Final NIST Report on Collapse of Building Seven Released

9/11 building brought down by fire, not explosives, report says
By Eric Lipton
http://www.iht.com/bin/printfriendly.php?id=15520920
Thursday, August 21, 2008

GAITHERSBURG, Maryland: Fires in the 47-story office tower at the edge of the World Trade Center site undermined floor beams and critical structural columns, federal investigators concluded Thursday, as they attempted to curb still-rampant speculation that explosives or fuel fires had been responsible for the collapse of the building on Sept. 11, 2001.

The long-delayed report by engineers at the National Institute of Standards and Technology in suburban Washington is intended to solve one of the lingering questions about the 2001 attacks: Why did the building at 7 World Trade Center fall, if it was not hit by an airplane?

"Heating of floor beams and girders caused a critical support column to fail," said Shyam Sunder, the lead investigator. "Video and photographic evidence, combined with detailed computer simulations, show that neither explosives nor fuel oils played a role."

No one died when 7 World Trade Center fell, nearly seven hours after the center's twin towers collapsed. But the fall of the adjacent tower - once home to branch offices of the CIA, the Secret Service and the emergency operations center of the New York City mayor - is cited in hundreds of books and Internet sites as perhaps the most compelling evidence that an insider secretly planted explosives, intentionally destroying the tower.

It is the first skyscraper in modern times to collapse primarily as a result of a fire.

Mainstream engineers and government officials have rejected the speculation as ridiculous. But national polls have shown that perhaps as many as one in seven Americans believes that the destruction of the World Trade Center towers was an inside job.

The investigators determined that debris from the falling twin towers ignited fires on at least 10 floors at 7 World Trade Center, which was about 400 feet, or 120 meters, north of where the two tallest buildings in the city once stood. The blazes burned out of control for six hours. The city fire department, devastated by the collapse of the twin towers, abandoned its efforts to extinguish the fire and the sprinkler system was incapacitated.

The heat from these fires, the investigators said, caused the beams on the lower floors of the east side of the tower to expand, ultimately causing a girder on the 13th floor to disconnect from a critical interior column that supported the building's long floor spans. Once the 13th floor gave way, a cascade of floor failures led to the overall collapse of the tower.

Skeptics have questioned whether explosives were planted at 7 World Trade Center, as well as the twin towers and the Pentagon, as the Bush administration was seeking a justification to invade Iraq and Afghanistan. What started as a small number of such conspiracy theorists has ballooned into a movement of sorts, largely fed by Internet sites that promote the theories.

"Seven World Trade Center is one of the key points of evidence, one of the smoking guns," said Richard Gage, a California architect who is leader a group called Architects and Engineers for 9/11 Truth. "There have been much hotter, longer lasting and larger fires in skyscrapers that have not fallen down."

The engineers also examined whether diesel fuel tanks in the building - to power the mayor's emergency operations center and other government offices - might have been a fuel source that caused the collapse. The investigators determined, partly on the basis of computer models and videos of smoke coming from the tower, that the heat generated from any fuel-fed fires would not have been enough to cause the collapse.

http://www.iht.com/bin/printfriendly.php?id=15520920

Definition of "Al Qaeda"

From "Wars and Rumors of War," by Lord Stirling, www.opednews.com, August 18, 2008:

" ... The United States, and various other nations, have been in a war in Afghanistan for going on seven years now, and we still have not been able to capture the 6'6" Arab who is so powerful that, while sitting on his backside in a cave in Afghanistan, he managed to get the USAF to stand down on 9/11; to change the laws of physics (so that jet fuel melts steel instead of burning at about half the necessary temperature), oh yeah, and is so loved that he raised a terror army of Arabs to follow an organization that in Arabic slang means 'little toilet.' ... "

http://www.opednews.com/articles/Wars-and-Rumors-of-War-by-Lord-Stirling-080818-121.html

CANADA: Calls for Domestic Probe into 9/11

Drew Noftle thinks the 9/11 Commission’s 2004 report is a fraud, and that Canada should look at pulling out of Afghanistan.

