9/11 Conspiracy

[GreenMonster]

I don't know if anyone caught the show on the History Channel last night, but the fact that 36% of people believe this is a conspiracy blows my mind. If 1/3 people believe Bush was behind this to this day, I have over estimated the general intelligence of the American people.

[Tasan]

* waits patiently for 1/3 of the board to go nuts over this *

[sabotai]

I try to take comfort in thinking that 1/3rd of the general population would say anything just because it paints Bush in a negative light.

At least I really hope that's what is going on here...

[JPhillips]

I didn't see the show, but did it specify that Bush was behind the conspiracy? I'd be surprised that that many people blame Bush, but I'm far less shocked that 1/3 of America blames some sort of conspiracy.

A large chunk of people always want to believe there is some mysterious power behind things. Look at the number of people that believe Saddam had WMD or that the CIA killed Kennedy.

[John Galt]

I don't know if anyone caught the show on the History Channel last night, but the fact that 36% of people believe this is a conspiracy blows my mind. If 1/3 people believe Bush was behind this to this day, I have over estimated the general intelligence of the American people.

I've heard that number before, but I've never investigated its reliability. Do you happen to have the poll question? I think the wording can make a big difference on that one. Similar or higher numbers have been attributed to people believing Saddam was behind 9/11 (and even higher than that among Fox News viewers). If both the 9/11-conspiracy and Saddam-did-it poll numbers are true, then that would leave less than 30% of Americans who have a close-to-accurate view of what happened. And I just find that number way too low, but I could be wrong.

[IMetTrentGreen]

I try to take comfort in thinking that 1/3rd of the general population would say anything just because it paints Bush in a negative light.

This has been my experience in talking to these people.

It's a lot like creationism vs. evolution, you combine dogma with an ignorance of science and you get some pretty out there theories.

[GreenMonster]

I've heard that number before, but I've never investigated its reliability. Do you happen to have the poll question? I think the wording can make a big difference on that one. Similar or higher numbers have been attributed to people believing Saddam was behind 9/11 (and even higher than that among Fox News viewers). If both the 9/11-conspiracy and Saddam-did-it poll numbers are true, then that would leave less than 30% of Americans who have a close-to-accurate view of what happened. And I just find that number way too low, but I could be wrong.

The 36% number was that 36 percent suspect the U.S. government promoted the attacks or intentionally sat on its hands. Sixteen percent believe explosives brought down the towers. Twelve percent believe a cruise missile hit the Pentagon.

Basically people believe that Bush and others had be warned of the attacks and did nothing, or actually encouraged this event to happen to enter the war with Iraq.

[molson]

Does "conspiracy" mean "in-house conspiracy"? Maybe the question was confusing. I'd answer "yes, it was a conspiracy", though one orchestrated by Al Qaeda.

The Bush phenomenon is facinating - it's absolutely a cult mentality. People aren't thinking for themselves anymore, their stance on ANY issue depends only on which side is anti-Bush.

Edit: I just saw Green Monster's clarification.

How can someone who thinks Bush is "stupid" also think he could pull this off?

[JediKooter]

I like how the pro conspriacy people on the show completely dicounted one of the main differences between a controlled demolision of a building and that of Trade Center 7. They convienently left out the fact that buildings that are imploded are: gutted of all material, many original welds are removed and various cuts are made to the metal frame so to help with the implosion. This takes weeks to do, not the few hours it took for Trade Center 7 to finally collapse.

But, when you have the reputation of Rosie backing you up, who needs facts?

[chesapeake]

If by "conspiracy" they mean a conspiracy of incompetence by the Bush Administration in their handling of intelligence that they had before them, then I'd agree with that. We've all heard about the report Condi Rice had in her hand in early August indicating that Al Qaeda was seeking to attack targets inside the US. But as for letting it happen, that's just plain nuts.

I still get calls at work from wackos that believe that the Jews were behind the whole thing. There are also a lot of folks out there that believe that Flight 93 was shot down before it could reach DC.

If you lump the bigots and the kooks in with the Bush-haters, I guess I can believe that it makes up almost a third of the population, though that still seems a little high.

