Chomsky, the Left-gatekeepers, and 9/11, page 1

I had never even really thought about this, until some comments by SO on a past podcast sent me on a mini-quest.

Noam Chomsky, leading spokesperson of the left, discourages research into 9/11. Why?

I had previously noticed that Chomsky rarely mentioned the Federal Reserve scam, but since he thoroughly thrashes the World Bank and the IMF in his lectures, I let it go and forgot about it. But now, his stance on 9/11 is ringing a few conspiratorial alarm bells.

If the left spends its time on this, that's the end of the left, in my opinion: the mainstream would be utterly delighted. It is highly likely that nothing significant will be found. And if -- which I very greatly doubt -- something is found that would quickly send everyone in Washington to the death chamber, the left is unlikely to emerge triumphant.

www.rense.com...

Is Chomsky really saying not to spend time on anomalies surrounding an event as important as 9/11? (note: there are no sources listed for this quote)

Could Chomsky really be high-level disinformation agent?

Since the 1960's, Chomsky has acted as the premier Left gatekeeper, using his elevated status to cover up the major crimes of the global elite.

www.rense.com...

The first book I read following 9/11 was Chomsky’s 9/11, which came out amazingly quickly following the events. Chomsky mainly focused on the US foreign policies which led to the attacks. This point is of great importance of course, but NORAD standing down is also important. Chomsky dismisses it…

Whether NORAD followed SOP, I have no idea, not having investigated the matter. I think the case is very weak, and diverts people from the really serious issues.

www.rense.com...

Again, he is suggesting not to research in a key area.

Later, a number of leftist intellectuals seemingly coordinated against the truth movement…

In the spring of 2002, when some of the material documenting official foreknowledge of 9/11 began to surface in the corporate media, The Nation, Z and Fairness and Accuracy in Reporting attacked independent investigators who are piecing together the evidence, instead of helping those who have done the best work.

www.911review.com...

questionsquestions attempts to follow the money…
www.questionsquestions.net...

Leftist funding flow chart


Full size image:
[img] www.questionsquestions.net...[/img]

It appears Chomsky might be receiving funds from Skull and Bonesmen and Rockefellers via FAIR. (On a side note, wouldn’t his MIT salary and proceeds from his book sales provide the necessary funds?)


the left replies to conspiracy theorists…

Stephen R. Shalom & Michael Albert of Zmag magazine explain in this article why the 9/11 conspiracies are not credible.

The article mostly focuses on the “whodunits”, not the technical aspects discussed everyday here on ATS.

The World Trade Center was not destroyed by planes, but by explosives

The planes were not hijacked, but commandeered by NORAD (the North American Aerospace Defense Command)

The hijackers were actually working for the U.S. government

U.S. intelligence knew about the plot, but did nothing so as to cause massive deaths and thereby mobilize public support for a war on terrorism that would benefit the government

The plot was organized by the Mossad

The Mossad knew about the plot, but did nothing, hoping that the massive deaths would mobilize public support for Israel’s war on the Palestinians

www.zmag.org...

Notice the first conspiracy they bring up, I for one find this theory very important, The World Trade Center was not destroyed by planes, but by explosives , they fail to address it in their article. A disinfo technique?

Finally, my question for fellow ATSers, (and hopefully the subject of this thread)

In your opinion(s), are Chomsky and other leftist intellectuals deliberately attempting to discredit the 9/11 truth movement?

"The evidence [9/11] has been produced, in my opinion, essentially is worthless. Even if it's true, who cares. Doesn't have any significance. It's like this heavy energy put out trying to find who killed John F. Kennedy. Who knows. Who cares. Plenty of people get killed all the time. Why does it matter if one of them happened to be John F. Kennedy?"

youtube.com...

The killing of JFK does not matter. If 9/11 conspiracy is true, does not matter. Chomsky does not care. Noam Chomsky is a shill.

Here are more comments on this thread.
www.abovetopsecret.com...

Does Chomsky mention other false-flag operations?

He has written extensively on Vietnam/Laos/Cambodia, does he ever talk about the Tonkin Gulf Incident?