By Carlito Pablo

On August 29, Drew Noftle and about a dozen other Vancouver-based 9/11 truth seekers will set out east on board a private bus, holding rallies in different cities along the way to Montreal. There they will link up with other crusaders from across the country for a march to Ottawa that will culminate on the day the world marks the seventh anniversary of the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks in the U.S.

As laid out in the 2004 report of the bipartisan 9/11 Commission created by American congressional legislation, “19 young Arabs acting at the behest of Islamist extremists headquartered in distant Afghanistan” carried out the deadliest terrorist strike ever on the U.S. mainland.

But according to Noftle, a founding member of the Vancouver 9/11 Truth Society, there has never been an official Canadian investigation into 9/11, which the 28-year-old English teacher noted is the principal reason why Canada is at war in Afghanistan.

“The main purpose of our group right now is we want to get a Canadian investigation into 9/11 in order to justify our war effort,” Noftle told the Georgia Straight. “If we don’t have a reason, we should pull out immediately.” ...
••••••••
Do you support a Canadian investigation into 9/11?

Lisa Barrett, Bowen Island councillor and antiwar activist:

“If we constantly say we want an investigation…I think we’ll get bogged down in the details of what happened in 9/11 when what happened in 9/11 is affecting us on a daily basis, and a much deeper and comprehensive analysis is required to find out what is this process of militarization and how is fear used to control the population. It’s far more important that we have a conversation about that. ... ”

STORY CONTINUES

Senator Lincoln Chafee, Republican For Obama, Wants 9/11 Reinvestigated

campaignspot.nationalreview.com

Two news items that really ought to run together:

August 13, Providence Journal: Ex-Sen. Chafee joins Republicans for Obama

August 13, Gothamist: Actor Ed Asner, former Dallas Cowboy Mark Stepnoski, and formerly famous hip hop group Arrested Development are leading a petition drive to get a referendum on New York City’s November ballot that would establish a new 9/11 investigation. If the group, called 911 Truth, can collect 30,000 signatures before September 4th, the City Council will be required to consider the measure, which calls for an investigative panel with subpoena authority.

Former Senator Mike Gravel (who would join the panel along with former senator Lincoln Chafee, Asner and 9/11 widow Lorie Van Auken) tells NY Mag that “the original commission didn’t get to the bottom of anything. We need to investigate from scratch.” Among the “Top 40” reasons the group gives to doubt the official story of 9/11, from their website:

• "Al-CIA-da?" The longstanding relationship between US intelligence networks and radical Islamists.

• Flight 93. Did the Shanksville crash occur at 10:06 (according to a seismic report) or 10:03 (according to the 9/11 Commission)? Does the Commission wish to hide what happened in the last three minutes of the flight, and if so, why?

• Pentagon Strike. How was it possible the Pentagon was hit 1 hour and 20 minutes after the attacks began? Why was there no response from Andrews Air Force Base, just 10 miles away. ...

http://campaignspot.nationalreview.com/post/?q=N2I1ZjI5MmVjZGVjNDNhM2FlNTlhMWQ5NDhkYmNhODI=

Right-Wing Documentary Blames Clintons for "Suppressing" Apocryphal 9/11 Miniseries

Also see: "Southeastern Asset Management (SAM), Longleaf Partners, the Return of Kenneth Langone - and 'THE PATH TO 9/11'"
•••••••
'Blocking the Path to 9/11,' produced by John Ziegler and Citizens United, claims that further showing of ABC's controversial project has been quashed.

By Lynn Smith
Los Angeles Times Staff Writer
August 15, 2008

In Hollywood docudramas, when the phrase "miscarriage of justice" is employed, it usually applies to the film's subject, not its creators.

But a new documentary called "Blocking the Path to 9/11," to be given a screening tonight, makes the case that former President Bill Clinton and Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton have pressured television and studio executives into quashing the DVD release of ABC's 2006 miniseries “The Path to 9/11." The privately financed documentary argues that the Clintons, who decried the original miniseries as a right-wing hatchet job, are out to salvage their political influence and legacy at the expense of free expression.

