Greg Palast - where is he coming from?

[Jayhawk]

I caught an interview with Palast by Alex Jones

http://www.gregpalast.com/index.php?s=9%2F11

and he doesnt talk about 9/11 being an inside job at all, in fact in one article on his website he specifically states that there is no evidence that Bush knew anything:

"We uncovered no information, none whatsoever, that George W. Bush had any advance knowledge of the plan to attack the World Trade Center on 9/11, nor, heaven forbid, any involvement in the attack."

Bearing in mind he writes for the Observer and does pieces for Newsnight I wonder if anyone can enlighten me. Jones does not challenge him on it in the interview at all. Generally he has some interesting stuff to say but this bothers me.

[orestes]

I would suggest that the fact that he works for the bbc and the observer makes it impossible to talk about his views - if he has them. This is the case with a lot of journalists I am sure. Until there is some shift to the topic becoming acceptable (which may never happen) journalists will not speak out. One or two can easily be ruined. It needs to get to the point when many have to start reporting it. Some sort of catalysing event is needed, like a new ... uh, that's going in an odd direction. Seriously, we are a long way away from getting it reported. Think million man march. Thats the sort of scale we need. Either that or a court case. But don't forget that a Mississipi court convicted a man in 1999 of being part of a government conspiracy to kill Martin Luther King. When is that ever mentioned? The court case showed that James Earl Ray did not and could not have killed MLK and that governmnent agencies, including the local police, were involved. Black officers testified that they were inexplicably moved from posts protecting him, locals testified seeing a man running from an area of shrubbery that the police later destroyed, there was testimony from an army sniper team that they had been ordered to take up vantage points in the area for an unknown possible eventuality (presumably if the first guy missed they were back-up). Do not underestimate the cowardice of the media. This was all shown in court and accepted by MLK's family. There were about two american reporters there. The lie that Ray killed him is still peddled. Given that, one wonders what could possibly be a big enough event to force the media to grow some testicles.

[John White]

The media responds when it is unavoidable for the system to conclude the people do not buy the lie: becuase that is when he system goes into crisis

With regard to Palast, and also Pilger, Chomsky, even perhaps Micheal Moore, the key word is pragmatism: their a lot less use without their jobs

Just to mention, Ian (Crane) mentioned at chicago the possibility of a London 911 conference for 07/07/07...thats the kind of event we need

[xmasdale]

[James O'Neill]

It is true in a strict sense that there is no evidence (that is documents, testimony etc) that Bush knew about the attacks. On the other hand there are reasonable inferences that can be drawn from the available evidence. For example, bush's famous slip when he said he saw the first plane that crashed into the North Tower on TV before going into the schoolhouse. He probably did, given the intelligence communities capacity to film and transmit that data in real time to Bush's specially equipped motor vehicle. Another piece of evidence is the failure to respond to what Andrew Card allegedly told him, remaining in his chair reading the pet goat story looking for all the world like a rabbit in headlights. The failure of the Secret Service to respond as they are required to do is a powerful piece of circumstantial evidence. Perhaps the strongest circumstantial evidence however is Bush's behaviour subsequently. He has consistently lied in the face of the evidence and he has played a major role in obstructing a real investigation. People with nothing to fear from the truth generally do not behave in this way.
There are a numbr of very good books in which these aspects (and others) are fully explored, and I would put Paul Zarembka's recently published "Secret History of 9/11" Webster Tarpley's "9/11 Synthetic Terror" and the forthcoming volume edited by David Ray Griffin and Peter Dale Scott well to the top of any list of require reading.
James O'Neill