[John Galt]

The 36% number was that 36 percent suspect the U.S. government promoted the attacks or intentionally sat on its hands. Sixteen percent believe explosives brought down the towers. Twelve percent believe a cruise missile hit the Pentagon.

Basically people believe that Bush and others had be warned of the attacks and did nothing, or actually encouraged this event to happen to enter the war with Iraq.

Again, though, I'd like to see how the question was worded. For example, you could ask:

Do you believe the United States received warnings about Al Qaeda attacking the US before 9/11 and did not act to prevent the attacks on the Pentagon and the WTC?

The answer to that question is almost certainly "yes." However, you can argue that the US receives so many warnings on a regular basis and none were that specific to the WTC. Nonetheless, someone could read the results as supporting your conclusion above. Similarly, you could ask:

Do you believe United States policy facilitated or otherwise encouraged the Al Qaeda attacks on 9/11?

While the answer here isn't certainly yes, a large amount of people may argue that US policy in the Middle East was at least one factor that motivated Al Qaeda to attack the U.S. But believing that doesn't mean you believe in a conspiracy.

There are a lot of broad wordings of these questions and I wanted to see what the source was for the History Channel's figure.

[GreenMonster]

A presidential bulletin on Aug. 6 had a catchy title: "Bin Laden Determined to Strike in U.S." Bush did not discuss it again with Tenet before Sept. 11.

Using this as a piece of "intelligence" is akin to saying the Miami Dolphins are determined to win the Super Bowl.

I do agree with John Galt that wording played a large part in the outcome of the question, but even so I don't think we had a crediable evidence that our government could have acted on.

[molson]

I still get calls at work from wackos that believe that the Jews were behind the whole thing. There are also a lot of folks out there that believe that Flight 93 was shot down before it could reach DC.

If you lump the bigots and the kooks in with the Bush-haters, I guess I can believe that it makes up almost a third of the population, though that still seems a little high.

Good lord, where do you work?

And I wasn't trying to lump kooks with the Bush-haters. Of course you can hate Bush and be 100% rational. It's just interesting to me that there's so many people have blindly jumped on that bandwaggon, have no other real interests or views in politics, and take that viewpoint to absurd conclusions.

[molson]

A presidential bulletin on Aug. 6 had a catchy title: "Bin Laden Determined to Strike in U.S." Bush did not discuss it again with Tenet before Sept. 11.

Using this as a piece of "intelligence" is akin to saying the Miami Dolphins are determined to win the Super Bowl.

I do agree with John Galt that wording played a large part in the outcome of the question, but even so I don't think we had a crediable evidence that our government could have acted on.

I'm sure they get those kind of warnings every week, and still do to this day. Then airport security changes and everyone bitches.

Though I'm not saying that Bush hasn't been a horrible president.

[JonInMiddleGA]

So I Google for "history channel poll on 9/11" and find this for the first link
http://www.911blogger.com/node/10346

Apparently there are people who not only believe it's a conspiracy but that THC is in on it.

A little more digging turns up this story referencing a Scripps-Howard poll that has the 36% figure as a result. It doesn't have the link to the precise question(s) but paraphrases it as
Thirty-six percent of respondents overall said it is "very likely" or "somewhat likely" that federal officials either participated in the attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon or took no action to stop them "because they wanted the United States to go to war in the Middle East."

I think I may have found the source of the number & the actual question asked though. Go to the Scripps polling website and look at this
http://www.newspolls.org/question.php?question_id=716
There are also accusations being made following the 9/11 terrorist attack. One of these is:
People in the federal government either assisted in the 9/11 attacks or took no action to stop the attacks because they wanted to United States to go to war in the Middle East.*

Very likely 16%
Somewhat likely 20%
Not likely 59%
Don't know 5%
*This question had 992 respondents; it was part of a survey posted on newsPolls.org on July 6, 2006.

Now the last bit of that has me a little confused about whether they mean the results of the survey were posted on that date or whether this might have been an online survey. If the latter, then it isn't worth the ink it would take to print it.

[chesapeake]

Good lord, where do you work?

And I wasn't trying to lump kooks with the Bush-haters.

I work at a place where kooks and angry people call in to vent their spleens. It is not one of the more fun parts of my job.