The documentary, which will be shown to a sold-out audience at the Skirball Center, was produced by former KFI-AM talk show host John Ziegler and Citizens United, a Washington, D.C.-based conservative political group that emphasizes the importance of strong families, limited government and free enterprise.

Even before its network broadcast, "The Path to 9/11" sparked fierce opposition from Democratic leaders, who called on Disney, which owns ABC, to cancel the program. While those attempts eventually failed, ABC conceded to last-minute edits to the $40-million, five-hour miniseries, which aired over two nights.

The miniseries, written by Cyrus Nowrasteh, offered a fictionalized account of the government's bureaucratic missteps that led to the terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center in 2001. The series, which earned seven Emmy nominations and drew a combined audience of about 25 million viewers, was seen as being especially critical of the Clinton administration for bungling efforts to capture or kill Osama bin Laden.

Jay Carson, a spokesman for the former president, said their camp pressed the network to edit the series but only to ensure historical accuracy. Even with the edits, the miniseries is still deeply flawed, he added.

"We felt it was too serious an issue to be put on television portrayed as fact what was in fact fiction," said Carson who was Bill Clinton's communications director at the time the miniseries aired. "We made clear that it would have been grossly irresponsible to air this movie in its original and ideologically driven form."

"Blocking the Path to 9/11" cost nearly $500,000 and is the seventh production of Citizens United, a 20-year-old nonprofit organization that has been making political films for the last four years to "offset the liberal bent of Hollywood," said David Bossie, the group's president.

Four other works are slated to premiere soon, including "Hype," an anti-Barack Obama film that will be shown in theaters near both the Democratic and Republican conventions.

Nowrasteh said he just wants "The Path to 9/11" to be shown -- on DVD or on air, but added, "I haven't gotten any indication this is ever going to be seen again."

In recent years, most popular television shows are typically released on DVD within months of their broadcast, but these decisions by networks are usually governed by the potential for profit.

Officials at ABC declined to comment about a DVD release of the original miniseries.

"They used to say money and profits dictated everything in Hollywood," said Nowrasteh, who has been working steadily on projects including an "on-again, off-again" pilot for Disney. " 'The Path to 9/11' had a huge viewership, yet it didn't mean a thing."

Nowrasteh has, however, dropped his membership in PEN, a worldwide organization of writers dedicated to fighting censorship. "You'd like to see an organization dedicated to the freedom of creative expression, right here in town, come forth," he said. "My film gets buried; they do nothing."

But PEN officials who discussed the issue internally don't see this as a censorship issue.

"From our standpoint, it had many hours of broadcast time, so it was exposed. It's not like it was stifled and no one heard it," said Adam Somers, executive director of PEN Center USA in Culver City. "In our opinion, it was a business decision by Disney. You have to assume if Disney thought they'd make money, they'd release it."

http://www.latimes.com/entertainment/news/la-et-path15-2008aug15,0,4263402.story

Video: The day before 9/11

25%+ of all Pentagon money is unaccounted for

The Pentagon receives the lion's share of the US tax payer's dollars.

36% goes to current military expenses. 18% goes to what's called "past military" which includes veteran's pensions and medical benefits.

The US spends more on its military than the following countries COMBINED: China, Russia, Britain, France, Japan, Germany, Saudi Arabia, South Korea, India, Brazil, Italy, Australia, Canada, the Netherlands, and Indonesia.

Where does the money go?

At least 25% - and some estimates are much higher - goes down a rat hole unaccounted for and never to been seen again. The above news report ran the day before September 11, 2001. The problem since then has become exponentially worse.

You can see the numbers here:
http://www.warresisters.org/pages/piechart.htm

The “Mad Scientist” Ivins, and Other 9/11 Legends

by Sander Hicks

As the sun begins to set on the tyrannical Bush/Cheney Administration, a “culprit” for the anthrax attacks has been dropped on us. The government has produced the dead body of “mad scientist” Bruce Ivins, the way a smiling cat produces a mouse carcass.

This new lone assassin story holds together quite well: as long as you look only at it, and not at any of the other grisly details about US government involvement in anthrax.

