posted 05-07-2004 09:51 PM            

May 7, 2004

To all:

Sometimes, to derive the truth about a situation, you have to look in the less traveled areas, sometimes doing a lot of digging to get there. When what you are looking for is something that those in positions of influence wouldn't want you to know, it seems reasonable that it would be made particularly difficult for you to get at. And, indeed, if something is particularly difficult to get at, you can conclude that it is something that someone wouldn't want you to know.

An interesting, and, apparently, largely unknown postscript to the events of September 11, 2001 was mentioned on CNN, today, Friday, May 7, 2004.

As reported by anchor Carol Lin, "Well, in the hours after the 9/11 attacks, six air traffic controllers sat down in New York and recorded their recollections of events that day. But an FAA manager destroyed the tape several months later, crushing the audiocassette in his hand and cutting the strands of tape into small pieces. Investigators don't believe anyone ever listened to the recording. And they say there's nothing to indicate the controllers had anything to hide about 9/11. They've cited FAA managers for poor judgment for allowing the tape to be destroyed."

And that, in its entirety, is it! I have never heard of this detail before, and it sounds particularly suggestive to me. Among other things, why go to such lengths to so utterly destroy the tape? If they didn't want anyone to know what was on it, why not simply tape over it? There are those who would suggest that sophisticated reproduction techniques could read previous recordings, even on retaped tape. Why not, then, simply tape over the tape several times? Nothing could likely be read through that. And, if the destruction of the tape was desired, why not simply pull it out of the cassette and burn it? Why go to the difficulty of cutting it? Was it intended that someone would be able, later, to put it back together?

Just as questionable, though, is the issue of the presentation of the incident, as little more than a blurb in the middle of a larger newscast. In fact, don't look for it under a separate heading on CNN. It is mentioned, essentially in passing, in the segment "Rumsfeld to Testify Before Congress: Should He Be Fired?; American Arrested in Connection with Madrid Train Bombings; Low Carb Diets Pricey", in the section for transcripts of the Friday, May 7, 2004 edition of CNN Live Today.

But, then, CNN doesn't necessarily get such high marks for providing material questionable to the Bush Administration in a ready way.

When Michael Moore revealed, on Lou Dobbs Tonight, the evident Halliburton-Carlyle Group cabal, working to overthrow and steal Iraq, the transcript for that episode took up to 17 days to be posted on the CNN website!

But, in fact, the entire media seems to get low grades when it comes to certain items.

Just try to find any reference to Brigadier General Mark Kimmitt's apparent faint during a news conference, a couple of weeks ago! The very day it happened, there seems no follow-up news reportage. And try using search engines to look for material on Mark Kimmitt fainting. Amid, perhaps, a dozen pages or more of references to the individual words, you might find, maybe three references to the actual event. And a couple of those are likely to be weblogs, asking if anyone else saw it happen!

The reason may be the circumstances of the incident. If you actually saw the event, you will have seen Kimmitt, in the middle of a response to a question, suddenly lose all expression from his face, his eyes slide shut, and his head loll forward, to hit the microphone. After a couple of seconds, he apparently regained himself, and was led off the dias. About 15 minutes later, it is recounted - in the few spots where it's recounted! - he came back, evidently in good shape.

To see it happen would remind someone of a puppet whose strings had been cut, dangling uselessly.

Or it would seem as if whoever was workng the microchip in Kimmitt's brain stem had turned away from the control panel for a second, and Kimmitt's systems idled!

If anyone has further information on any of these matters, it can be of interest.