Two weeks ago I met Dr. William Miller, the founder of a movement that is quantifying effective psychotherapy as few theories have, called Motivational Interviewing. Dr. Miller was introduced as “the most quoted scientist in the world today,” so I assume if you Google his name you’ll find oodles of information.
Like any lesser mortal I bought one of his books to get an autograph. It was a pretty recent book, Quantum Change. Having only read the first chapter I understand the premise, that many people experience a life-changing insight or epiphany that is sudden, surprising, benevolent, and enduring. Before continuing into the research and scientific quantification of the phenomenon, though, I would like to record one of my own experiences. As I’ve gone through the preface and first chapter a single experience many years ago keeps coming back to me, and it will be interesting, after I put it into words, to see how well it fits (or doesn’t) with Dr. Miller’s collected and tested samples.
My story starts in my upbringing. Anger was never really expressed in our home and so the five of us kids never really got any education in its proper use. Not that this is necessarily bad; imagine the world with much less arguing and fighting, and a commitment to get along even if we disagree. But the downside was that we got married to people who didn’t grow up like us. Two or three of us latched onto someone who used anger in a very different way.
My wife was one of them. She was accustomed to anger and arguments being a normal part of relationships. While not trying to sound self-righteous, I think that if she and her family hadn’t hidden that fact from me until we were married I may have made a different decision in partners. But they did hide it, and we married. A part of me believes that since they hid it they knew that something was wrong, but they chose not to change it for the better and simply covered it up until it was too late for me. Over three years the arguing grew between us. I tried in lots of ways, subtle and obvious, to let her know that I didn’t want to argue and would rather resolve things in a less heated manner. I said many times, “I wasn’t raised learning how to argue. I don’t know how and I don’t want to learn.” But I suppose that just gave her the upper hand when she repeatedly insisted on arguing.
Halfway through that third year I was getting increasingly frustrated and unhappy. There was more heat than warmth in the marriage. I don’t remember what the argument was about that one particular day, but I do remember graphically the moment when I broke. I was getting nowhere with her again and in frustration I hauled off and kicked the easy chair in the living room. It didn’t hurt either of us too bad, but the heavens opened up, a light shone on my perception, and it occurred to me that “this is not who I am.” It was astounding. It was crystal clear. If I participated in one more second of argument with her I was betraying who and what I was. The longer I went with this the more I lost something of myself I treasured. I could no longer argue with her. I calmly told her, “I am not going to argue with you anymore.”
It took her a while to believe me. She tried to engage me, and it increasingly frustrated her that I wouldn’t. But something about the realization was so solid and eternal that I had no trouble abiding by it.
It was one of the main things that signaled the end of the marriage. Her final act of control in the marriage was hiring a lawyer to do the fighting for her.
In truth I married again, and sadly the arguing came up again. I told her from the beginning (before we married, in fact) that I didn’t want to argue. That marriage lasted for five years. She insisted on fighting me. I didn’t even hire a lawyer to fight hers when she’d had enough of my calmness and reason.
I’ve dated a little in the seven or eight years since, but this one realization severely limits the field for me. Arguing is so commonplace. It’s so frequent in the media, movies, government, and even religion. ‘Fighting’ is so much a part of our culture that a local hospital says “We fight cancer” instead of “We treat cancer patients” and people don’t even question the stance.
This realization, that I refuse to argue, has lasted without question. It seems to be a truth that I can’t, well, argue. Because of it I’ve have the chance to study the difference between discussion and debate and to observe the upmanship that so many people engage in, and have opted to not play what has become for me silly little games of power. I have learned that in arguing you tend to forget to be loving, and since this to me is the most powerful force in the universe and the most important task of being with people, I simply can’t afford to learn how to argue. It has helped me become a more honest person, for in order to not have to fight (which a lot of people use to ward off the truth) I simply admit when I’ve been wrong. I’m still human and not a hundred percent on this score, but progressing. I have come to believe that marriages based on cooperation are infinitely more successful than marriages based on competition. I regularly hear from clients and coworkers that I am an exceptionally calm person.
We’ll see how this story fits with Dr. Miller’s research.
I’d bet every one of you readers has a story of life-changing insight or epiphany you could tell.
