DRG. Ghandi. GOP Gloating: OBL Re-elected Bush in 2004

[Mark Gobell]

David Ray Griffin mentioned and Republicans gloating that the 2004 OBL video helped to re-elect Bush.

We're not wrong are we.

Fascinating fact:

September 11 is the 100th anniversary of the day Gandhi began his nonviolent resistance to British imperialism.

http://www.seacoastonline.com/news/exeter/09082006/opinionletters-x-co l-wall0908.html

Honoring the victims with truth and prayers

As we approach Sept. 11, there are so many reminders of what happened on that dreadful day five years ago. Movies, documentaries, commentaries, are filling our screens and airwaves. I don't intend to see movies of either Flight 93 or the Twin Towers. It's too early for me to take this in as entertainment, no matter how well-intentioned they are.

In comparison to Flight 93 or the World Trade Center events, there has been very little published or shown about the Pentagon attack. Unlike the WTC, there were apparently no videos or still photos that showed the plane hitting the Pentagon, although a surveillance video at a gas station that might have shown this was apparently removed by government officials. This lack of information has given rise to some strong conspiracy theories, which are held by people on both the left and the right. Some of their views really surprised me.

A former military pilot wrote me that he taped a CBS program showing videos taken from a helicopter of the Pentagon shortly after the crash. From scrutinizing the stills he made from the video, he could see only one hole -- not the three that would have been expected from the fuselage and for the two five-ton engines. From his long experience, he could not believe a novice pilot was capable of flying a plane that size at 500 mph at low levels, avoiding all obstacles and hitting the building at near ground-level. This man is a staunch conservative and one who has no patience with liberals. Yet he, and a number of others in the far left, do not believe the Pentagon crash story.

Other people believe all the terrorist attacks were orchestrated by our government, which, on the face of it, seems preposterous. David Ray Griffin, a professor emeritus of theology at Claremont School of Theology, is one of the leading lights of Scholars for 9/11 Truth, a nonpartisan organization "dedicated to exposing falsehoods and to revealing truths behind 9/11." Lecturer Kevin Barret of the University of Wisconsin also subscribes to the conspiracy theories of the attacks. He will devote a few hours of his class in Islam: Religion and Culture to discuss and debate some of these theories. (I don't see how that fits in with the title of his course.)

So why all these conspiracy theories around this horrific event? I think the Bush administration, in its passion for secrecy, bears some responsibility here. We have learned there are powerful people in this administration who wanted to invade Iraq, long before Sept. 11. When we did invade Afghanistan and then somehow let Osama bin Laden escape, turning our attention to Iraq, some people began to wonder.

When the rationale for invading Iraq kept changing, more people wondered. When Bush stonewalled forming a 9/11 commission until brave widows shamed him, there seemed to be no reason except a cover-up. When some Republican political operatives gloated that bin Laden's October 2004 tape helped re-elect Bush, suspicions were aroused even further. No wonder conspiracy theories abound.

None of this gives solace to those who grieve the dead and wounded on that terrible day five years ago. We must mourn them and offer strength and hope to their families (unlike Republican favorite Ann Coulter whose despicable portrayal of some 9/11 widows was never repudiated by Bush.) We must honor them with the truth as well as our prayers.

September 11 is the 100th anniversary of the day Gandhi began his nonviolent resistance to British imperialism. Our Sept. 11 events have wiped that memory from our consciousness, but we need to remember it. On Sept. 11, I will sing with my group for peace, and I will also sing for more honesty from all governments and the lessening of the need to rattle the sword.

Paula Garabedian Wall writes from her home in Fremont and sings with Voices from the Heart. She can be reached at pgwall@juno.com.