Sunday, August 16, 2009

HEAVY HANDED OPPOSITION TO 9/11 TRUTH FROM MODERATOR OF GREENlEFT

Since I posted my letter to the STAR TRIBUNE, which has not been printed, on why 9/11 was an inside job on various Green discussion lists, I have encountered heavy handed opposition from Peter Robson, moderator of the Green Left discussion list. (GreenLeft_discussion@yahoogroups.com) In order to elucidate the issues in this discussion, I have reposted my letter, followed by Mr. Robson's admonition, and my reply.
Robert Halfhill



Robert Halfhill
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Phone: 612-870-8026
Email: rhalfhill@juno.com

August 9, 2009

Star Tribune
Letters Editor
425 Portland Avenue South
Minneapolis, Minnesota, 55488

Three recent Star Tribune articles -- the July 29th article in which Congressman Collin Peterson is quoted as saying "Twenty-five percent of my people believe the the Pentagon and Rumsfeld were responsible for taking the Twin Towers down," and the two articles in the August 5th Star Tribune about Jesse Ventura maintaining that
"the 9/11 terrorist attacks were hatched by conspirators unknown to the general public," and columnist Michael Smerconish's complaints about the "9/11 was an inside job" crowd -- are examples of how the truth about 9/11 keeps breaking through the media blackout.
I first realized that the government must have deliberately let the hijackers reach their targets when I remembered that the civilian air traffic control system's radar can detect immediately when a plane deviates from its assigned course and that the protocol
mandates that the civilian air traffic controllers inform the military within ten minutes of detecting a hijacking. Apologists for the government have argued that our air defenses are set up to detect an attack from outside U.S. airspace, not from the inside. However this is proven to be untrue by the fact that the military has always been able to intercept domestic hijackings within minutes.
My puzzlement upon seeing pictures of the wreckage from the World Trade Centers mostly piled up on the ground where the buildings stood rather than being scattered all over the surrounding terrain was alleviated when I recalled reading about the controlled demolition of buildings in downtown Minneapolis to bring them down on their footprints. In fact this is the only way to implode buildings instantaneously without damaging their surroundings.
All three of the experts who testified at the May 1, 2002 hearing of the House Committee On Science about the destruction of the World Trade Center buildings said that fire had never before caused a steel framed building to collapse. Yet on 9/11 we had three such collapses, including WTC 7 which had not even been struck by a plane.
Steel, even if unprotected by insulation, does not melt until it reaches a temperature of 2750 degrees Fahrenheit and does not even begin to lose its strength until it reaches 1600 degrees Fahrenheit. Hydrocarbon fires do not reach either temperature unless augmented by extra air or oxygen inside a blast furnace.
The August 25, 2007 issue of SCIENCE NEWS quotes Allen Hay, chief fire safety officer of the New York Fire Department, as saying about WTC 7, "We just expected it to burn out -- we didn't expect it to fall down." "It's the only building I know in New York City to ever collapse (strictly) from fire."
Al Qaida would not have been able to implant the explosives for controlled demolition inside the World Trade Center buildings -- only elements of the U.S. government would have been able to do that. It is significant that the Project For A New American Century
stated that the American people might need a new Pearl Harbor to wake them up. We need only ask ourselves who benefited from the crime on 9/11.Whose poll numbers shot up into the stratosphere after 9/11 and who gained the popular support to enable him to invade Afghanistan and Iraq, abolish habaeus corpus, and take, at least, the de jure power to lock anyone up for life without a trial without even telling them why they were being imprisoned? Only the Bush/Cheney Administration and the neo cons in government from the Project For A New American Century.

Robert Halfhill


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15b. Re: THEORY THAT TWO PLANE IMPACTS AND FIRE COLLAPSED THREE WTC BUILD
Posted by: "Peter Robson" campbell.robson@gmail.com rebel.hobbit
Sun Aug 9, 2009 5:41 am (PDT)


MODERATOR'S NOTE:

9/11 Truthers should find another venue please.