Tuesday, October 30, 2007
Sunday, October 21, 2007
Fascist Warning
I heard today that several neoconservative pundits and media personalities are planning a campaign to provide an 'education' program at colleges across America about Islamo-fascism. In education there should be a rounded presentation of different philosophies, points of view, and facts to teach our young adults how to evaluate between them in order to make an informed choice.
This push to 'educate' about Islamo-fascism, though, has me thinking several things:
1. Fascism by itself is a horrible thing. Is there that much difference between religious sects that we must distinguish the Islamic version of fascism? In the interest of fairness and to give students the chance to develop a rounded viewpoint, shouldn't there also be a unit on Christo-fascism?
2. Religion really isn't the point with fascism, anyway. Such a form of governing may borrow from religion or claim roots in it, but at the bottom of it the leaders are only borrowing from the legitimacy of religion to push their unholy agenda. No form of fascism is supported in religious literature.
3. What the neocons are speaking out against is Islamic extremism. They ought to label it as such. But again, if we are going to recognize Islamic extremism it would only be fair to recognize Christian extremism. They are equally destructive and neither conforms to religious tenets.
4. I haven't had a chance to check with my Moslem friends about this situation (Asdan, Furqaan, Omar, Majed, and others). I have made these friends through community efforts to get people to get along. They are all advocates for peace, and none are extremists. If I was in their shoes I would be really frustrated, even angry. Some of our national leaders are connecting their religion with the most horrible form of government possible.
5. Which is really what is going on, anyway. The pundits and media personalities are really just furthering the myth that Islam is bad, wrong, evil, dangerous, evil, violent, and evil. Why do we put up with such narrowmindedness and insecurity?
Somewhat connected, but this morning I wrote a thought down that seems appropriate here: I wish that the Competitors of the world could accept that there are those who do not want to compete, but would rather cultivate cooperation.
Let us have some legitimacy. Let us practice what we believe is right. Don't make us out to be wrong. I would be perfectly content to let you play your games of power and influence -- because that's what makes you feel that you have purpose, and I have no desire to butt into your game and take over -- if you would let me do what fulfills my life. One day we will each have to answer to God, a.k.a. Allah. Since Jesus was one of the most peaceful activists the world has ever known, I would like to be able to report that I followed His lead.
P.S. I lied a little in the last paragraph. I am not content to let leaders play their games of power and influence because it results it poverty and death for innocent people. That's just inexcusable.
This push to 'educate' about Islamo-fascism, though, has me thinking several things:
1. Fascism by itself is a horrible thing. Is there that much difference between religious sects that we must distinguish the Islamic version of fascism? In the interest of fairness and to give students the chance to develop a rounded viewpoint, shouldn't there also be a unit on Christo-fascism?
2. Religion really isn't the point with fascism, anyway. Such a form of governing may borrow from religion or claim roots in it, but at the bottom of it the leaders are only borrowing from the legitimacy of religion to push their unholy agenda. No form of fascism is supported in religious literature.
3. What the neocons are speaking out against is Islamic extremism. They ought to label it as such. But again, if we are going to recognize Islamic extremism it would only be fair to recognize Christian extremism. They are equally destructive and neither conforms to religious tenets.
4. I haven't had a chance to check with my Moslem friends about this situation (Asdan, Furqaan, Omar, Majed, and others). I have made these friends through community efforts to get people to get along. They are all advocates for peace, and none are extremists. If I was in their shoes I would be really frustrated, even angry. Some of our national leaders are connecting their religion with the most horrible form of government possible.
5. Which is really what is going on, anyway. The pundits and media personalities are really just furthering the myth that Islam is bad, wrong, evil, dangerous, evil, violent, and evil. Why do we put up with such narrowmindedness and insecurity?
Somewhat connected, but this morning I wrote a thought down that seems appropriate here: I wish that the Competitors of the world could accept that there are those who do not want to compete, but would rather cultivate cooperation.
Let us have some legitimacy. Let us practice what we believe is right. Don't make us out to be wrong. I would be perfectly content to let you play your games of power and influence -- because that's what makes you feel that you have purpose, and I have no desire to butt into your game and take over -- if you would let me do what fulfills my life. One day we will each have to answer to God, a.k.a. Allah. Since Jesus was one of the most peaceful activists the world has ever known, I would like to be able to report that I followed His lead.
