Peter Dale Scott's "The Road to 9/11"

[Brannagyn]

You lack the evidence as does Dale's book. Complete fiction; like the Da Vinci Code. Stuff to suck you in to pure fictional implications of false conclusion he lets you take the leap to pure stupid ideas.

The author counts on ignorance of 9/11 and lack of thinking to sell his book of false information.

This is a thread specifically giving Beachnut an opportunity to alter my opinion of him. I'm happy for others to dive in with critiques of the book but I'd first like to see Beachnut's views on it given his damning comments above. From the intensity he clearly knows the subject well and can quickly point out the entire range of falsehoods that render it complete fiction.

I'm honestly curious about what flaws might exist there as Dale Scott strikes me, personally, as someone sincerely interested in clarification of complicated and unclear issues rather than someone pushing an agenda.

For those of you who may not be aware the central thesis of the book is that enough evidence exists to warrant much closer investigation into the actions of major figures in the administration during the days around and on 9/11, specifically that Dick Cheny for one should be required to testify under oath about those events and other related ones such as his Energy Task Force meetings. Please don't ask me to lay out specific arguments made, my time is limited (severely) and more people than Beachnut have claimed complete familiarity with its contents.

A large part of the book is also a history of US government involvement in international affairs and presumably Beachnut will also be addressing the entire list of inaccuracies in his dismissal of this work of "complete fiction". The introduction itself might be as good a place as any to start and it only as 122 sourced references. I'll check back in a little while to see how many have been identified by Beachnut as "fictition" and "false information".

[funk de fino]

Please don't ask me to lay out specific arguments made, my time is limited (severely) and more people than Beachnut have claimed complete familiarity with its contents.

Theres your problem, right there.

One claim at a time would not have been too difficult would it? It should stand or fall on the evidence presented.

[T.A.M.]

Whether his book is full of lies or not, only requires to go to his footnote section (usually located in the back of the book) and where possible track down his source documents for accuracy.

I personally have not read his book, but what claims is he making that are contraversial?

TAM:)

[A W Smith]

<snip> Other early proponents of investigation (and far more central than whatever anti-semite fringe existed) included Peter Dale Scott, Nafeez Ahmed and Michel Chossudovsky, none of whom seem to come up much here. There was also Michael Ruppert and the good ol’ whipping boy Alex Jones. I’m sure some are slipping my mind and that those more closely involved could name many more, suffice to say implying that the roots of the ‘truth movement’ were among ‘prominent anti-semites’ without pointing out the much more central figures is either ignorant or deliberately deceitful. Your choice which.

So why did it take almost 6 years for Peter Dale Scott to put pen to paper? The Road to 9/11 was not published untill 2007 (http://books.google.com/books?id=fhLVHAAACAAJ&dq=isbn:0520237730).

It is clear he has had an agenda going back to 1972.
from
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peter_Dale_Scott





The War Conspiracy (1972, out of print)
The Assassinations: Dallas and Beyond (in collaboration, 1976, ISBN 0-394-40107-7 (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:BookSources/0394401077))
Crime and Cover-Up: The CIA, the Mafia, and the Dallas-Watergate Connection (1977, ISBN 0-87867-066-1 (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:BookSources/0878670661))
The Iran-Contra Connection (in collaboration, 1987, ISBN 0-89608-291-1 (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:BookSources/0896082911))
Cocaine Politics: Drugs, Armies, and the CIA in Central America (in collaboration, 1991, 1998, ISBN 0-520-21449-8 (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:BookSources/0520214498))
Deep Politics and the Death of JFK (1993, 1996, ISBN 0-520-20519-7 (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:BookSources/0520205197))
Deep Politics Two: Essays on Oswald, Mexico, and Cuba (1995, 2007, ISBN 0-9790-0994-4 (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:BookSources/0979009944))
Drugs Oil and War (2003, ISBN 0-7425-2522-8 (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:BookSources/0742525228))
The Road to 9/11: Wealth, Empire and the Future of America (September 2007, ISBN 0-5202-3773-0 (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:BookSources/0520237730))


He retreats from using the word "conspiracy" and instead uses his own buzzword "deep politics" to avoid the negative connotation.


I only had to watch this video clip of Scott and Rupert for a little while to hear the geezer poet spout the same old foggy unfalsifiable assertions we have heard for years.


-7204908005306311102

[beachnut]

The book makes the reader imagine, and then adopt fictional conclusions. He leads you to fictional conclusions.

I could just crucify the book and the author outright with a bad omen!
This book, which combines extensive research, perceptive analysis, and a fascinating narrative, will surely be considered Scott's magnum opus."--David Ray Griffin, author of Debunking 9/11 Debunking This one endorsement, says the book total woo, endorsed by the top dolt hearsay man on 9/11 issues. But I will not do that, the book is self critiquing.

You go first -
Please name a conclusion you came to about 9/11 from this grand book? A book I bet is in the Political section at your local library.

[16.5]

specifically that Dick Cheny for one should be required to testify under oath about those events and other related ones such as his Energy Task Force meetings.
Please don't ask me to lay out specific arguments made, my time is limited (severely) and more people than Beachnut have claimed complete familiarity with its contents."

Yeah, lets precipitate a Constitutional Crisis over executive privilege and separation of powers because some douchenozzle Truther wants to sell some books!

FAIL

[beachnut]

So why did it take almost 6 years for Peter Dale Scott to put pen to paper? The Road to 9/11 was not published untill 2007 (http://books.google.com/books?id=fhLVHAAACAAJ&dq=isbn:0520237730).

