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"9/11 Truthers Demand a New Investigation"
Former Vice President Dick Cheney told a group of Republican donors Thursday that Mitt Romney is the "only man" qualified to lead the country through a potential crisis like the 9/11 attacks.
Speaking at the first of two fundraisers he hosted for Romney near Jackson, Wyo., Cheney praised Romney as the only candidate in the race who can handle "the kind of challenges a president has to deal with."
"There is always, sooner or later, a crisis, totally unanticipated. You can't plan on it, you don't know what it's going to be, but if you go through the campaigns and study the history books and talk to all the experts, sooner or later there's going to be a big surprise, usually an unpleasant one," Cheney said, citing the memory of the 9/11 attacks. "When I think about the kind of individual I want in the Oval Office in that moment of crisis, who has to make those key decisions, some of them life and death decisions, decisions as the commander in chief, who has the responsibility for sending our young men and women in harm's way. That man's Mitt Romney."
Romney, who took the stage after Cheney, praised the former vice president as a "great American leader" who dedicated his life to public service.
"He went back to Washington and served year after year after year—and not always in ways that achieved a lot of visibility. And at times when he achieved visibility, [it was] sometimes not the visibility he wanted, but in each case, put his country foremost in his life," Romney said, according to a pool report. "And to do that and to bring up a family in that ... is something which I respect and admire."
Romney made no mention of Cheney's ex-boss, former President George W. Bush—from whom Romney has distanced himself during the campaign. Romney and Cheney addressed donors who paid between $1,000 and $10,000 to hear the men speak at a local country club. Individuals who contributed $30,000 were invited to a private dinner at Cheney's Wyoming home. The two events were expected to bring in at least $4 million for the Romney campaign and the Republican National Committee.
This opening segment of the interview with Senator Mike Gravel includes an excerpt from his speech at the forum, "Creating a New path to Peace and Prosperity: Empowering Citizens to End the 9/11 Wars and Restore Lost Liberties on May 19, 2011 in Oakland, California. You can get the entire video of the forum produced by Ken Jenkins with Dr. Bob Bowman, Richard Gage, AIA and Kathy McGrade from a donation of $30 or more to the Citizens 9/11 Commission Campaign at www.9-11cc.org
Senator Mike Gravel and George Ripley joined Jonathan Mark at GCTV on their tour throughout Massachusetts in support of a ballot question that would empower citizens to conduct a real investigation regarding the events of September 11, 2001. This video was produced by Flyby News through the facilities of Greenfield Community Television.You can also watch the entire video online in high resolution at www.GCTV.org/videos.
Part 1 - http://youtu.be/kLENHb5OfTc
Part 2 - http://youtu.be/f3qFcmE7cYc
Part 3 - http://youtu.be/fAn-9l93_FM
Part 4 - http://youtu.be/9tzwhRbkUmc
Part 5 - http://youtu.be/h_Y_5q2g19w
Part 6 - http://youtu.be/OIafjZSXL1o
Part 7 - http://youtu.be/u7TJKq5EUus
Part 8 - http://youtu.be/ek9IHY2086g
Part 1 opens with an excerpt from Senator Gravel's speech at the forum, "Creating a New path to Peace and Prosperity: Empowering Citizens to End the 9/11 Wars and Restore Lost Liberties", recorded in Oakland, California on May 19, 2011.
Parts 2 and 3 are with George Ripley, who is on the steering committee for Citizens 9/11 Commission Campaign. Parts 4, 5, 6, and 7 are with Senator Gravel, and Part 8 is an excerpt with Bob Bowman, which like the first segment uses an excerpt from the May 19, 2011 Oakland forum for 'Empowering Citizens to End the 9/11 Wars and Restore Lost Liberties.' Also, I inserted into that last segment Dr. Bowman's 3-minute WTC-7 blow-out video compilation, (the smoking gun of 9-11) and credits. The entire video will be available in high resolution viewing when posted at www.gctv.org/videos. Look for films by FLYBY NEWS in the alphabetically arranged categories..