The biggest hole in the current news story is that we all are expected now to reverse seven years of thinking, and suddenly believe that the anthrax attacks had no connection to 9/11. They were the work of an American insider, a psycho killer inside the US Army’s Fort Detrick, the Maryland headquarters of tax-payer funded chemical warfare.

With all the blame on Ivins, the official story has contradicted itself.

For example, look at this:


Above is the letter that was sent to Senator Tom Daschle. Would a crazy mad scientist NOT tied to the 9/11 attacks send his anthrax letters out right after 9/11, with “09-11-01” on top, and end the cover note with “Allah is Great”? Would he be willing to contribute to the public terror and build up the effect of 9/11, resulting in the advancement of the neo-con agenda? And here’s the stickler: Would he drive seven hours to Princeton, NJ to mail the letters, because he’s obsessed with a Catholic sorority there, but at the SAME time he’s sane enough to use the 9/11 attacks as a cover story? One that keeps him safe for seven years?

Something doesn’t add up.

Remember Jerome Hauer? We New Yorkers remember him well as the guy whose idea it was to spray carcinogenic insecticides, at eye level, from small pick up trucks, in residential city neighborhoods, to combat the almost nonexistent threat of “West Nile Virus” back in the Giuliani days.

He was a NYC Government bio-terrorism expert who happened to be doing a bio-terrorism drill called “Tripod II” inside the World Trade Center on the morning of 9/11.

It turns out Hauer is old friends with Steven Hatfill, the other anthrax suspect. It turns out, they both lectured at the Council on Foreign Relations together not too many years ago on the topic of “Building a ‘BioBomb’: Terrorist Challenge.” Yep, Hatfill, who commissioned a report from the CIA on how to attack people using anthrax in the mail, back when he worked at Ft. Detrick.

According to a San Jose newspaper, Jerome Hauer told the White House to go on Cipro on the evening of 9/11/01. They did. (On the phone with me, he denied telling the White House that, for what it’s worth.)

Shortly thereafter, Hauer’s next job was at the National Institute of Health, where he was tasked with, guess what? Investigating the anthrax attacks. And who did he point the finger to? Not Ivins, not Hatfill, not any of the gang at Ft. Detrick, or S.A.I.C., Hatfill and Hauer’s old employer, the military contractor. No, Hauer blamed Al Qaeda and Bin Laden. Another Democrat reading from the neo-con hymnal.

(In the same way, when Dan Rather looked at the collapse of the towers on 9/11 and on live TV said it looked just like one of those controlled demolitions, Hauer happened to be right there alongside Rather, saying, nope, it’s clear to me right now that it was jet fuel that dropped those structures. He knew more than one page of the hymnal.)

When you hear the media go on and on about Bruce Ivins’ obsession with sorority girls, or his insanity, take it with a grain of salt. A man’s reputation is fragile and it’s the first thing attacked in a situation like this.

For example, take Dr. Graham. He was a 9/11 truth researcher who died two years ago in Louisiana. Dr. Graham was a Louisiana community activist, a Vietnam veteran, an evangelical, an inventor, and a dentist who met two of the 9/11 hijackers in his hometown of Shreveport ten months before 9/11.

He warned the FBI that he found the two young Saudis suspicious. But he was verbally abused and threatened by FBI. When 9/11 happened, these same two young Saudis were called Bin Laden’s right hand men. That’s interesting because the same two were protected by various agencies of the Federal government in multiple instances, in various cities across the USA.

In 2004, on the verge of publishing a book about his experiences with the FBI and the 9/11 terrorists, Dr. Graham was poisoned.

Here’s where the Graham story becomes a lot like the Ivins story. Graham was taken to the hospital and the FBI showed up in the ER at the same time. The FBI intimidated doctors, told them he was crazy. The cardiac surgeon abandoned Graham after that. The FBI implied Graham was suicidal to the Shreveport media. Graham died a slow death a year and a half later from the poisoning. The local media there have been reticent to cover this story, and effectively consented to let the FBI write it for them. But it’s the FBI who should be indicted for murder.

