Asymmetrical Information

Not being one to read what the tinfoil crowd says, just why is Bush supposed to have been complicit in 9/11? What gain was there?

Just troll DU or DailyKos for five minutes and you'll find out pretty quick that Bush "LIHOP" or "MIHOP" (let it or made it happen on purpose) so as to use the FEAR to take away our rights, go to war with Iraq to steal their oil, give out contracts to his Halliburton buddies and enrich his oil tycoon contributors.

The problem I have with these conspiracy theories is that the Bush administration didn't react in the way you'd expect if they rigged the whole thing.

If Bush had planned 9/11 or known it was going to happen, would he have really sat around looking like a stunned bunny for those eight minutes Michael Moore used to such effect in Fahrenheit 9/11? If Bush lied about Iraqi WMDs in order to trick the country into the war, why didn't he arrange for WMDs and/or smoking-gun incriminating documents to be found afterwards? Etc, etc.

Dan -

Have you ever heard the advice about teaching a pig to sing?

Thanks, Dave, but even assuming, arguendo, that all those things are true, what does Bush personally get out of it? Under the conspiracy theories, rhere's got to be something in it for him, after all, but they never say what.

Conspiracy? That requires information be compartmented, that no one writes a book and that everyone involved resolves themself to this purpose. In Washington that is impossible.

For those who believe in conspiracies of this magnitude please, once again, consult your psychic.

It's comical that the Left can believe that Bush was smart enough to plot the 9/11 attacks and fool the entire world into believing that terrorists did it, while at the same time, any Liberal you ask will tell you Bush is an idiot.

Henry Reardon -

Like that SNL skit where Phil Hartman played Reagan, doing photo ops in the Oval Office and then immediately unscrolling a secret map and barking orders? ("These are the countries we sell arms to, which money we then take and use to fund paramilitary groups in the countries labeled with green pins!")

Frankly, I don't think the fact that, apparently, the Left believes Bush is responsible for 9/11 is any more ridiculous than that the Right believes/d that Clinton had Vince Foster murdered.

The mess in Florida in the 2000 election manufactured a large quantity of prime moonbats ready to swallow any theory--no matter how far-fetched--that was based around the notion that GWB had ruthlessly stolen the election and was planning to become a dictator. When 9/11 came, it was a grand opportunity for said moonbats to turn a dying avocation into a long-term gig.

First, no I don't believe that Vince Foster was murdered by anybody. That being said it would take a conspiracy of only two people to have someone murdered (the stiff doesn't count). It is clearly less ridiculous to believe in that possibility rather than in a conspiracy requiring 10's if not 100's of people.

Conspiracy theories are inevitable when the government clamps down on information, rather than opening it up. Hell, the official explanation is one of the nuttier ones, if you ask me. Box cutters?

I think the number of people who have the right amount and quality of information to decide this matter is far too little, and far too interested in keeping information scarce.

the official explanation is one of the nuttier ones, if you ask me. Box cutters?

Not at all. Before 9/11, that was one of the sharp instruments you could more easily get into an airplane without raising suspicion. After that, all you have to do is slit a stewardess' throat, drag her bloody corpse down the aisle way, and warn everyone else that they better cooperate.

(To catch a criminal, you must think like a criminal, my dear simple Watson...)

As long as "everyone else" doesn't understand that cooperation leads to inevitable death regardless, that works; once they suspect that death is coming anyway, then you get the Flight 93 result, or Richard Perle learning how a quarterback sacking works.

Conspiracy theories aren't about information or the lack of it, at least for the theorist. That might apply to the general acceptance of a conspiracy theory, but the whole impetus behind conspiracy theories and the like isn't a genuine effort to understand the world; its an attempt to make the world conform to the conspiracists world view. As such the government could be as transparent as glass--- the theorist would just keep on moving and invent some new conspiracy that cleverly uses the transparency of the government to fool people into thinking the conspiracy doesn't exist. Wouldn't even give them a seconds pause.

Of course, "the left" doesn't think Bush was behind 9-11. A few individuals do. People like Jane find it useful to pretend that "the left" (ie, anyone who doesn't approve of George Bush) is somehow unhinged.

The "Bush planned/permitted 9/11" theories posited by some leftists are eerily similar to the "FDR planned/permitted Pearl Harbor" scenarios beloved of some right-wingers. The reasons for both conspiracy theories are essentially the same: 1)an attempt to discredit the leader of the other ideological faction; 2)a refusal to accept that such attacks are the result simply of gross complacency and incompetence on the part of the US government and security services.