I guess my point is that a poll question like this would lump the kooks in with the folks that hate Bush/Cheney & Co. so much that they have convinced themselves that they were complicit in the attacks.

[Mustang]

I work at a place where kooks and angry people call in to vent their spleens. It is not one of the more fun parts of my job.

AT&T?

[Maple Leafs]

http://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/conspiracy_theories.png

[chesapeake]

A presidential bulletin on Aug. 6 had a catchy title: "Bin Laden Determined to Strike in U.S." Bush did not discuss it again with Tenet before Sept. 11.

Using this as a piece of "intelligence" is akin to saying the Miami Dolphins are determined to win the Super Bowl.

I think this is an overly generous absolution of the Administration on this. For information to get into the President's morning briefing, it has to be of a level of importance that the President needs to know about it. That this Bin Laden piece was the headliner that day indicates that more than just the standard chatter.

As I recall, the publicly available 9/11 Commission Report gives a good rundown on what we knew when, so I won't belabor the point, other than to say that the Bush Administration at the time wasn't overly concerned with terrorism -- certainly there was no sense of urgency about the problem.

[MJ4H]

I spend a lot of time and effort debunking the 9/11 nonsense. It does my heart good to see that no one has sided on the conspiracy side in this thread up to this point.

I saw this history channel documentary the first time it aired a couple of months ago. I watched the first part of it again last night, but I changed the channel when my wife gets home. She gets annoyed at me for spending time and effort on this stuff so I gave her a break since I'd seen it already. It is a reasonably good look at the nonsense and the correct answers to the questions that these people ask.

9/11 had a quite profound effect on me emotionally and this conspiracy stuff really chaps my hide. I cannot seem to ignore it. I go to these discussion boards and attack with as much logic as I can so that fence-sitters can see it is bunk. It doesn't always turn out for the best, but I feel like I must do what I can.

[JonInMiddleGA]

I work at a place where kooks and angry people call in to vent their spleens.

You work for Air America?

[molson]

It does my heart good to see that no one has sided on the conspiracy side in this thread up to this point.



Do you remember the "Loose Change" thread here way back? I made a quick search and couldn't find it. There was some spirited dicussion on both sides.

And I feel exactly the same way you do. That discussion and others like it infuriated me for some reason I couldn't really articulate.

[chesapeake]

Worse. Congress.

[MJ4H]

Do you remember the "Loose Change" thread here way back? I made a quick search and couldn't find it. There was some spirited dicussion on both sides.

And I feel exactly the same way you do. That discussion and others like it infuriated me for some reason I couldn't really articulate.

Yes I remember it well. I think it may have even been what started me on this stuff.

[EagleFan]

It's a conspiracy of the worst kind. Our government used the chemicals they spread in vapor trails to control the minds of those innocent "terrorists". Using that control they masterminded the attacks. They used the anger over the attacks as a springboard to attacking Afghanistan which would lead to an attack on Iraq and ultimately their goal being an all out attack against Iran to be able to control 3 major countries within the Middle East.



It's soooo obvious.... :D

[GreenMonster]

I think this is an overly generous absolution of the Administration on this. For information to get into the President's morning briefing, it has to be of a level of importance that the President needs to know about it. That this Bin Laden piece was the headliner that day indicates that more than just the standard chatter.

As I recall, the publicly available 9/11 Commission Report gives a good rundown on what we knew when, so I won't belabor the point, other than to say that the Bush Administration at the time wasn't overly concerned with terrorism -- certainly there was no sense of urgency about the problem.

I am pretty sure any administration would be concerned with terrrorism inside the US borders. What I am not sure about is how you act on a piece of information like this. What steps or processes are needed to start on the date of this brief to ensure a tradegy like 9/11 doesn't happen.

[Tasan]

I work at a place where kooks and angry people call in to vent their spleens.
You work for Air America?
Worse. Congress.

Best
Triplet
Ever

[GoDukes]

Some stopped flying regular flgihts altogether. I'm sure there was word that this kind of attack was possible.

Does not in any way mean that they were aided.

The PopMech article/show that debunks the conspiracy theories are great.

[Rizon]

WAR IS PEACE.
FREEDOM IS SLAVERY.
IGNORANCE IS STRENGTH.