I thought it might be interesting, philosophically speaking, to see how everybody that jumps the gun when it comes to protesting and speaking up against the American government in a post-9/11 world would respond to the question: If you were in a high-ranking position in the government in a post 9/11 America, how would you have responded to the terrosist threat after the fall of the WTC? Disclaimer: Don't get me wrong - i'm not pro Bush - Just challening people to think further, the fact is that approximately 3000 people WERE killed on 9/11 alone as a result of terrorism. Now, I for one do not agree with the way our government handeled the situation - and my reasoning is the fact that we as Americans were taken advantage of, our emotional vulnerability, grief, and loss used against us to push another political and oil stained agenda. But would offering the peace pipe really be the answer? ~Amadeo www.myspace.com/TheVagabondTroubadour
I would have secured our borders and done a total revamping of INS. No way would one of the suspects receive a renewal for his visa in the mail a few months later. http://www.jihadwatch.org/archives/000736.php I would have done a thorough investigation of the event, without being forced by the congress and the families of the victims. I would have called the Heads of the CIA and FBI out on the carpet as to why they had no previous information on this attack. I would have further strengthened our foreign relations with the world, by trying further peace negotions between Israel and Palestine. And I would know who sent the anthrax by this time! That's just a start but that would have been the sane grown up approach at the time. I agree the US public and the rest of the world to a certain extent were taken advantage of by the neo-cons with their private agendas.
Hey d' you ever think about running for office ? Just thinking out loud here... Is it our place/would it have made a difference trying to negotiate a teaty between Palastine and Israel? Considering that the US government is by definition prejudice in Israel's favor, and the relgious factor of Palastine- which in this case becomes an entirely relevant prejudice (irrelevant of whether it's just or not). Also would the American people/victims of 9-11 been comforted or 'silenced' by any other means then war/revenge/justification ?
I would not be in a high-ranking position in government, nor would I want to be. You don't get to high positions of power unless you are completely ruthless and corrupt. All governments are run on corruption. If this is the case, and it is, why do so many people turn to government to save them and protect them when they perceive they are under attack? Why are people stupid enough to believe the government is looking out for the people's best interests? HOWEVER... First, I would ask questions regarding the attacks to see if what most people THINK happened is what really happened the way the government says it happened. Most people believe everything the government and media (which are one and the same) tell them, without ever thinking for themselves and asking questions. Instead, they believe the media is there to think for them. This is why we're in the mess we're in to begin with. In other words, I don't believe any of the government's half-baked lies about 9/11, which was simply used to usher in the Soviet-style police state we now see, while carrying out a war agenda that was planned many years in advance. The government stood everything to gain from these attacks, and they did. These attacks were not perpetrated by some guy on dialysis, living in a cave in Afghanistan. If people are gullible enough to believe that, they will likely believe anything. That is just what those who lord over you want. They want masses of sheep who are incapable of thinking critically, who will buy every lie they are fed. It's quite amazing how people can be manipulated to go to war while giving up their civil liberties for so-called "security." These are the same tactics that have been used by every dictatorship throughout history... nothing has changed. Of course people haven't learned because people don't know history. They know only what they're told to know and nothing more. The government is not your savior, and it's time people begin to realize this. The biggest threat to your safety and your freedoms is your own damn government! Not Osama bin Laden (a CIA asset). Not al-Qaeda (which was created and funded by the US government). Not anyone they tell you it is.
Probably not. And who does this most benefit? Bin Laden? I don't think so. 9/11 was perpetrated to trigger that very reaction in the American people, so they would literally beg to go to war, which the complicit government was more than willing to do as these wars were all planned well in advance in the 90s. It was even admitted by PNAC in a 2000 document, titled 'Rebuilding America's Defenses', that to carry out their agenda in the middle east, they would need a new Pearl Harbor-style attack to get the people behind these wars. Then conveniently along comes September 11th and people are falling for this nonsense about 19 Arab hijackers with boxcutters, which is just ridiculous. People will believe ANYTHING the government tells them. That is how conditioned and uninformed the public is.
Have the victims been comforted by what has transpired so far? The American people I think would have stood by a well thought out plan that would have minimized further death and destruction. I think diplomacy in the middle east is the only way this mess will ever be solved. America has in the past played a huge role in the negotiations between Israel and Palestine, but that was back in the day when we had a thinking administration. The US is the only force in the world that holds any sway with Israel, and even that has been minimized since the beginning of this debacle. They now feel free to terrorize the entire area with the munitions the US supplied them. The only ones benefitting right now are the Saudis, Israelis and the neo-cons. Funny isn't it that the majority of the hijackers were Saudi?