About being a Zionist stooge…

He has further defined himself as a Zionist; although, he notes that his definition of Zionism is considered by most to be anti-Zionism these days, the result of what he perceives to have been a shift (since the 1940s) in the meaning of Zionism (Chomsky Reader)

en.wikipedia.org...

He explains this a bit more here…

I was a Zionist activist in my youth. For me, Zionism meant opposition to a Jewish state. The Zionist movement did not come out officially in favor of a Jewish state until 1942. Before this it was merely the intent of the Zionist leadership. The Zionist movement for a long time stood against the establishment of a Jewish state because such a state would be discriminatory and racist.

www.chomsky.info...

I remember reading something Chomsky said about Israel. I’m not sure exactly, but he said something to the effect that Israel couldn’t just simply pull away from the Gaza strip because they needed it as a water source, something he said was rarely mention in the endless Israel debates.

IMHO, he is not a Zionists tool. He just never focuses on individuals or their religions; rather he focuses the institutions that make their wrongdoings possible. He doesn’t want scapegoats or heads on a platter, he seeks actual changes.

Dear Everybody:

If Noam Chomsky indeed thinks the truth about 9-11 isn’t worth knowing, then he is either A) an imbecile , B) a Zionist, C) part of the cabal behind 9-11 or D) a wimp unable to face the truth. I’ll give him the benefit of the doubt and assume that he is simply not capable of dealing with the scenario that 9-11 was an inside job. Most people fall into this category. They would have a mental “meltdown” if they had to internalize reality. It would fry their circuits. It’s simply too much (shocking information) for most to handle — they need to block it out to be able to function in their day-to-day lives.

But there is no way around it, 9-11 needs to be understood, however uncomfortable the actuality may be. For the past five years we have been basing our politics on this event, and gone to war because of it. No matter how painful, we are morally obligated to know what we are doing and why.

Here is a really good article written by Jon Korein on the importance of comprehending 9-11: nomoregames.net...

Greetings,
The Wizard In The Woods

The claim that the Air Force “owns” MIT appears to be largely false, (or at least inaccurate) although the Pentagon is a major contributor to the privately owned institution.

Chomsky explains...

It affects research, strikingly. I’m sure you see it here, but at a research institution like where I am, MIT, you see it pretty clearly. As funding shifts from public entities, including, incidentally, the Pentagon, in fact, primarily the Pentagon, which has long understood that its domestic role is to be a cover for transferring public funds into private profit.

www.zmag.org...

I doubt the Air Force endows MIT’s linguist department much. (judging from the freely available course material.)

CN23 - first, may I say congratulations on the web comic. Nice one. I particularly enjoyed the stuff about ATS. I have my own suspicions about this site - it's too big a draw not to get some attention from the disinfo merchants.

Anyway, back to the topic. I've been mulling this over, and looking more closely at links which before I'd just skimmed.

The first thing to establish is, what is a "gatekeeper"? How shall we define it?

I think a useful definition is, "someone who consciously frames an argument in such a way as to exclude discourse that is looked upon unfavourably by the elite, however defined."

They must be conscious of what they're doing. They must therefore deliberately use disinformation techniques to divert attention from the arguments to be dismissed. And they must be "controlled", however lightly, by the elites whom they protect.

Now, for various reasons, I don't believe Chomsky falls into this category, despite his dubious protestations on the 9/11 issue. I think it's entirely possible that these statements which, taken in isolation, may seem strange, in fact form part of a consistent pattern of Chomsky's thinking. In other words, he just looks at the situation differently. But I've got something slightly more interesting to contribute to the debate than a simple defence of Chomsky.

I've been looking at this Zmag article you referenced earlier in the thread. I am looking at the authors with somewhat new eyes now, because I find the writing dishonest. What follows is some of my thoughts on this piece.

Now I like Zmag in many respects. I like the facts it brings up, the humanity it brings to bear on political issues, I like the tone of dissent it brings to bear. I do, however, find it somewhat ideologically driven and worthy (therefore dull at times) in nature. These are, however, minor criticisms and I would be saddened indeed if it disappeared from the news-stands altogether.

The article concerned, on the other hand, is, to me, somewhat out of the ordinary for Zmag. The smug and dismissive tone of the opening paragraphs is somewhat unusual, to me, but it is how the argument is developed that I find disturbing.

