain why the Obama regime's despicable decision to bestow unprecedented constitutional protections on those whose only connection to America is that they have directed the incineration of thousands of our innocent countrymen or worked not quite as "successfully" for the same or worse.

CBS News legal analyst Andrew Cohen is a long-time critic of the Bush administration, enhanced interrogation techniques, military tribunals, Gitmo, and many aspects of the government's prosecution of the war on terror. For general background, see Cohen's CBS News blog "Court Watch." It is, therefore, no surprise at all to see Cohen defending the propriety of the upcoming New York City terror trials. 

Taking to his Twitter account to take a swipe at flyover country, the New York-based editor of a print journalism trade publication all but stuck his tongue out at middle America while chanting "nya nya nya nya boo boo."

Tweeted Greg Mitchell of "Editor & Publisher" around 10:40 a.m. EST (h/t Dan Gainor):

New Yorkers happy to host trial of 9/11 mastermind: Unlike wimps in heartland who tremble at thought of any minor Gitmo-ite coming to town.

Is Chris Matthews feeling pressure to keep up with the Olbermanns when it comes to flinging invective at conservatives?  On this evening's Hardball, discussing Dick Cheney's statement—-made at a dinner at which he received an award—that Pres. Obama is dithering on Afghanistan, an apparently incensed Matthews spluttered [unexpurgated in the original]:

"What G--D--- award . . . are they giving these guys?"

Usually it is easy ignore the commentary from that great bastion of cultural insight, known as the gossip Web site Gawker. But every now and then, even Gawker steps over the line.

In a Sept. 11 post by Alex Pareene that was allegedly meant to reflect on the passing of eighth anniversary of the 9/11 terrorist attacks, Pareene launched into a hate-and-expletive-filled anti-President George W. Bush, anti-conservative and anti-Glenn Beck attack in his post. His first assault was on the prior administration.

"Shortly after (or maybe during) that day, our president at the time, a little [expletive] no one liked, handed over the reins to the most psychotic elements of his administration," Pareene said. "In the vast national wave of jingoism, paranoia, dread, and fear that followed, he and his friends led us into an unrelated war they'd been planning beforehand, allowed the CIA to wiretap and torture anyone they liked (and encouraged the CIA to wiretap and torture even more than they were comfortable with!), and regularly insisted that our memory of that day should not be sullied with critical thinking or expressions of anything other than still-palpable fear."

So Charlie Sheen recently penned a fictitious conversation between himself and President Obama – one in which he questions our Commander-in-chief on the big 9/11 cover up. Yes, the star of Scary Movie 3 – and Scary Movie 4 – believes that the Bush/Cheney regime were behind the attack, and feels that our current President should investigate immediately, in an effort to answer a “bottomless warren of unanswered questions surrounding that day…”

Now, never mind how insulting this is to anyone personally affected by the tragedy – or who saw it firsthand. Sheen is just awesome for illustrating the three key components to being a conspiracy theorist/loser:

• The egomania. In this “open letter,” Sheen actually uses Obama’s made up words to compliment himself. Yes, the President admits to enjoying “Two and a Half Men,” writes Charlie. And here I thought Martin was the delusional one in the family.

With the eight year anniversary of 9/11 mere hours away, the Associated Press has written a very moving, very emotional piece, focusing on victims who fear leaving the house on that day, victims who will never view that day as routine, victims who get a sick feeling in their stomach when the anniversary arrives each year - Muslims. 

While nobody is promoting discrimination against any group of people based on the actions of a maniacal few, one has to question if the alleged terror experienced by Muslims on this anniversary warrants a focal point?  On a day in which Americans take time to remember the devastation and the loss of life on 9/11, we are encouraged by the AP to feel sorry for those who might receive strange stares, or may 'feel' less safe on this day because they are Muslim. 

Yet there is little mention of Americans themselves who feel a little less safe on 9/11, because we remember being attacked on that day, we remember watching over 3,000 of our friends and family dying that day, we remember the screams of the heroes on Flight 93, the screams of women and men, mothers and fathers, wives and husbands, who desperately made an attempt to take back a plane scheduled for a suicide mission which surely would have killed many more. 

A quote from Sarah Sayeed attempts to capture the anxiety of the day as she wonders, ‘should I go anywhere?'  An appropriate question, but perhaps more so for Americans who asked themselves the same question weeks, months, and even years after the tragedy.  There is no attempt to capture the anxiety of those who still give a quick glance up to the sky each time the sound of an airplane fills their ears.