"The evidence in hand points to the urgent need for a citizens' investigation with grand jury powers."
- U.S. Senator Mike Gravel
(D-Alaska, 1969-1981)
Citizens 9/11 Commission Campaign
9/11 Truthers Demand a New Investigation
The CIA's impunity on 'torture tapes'
That the CIA could destroy its videotapes of 9/11 conspirator interrogations without penalty is a shocking abuse of democracy
Hamilton and Tom Kean – the co-chairmen of the 9/11 Commission – are the prototypical Wise Old Men of Washington. These are the types chosen to head blue-ribbon panels whenever the US government needs a respectable, trans-partisan, serious face to show the public in the wake of a mammoth political failure. Wise Old Men of Washington are entrusted with this mission because, by definition, they are loyal, devoted members of the political establishment and will criticise political institutions and leaders only in the most respectful and restrained manner.
That is why it was so remarkable when Hamilton and Kean, on 2 January 2008, wrote an op-ed in the New York Times repeatedly accusing the CIA and the Bush White House of knowingly "obstructing" their commission's investigation into the 9/11 attack. As many imprisoned felons can attest, the word "obstruction" packs a powerful punch as a legal term of art signifying the crime of "obstruction of justice", and yet, here were these two mild-mannered, establishment-protecting civil servants accusing CIA and Bush officials of that crime in the most public and unambiguous manner possible.
What triggered this duo's uncharacteristic accusatory outburst was the revelation that the CIA had purposely destroyed numerous videos of interrogation sessions it had conducted with al-Qaida operatives (destroyed were 92 videos, showing hundreds of hours of interrogations). The 9/11 Commission had repeatedly demanded, with the force of law behind it, that all such interrogation materials be provided to it. Numerous courts presiding over lawsuits relating to torture allegations against the CIA had also ordered that any such videos be produced.
But with those orders pending, the CIA destroyed the very evidence it was legally compelled to preserve. With at least the knowledge, if not direction, of White House officials, they did so almost certainly with the intent of preventing the world from seeing how they treated detainees in their custody – with torture – but the effect was to prevent the 9/11 Commission and multiple courts from learning what al-Qaida operatives said (or did not say) about 9/11 and other matters under investigation.
That is why the CIA's actions were so clearly criminal: destroying evidence one knows is relevant to a lawful investigation or a judicial proceeding is the very essence of "obstruction of justice". Individuals are routinely prosecuted and imprisoned in the US for such acts in far less serious cases. So egregious and deliberate was the CIA's criminality – purposely destroying evidence relevant to the most significant terrorist attack in history on US soil – that not even Hamilton and Kean were willing to paper over it.
Despite all that, there have been no legal consequences whatsoever for the crimes of these CIA officials. Last November, the Obama justice department – following the administration's all-too-familiar pattern of shielding Bush-era crimes from acountability – announced it was closing its criminal investigation into the matter with no charges filed. And this week, a federal judge, whose own order to produce these videos had been violated by the CIA, decided that he would not even impose civil sanctions or issue a finding of contempt because, as he put it, new rules issued by the CIA "should lead to greater accountability within the agency and prevent another episode like the videotapes' destruction".
In other words, the CIA has promised not to do this again, so they shouldn't be punished for the crimes they committed. Aside from how difficult it is, given the agency's history, to make that claim without triggering a global laughing fit, it is also grounded in a principle of leniency rarely applied to ordinary citizens. After all, most criminal defendants caught up in the life-destroying hell of a federal prosecution are quite unlikely to repeat their crimes in the future, yet that fact is no bar to punishing them for the illegal acts they already committed.