None of the “conspiracies” being talked about strike us as remotely interesting, much less plausible. Neither of us would ordinarily have spent even five minutes exploring conspiracy claims because they fly in the face of our broad understanding of how the world works. But such theories seem to have some popularity among progressives, so they must be addressed.

This is the statement of an ideologue. "Our broad understanding of how the world works" is correct; therefore, anything that contradicts it can be easily dismissed. Still, some idiots believe this rubbish, so let's have a look at it... as long as we can use tongs, gloves and a nosepeg.

They start out with defining a conspiracy.

The most common definition of a conspiracy is two or more people secretly planning a criminal act. Examples of conspiracy theories include the belief that: (1) JFK was assassinated by rogue CIA elements attempting to ward off unwanted liberalism; (2) negotiations between the United States government and Iran to release American hostages in then-President Carter’s last year failed because Reagan’s aides secretly struck a deal with Iran to hold the hostages until after the election; (3) 9-11 was a plot by a rogue CIA/Mossad team cunningly engineering rightward alignments in the United States and/or Israel.

The examples they choose, and the way they phrase each one, is interesting. I had personally, in all my years reading around the subject, heard that the motive of JFK's assassins was to "ward off unwanted liberalism". Far more pertinent motives have been put forward, though to enumerate them fully is beyond the scope of this post and thread. Should we excuse this misstatement on the grounds that the authors have such disdain for their subject matter that they cannot be bothered to research it correctly? In my opinion, we should not.

Now I thought the second example they chose was what actually happened. I cannot specifically remember, but I might even have picked up this idea from Chomsky. I don't have time to research it right now... but it's an odd one to choose, frankly. We also have the JFK hit standing alone, rather than, as it should be, put into the context of the MLK and RFK assassinations.

Then, the third example is something of a misdirection of the 9/11 truth arguments, but we shall come to this in more detail later on.

The overall impression given is that Conspiracy Theorists see conspiracies everywhere and, well, they're nut-jobs. Look at why they think these things happen! Ridiculous!.

The fact that distortions of these ideas and of the people who hold them are necessary to prop up the central thesis of the piece is not a good sign. The next paragraph contains an extraordinary assertion:

A broader definition of conspiracy includes misleading, but still legal acts. For example, even if the U.S. president and his top aides could legally perpetrate the secret 9-11 attacks, doing so would still be a conspiracy.

Am I alone in finding the bolded sentence spectacularly illogical and astonishing in a think-piece in a respected magazine? Under what circumstances would perpetrating such attacks be legal? What kind of bizarro-world would we have to be living in?

The paragraph continues with something that even tops that last sentence:

Legal assassination disguised as an accident or secretly pinned on someone else might also fit the second definition because it’s not just secret, but actively deceptive. But no definition of conspiracy, however broad, includes everything secret.

HUH? Assassinations are never legal. True, Israel regularly assassinates inconvenient Arab politicians, and Pinochet was responsible for thousands of deaths... but in this small, busybody world, what they do is illegal somewhere. I mean, even Saint Donald of Rumsfeld is wanted in Germany... oh! the humanity!

But the point we are meant to grasp is that "no definition of conspiracy, however broad, includes everything secret."

My point would be that the legal, criminal definition of conspiracy would be entirely sufficient to define most "conspiracy theories." JFK: conspiracy to murder, likewise 9/11. Florida 2000: conspiracy to pervert the electoral process. Here's one: in defiance of antitrust laws, California power suppliers get together in secret to manipulate the power markets. Brown-outs ensue. The Governor of California, Gray Davis, and his deputy, Cruz Bustamente, sue. The power companies meet in secret with Arnie and back his candidacy in the recall election. Arnie wins: the lawsuit goes away.

Conspiracy to pervert the course of justice.

My argument is that almost all conspiracies (racking brain, can't think of exceptions, but covering myself just in case) can be defined in terms of simple criminal activity and treated as such. But the authors' purpose is different. Here comes the straw man.

