You are generalizing.

I personally don't watch any news.

I have spent time over the past several years reading from the 9-11 truther sites.

I can take what I have read from several different sources and with using common sense determine that most of what is theorized makes no logical sense.

The CIA was behind 9-11..

Yes.. I am certain that the CIA planned an operation in which made them look like complete and total fools.

That is a very good strategy. The more incompetent we look the better off we will be as an agency.

Is that really logical?

It gave the state total power over the people did it not? If it wasn't for 9-11, there is no way in hell they'd have been able to justify all the privacy invasions and restrictions on our freedoms that they have pulled on us in the decade since. They knew this, so they created an event that they knew they could then use to get what they wanted and it has quite obviously worked.

They knew exactly what they were doing. These are no dummies.

This is not Stalin's Soviet Union.

There are no gulags or secret police demanding to see your papers when you walk down the street.

I don't like the Patriot Act. I think its a pile of crap that is typical of this incompetent government. Wait until something happens then react with some BS that won't work to fix it.

And no.. I don't believe for one second that they are smart enough to pull something like this off.

I would believe the theory if there was some massive anti government movement that threatened to topple the whole system.

There wasn't one before 9-11.

There was no urgency to use these types of extreme measures to achieve whatever.

All they achieved was reinforcing the fact that they are incompetent and basically useless..

MISSION ACCOMPLISHED

Seriously, truthers clam it was to start the war but what good have we gotten from the war? We didn't get anything. So they masterminded this awesome plan to justify a war but then epic failed at the war? Yea I think not.

This is not Stalin's Soviet Union.

There are no gulags or secret police demanding to see your papers when you walk down the street.

Seriously, truthers clam it was to start the war but what good have we gotten from the war? We didn't get anything. So they masterminded this awesome plan to justify a war but then epic failed at the war? Yea I think not.

What did they get are you kidding me? Cheneyes Halliburton got filthy rich as well as the rest of the defence industry. Instead of a peace dividend from the end of the cold war we got a bigger bill than ww2 and we are still fighting. We got screwed and now the country is broke, go figure.

Thats not the government. There are lots of defense projects that have nothing to do with that war. Please list specific defense items that were not in production before that war and are now in production to be used in that war. (specifically) Why would the government start a war to give more of the governments money to contractors? That doesn't make sense.

because they are all intertwined.

Seriously? you dont think Cheneyes former emplyer and employees at Halliburton didnt benefit from all this?

I think he still draws a check from his stock options at Halliburton.

No one associated with the people that so called "planned" the attack based on conspiracy theories benefited. Wow some company and their employees got money as a contractor? Thats totally a reason to destroy the pentagon and wtc.

I think the filthy defence contractors and industry would do about anything to keep the cash flowing.

Iamgine what this country could do with the trillions wasted in Iraq and afghanistan. what a waste of resources.

Well, this thread seems to have gotten off-topic.

It began as posting research into Zelikow and Aspen Strategies Group. The idea being that if there is global elite conspiracy that these two might bear further investigation and consideration. Zelikow provides the link to 9/11, and both have ties to the Bush and Clinton administrations. That's just an over-simplified summary.

Problem is, I don't see a smoking gun here. Personally, I'm fairly convinced that Al Qaeda carried out the 9/11 attacks. However, if someone could produce a link between ASG and Osama Bin Laden, that would raise a red flag in my mind. If someone could provide a link between Bin Laden and the CIA, that too would be cause for concern.

I think too much stress has been placed on Tony Blair's quote of Al Qaeda having links to a global network. There are muslim terrorists in the Philippines, Indonesia, India, Aghanistan, Pakistan, all throughout the Middle East and North Africa, and they were even involved in Yugoslavia during the ethnic cleansing. To my understanding, there is a fair-sized muslim population in Great Britain, France, Germany, Switzerland, Holland, Sweden, and Spain. Islamic terrorists have been known to recruit college students in Germany. We've had our own militant Islamic groups within the U.S. too. When one talks about recruitment and fundraising, Al Qaeda may have contacts within each of these populations, thereby creating a global network. Therefore, I think the ASG link proposed is rather flimsy until someone provides an actual connection between the two groups. Otherwise, it is simply speculation.

if someone could produce a link between ASG and Osama Bin Laden, that would raise a red flag in my mind.

I have never had police try to stop me while I am walking down the street. I have known people who lived for years without an ID. One of them never even had a driver's license until he was 52 years old.

It sounds to me like you are talking about racial profiling which is a separate issue altogether.

Does anyone know what Occum's Razor is? It seems like something these discussions need applied....at least on one end.

Occam's (or Ockham's) razor is a principle attributed to the 14th century logician and Franciscan friar William of Ockham. Ockham was the village in the English county of Surrey where he was born.

The principle states that "Entities should not be multiplied unnecessarily." Sometimes it is quoted in one of its original Latin forms to give it an air of authenticity:

"Pluralitas non est ponenda sine neccesitate"
"Frustra fit per plura quod potest fieri per pauciora"
"Entia non sunt multiplicanda praeter necessitatem"

In fact, only the first two of these forms appear in his surviving works and the third was written by a later scholar. William used the principle to justify many conclusions, including the statement that "God's existence cannot be deduced by reason alone." That one didn't make him very popular with the Pope.

Many scientists have adopted or reinvented Occam's Razor, as in Leibniz's "identity of observables" and Isaac Newton stated the rule: "We are to admit no more causes of natural things than such as are both true and sufficient to explain their appearances."

The most useful statement of the principle for scientists is
"when you have two competing theories that make exactly the same predictions, the simpler one is the better."

In physics we use the razor to shave away metaphysical concepts. The canonical example is Einstein's theory of special relativity compared with Lorentz's theory that ruler's contract and clocks slow down when in motion through the ether. Einstein's equations for transforming spacetime are the same as Lorentz's equations for transforming rulers and clocks, but Einstein and Poincaré recognised that the ether could not be detected according to the equations of Lorentz and Maxwell. By Occam's razor it had to be eliminated.

The principle has also been used to justify uncertainty in quantum mechanics. Heisenberg deduced his uncertainty principle from the quantum nature of light and the effect of measurement.

The most useful statement of the principle for scientists is
"when you have two competing theories that make exactly the same predictions, the simpler one is the better."

Does anyone know what Occum's Razor is? It seems like something these discussions need applied....at least on one end.