Out of curriousity, and be honest, what was your IMMEDIATE response the second the planes hit the building on 9-11-2001? did you see the truth right away? were you vocal about it? how did people respond? Or, did it take you a little while to find the truth? say a year later after some research, you came to the conclusion that things simply did not add up. As blind as most people were, at least a minority (though a large minority) is waking up to the lies. This 9-11 thing had the world fooled, remember, it will take a while for the large majority to come to their senses. maybe it will be to late by than.
During the run-up to the Iraq invasion, two-thirds of the American public actually believed that the hijackers were Iraqi. Shows you how people can be manipulated by stating 'Saddam' and '911' in the same breath again and again. .
When it was first happening the strangest thing that I noticed was the Israeli ambassador coming on the news to be interviewed, calling us to an outright war in the middle east. And the next day the Israeli prime minister was right there doing the same thing. My mouth was still standing open I was still grieving (Officially we still didn't know the cause.) and these "butt heads" were calling us to a war in their part of the world. We hadn't even picked up our dead......That's when I lost all respect for the Israelis. That's before I'd ever heard of the PNAC, now the cowards have gone under cover.
Some even here on hipforums still do. Amazing isn't it? When you point out that it's wrong they counter with: "But he killed his own people." I bet if you ask them they wouldn't know when that took place or that it was in collusion with the US government that it took place.
Hey, thanks for all of your thoughts... I guess what it boils down to is whether you buy the answers given us by the man, or - for example - Alex Jones... I'm pretty convinced myself there's a hell of a lot more going on, like "Pressed-Rat" here was saying - though I also believe that line of thinking can very quickly be diluted or overshadowed by preconceptions amongst conspiracy theorists - though i'm not saying they're wrong – is there every really an answer as to how deep the rabbit hole goes? I'm from New York, and was there when it all happened that day, and after the terror it was just shear rage, I stumbled across this online a coupl'a days ago which I think really captures the mood in New York back then – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z2ZsnL_XNXo Though i'm not particularly a fan of his radio show - that recording is almost like a time-capsule from that day. It makes me physically sick just listening to it, not because of what he was saying, but because of that feeling of shear…how would you word it? Disbelief, sorrow, anguish, helplessness, vulnerability and bleeding rage all at once. I think "CarlFloydFan" makes an excellent point here... its human nature though, something like that just can't go unanswered... but how do we go on proving the nature of the beast? Who is the beast? How do we prevent going from determined true patriots and accomplish something real to raving conspiracy theorists? That's to say - the sway the common citizen has over the fact that anybody pointing out anything remotely conspiracy like isn't taken seriously. But what if there’s any truth to Bohemian Grove, skull and bones and all of that? Is that just the cover? Is there an answer? What "CarlFloydFan" said connects to I wrote about the how we were manipulated into submitting - even begging and screaming to go to war. Though I do think Saddam got what he deserved - because let's face it - the stuff that goes on down there doesn't exactly vibe with out values. (but then again-who are we to judge?) I believe the fact that we were used, manipulated, and emotionally raped - is enough reason to question the game. Irrelevant of the cultural differences and what really goes on down in the middle-east. Who are the real players? ...and above all - who is to answer for the 3000 lives and counting?
I don't think I'll ever forget that day. It must be like how my parent's generation always remembered Pearl Harbor day. My Dad enlisted that day at seventeen and served in the Pacific and Korea. Funny thing though he never talked to family about what he experienced. He never came off as a hero or great warrior. But he always put his hand over his heart during the National Anthem, and always removed his hat during it. He always had a far away look in his eyes when it played. Perhaps he was thinking of his lost shipmates and those lost at Pearl Harbor. And he never demonstrated any animosity to the Japanese. I don't think my Dad knew how to hate anyone. He spent some time in Japan after the war and he really loved the country and the people there. I don't think he enlisted to kick anyone's butt, I think he joined up to do something and that's about all a poor kid could do after Pearl Harbor. Howard Stern is not a good role model. He's a shock jock. And that is what he was doing that day...stirring up ratings. If we had had a strong Chief Executive that could have given us a more productive outlet for our grief perhaps we wouldn't have gone towel head hunting. And we were misdirected to turn our anger on the wrong targets.
The rest of the world was not cheering. Most of the world was grieving along with us. Yet we operated on the Howard Stern premise that we should nuke them all. Howard and his ilk are not the sort people I want to emulate. They get rich off stirring up controversy. Why wasn't there a sane voice in the White House speaking out for reason and adult behavior. Because it worked for the PNAC agenda. They got what they wanted, and they have all become rich at the expense of innocent lives. You feel more secure now?