What actually produced this astounding outcome is the two-tiered system of justice that is now fully entrenched in the US: one in which ordinary Americans are subjected to a brutally harsh and unforgiving system of punishment, while political and financial elites are vested with virtually full-scale immunity for even the most egregious of crimes. It is that warped "justice" system that has caused Americans to witness the construction of the world's largest penal state for ordinary citizens at the very same time that the most destructive elite crimes – a worldwide torture regime, Wall Street plundering on a massive scale, illegal domestic eavesdropping, an aggressive war in Iraq that killed at least tens of thousands of innocents – have gone completely unpunished.
As I spent the last 18 months writing my forthcoming book on this two-tiered justice system, I genuinely expected, as I recount there, that there would be indictments in the CIA video case, thus providing a counter-example to the book's argument that elites are now immune from the rule of law. "Even our political class," I wrote, "couldn't allow lawbreaking this brazen to go entirely unpunished." Alas, as Wednesday's court ruling (pdf) demonstrated, I was wrong: there is no elite criminality too egregious to enjoy this shield of immunity. Thus can the CIA purposely destroy evidence it has been ordered to produce both by a congressionally-created investigative commission and multiple courts – and do so with total impunity.
The US has formally sent to trial five suspected al-Qaeda militants believed to have planned the 9/11 terror attacks.
The five Guantanamo Bay inmates, including alleged mastermind Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, will be tried by a military commission.
They will face charges including terrorism, hijacking, conspiracy, murder and destruction of property.
They could face the death penalty if found guilty, the Pentagon confirmed.
Khalid Sheikh Mohammed and the four others - Waleed bin Attash, Ramzi Binalshibh, Ali Abd al-Aziz Ali and Mustafa Ahmad al-Hawsawi - are expected to be tried together, the Pentagon added.
They are accused of planning and executing the terror attacks of 11 September 2001, which saw hijacked planes strike New York, Washington and Shanksville, Pennsylvania.
A total of 2,976 people died in the attacks.
Jonathan Beale
BBC defence correspondent
I was one of the handful of journalists present when Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, or KSM as he became known, was first charged under the Bush administration.
On that day, the defendants and lawyers' voices were cut off mid-flow whenever the US military judge deemed they were divulging classified information. That happened at any mention of their treatment - including "waterboarding".
KSM was slim with a full beard and apparently vain. With no photographs allowed, his court portrait had to be approved by the man himself. He complained that his nose was hooked.
The Obama administration had hoped to try the five defendants in a civilian court in New York, but there was too much opposition to letting them on the mainland.
Guantanamo appears to be the only option. But why now? Does it have anything to do with a presidential election? And given what's already been said, what are the chances of a fair trial?
Architects & Engineers: Solving the Mystery of WTC 7
by Daniel Hopsicker.
Watched this with 100% concentration and it lost me so many times!
Following the September 11, 2001 terrorist attack on the World Trade Center, a rumor circulated on the Internet claimed that 4,000 Jews did not report to work, or "called in sick" that morning. It suggested that no Jews died because they somehow had foreknowledge of the attack. There are several variations of this rumor, including one suggesting that Israel was behind the attacks.
Such rumors are absurd. Among those who died in the collapse of the Twin Towers were scores of Jews. Their lives, and their untimely deaths, have been widely documented on television, in newspapers and in makeshift memorials across New York City. The terrorists who targeted the World Trade Center did not distinguish between the many Christian, Jewish and Muslim workers in the building who perished.
These rumors appear to have originated in the Arab world. They are among several conspiracy theories being circulated in the Arab and Muslim media, as well as on Web sites and bulletin boards, that Israel or the Jews - and not Arab terrorists - were responsible for the attacks on September 11.
More on Anti-Semitism in the Arab World >>
Other Internet rumors >>
Odigo, the instant messaging service, says that two of its workers received messages two hours before the Twin Towers attack on September 11 predicting the attack would happen, and the company has been cooperating with Israeli and American law enforcement, including the FBI, in trying to find the original sender of the message predicting the attack.
Micha Macover, CEO of the company, said the two workers received the messages and immediately after the terror attack informed the company's management, which immediately contacted the Israeli security services, which brought in the FBI.
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