P.S. I lied a little in the last paragraph. I am not content to let leaders play their games of power and influence because it results it poverty and death for innocent people. That's just inexcusable.
Which of These Is Not Like the Others?
Given a picture of an ant, a butterfly, and a spider, and asked to choose which one doesn't belong, a lot of people would say the butterfly. It can fly, the others can't. Until we consider that a spider can anchor its web to a tree branch, launch itself into a breeze, spread its legs, and in essence becomes a tethered kite until it reaches a new destination. Is that flying? ("That's not flying, that's falling...with style!"). We say that we fly kites. So this judgment becomes muddied.
Then we study wee creatures in our world and discover that some insects have six legs, others have eight. In the picture above the ant and the butterfly have six legs and the spider has eight. The spider is the one that doesn't fit. Although it may resemble an ant more than a butterfly on the surface, the spider is in a whole different classification.
The lesson from this, in the style of Sesame Street, Taoism, Buddhism, and many philosophical traditions, is that there is more than one level of understanding. Deeper, more informed understanding is more accurate than superficial judgment.
Shift gears. Why is it that the more tyranical and despotic leaders of history -- into the present day -- always oppose intellectuals? Why do they arrest them, ship them away, or execute them? Why is there less of an emphasis on education and more on militarism? Because intellectuals understand things on a deeper level. They can see through the despot's machinations. They are capable of exposing the truth when the despot is keeping a superfical image to the public but behind the scenes is doing unethical, illegal, inhumane things.
The President, right or wrong. Don't question the President. America, love it or leave it. Either you're with us or you're with the enemy. If the President says it, it's good enough for me. Bush says he reads the Bible / has a Father greater than his earthly father / goes to church, therefore he's a Christian and that's that.
"I am the decider" (if one makes poor decisions, this is worthless). "Terrorists want to kill you" (what proof? Until there is credible science that debunks the Conspiracy Theory of 9-11 this one is up in the air. That our soldiers die in Iraq doesn't prove the statement; it suggests cause and effect, that if people are occupied by a foreign military force and seventy percent of the deaths that result are innocent civilians then they will fight back). Moslem extremists are the biggest problem in the world today (what about Christian extremists?). National security is the preeminent issue of our time (then the underlying problem is insecurity). "These are dangerous times" (stated by nearly all despots throughout history). And so forth.
Intellectuals can see behind the smoke and mirrors. They are a threat. They threaten the status quo, the exposure of deceit, the ill-gotten consolidation and hold on power that despots accumulate. They can't be tolerated, nor can we afford to train up any more. Education isn't as important as bullets and bombs. The liberal thought process, or critical thinking, must be discouraged. Keep the people ignorant and you can play on their emotions, especially fear.
Step into my home
Said the spider to the fly.
I hope that whoever from the Department of Homeland Security is monitoring my blogs has children, and that love for those children is stronger than the dictates of leaders who give an image of strength but underneath harbor the fears that they project onto the public, and don't mind consigning others to death trying to resolve their anxieties.
Then we study wee creatures in our world and discover that some insects have six legs, others have eight. In the picture above the ant and the butterfly have six legs and the spider has eight. The spider is the one that doesn't fit. Although it may resemble an ant more than a butterfly on the surface, the spider is in a whole different classification.
The lesson from this, in the style of Sesame Street, Taoism, Buddhism, and many philosophical traditions, is that there is more than one level of understanding. Deeper, more informed understanding is more accurate than superficial judgment.
Shift gears. Why is it that the more tyranical and despotic leaders of history -- into the present day -- always oppose intellectuals? Why do they arrest them, ship them away, or execute them? Why is there less of an emphasis on education and more on militarism? Because intellectuals understand things on a deeper level. They can see through the despot's machinations. They are capable of exposing the truth when the despot is keeping a superfical image to the public but behind the scenes is doing unethical, illegal, inhumane things.
The President, right or wrong. Don't question the President. America, love it or leave it. Either you're with us or you're with the enemy. If the President says it, it's good enough for me. Bush says he reads the Bible / has a Father greater than his earthly father / goes to church, therefore he's a Christian and that's that.
