Please first check out this short video for some context about this diary:
Republican Redundancy
Even if you wholeheartedly believe that 19 Arabs led by Bin Laden pulled off the biggest, most complicated and most successful terrorist strike ever all by themselves despite the best efforts of the trillion dollar a year mil/intel/justice/customs/law enforcement organizatons of the most powerful nation in world history, whose interests are you serving by aggressively policing and/or ridiculing anyone who rationally demands answers for the many legitimate, unanswered questions about what happened that day?
I have hever understood why well-meaning individuals choose to spend time and energy policing those who rationally question the events of 9/11 in ostensibly intelligent and progressive discussion groups. Please allow me to expand my (perhaps unpopular?) opinion on this understandably sensitive topic below the fold.
The "9/11 Changes Everything" mantra has been successfully used to justify:
1) an insane invasion and occupation,
2) an Orwellian state of neverending warfare,
3) an all-out assault on our Bill of Rights and our Constitutional separation, balance and oversight of powers,
4) rampant and bald faced war profiteering and a huge increase in dubious mil/intel/security expenditures,
5) an insane doctrine of military pre-emption,
6) torture and rendition,
7) a culture of authoritarian secrecy,
8) the persecution of political dissent,
9) enraging the Muslim world and alienating the rest of the world,
10) etc., etc., etc.
while doing little or nothing to enhance our security or address the root causes or symptoms of Islamic terror.
Our ports are no more secure than they were on 9/11, and they are being sold to an Arab government that recognized the Taliban. Our nuke plants are just as vulnerable as ever. The CAPPS II no-fly list supposedly protects us against a non-existent threat (when was the last time a US domestic flight was hijacked by a US citizen?) while actually helping any terrorist cell with the resources to do a few test runs before the big event. Finally, not one individual has been publicly held accountable for his or her failures on 9/11, and Homeland (Pork Barrel) Security proved its "worth" during the Katrina debacle.
All of this disgusting vileness and much more has gone down in the name of an official conspiracy theory -- namely, that 19 Arabs acting alone at Bin Laden's behest caused 100% of the 9/11 tragedy without any actionable foreknowledge of any government official with the power to stop them -- worthy of Doctor Evil and containing quite a few gaping plot holes. Even assuming that the official conspiracy theory is 100% true, the problem of a few thousand hardcore fundamentalist Islamic terrorists would quite obviously be best addressed with a small but expertly trained team of covert infiltrators and special operations forces.
Considering this, how can one possibly find merit in actively policing and ridiculing those who rationally draw attention to dubious elements of the official 9/11 conspiracy theory -- regardless of one's personal beliefs concerning the events of that day? Considering all the heinous shit that's been done in the name of the 9/11, why are so many inclined to censor any deviation from "conventional wisdom" of the events of that day?
Note that I'm not talking about conspiracy theory garbage like pods or rays or the idea that no planes crashed or any other sort of crazy (and IMHO, useless and/or counterproductive) speculation about what happened that day. But isn't it politically strategic to keep asking legitimate questions about the events of that day, considering that 9/11 is the only thing that gives a shred of cover to an otherwise completely failed and unredeemably criminal administration?
Almost none of the victims' families' most difficult questions about 9/11 have been answered. Don't 9/11 victims' families deserve at least a full, independent and impartial investigation where the investigators have complete subpoena power and everyone testifies under oath? And please consider that despite the monolothically repetitive MSM 9/11 message and the often dubious and/or ridiculous claims made by the amateur "9/11 Truth" community, a recent Zogby poll showed that only 48% of Americans think that "the US government and 9/11 Commission are NOT covering up" the 9/11 attack. And more than 50% of the Democrats polled think that the "US government and 9/11 Commission are covering up" the events of that day.
Please do not misinterpret this diary entry as some sort of 9/11 conspiracy mongering. This diary entry isn't about the Truth of 9/11. It's about the Consequences of 9/11 -- which anybody other than a regressive moron must admit have been inarguably heinous. My point is not whether some members of the US government had something to do with 9/11, whether they are covering up their criminal negligence that day or whether they are just covering up their embarrassing incompetence. My point is simply this:
Considering all the horrible crap that has gone down in the name of the official 9/11 narrative -- even if you believe it, why in the world would you want to waste your precious time and energy defending it against rational questioning?
Personally, I advocate highlighting legitimate questions about 9/11 because regardless of whether we're talking about the Big Lie or a lot of smaller cover ups, it's beneficial to get people questioning 9/11 in rational ways, if only to force the Bush administration to finally release the information and clear up the myriad inconsistencies it should have in the first place!