Recently, anthrax suspect Steven Hatfill was paid $6 million of your taxpayer dollars. He didn’t like being called a “person of interest” in the anthrax investigation and he sued the Department of Justice. Wow, $6 million.

I guess it pays to be friends with people like Jerome Hauer and the Council on Foreign Relations. And yet I’m still waiting for answers regarding so much about Hatfill. I wish I had all the time in the world to fully research his alleged ties to far-right fascist groups in South Africa (who used anthrax). And why did the Washington Post Magazine report that a glove box for handling toxic chemicals was found concealed at the bottom of a pond on Hatfill’s property? The $6 million doesn’t exonerate him in my eyes. It sounds like someone pulling favors.

The same Department of Justice that paid him hasn’t responded to my formal request that the Inspector General at Justice look into FBI involvement in the death of Dr. Graham. This might seem unreasonable but they themselves promised a response. They are now five months late.

I had called them from Shreveport after I had confronted the local FBI. I felt the walls closing in. The FBI didn’t deny that they had told the local media the Graham was crazy. They stuck to their story and tried to get me to believe it. But they couldn’t provide evidence. There is none.

Graham was a good man and his suspicions were right on. The FBI agent I talked to had murder and cover-up just pouring out of his body-language, his nervous twitches, and the way he expelled me and another reporter from their offices.

In the same way, we are being handed an official story about Bruce Ivins. But details are left out. Like why did the FBI have to offer Ivin’s son $2.5 million and the “sportscar of your choice” to say certain things about his dad? If Ivins was guilty, then why the need to fabricate evidence? An offer of $2.5 million sounds heavy handed, like you’re desperate to find a fall guy, dead or alive. Preferably dead, patsies are so much more agreeable that way.

Let’s go back to Jerry Hauer.

This was a guy who came up a lot at the Citizens Grand Jury convened by citizen activists in the well-organized 9/11 truth community. When I was researching my story on the Spitzer-Silverstein connection for New York Megaphone, I tracked down Hauer’s home phone number and called him on Labor Day, last fall.

My timing was good, because I think he was a little drunk. He said things slightly slurred, and was at times a bit too honest. It was all a joke to him. On the audio file you can hear people laughing in the background.

We discussed the San Diego Citizens Grand Jury Indictment, which he dismissed with insults, but couldn’t say why.

He confirmed that he worked with Hatfill at SAIC. Then, I asked if Hatfill was innocent of involvement in the anthrax attacks. He was less than direct:

HICKS: A lot of people are wondering you know, where these anthrax attacks came from.

HAUER: I have uh…NO idea.

HICKS: Do you think that Hatfill is innocent?

HAUER: I…I…think that the FBI…should not have s…said anything about Hatfield until they knew more. I do not think Steve Hatfield is a murderer. I think Steve Hatfield is very passionate but I don’t think he’s a murderer. I don’t believe he did it.

HICKS: Uhhhh. That seems to be not the most clear, specific response in the world. I’m wondering if you’re saying that Hatfill…Can you say conclusively that Hatfill was not involved in the anthrax attacks? Is that what you’re saying?

HAUER: I’m not going to get into those details.

HICKS: So you’re leaving some room for ambiguity?

HAUER: No, I’m not. I’m not going to get into those details.

HICKS: Why not?

HAUER: I just don’t want to comment on it.

I just listened to the whole mp3 again for the first time in a while. I remember the night I made the interview. And then, using 1/8 inch audio cables, I turned my phone recording tape player into something that could talk to a Mac. Using some mp3-studio shareware I downloaded, I made this mp3.

I was excited because I sort of knew that someday, the US Government and the FBI would throw up a sloppy non-answer for the anthrax attacks. And on that day, I knew that this interview would be especially relevant. I felt at the time I had contributed something to advancing the real story on anthrax.

In this audio file, notice how Jerry Hauer sort of acknowledges that the FBI is mishandling the case, and yet he still refers to them as the place to go for answers. That’s called misprision of a felony, when you know that someone is committing a crime, like covering up the five anthrax murders. But you don’t do anything about it.

Maybe because you were involved.

Audio - Hicks and Hauer:
http://www.voxpopnet.net/podcasts/hauer.mp3