"I am the decider" (if one makes poor decisions, this is worthless). "Terrorists want to kill you" (what proof? Until there is credible science that debunks the Conspiracy Theory of 9-11 this one is up in the air. That our soldiers die in Iraq doesn't prove the statement; it suggests cause and effect, that if people are occupied by a foreign military force and seventy percent of the deaths that result are innocent civilians then they will fight back). Moslem extremists are the biggest problem in the world today (what about Christian extremists?). National security is the preeminent issue of our time (then the underlying problem is insecurity). "These are dangerous times" (stated by nearly all despots throughout history). And so forth.
Intellectuals can see behind the smoke and mirrors. They are a threat. They threaten the status quo, the exposure of deceit, the ill-gotten consolidation and hold on power that despots accumulate. They can't be tolerated, nor can we afford to train up any more. Education isn't as important as bullets and bombs. The liberal thought process, or critical thinking, must be discouraged. Keep the people ignorant and you can play on their emotions, especially fear.
Step into my home
Said the spider to the fly.
I hope that whoever from the Department of Homeland Security is monitoring my blogs has children, and that love for those children is stronger than the dictates of leaders who give an image of strength but underneath harbor the fears that they project onto the public, and don't mind consigning others to death trying to resolve their anxieties.
Wednesday, October 17, 2007
Losing Hatred
I have been accused in the past of being hate challenged because I find it difficult to feel that feeling for people. I have been accused of being in denial of my own hatred for others.
It is late and I should be in bed, but I just returned from a community meeting about reducing hatred between people of differing faiths. The crowd was equally divided between Muslims, Christians, and Jews. There were about ten people I knew well from these types of meetings; I've been involved with them in this community for five years. And there were many people I had never met before.
In a small group dialogue I recounted that part of my ancestry comes from Pulaski, TN, where the KKK was started. Yep. Those are some of my roots. One young Muslim man, whose family emigrated to the US only a generation ago, said it was really interesting to hear a white American man tell some of his story; he is so accustomed to hearing stories of immigrants that end up being so close to his and his family's, and white people don't expose their stuff. My reaction was that my family's immigration story just goes back a few more decades than his.
That young man was one of the more level-headed, creative, assured, peaceful people I've met in a while. After the meeting, in the parking lot, I got to know more about another young Muslim man and found that he and I have very similar passions and styles of living. I also gave a hug to a gal I already knew as she was departing; I realize that hugging an unmarried Muslim gal in public would raise some eyebrows, but we've done that for quite a while without being struck down by lightning.
As I was driving away it struck me that I had just spent a couple of hours with some peaceful Jews and Muslims. Don't hear about those types in the news very often. We have a lot of beliefs in common, even religious. I felt very fortunate to have spent time with them and would be quite happy to be around them some more. What made the time so valuable was that we talked openly about our upbringings, beliefs, and experiences. When you do that there is no way that they can remain stereotypes...they become humans like me. Very much like me.
I am very fortunate to live in a place where there is more diversity than usual. We have a major university that draws people from all over the world. Then again, I have made decisions to put myself in places to connect with others; out of a hundred thousand people in the city only about thirty showed up for this publicized meeting. But it enriched my life in a way that can't be had in any other way.
And I got more hugs tonight than I've had in a while. What's it worth to feel safe and comfortable enough with people to make such contact?
Hate challenged? Perhaps projection is alive and well in the world.
It is late and I should be in bed, but I just returned from a community meeting about reducing hatred between people of differing faiths. The crowd was equally divided between Muslims, Christians, and Jews. There were about ten people I knew well from these types of meetings; I've been involved with them in this community for five years. And there were many people I had never met before.
In a small group dialogue I recounted that part of my ancestry comes from Pulaski, TN, where the KKK was started. Yep. Those are some of my roots. One young Muslim man, whose family emigrated to the US only a generation ago, said it was really interesting to hear a white American man tell some of his story; he is so accustomed to hearing stories of immigrants that end up being so close to his and his family's, and white people don't expose their stuff. My reaction was that my family's immigration story just goes back a few more decades than his.
That young man was one of the more level-headed, creative, assured, peaceful people I've met in a while. After the meeting, in the parking lot, I got to know more about another young Muslim man and found that he and I have very similar passions and styles of living. I also gave a hug to a gal I already knew as she was departing; I realize that hugging an unmarried Muslim gal in public would raise some eyebrows, but we've done that for quite a while without being struck down by lightning.