The "resignation" shortly after midnight on Sunday morning of President Obama's "green jobs czar" Van Jones has generally been seen as a convenient holiday weekend move.

By Friday, after White House Secretary Robert Gibbs would only say that he still was a part of the administration, it was obvious that Jones's resignation was only a matter of time. The 9/11 truther and other evidence accumulated by Glenn Beck, Gateway Pundit, WorldNetDaily, and others was simply overwhelming.

But it seems to me that it would have been more convenient had the White House waited until early Sunday afternoon to announce Jones's resignation. Given the establishment media's near blackout of his past statements and actions, it's likely that the Sunday morning network talk shows would have avoided Jones completely, or would have given the topic very short shrift. A Sunday afternoon resignation would have been much more invisible -- except for something that came out on Saturday evening.

I believe that Jones's resignation may have been moved up by 12 hours or so. That's because on Saturday evening, Scott Johnson at Powerline presented proof that roughly 40 hours after the 9/11 terrorist attacks occurred, avowed Communist Jones publicly declared that the U.S. deserved what happened. I'm not kidding.

All three morning shows on Friday skipped any reference to the developing controversy over Obama administration Green Jobs Czar Van Jones and his connection to the 9/11 Truther movement. CBS’s Early Show, NBC’s Today and ABC’s Good Morning America totally ignored the story, although ABC’s Jake Tapper did file an online report over the subject.

And although Fox News on Thursday covered the revelation that Jones signed a 911truth.org statement in 2004 urging an investigation into whether or not George W. Bush had prior knowledge about 9/11 ("people within the current administration may indeed have deliberately allowed 9/11 to happen, perhaps as a pretext for war"), none of nightly news programs highlighted this potential problem for the Obama administration.

So, while Good Morning America found no time for this incendiary topic, co-anchor Robin Roberts did host a segment on testing name brand versus store brand pizza. Early Show’s Harry Smith explained to viewers how to keep your lawn in top condition this autumn. And Today’s co-hosts thrilled over the must-have fashions for the fall season.

UPDATE: More promo videos at end of post.

Calling all 9/11 Truthers: the National Geographic Channel will be airing a program on Monday evening that will debunk many of your conspiracy theories.

Aptly named "9/11: Science and Conspiracy," the special aims to address some of the most common connivances espoused by wackos like Rosie O'Donnell.

Such theories include (video preview embedded below the fold, h/t Craig Moncho):

Don't like ObamaCare? Well, more than likely - you're suffering from some sort of psychological delusion according to Newsweek Senior Editor and self-declared psychiatrist Sharon Begley.

Begley, in a piece posted on Newsweek's Web site on Aug. 25, theorized that the widespread opposition to President Barack Obama's health care reform is from any legitimate reason, but instead it exists mostly because people are not willing to go against their own beliefs, but have a desire to satisfy their need to think they're beliefs are right.

Begley used the analogy that some people refused to dismiss a connection between Saddam Hussein and the 9/11 terrorist as why people won't dismiss some of the "myths" about ObamaCare.

"Some people form and cling to false beliefs about health-care reform (or Obama's citizenship) despite overwhelming evidence thanks to a mental phenomenon called motivated reasoning, says sociologist says sociologist Steven Hoffman, visiting assistant professor at the University at Buffalo," Begley wrote.

Anti-Bush 9-11 "Truthers" get a fair hearing from the New York Times, but anti-Obama "Birthers" are harshly criticized, and Rush Limbaugh is of course to blame.

Media reporter Brian Stelter's Saturday Business story, "A Dispute Over Obama's Birth Lives On in the Media," questioned those questioning Obama's birth certificate, his citizenship, and his resulting eligibility for the presidency. Good for the Times. But where is the Times's critcism when liberals gin up wackier conspiracy theories?

Back in June 2006, Times reporter Alan Feuer showed far more respect to a conspiracy theory many times more incendiary and implausible: That the 9-11 attacks were an inside job, that the controlled demolition of the World Trade Center towers and the Pentagon were engineered by President Bush. Yet not once did Feuer dismiss the 9-11 Truthers bizarre charge as a "conspiracy theory," as Stelter did in the first line of his Sunday piece on the Birthers:

The New York Times's lead story Sunday was on a C.I.A. program allegedly concealed from Congress by Dick Cheney, and abruptly ended by new C.I.A. director Leon Panetta when he learned of it. The headline to intelligence reporter Scott Shane's story huffed: "Cheney Is Linked To Concealment Of C.I.A. Project." Democrats are of course calling for an investigation.