I have warned people before about this, but I will again.

Engineers of various stripes have given examples of how the twin Towerscould collapse through the EXTREME HEAT caused by two jet airline impacts.

It's frankly a distraction from politics, where, if you looked hard enough, you could see that the US state created the terrorist organisation that did the damage and the same US state directly killed many, many times as many people before and after for far less.

This is a list for politics not conspiracy.

Thank you

Peter R

REPLY BY ROBERT HALFHILL

IF IT WERE TRUE, WOULD IT BE A CONSPIRACY THEORY?
Mr. Robson:
If it were true, which it is, that the U.S. government murdered 3000 of it own citizens on 9/11, would it be a distraction from politics to try to expose it? Was Watergate a conspiracy theory that was a distraction from politics? Watergate incidentally refutes the traditional Marxist view that it is useless to focus on charges about government conspiracies and that we should focus instead on the injustices inherent in the social system that the government props up, the capitalist system, and particular unjust actions, such as the Vietnam or Iraq War, since you can never prove charges about governmental conspiracies. The illegal actions of the Nixon Administration during Watergate WERE proven and the exposure led to a sea change in the naivety of a large part of the American citizenry about their government. Again, was Watergate a conspiracy theory and a distraction from politics? A conspiracy is just two or more people conferring together to carry out illegal or unethical actions. Contrary to the typical liberal dismissal of "irresponsible conspiracy theories," conspiracy theories are either true or false, probable or improbable, but not irresponsible. It is just as much a category mistake to call theories about conspiracies around 9/11 irresponsible or responsible as it would be to waste time debating whether the theory of evolution is responsible or irresponsible instead of true or false.
Is it an "irresponsible conspiracy theory" and a "distraction from politics" for historians to discuss Hitler's responsibility for the Reichstag Fire to justify his assuming emergency powers and instituting his dictatorship? Is it a conspiracy theory to discuss his arranging to have men dressed as Poles attack German border posts to create support for his invading Poland?
When a defected, former Russian KBG official was poisoned with polonium, there were articles in the press stating that he planned to reveal that the Russian government blew up apartment buildings in Moscow and killed its own citizens in order to blame it on the Chechens and justify the reconquest of Chechnya. False flag attacks are a typical tactic of governments to get their citizens to support foreign wars and invasions. Are you saying the U.S. government is too good and honest to resort to such tactics?
The architect who designed the World Trade Center designed the buildings to withstand the impact of a 747. And you have still not explained how a jet fuel fire can melt steel girders when steel does not melt unless it reaches 2750 degrees Fahrenheit and hydrocarbon fires cannot even reach the 1600 degrees needed to make steel soft and ductile. And if you have ever forgotten to use a potholder and grasped the metal handle of a hot skillet on the stove, you will understand that EVEN IF part of the frame work of the World Trade Center had been exposed to a temperature over 2750 degrees, the heat would have been conducted away by the rest of the steel frame before any melting could occur. As the three experts who testified at the May 1, 2002 hearing of the House Committee On Science -- Dr. W. Gene Corley, American Society of Civil Engineers and Chair of the Building Performance Assessmant Team reviewing the WTC disaster; Dr. Arden L Bement, Jr., Director of the National Institute of Standards and Technology; and Dr. Jonathan Barnett, Professor of Fire Safety Studies at the Worcester Polytechnic Institute -- said there had NEVER BEFORE been a collapse of a protected, steel framed building because of fire. And Allen Hey, chief fire safety official of the New York City Fire Department was quoted as saying about WTC 7 in the August 25, 2007 SCIENCE NEWS, no steel framed building had ever fallen down solely because of fire prior to 9/11. But on 9/11 we had three of them. Your contention that fire even with the jet plane impact, which the buildings were designed to withstand, was responsible for the collapse requires that the laws of physics be suspended.
And opposed to the few architects you cited, there are the more than 750 architects who signed the statement of Architects For 9/11 Truth.
Robert Halfhill


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REPLY BY PETER ROBSON TO
IF IT WERE TRUE, WOULD IT BE A DISTRACTION FROM POLITICTS?