As I was driving away it struck me that I had just spent a couple of hours with some peaceful Jews and Muslims. Don't hear about those types in the news very often. We have a lot of beliefs in common, even religious. I felt very fortunate to have spent time with them and would be quite happy to be around them some more. What made the time so valuable was that we talked openly about our upbringings, beliefs, and experiences. When you do that there is no way that they can remain stereotypes...they become humans like me. Very much like me.
I am very fortunate to live in a place where there is more diversity than usual. We have a major university that draws people from all over the world. Then again, I have made decisions to put myself in places to connect with others; out of a hundred thousand people in the city only about thirty showed up for this publicized meeting. But it enriched my life in a way that can't be had in any other way.
And I got more hugs tonight than I've had in a while. What's it worth to feel safe and comfortable enough with people to make such contact?
Hate challenged? Perhaps projection is alive and well in the world.
Friday, October 12, 2007
Conspiracy Theory resources
As a follow-up to the blog on conspiracy theory, a couple of sites to find information about research to test the Official Version of 9-11 are http://www.911truth.org/ and, from an architectural point of view, http://www.ae911truth.org/. I don't recommend these in an effort to convert anybody, but only for you to look at information and decide for yourself. Which is, after all, the process of liberal or critical thinking, which is such a dirty thing anymore.
Cheers, if it ain't keepin' with the situation.
Cheers, if it ain't keepin' with the situation.
Tuesday, October 9, 2007
NO: It's Not Enough
On the phone with my 16-year-old daughter, she said that one of the girls on the varsity basketball team was pregnant. "Why is it that the really Christian ones are the ones who get pregnant?" she mused, and then gave herself an answer: "They're probably too scared to talk to their parents about birth control."
In the half-second pause that followed I felt fortunate that my daughter was talking to me about it.
Research has shown that abstinence-only programs have no more effect on teen pregnancy than no programs at all. My guess is that it has the same base -- and lack of success -- as Nancy Reagan's 'Just Say No' campaign against drugs in the 1980s. It relies on an authoritarian command ("Because I said so!") without even beginning to understand the dynamics underlying a very strong urge. And scaring people into believing doesn't result in solid conviction; it's merely hopeful, loyal, or subservient. Even more, it ignores knowledge about the subject and only treats it as bad, giving adherents no skill in dealing with it when it, uh, pops up.
Sexuality is complex. A lot of 'normal' adults have strong misperceptions and misunderstandings about it. How can we expect teens to deal with it okay when we're not that adept as adults?
I wrote a letter to my daughter several years ago, anticipating that one day she would be confronted with the issue of sex. In as simple language as I could muster, I wrote about love and feelings and relationships and decisions and the future and.....and sex. It's not easy to say, "I want to rely on you to make good decisions for yourself" when her friends are getting pregnant. But hey, she recently got her driver's license and there was some practice in Daddy letting go. And she seems to react better to guidance and encouragement than to command and control. I think it's time to send the letter.
In the half-second pause that followed I felt fortunate that my daughter was talking to me about it.
Research has shown that abstinence-only programs have no more effect on teen pregnancy than no programs at all. My guess is that it has the same base -- and lack of success -- as Nancy Reagan's 'Just Say No' campaign against drugs in the 1980s. It relies on an authoritarian command ("Because I said so!") without even beginning to understand the dynamics underlying a very strong urge. And scaring people into believing doesn't result in solid conviction; it's merely hopeful, loyal, or subservient. Even more, it ignores knowledge about the subject and only treats it as bad, giving adherents no skill in dealing with it when it, uh, pops up.
Sexuality is complex. A lot of 'normal' adults have strong misperceptions and misunderstandings about it. How can we expect teens to deal with it okay when we're not that adept as adults?
I wrote a letter to my daughter several years ago, anticipating that one day she would be confronted with the issue of sex. In as simple language as I could muster, I wrote about love and feelings and relationships and decisions and the future and.....and sex. It's not easy to say, "I want to rely on you to make good decisions for yourself" when her friends are getting pregnant. But hey, she recently got her driver's license and there was some practice in Daddy letting go. And she seems to react better to guidance and encouragement than to command and control. I think it's time to send the letter.
Sunday, October 7, 2007
Remember the Conspiracy Theory?
My apologies for not writing for quite a while; there is something about me that I occasionally have to take a vacation from writing to recharge my batteries.