The Central Intelligence Agency withheld information about a secret counterterrorism program from Congress for eight years on direct orders from former Vice President Dick Cheney, the agency's director, Leon E. Panetta, has told the Senate and House intelligence committees, two people with direct knowledge of the matter said Saturday.

Sounds serious, yes? But the program that the conniving Cheney hid from Congress turns out to have been not much of a secret after all, as demonstrated but not acknowledged in Tuesday's follow-up story by Shane and Mark Mazzetti: "After 9-11, C.I.A. Had Plan To Kill Al Qaeda's Leaders." (Well, one would hope so!)

Here's the front-page headline from the December 15, 2002 Times (hat tip Andrew Breitbart): "Bush Has Widened Authority of C.I.A. to Kill Terrorists." Sound familiar?

Sooner or later, liberals will learn to not provoke Liz Cheney on issues of national security.

Those who watch the news for information other than the tragic death (and subsequent funeral circus) of Michael Jackson have most likely heard of the most recent round of accusations made by congressional liberals against the Central Intelligence Agency.  On the July 14 “Morning Joe,” the former vice president's daughter issued a thrashing of Washington Post columnist Eugene Robinson, who (one would guess) did not adequately prepare to argue about the laws concerning when the CIA is required to brief Congress.

Robinson first submits the following:

EUGENE ROBINSON, Washington Post columnist: Hi, Liz, how are you? I have a question. I actually have a question for Liz in a minute, but you know, look, it's inconvenient that there is a law, there is a 1947 law that requires that Congress be briefed on significant intelligence operations or activities or anticipated significant intelligent activity, so it seems to be clear that they should have been briefed. And if the Vice President told the CIA not to brief Congress then that was wrong.

That certainly sounds correct, at least on the surface – if that’s the law, that’s the law.

Except, that’s not the law:

Noted free-speech champion Keith Olbermann has declared that we have to "legally stop" Glenn Beck. The Fox News host's crime? Not reacting strongly enough for Olbermann's taste when a guest made an over-the-top remark.  [H/t reader JKF.]

On the June 30 editon of Beck's show, former CIA analyst Michael Scheuer said: "the only chance we have as a country right now is for Osama bin Laden to detonate a major weapon in the United States." Apparently Scheuer thinks that's what it would take to shock the country and its leaders back to their senses. Olbermann was infuriated that Beck didn't "scream at him" or otherwise jump down Scheuer's throat, choosing instead to nod gravely while suggesting that would be the last thing OBL would do.

View video here if player not visible.

In Olbermann's eyes, nodding in the third degree is a crime warranting legal action to "stop" Beck.

On the Wednesday, June 10, Beck show on FNC, during an interview with host Glenn Beck, actor John Voight informed viewers that he decided to abandon his left-wing past partly because he blamed the "Marxist" anti-war movement of the Vietnam War era for causing the "slaughter" in South Vietnam and Cambodia after America pulled out of the region. After recounting that "I was surrounded by people who were very heavily programmed Marxist, and I didn't even realize it at the time that this was communist-based stuff, you know, that the communists were behind organizing all of these rallies and things," Voight continued:

And then I saw the end of the war. I saw us pull out, and then I saw the communists move in and slaughter 2 1/2 million people in South Vietnam and Cambodia. And I saw the left that had precipitated this turn away, just walk away from it. ... They didn't take seriously the blood that they had been directly causing. And it didn't – but I must say programming is very, very deep. And I didn't really pull out of it for quite a while afterward. But that's where the dime dropped and things started to happen. And then I , you know, then 9/11, of course.

Below is a complete transcript of the interview from the Wednesday, June 10, Beck show on FNC:

There was a tell-tale moment during Ed Schultz's repugnant rant on today's Morning Joe. In the course of alleging that Dick Cheney wants Americans to die in a terrorist attack, Schultz boasted: "I got a lot of support when I said that on the Ed program, I got a lot of support overnight when I said it again." [H/t reader Melody and Mitchell Blatt.]

Translation: the ratings-starved Schultz will say pretty much anything if it garners him a few more eyeballs on the paranoid-lefty fringe.

Here's Schultz spewing his bile . . .