Thought about it a little more. What's strange is they are calling for a nuclear war, while at that point in disaster...I was more concerned with the efforts to find survivors, not revenge. Where was Howard's concern for the victims of the attack? I don't think he even mentioned that there may be any. He never considered the victims he only called for all out revenge even before he was aware of the total scope of the disaster. He appeared to know who the perpetrators were before the White House did. Strange isn't it. Perhaps his Jewish heritage was a factor? Like the Israeli Ambassador and Prime Minister he knew before we did. He even brought up Palestine. He even discounted Bin Laden, just as we have given up on our "dead or alive" and "smoke him out" policy now. He called for an all out nuke attack on all arabs. That's something I don't think most Americans would have fallen for had we had a strong leader. We nuked Japan, we wiped out the American native nations, now we on a road to wipe out Arabs. Somethings I am not proud of.
Hi Gardener - et. al. ... Thanks you for your sharing your stories and thoughts... let me start off by saying that by the sound of it i'd be proud to have a father like you did. I wonder at times if there really is an answer... or does it all just come down to faith? Right after 9-11 I seriously considered joining up as well, but for some reason it didn't feel right... part of the reason I started this post is because, quite simply, I'm starting to really question all of it - i'm not sure where the battle lines are at anymore. I feel like the war isn't just across the world off in the dessert somewhere, it's in our streets now - and not just on 9-11, it still is now. It's in our living rooms, on our TV screens, in our schools, at Starbucks, the issues at hand reach far deeper, and an equally large part of it might even be rooted in our own soil. I imagine that day will really be cemented in memory forever - like Pearl Harbor was the last time around, or "where were you when Kennedy was shot"... I completely agree with you with the fact that Howard Stern is definitely not a good role model - i can't stand the guy really - but the sad fact is that... well... New York City really was just like that in the days just after 9-11, after the dust settled down...And you bring up some great points by the way, about Stern's approach, and the thought crossed my mind as well - coincidentally - that he was talking about lot's of factors before they were even publicly known to us. Might sound far fetched, but perhaps it does have something to do with his heritage. I travel a great deal, i'm a poet and folksinger by trade, and so end up takin' on all sorta jobs here and there when the gigs run low... which in turn led me to work for several Political Activist organizations. I stept into that role with the same line of thought that a lot of young kids on the board here got going. I've since quit on principal though, in the end it was almost like a capitalist organization working to fight capitalism - i quit because of the fact that the more time progresses and the more I really start to think about it it seems like nobody has any real answers... I'm working on an album right now which i'm calling "America" - I write my own material mostly, so i'm off thinking about all of this time to time when i'm writing but it doesn't add up. There's answer's I'd like to give, but I'm not sure anymore what those answer's are - though I had myself convinced for a while that I did. I think America - and the American youth, desperately need to believe again. I've been out searching for America for such a long time now, but with each day it seems further and further away... Your line in your previous post here basically sums up my lingering thoughts for the day: "We nuked Japan, we wiped out the American native nations, now we on a road to wipe out Arabs. Somethings I am not proud of." But at the same time I wonder: Would we in turn be forfeiting the American Dream if we'd lay down our guns? What would be the concequence of being "righteous" ? I'm writing a book by the way - it's called "Melody: A Memoir By Amadeo de' Medici", which is really relevant to all of this conversation, I’ll post an excerpt from the Postscript here... I'll be signing off for tonight, I look forward to reading your thoughts though...
I've had to remove the excerpt from my book here due to copyright issues...sorry, if you'd like to read it PM me.
nine eleven nine eleven nine eleven....terrorism terrorists Al Qaeda Saddam terrorism....America here in America our way of life our freedoms.....post nine eleven world post nine eleven world.....stick your post nine eleven lexicon up your ass.... In a post nine eleven world the greatest threat to freedom is those who perpetrated or at least encouraged those attacks.....no need to name any names here but you get where Im going with that one. Im so sick of this democracy of hypocrisy and all of the willing sheeple herded around by the media and special interests. Time to seceede from the union metaphysically or something, I dont know. Forgive me for I am ranting, but if any of you would like to engage in critical thought Im down for that too. So how about that population control? Are we counterculturalists next...or will the 911 truth movement be first to pay the price? We are all a target of government poison and subterfuge in one way or another so fuck it. Power to the peaceful.....but dont forget, even Gandhi said that if you are being shot at by all means pick up a weapon and fire back. We have come to a cultural breaking point, lets be a part of positive change. Lots of love....
Hi, Well, the reason I started this post is exactly to provoce the kind of response that you just posted - with the exception of the "shove it up your ass bit" that was pretty uncalled for, but whatever, each to his own juvenile b*ll eh? If you've got something to say i'd love to hear it. ~Amadeo