Today I pulled a DVD off the shelf, dusted it off, and popped it in. It has two pieces on it, an address by David Ray Griffin on 9-11 and the American Empire, given on April 18, 2005, and one on Eric Hufschmid's analysis of the 9-11 attacks. Both are part of what is known as the 'conspiracy theory' that the 9-11 attacks were an inside job. The conspiracy theory has largely dried up and disappeared by now.
My degrees are in a social science. I am trained to look critically below what is happening or what is being said to determine if the content matches the process. If it does, fine. If it doesn't then something is going on underneath that we aren't being told.
Dr. Griffin and Mr. Hufschmid offer example after example to question the Official Version of what happened at the World Trade Center and the Pentagon that day. Their points are hard to argue. For example, we all accept that WTC Buildings 1 and 2 were hit by airplanes and came down. But why did Building 7, of steel contstruction, which was not hit by an airplane, had minor fires on two floors, and was not hit by either other building falling, also fall that day? Why couldn't the intelligence offices of our government find a reason, when the landlord of WTC stated on a PBS interview that he had requested the NYC Fire Department 'pull' the building that day? 'Pulling' a building means a controlled demolition, which takes weeks or months to plan, test, plant charges, test, and execute. Besides, the NYC Fire Department doesn't do controlled demolitions. That's done by private companies. The landlord, Larry Silverstein,by the way, obtained the WTC properties just two months prior to the attacks, replaced security with his own people, and made upwards of seven billion dollars in insurance reimbursement following the attacks.
This is just one hole in the 9-11 Commission report. That report concluded the cause of Building 7 coming down was unknown. It also concluded that the central core of Buildings 1 and 2 were hollow steel shafts that housed elevators and stairwells, when in fact there were more than forty thick steel beams that supported the buildings from the inside, designed to withstand the impact of 160 mps winds (on the full surface of one side of the building this amounts to oodles more force than an airplane hitting it). The Commission reports simply ignored the design of the buildings (what would motivate them to ignore it?). The idea that jet fuel melted the steel in the buildings is disproven: most of the fuel was spent in the initial contact blast, burning jet fuel isn't hot enough to melt steel else airplane engines would melt down on the runway, and there were people standing in the gaping holes left by the planes after the fire had died down (photographic evidence). The 'pancake theory' of how the buildings came down has been debunked by computer modeling. Buildings 1, 2, and 7 all appear in video as controlled demolitions.
The Pentagon attack is likewise suspect; a Boeing 757 would have had to skim just feet off the ground at 400 mph after turning 270 degrees in a tight pirouette to hit as is alleged. One wonders why there weren't hundreds of people who saw the airplane skimming just over the adjoining buildlings and highway without hitting so much as one of the highway signs or light poles thirty feet above the ground. The strike profile on the building looks more like a missile or drone hit it. More photographic evidence: there were no parts of a 757 at the crash site. At the Pentagon as with the WTC, evidence was removed from the scene before investigation could be properly conducted.
On and on, there are questions that have never been answered. At least not in the Official Version (and remember that there were three Official Versions of the military response to the attacks in the week after). Heck, it's possible that Dick Cheney was at the helm ordering a stand-down of Air Force interception of hijacked jets, or sending the intercept fighters the wrong direction so that they were 150 miles away when the WTC was hit.
The conservative media in the nation went on high energy to back up the Official Version. As is necessary with propaganda a term had to be assigned to the package of questions that brought up the inconsistencies of the Official Version, and thus we had 'conspiracy theory'. It worked. It makes anybody who uses the questions into nutcases, into shadowy characters who are really unpatriotic and bad.
Again, I'm trained in the sciences. If a theory exists, it will remain a theory until it's investigated and either confirmed or refuted. There has been a lot of research on the probabilities of the Official Version and the 9-11 Commission report, and has come up with a lot of inconsistencies and improbabilities. Even impossibilities. But what happened to the research? Shouldn't the exposure of what amounts to lying be a cause for concern to the American public? Lying that covers up likely government actions that resulted in the deaths of more than three thousand Americans? Lies that were further employed to start a war that to date has resulted in more than three thousand American military deaths and possibly a million Iraqi military and civilian deaths? Until I hear a credible refutation to the questions of the conspiracy theory I cannot help but think it could be true.
That the conspiracy theory has died out even with research to support it says a lot.