On World News Sunday, ABC News anchor David Muir read a brief story relaying to viewers an attack on former Vice President Cheney by CIA Director Leon Panetta which appeared in the New Yorker magazine. In the interview, Panetta suggested that Cheney may desire to see terrorists hit America again for his own benefit. Muir recounted:

In an interview excerpt aired on Tuesday's NBC Nightly News, from the NBC News special, 'Inside the Obama White House,' set to air at 9 PM EDT/PDT tonight (Tuesday) and Wednesday, Brian Williams used President Barack Obama's upcoming speech to Muslims in Cairo to take a dig at former President George Bush, as he contended: “It's a speech that your predecessor perhaps could not have given constitutionally, given who he is, and could not have given because the attack came on his watch.” Obama rejected Williams' premise: “I'm not sure that it's true that President Bush couldn't have given a speech in the Muslim world.”

That interview was conducted earlier Tuesday at the White House after Williams had a long sit-down with Obama on Friday, a session excerpted on Friday's NBC Nightly News which showed Williams cuing up the President to rebuff critics of his Supreme Court nominee. My NB post, “Williams Cues Up Obama to Agree: 'That's One of Those She'd Rather Have Back,'” recounted:

NBC provided a platform Friday for President Obama to fire back at conservative critics of his Supreme Court nominee, Sonia Sotomayor, as Brian Williams cued him up to agree her comment that a Latina judge would make better decisions than a white male one, is “one of those she'd rather have back.” Obama naturally agreed as NBC Nightly News aired his response for an uninterrupted two-plus minutes -- an eternity on TV news.

Kate Phillips blogged the Obama-Cheney dueling national security speeches Thursday morning at nytimes.com. Phillips got her Cheney feedback from New York Times reporter Jim Rutenberg, who was listening to Cheney live at the American Enterprise Institute. Cheney began his speech right after President Obama had finished addressing an audience at the National Archives.

A double standard was soon evident. While the reporters reacted passively to Obama's speech, simply relaying great chunks of it which went unchallenged, Phillips and Rutenberg peppered Cheney's speech with questions on several occasions or otherwise sniped at him.  Some excerpts from the Times's live coverage of Cheney's speech:

Mr. Cheney Begins | 11:22 a.m. The former vice president steps up -- and you know he's ad-libbing a little when he begins by saying that you can tell that President Obama was in the Senate, not the House, (where Mr. Cheney once served), because representatives have a five-minute rule on the floor for speeches.

Four weeks after FX's Rescue Me featured a New York City firefighter telling a French journalist how the 9/11 terrorist attacks were part of “a massive neo-conservative government effort” to enable “American global domination,” Tuesday night's episode gave the French character “Genevieve,” interviewing firefighters for a book on 9/11 first-responders, a platform to rail against how the U.S. failed to heed France's advice in starting “two new wars” in the name of “revenge.”

Discussing 9/11 with firefighter “Tommy Gavin,” played by show creator Denis Leary, “Genevieve” agreed “9/11 was a tragedy. To most of the world it was a tragedy,” but she fretted, “to Americans, it was the beginning of the end of the world.” As the two walked along a Manhattan street following a visit to Ground Zero, she lectured, presumably alluding to Iraq: “France warned the U.S. government because of their experience with Algeria. And then told them that maybe this was not a good idea and they didn't want to send their people to die.” As to why she wants to write about 9/11:

It's an amazing story, it's a story about how so many people in the world came to support America and its people, to say, “hey, you know what? You've done so much to help us and to support us, we want to give back to you.” But what did your government do with all that good will? Hell, you went right back to war. You started two new wars. In the name of what? Revenge?...Every goddamn war is about revenge -- and the French don't believe in guns.

To which, Gavin zinged: “Or soap.”

Audio: MP3 clip (2:20, 900 Kb)

As media members pressure Congress and the White House to prosecute Bush administration officials for enhanced interrogation techniques employed at the terrorist detention center at Guantanamo Bay, they present their case as if such practices began quite recently.

This is by no means surprising as the full grips of Bush Derangement Syndrome cannot be felt without either a complete revision of history or one totally ignoring everything that happened prior to January 20, 2001.

With this in mind, an op-ed published in Sunday's Los Angeles Times, which accused one of the left's most-sacred golden idols, Robert F. Kennedy, of being involved in teaching torture techniques to Brazilian police officers, is sure to raise a few eyebrows (h/t Gary Hall):