I think that toxic nails it on the head - conspiracy theorists of any ideological persuasion want to believe in vast, malign combines ranged against them to rationalize their own marginalization in political life.

Of course, "the left" doesn't think Bush was behind 9-11. A few individuals do. People like Jane find it useful to pretend that "the left" (ie, anyone who doesn't approve of George Bush) is somehow unhinged

Neither Jane, nor Jesse Walker in the post Jane linked to, associated the conspiracy theorists with "the left". In fact, Jane didn't say anything other than that she liked Jesse's quote.

So, um, what is it you're whining about, again?

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There is an existence proof that you can have a large conspiracy keep secrets for a long time, specifically, the Enigma secret. No public knowledge was available till forty years after the successfull breaking of German codes on a large scale.
Forty years from now we may know a great deal more about whether the Bush Jr. administration let a group of terrorists succeed in their mission. For now, speculation is useless.

Enigma? Hmm, the copyright on my copy of David Kahn's "The Codebreakers" is 1967.

Forty years from now the world will undoubtedly know more about many things, but fools will still be expressing opinions on topics they know nothing about.

Dan, while I have no idea why purple blamed Jane for it (in a world without blog pseudoynym's that clause would be unparseable), one commenter in this thread said that "It's comical that the Left can believe that Bush was smart enough to plot the 9/11 attacks," without giving any explanation as to who he means by The Left, and those words are frequently used to refer to (ambiguously) refer to everyone who voted for John Kerry in 2004. Another said that Daily Kos is full of people who in believe in 9/11 conspiracy theories. This is another good way of slurring a large number of Democrats. So that's probably who purple is complaining about.

Quarterican, I'm SO happy that someone else remembers that SNL skit! I always think of it as Left Wish Fulfillment - they didn't BELIEVE that about Reagan, that he could bark orders AND speak Russian on the Red Phone - but they WANTED to believe in an all-powerful leader.

That one skit has helped me understand my colleagues (especially the political scienctists, who WANT to be ruled by Philospher Kings) much better.

So that's probably who purple is complaining about

It is pretty obvious that purple was only interested in doing a little slurring of his own -- lumping Jane in with the people who think all of the left is like the idiots at DailyKos.

Wow. I thought "I hate Paul Krugman!! Who's with me?" was chum in the water for commenters, but "I think liberals are wrong to blame 9/11 on a Bush conspiracy" has more than surpassed it. :)

Have fun, you guys.

But you didn't participate in that thread, suggesting that perhaps you didn't have any ideas to contribute. Conspicuously ironic by your absence, as it were.

There are some who believe that flight 93 was shot down by an American jet to prevent it from crashing into its destination, and was not really driven into the ground by determined passengers. I've never known Americans to be suicidal like that. Have you?

The plotline here is pretty clear; The plane couldn't be forced down (I don't know the details on that) so it was shot down to prevent not only the passengers but also the presumed target from being taken out. The passengers were then glorified as heroes.

That would also explain Bush's very real reluctance to have the 9-11 investigation, which only fans the conspiracy theories that much more (why wouldn't a president WANT to investigate somthing like this...*ominous music* There must be a reason!)

Personally, I haven't spent enough time looking into this to know one way or another.

In terms of Bush letting 9-11 happen, the belief is that he did it to justify a war which would be hard to do otherwise, justify removing illegal aliens after campaigning strongly for the hispanic vote, justify new surveilance powers which had been requested for a long time, etc. In short, getting his policies across.

I don't think I personally believe it, but that's the notion. As to how some on the left see "W" as both stupid and crafty, they usually attribute the crafty part to his cabinet and view him as somthing of a puppet (though they usually underestimate his charisma, since they're so busy degrading him.)

Three non-paranoic reasons Flight 93 might have crashed:

1) The terrorist pilot flew into the ground when the passengers broke into the cabin.

2) It took too long to get a pilot through the mob and too the controls after the passengers got the terrorists out of there.

3) Or maybe there wasn't a non-terrorist pilot left, because earlier the passengers had followed the government line on dealing with terrorists (huddle together, say "baa", and hope someone else will do something) while the pilots were hacked to death with little-bitty knives.

IMO, 9/11 was the quite predictable result of the policy government and airlines had followed since the first wave of hijackings in the 60's. You can't single out Bush for blame...

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