Today I pulled a DVD off the shelf, dusted it off, and popped it in. It has two pieces on it, an address by David Ray Griffin on 9-11 and the American Empire, given on April 18, 2005, and one on Eric Hufschmid's analysis of the 9-11 attacks. Both are part of what is known as the 'conspiracy theory' that the 9-11 attacks were an inside job. The conspiracy theory has largely dried up and disappeared by now.
My degrees are in a social science. I am trained to look critically below what is happening or what is being said to determine if the content matches the process. If it does, fine. If it doesn't then something is going on underneath that we aren't being told.
Dr. Griffin and Mr. Hufschmid offer example after example to question the Official Version of what happened at the World Trade Center and the Pentagon that day. Their points are hard to argue. For example, we all accept that WTC Buildings 1 and 2 were hit by airplanes and came down. But why did Building 7, of steel contstruction, which was not hit by an airplane, had minor fires on two floors, and was not hit by either other building falling, also fall that day? Why couldn't the intelligence offices of our government find a reason, when the landlord of WTC stated on a PBS interview that he had requested the NYC Fire Department 'pull' the building that day? 'Pulling' a building means a controlled demolition, which takes weeks or months to plan, test, plant charges, test, and execute. Besides, the NYC Fire Department doesn't do controlled demolitions. That's done by private companies. The landlord, Larry Silverstein,by the way, obtained the WTC properties just two months prior to the attacks, replaced security with his own people, and made upwards of seven billion dollars in insurance reimbursement following the attacks.
This is just one hole in the 9-11 Commission report. That report concluded the cause of Building 7 coming down was unknown. It also concluded that the central core of Buildings 1 and 2 were hollow steel shafts that housed elevators and stairwells, when in fact there were more than forty thick steel beams that supported the buildings from the inside, designed to withstand the impact of 160 mps winds (on the full surface of one side of the building this amounts to oodles more force than an airplane hitting it). The Commission reports simply ignored the design of the buildings (what would motivate them to ignore it?). The idea that jet fuel melted the steel in the buildings is disproven: most of the fuel was spent in the initial contact blast, burning jet fuel isn't hot enough to melt steel else airplane engines would melt down on the runway, and there were people standing in the gaping holes left by the planes after the fire had died down (photographic evidence). The 'pancake theory' of how the buildings came down has been debunked by computer modeling. Buildings 1, 2, and 7 all appear in video as controlled demolitions.
The Pentagon attack is likewise suspect; a Boeing 757 would have had to skim just feet off the ground at 400 mph after turning 270 degrees in a tight pirouette to hit as is alleged. One wonders why there weren't hundreds of people who saw the airplane skimming just over the adjoining buildlings and highway without hitting so much as one of the highway signs or light poles thirty feet above the ground. The strike profile on the building looks more like a missile or drone hit it. More photographic evidence: there were no parts of a 757 at the crash site. At the Pentagon as with the WTC, evidence was removed from the scene before investigation could be properly conducted.
On and on, there are questions that have never been answered. At least not in the Official Version (and remember that there were three Official Versions of the military response to the attacks in the week after). Heck, it's possible that Dick Cheney was at the helm ordering a stand-down of Air Force interception of hijacked jets, or sending the intercept fighters the wrong direction so that they were 150 miles away when the WTC was hit.
The conservative media in the nation went on high energy to back up the Official Version. As is necessary with propaganda a term had to be assigned to the package of questions that brought up the inconsistencies of the Official Version, and thus we had 'conspiracy theory'. It worked. It makes anybody who uses the questions into nutcases, into shadowy characters who are really unpatriotic and bad.
Again, I'm trained in the sciences. If a theory exists, it will remain a theory until it's investigated and either confirmed or refuted. There has been a lot of research on the probabilities of the Official Version and the 9-11 Commission report, and has come up with a lot of inconsistencies and improbabilities. Even impossibilities. But what happened to the research? Shouldn't the exposure of what amounts to lying be a cause for concern to the American public? Lying that covers up likely government actions that resulted in the deaths of more than three thousand Americans? Lies that were further employed to start a war that to date has resulted in more than three thousand American military deaths and possibly a million Iraqi military and civilian deaths? Until I hear a credible refutation to the questions of the conspiracy theory I cannot help but think it could be true.
That the conspiracy theory has died out even with research to support it says a lot.
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