People often secretly get together and use their power to achieve some result. But if this is a conspiracy, then virtually everything is a conspiracy... Every business decision, every editorial decision, every university department closed session would be a conspiracy. Conspiracy would be ubiquitous and, therefore, vacuous. Even in the broadest definition, there must be some significant deviation from normal operations. No one would call all the secret acts of national security agencies conspiracies, as they are sufficiently normal and expected.

Say WHAT? Er... when the national security agencies do something in secret, all too often it's because they'd get into bloody hot water if it came out. Like torture people in a network of secret jails strung out across Europe. Like hire al-Qaeda to assassinate Colonel Qadaffi. Like overthrow a government in a sovereign country. I mean, sponsoring coups is what the CIA does for a living - no serious student of the history denies that!

But the message of the paragraph is clear. "Conspiracy theorists" see conspiracies everywhere. They're nuts.

There then follows a spectacular example of eating your cake and having it too, which we know in the real world is impossible. However, in bizarro-disinfo world, it's necessary and good. We're going to find out what makes conspiracy theorists tick...

Conspiracies do happen. But a conspiracy theorist is not someone who simply accepts the truth of some specific conspiracies. Rather, a conspiracy theorist is someone with a certain general methodological approach and set of priorities.

Conspiracy theorists begin their quest for understanding events by looking for groups acting secretly either in a rogue fashion, or to fool the public. Conspiracy theorists focus on conspirators’ methods, motives, and effects. Personalities, personal timetables, secret meetings, and conspirators’ joint actions claim priority attention. Institutional relations largely drop from view. Thus, rather than seeking a basic understanding of U.S. foreign policy, conspiracy theorists ask, “Did Clinton launch missiles at Sudan in 1998 in order to divert attention from his Monica troubles?” Rather than examining the shared policies of Kennedy and Lyndon Johnson vis-à-vis Southeast Asia, as an examination of institutions would emphasize, they ask, “Did a group within the CIA kill Kennedy to prevent his withdrawing from Vietnam?”

This establishes two points: one, conspiracy theorists have incorrect understanding of the structural nature of things, and two, because of that, they get all personal about stuff and look for evidence to support their wackjob theories.

Continues...

(continued from previous post).

To recap... I concluded my last post

This establishes two points: one, conspiracy theorists have incorrect understanding of the structural nature of things, and two, because of that, they get all personal about stuff and look for evidence to support their wackjob theories.

I find this rather sweeping.

Would the authors include in this definition all the people, like the 9/11 widows for example, who just want answers to some tough questions and have been, quite egregiously, denied? Not everyone who doubts the validity of the official story of 9/11 has jumped to specific, firm conclusions, myself included. I have tentative ideas, but each new piece of evidence can force a reassessment of those ideas. For myself, and for many others, it's more like an effort to put together some sort of coherent narrative given a huge and confusing set of facts. But this is driven by the incongruity of particular facts.

It's also driven by an ideological view that institutional relations, rather than personal ones, are what count. This is a whole other ball game but I would have thought that each situation would involve a mixture of the two levels. The authors would have us believe that replacing any of the individuals in a government would lead to the same results in the end because of the structural pressures brought to bear on those individuals. I would argue that the nature of the individuals is also very important, perhaps overridingly so. This, however, is a philosophical difference and not an excuse to pour scorn on someone's argument.

There are, of course, complicating borderline cases. A person trying to discover a possible CIA role in 9-11 could be trying to verify a larger (incorrect) institutional theory—that the U.S. government is run by the CIA.

Again, this theory is not one that I've ever seen, anywhere. Correctly stated, it's far more plausible: the CIA has achieved a measure of autonomy from the US government, and is not, itself, a monolithic institution. Internal power politics coupled with compartmentalisation have produced an organisation rife with internal fiefdoms. These people are not interested in "running the US government". They have their own values and goals, which may be personal or ideological. As long as they can get their funding, they're happy... even if that funding comes from dealing in drugs.

But at last... we're coming to the reason why conspiracy theorists are nuts:

In a famous study in the 1950s, researcher Leon Festinger wanted to find out how a religious sect would react when its prophecy that “the Earth was going to come to an end” failed to come true on the predicted date. When the fateful date arrived and nothing happened, did the believers cease to be believers? No. Instead they asserted that God had given humankind one more chance and they maintained the rest of their belief system intact.