Robert,

This will be the final piece of correspondence on the list that I will allow on this issue.

Please feel free to continue the discussion with me off list if you like.

You are correct that conspiracies are either true or false. The 9/11 Truth movement's version of events at the WTC falls into the latter category.

The following is a response from Mary Katherine Ham (yes a conservative, but correct on this one, nonetheless):

"Myth No. 2: The “official story” concludes that fires set off by the jet fuel and initial explosions of the aircraft entering the World Trade Center towers caused the steel structure to weaken and eventually fail. But “no large, steel-frame, fire-protected building had ever collapsed before due solely to fire,” is how the book “Debunking 9/11 Myths”restates the idea. Theorists conclude it must have been controlled demolition that led to collapse.

Fact: Each plane was carrying thousands of pounds of jet fuel, which burns at 2,190 degrees Fahrenheit, a great deal lower than the temperature required to melt steel (2,750).

Experts and investigations conclude that steel didn’t have to melt to cause collapse. Instead, the planes entering the buildings at 750 feet per second caused significant damage. They were banked at an angle that took out multiple floors upon impact and likely stripped the fireproofing from the core load-bearing structures on those floors. Jet fuel then ignited everything inside the buildings.

Steel weakens at as low as 400 degrees. At 980, it’s at only 10 percent strength, according to industry experts. As the core steel columns weakened, load-bearing was transferred to the building’s shell. As the fires continued to burn, multiple floors weakened, sagged, and pulled on the outside
structure causing total collapse.

The jet fuel followed the path of least resistance, incidentally, which means some of it flowed down the elevator shafts from the top of the building, causing explosions and fireballs on lower floors, which conspiracy theorists sometimes cite as evidence of bombs."

The full post is here http://townhall.com/columnists/MaryKatharineHam/2007/09/11/top_5_911_truther_myt\hs_you_should_be_prepared_to_debunk
>

Secondly I'm going to post something by Ben Cohen on why he thinks (and I agree with him) that this conpsiracy theory is damaging:

"The 9/11 truth movement was enormously helpful to the Bush Administration as it provided a giant distraction from the colossal crimes they committed in Iraq and Afghanistan. If their energies had been directed in a positive way, there's a good chance Bush would have been impeached and Dick Cheney thrown in jail. Alas, the 9/11 truth movement dedicated its time to proving the U.S government tried to kill thousands of its own people in exchange for gold/political power. "

Full post here: <
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/ben-cohen/my-argument-with-the-911_b_245788.html
>

I won't allow this list to be the forum for such damaging theories.

Take it up personally with me but take it off
this list.

Peter Robson

Mon Aug 10, 2009 11:11 am

Peter Robson
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GRATUITOUS SLANDER OF 9/11 TRUTH MOVERMENT BY PETER ROBSON THROWN INTO A MODERATOR'S REPLY TO A DIFFERENT POSTER


As for the 9/11 truth poster: I believe there is something inherently racist about the 9/11 Truth myths. They argure, perhaps unconsciously, that the 3000 largely white people who died on Septmber 11 are more important than the million, largely brown people (half of which were children) who died as a result of the invasion of Iraq. The same can be said of the similar
number who died in Afghanistan.

This is the dead-to-rights war crime that Bush and his cronies can be done for. But instead 9/11 Truthers focus on a lame conspiracist version of
events. I won't tolerate it. The poster can stay, but i will delete any posts of this nature in the future.

That's my explanation.

Peter R

glw moderator




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OUTLINE OF A REPLY TO PETER ROBSON IN A LEETER TO SHITLEY JOHNSON

The debate with Peter Robson continues. He included two other posts with this which I will send.