...To the conspiratorial mind, if evidence emerges contradicting a claimed conspiracy, it was planted. If further evidence shows that the first evidence was authentic, then that, too, was planted.

Equating the efforts of serious researchers to gather it together and assemble it into some sort of logical narrative with the results of an investigation of religious beliefs is, simply, dishonest.

The last paragraph also ignores the fact that the CIA, for example, has a sizeable budget for disinformation. Disinformation and psychological warfare are used against the US public and that of other nations on a regular basis. Therefore sifting evidence for disinformation is vital if a credible picture of what happened that day is ever to emerge. There are, undoubtedly, occasions where evidence has been planted. Websites like 9/11 Myths are just as apt to suppress inconvenient evidence, or to try to present misleading arguments. The website just linked, for example, spends a long time "debunking" the myth that Mohammed Atta's passport could not have survived the plane's impact and fireball... but then, whoops! shows that according to the 9/11 Commission's own report, an unidentified, be-suited male handed the passport to a policeman shortly after the impact. This is hardly proof that Atta was on the plane, and considering the vast amount of peculiar behaviour that day, actually supports the "conspiracy theory" end of things.

We then get a list of "specific" conspiracy theories. These are presented without comment, and are presumably meant to be so outlandish that they are unworthy of rational discussion. This, handily, prevents the presentation of information that might support some of these theories. Now, if I were trying to make the "conspiracy theory" angle seem ludicrous to someone who knew nothing about the subject, I could have definitely put together a better list, so perhaps the authors are arguing from ignorance. On the other hand, by presenting them as prima facie outlandish, the authors plant the idea in the brain of the casual reader that these theories can simply be dismissed out of hand. This could be why the first on the list is the claim - more properly expressed - that the towers were taken down by controlled demolition.

We are then posed the question, "don't lies and cover-ups point to a conspiracy?" Immediately comes the fair point that in the wake of a big intelligence failure (the official version) would come an orgy of ass-covering. This is absolutely true. However, the authors go further...

On the contrary, if events were as carefully choreographed as the conspiracy theorists claim, the conspirators would have been better at coordinating their stories.

Prominent conspiracy theorists Illarion Bykov and Jared Israel say: “It appears that Cheney may have blurted out the crucial fact that the Secret Service had an open line to the FAA, then realized he was talking too much and stopped before completing his sentence. But if he did indeed talk too much, he also stopped talking too late.”

So we’re to believe that Vice President Cheney, having just successfully plotted to incinerate thousands of Americans, didn’t prepare his cover story well enough to avoid blurting out “too much.”

This is not a particularly outlandish belief. It has been a staple of the detective novel and detective lore since such things began. The criminal "always makes a mistake" or "returns to the scene of the crime". "Leakage" is a commonplace term to describe the counterproductive involuntary activities that occur when someone has done something they know, on some level, is wrong. But I'm getting too psychological here: it's actually quite simple. The argument here is reversed - the authors expect people who would pull off such a conspiratorial endeavour to never make mistakes... but they also level the criticism that an incompetent govnernment could never pull off such a plan to perfection. Therefore, "conspiracy theorists" (how I'm growing to hate that term) are damned if they do, damned if they don't. The plotters are so clever they wouldn't make stupid mistakes like that, or they're too stupid to pull off a plot like that. No happy medium allowed, just two mutually exclusive categories.

That's intellectual dishonesty and deeply flawed logic. More follows:

Conspiracy theorists often endow their enemies (whether the CIA or capitalists or Jews or Freemasons) with immense powers and near infallibility. To them, nothing is accidental or unintended. Since Bush and Co. must have received evidence of an impending terror strike, say the conspiracy theorists, and would not have overlooked such evidence if they didn’t want such a strike to occur, then they must have been in on it. But consider these indications of less than infallible perception: (1) The INS sent a student visa to two of the hijackers six months after 9-11. (2) Richard Reid, the shoe bomber, was allowed on a plane despite his suspicious behavior and an FAA advisory to watch for shoe bombs. (3) Reporters tested security at airports post-9-11 and were able to get weapons past checkpoints. Incompetence does occur.

Interesting. How did the FAA know about the shoe bombs? I hadn't heard that one. Even though I'm suspicious of most things cited in this article that I haven't previously heard about, I'm inclined to believe this one, simply because its presence actually weakens the authors' argument.

Firstly, I have yet to come across any investigative report that suggests that "nothing is accidental or unintended". This is simply ludicrous. Nor is anyone suggesting that any of the people involved have super-powers. In fact, the opposite is true: the official myth asks us to believe that Hani Hanjour, the alleged pilot of the plane that hit the Pentagon, executed manoevres that a seasoned pilot would have found testing, despite the fact that he was consistently described as hopelessly incompetent by his instructors, and that on a small light plane, let alone a large commercial jet.

Secondly, no-one is pretending that the US government, or even any of its agencies, is a perfectly functioning monolith. Quite the opposite. The fact remains that FBI agents who were looking into the hijackers were ignored and even told to drop their investigations. I am not about to go into the myriad circumstantial evidence... but suffice it to say that rather than posit conspirators with super-powers, I would say that one of the main characteristics of those people who become interested in this stuff is a sense of the limits of coincidence. There's just too much smoke for there not to be a fire in there somewhere.

To be continued....

[edit on 12-12-2006 by rich23]

Wow!! rich23, I can see why your avatar bar got red so quickly!

Excellent information and clear reasoning! It does appear Mr. Shalom & Mr. Albert wrote with their emotions rather than logically.

After reading your posts, I’m also convinced that Shalom and Albert have falling victim to their own ideologies. As you so aptly pointed out, their article uses many disinformationist tactics.

I also wonder why they constantly insist on having Bush in the loop. Whether it’s Daddy pulling the strings or the ghost of Colonel House doesn’t really matter, it’s pretty obvious that Bush wasn’t privy to specifics of the 9/11 Operation. However, I’d like to point out that The Pet Goat is indeed a page turner and must have been extremely difficult for Mr. Bush to put down. What will happen to the misbehaving goat? …

Spoiler warning: Plot and/or ending details follow.

"The Pet Goat" is the story of a girl's pet goat which eats everything in its path. The girl's parents want to get rid of the goat, but she defends it. In the end, the goat becomes a hero when it butts a car robber into submission. A sample passage:

A girl got a pet goat. She liked to go running with her pet goat. She played with her goat in her house. She played with her goat in her yard. But the goat did some things that made the girl's dad mad. The goat ate things. He ate cans and he ate canes. He ate pans and he ate panes. He even ate capes and caps.

Spoilers end here.

en.wikipedia.org...

I found something fresher regarding 9/11 and Chomsky.( 2006-10-06, although not as riveting as the Pet Goat )

He pretty much reiterates that researchers should focus on other subjects. This is an exchange with ZNet Sustainers who seem to be more conspiracy-minded than previous Chomsky interviewers. They also appear to be more knowledgeable of conspiracy theories in general.

Here are 2 particularly interesting ones:

ZNet Sustainer: Considering the long history of false flag operations to wrongly justify wars, our most recent precedent being WMD in Iraq, The Gulf of Tonkin in Vietnam, going back much further to Pearl Harbor (FDR knowingly allowing the Japanese to bomb Pearl Harbor – which is different from false flag operations), to the 1898 Spanish-American War, to the 1846 Mexican-American War, to Andrew Jackson’s seizing of Seminole land in 1812 (aka Florida).

Noam Chomsky: The concept of "false flag operation" is not a very serious one, in my opinion. None of the examples you describe, or any other in history, has even a remote resemblance to the alleged 9/11 conspiracy. I'd suggest that you look at each of them carefully.

blogs.zmag.org...

and…

ZNet Sustainer: Considering that in the US there are stage-managed elections, public relations propaganda wars, and a military-industrial-education-prison-etc. complex, does something like this sound far-fetched?

Noam Chomsky: I think that's the wrong way to look at it. Everything you mention goes back far before 9/11, and hasn't changed that much since. More evidence that the 9/11 movement is diverting energy and attention away from far more serious crimes -- and in this case crimes that are quite real and easily demonstrated.

[edit on 13/12/06 by ConspiracyNut23]

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