Again I learned many interesting facts. In addition to learning that we are dishonoring the 9/11 victims -- If they were murdered, which they were, would it be dishonoring them to expose the fact that they were murdered and attempt to bring their killers to justice? -- and that steel softens and loses most of its strengh at 400 degees --he didn't say whether the degrees were fahrenheit or centrigrade, but if he meant fahrenheit, I wonder why the coal stove my parents used for heating in Kentucky during the 1940's and 50's didn't deform since the coal fire inside was hotter than 400 degrees? --and most demoralizing of all, I learned that the 9/11 truth movement distacted from the fight against Bush because of his other crimes and that if it weren't for us, Bush would have been impeached and Cheney jailed. But the one thing that stopped me from committing hari kari in utter shame was that I rembered that the movements against Bush/Cheney's other crimes, such as the Iraq War, which I also participated in, were blacked out far less and received far more press coverage than 9/11 truth. In short, the 9/11 Truth movement was minuscule in relation to the Anti War movement and did not have anywhere near the power to divert significant amounts of energy from the Anti War or other movements,

I hope I remembered to click Reply All instead of Reply in sending this to you. But if I did not, I recommend you send this to the rest of the people on the 9/11 list and urge them to sign up for the GreenLeft_discussion@yahoogroups.com list and start giving Mr. Robson hell until he throws you off the list.
Robert Halfhill
----------------------------------------------------------------------
ADDITIONAL RESEARCH BY ROBERT HALFHILL

Since jet fuel is just kerosene, I looked up the temperature at which kerosene burns in open air on WIKIPEDIA. It burns at 549.5 degrees Fahrenheit or 287.5 degrees Centigrade. This is considerably less than the 2,190 degrees Fahrenheit claimed by Mr. Robson. He hay be thinking of the temperature at which kerosene burns in a jet engine in which compressed air is forced into the combustion chamber of the jet engine. The temperature at which kerosene burns in air is relevant when we are considering the burning temperature os kerosene spilled on the floors of the World Trade Center. In fact, the clouds of dark black smoke, which indicated the presence of many uncombusted carbon particles, which indicates the fire was oxygen starved and was burning at a lower temperature than it would have burned in the open air...Since WIKIPEDIA is considered unsuited for scholarly research because of all the people with agendas loging in to rewrite posts, it would be better for me to get to the Library and consult the BRITANNICA.

549.5 degrees Fahrenheit is still above the 400 degrees Fahrenheit at which Robson claims steel begins to soften. However, http://scienceblogs.com/insolence2008/02/the_troof_hurts.php says, "Even high temperture steel loses 50% of its strength at 600 degrees Centigrade," which is 1112 degrees Fahrenheit. This is not necessarity contradictory to Robson's claim that steel BEGINS to lose its strength at 400 degrees Fahrenheit. However since the architech of the World Trade Center designed in a lot of reduncy so the building could withstand 747 impacts, etc, it is unlikely that that an oxygen starved fire burning at LESS than 549.5 degrees Fahrenheit would have been sufficient to cause the WTC to fall down, EVEN IT the steel framewood had not conduced the heat away almost as fast as it was produced. And even heat sufficient to buckle the steel girders would not have caused the three WTC buildings to implode inward and fall ontheir foot prints, let alone pulvarize the massive amounts of concrete into a fine dust.

It would be advisable for me toe check a more objective reference, such as the BRITANNICA for the temperatures at which steel loses its strength, since the science blog is an anti 9/11 Truth site. This is indicated by its calling it 9/11 Troof, whiich is a cheap way used by opponents of 9/11 Truth to mock our movement.

As for Robson charging that 9/11 Truthers are racists, he simply assumes without investigating that 9/11 Truthers think the lives of the 3,000 mostly white people killed on 9/11 are more important than the lives of the one million Iraqis killed in the war the Bush Administration used 9/11 to justify. I do not need Mr. Robson to remind me that Iraqi lives are just as important as American lives. In fact, decaades before Robson and I interacted over the Internet, and before he was even born for all I know, I recognized that the number of people who lost their lives in the American invasion of Vietnam was 3,000,000 and not 58,000, since each Vietnames life has as much value as each American kife.

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