It is clear he has had an agenda going back to 1972.
from
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peter_Dale_Scott

He retreats from using the word "conspiracy" and instead uses his own buzzword "deep politics" to avoid the negative connotation.


I only had to watch this video clip of Scott and Rupert for a little while to hear the geezer poet spout the same old foggy unfalsifiable assertions we have heard for years.


-7204908005306311102
I think he fell asleep writing his book. He even has a CT for McVeigh; how cute. He sees CTs, he sees them everywhere; he has no clue.

I can not wait for Brannagyn to tell me what he concluded from the book that is next to the crapper at his house and in the crapper at my house.

[beachnut]

I'm honestly curious about what flaws might exist there as Dale Scott strikes me, personally, as someone sincerely interested in clarification of complicated and unclear issues rather than someone pushing an agenda.

What can I say, I thought this was funny; I am still amused. Be careful this thread could end up in the comedy subforum.

The other posts are dead on

[MikeW]

Flaws in the book? Let's take the chapter on "The 9/11 Report and Vice President Cheney".

When he comes to talk of the "many serious problems, first raised by members of the Family Steering Committee, that the 9/11 Commission Report, like the Kean-Hamilton book, simply failed to address", the following example he provides is... the "hijackers are still alive" story. By way of support he selectively quotes Robert Mueller from September 20th saying the identities were in doubt, and doesn't tell his readers of Mueller's later statement that the questions had been cleared up.

His next example is the usual "why didn't the 9/11 Commission discuss the collapse of WTC7", hardly a surprise as they weren't set up to do that and no-one on the Commission was qualified.

He says Dick Cheney was the source for the order grounding planes and the shoot-down order, but in my view fails by a very long way to prove that.

He joins David Ray Griffin in pretending that Cheney saying "when I arrived [at the PEOC] within a short order, we had word that the Pentagon's been hit" means he arrived in the PEOC before the Pentagon was hit.

He places heavy reliance on Richard Clarke's timeline, despite its obvious flaws (talking to Myers in the NMCC when he was actually with Max Cleland, for instance).

He places very heavy reliance on Mineta's testimony, despite its even worse problems (as discussed here many times).

He seems to think the "phantom flight 11" issue wasn't discussed in the 9/11 Commission report.

He assumes, I think, that the phantom flight 11 was flight 77? I need to read it again, might be wrong there. Anyway, he mixes it up with flight 77 in a confusing way and seems to imply that it's the plane Mineta says Cheney and "the young man" spoke of later. Nafeez Ahmed does something similar, using the phantom account to pretend people were tracking Flight 77 on radar long before the Commission said, but that's incorrect. These are different reports from different sources and the phantom wasn't on radar.

He says the June 2001 intercept rule changes placed a new requirement forcing approval by Rumsfeld before intercepts could be launched. Wrong.

He reports Mike Ruppert's claim that Cheney was responsible for this through the Office of National Preparedness, and impressively says this hasn't been challenged. This is just the claim that Cheney was "in charge of NORAD" on 9/11 and there's not a jot of evidence to support that.

That's not an exhaustive list, but I'm busy so it'll have to do for now.

[Brannagyn]

Appreciate the comments Mike. Give me chance to look into them and get back to you. Remember he isnt trying to use the book to prove the guilt of a particular party but simply to show that there are enough unresolved issues or unclear areas to justify renewed and more far-reaching investigation.

In the meantime, as you seem to have been the first other person in the thread to have read the book, how would you characterize the 11 chapters that preceeded this? Would you say "Complete fiction" is accurate?

Thanks again, I am in all honesty curious to see an intelligent opposing view to Scott's.

Theres your problem, right there. One claim at a time would not have been too difficult would it? It should stand or fall on the evidence presented.

As you can see, people who've actually read the book are more than capable of commenting on it.

So why did it take almost 6 years for Peter Dale Scott to put pen to paper?

The simple answer is for you to go out, buy a copy of the book....actually no need, just stand for a few minutes in your nearest bookshop and read the very first sentence of the book.

It is clear he has had an agenda going back to 1972.

An "agenda"? Sounds sinsiter. Care to clarify?

He retreats from using the word "conspiracy" and instead uses his own buzzword "deep politics" to avoid the negative connotation.

"Deep politics" has a specific meaning other than 'conspiracy' which is a far broader term, applicable to many things unrelated to politics.

My thanks for the video though, I hadn't seen it before.

It was also especially nice of you to provide evidence of my previous assertion (in my discussion with Mark Roberts) that figures such as Dale Scott and Ruppert were prominent in the early (i.e. pre- Loose Change) 'truth movement' and that they were not influenced by antisemitism as can clearly be seen from their handling of the question at the end attempting to paint Jewish Zionists as global puppet-masters.

I could just crucify the book and the author outright with a bad omen!

Crucify it with a bad omen? I'm not entirely sure what that means, but go ahead. Crucify to your hearts content.

You go first......Please name a conclusion you came to....

Too late to "go first". You've already stated the conclusions you reached. The thread is to discover your evidence, or at least reasons, for them.

Seriously, have you even read the book? How about we leave it to the 11 chapters preceeding the one MikeW is commenting on? As I said, just start with the introduction and work your way on.

I'm prepared to accept that a lot of people here have opposing views to material contained in the final chapters were he deals specifically with the events surrounding 9/11. I'm very curious to whatever inaccuracies exist there and how they may impact on his overall thesis (worth of further investigation).

The idea that the book is complete fiction though?

[applecorped]

Don't you have any original thoughts? Stop relying on other people.

[dudalb]

That Griffen approves this book is the kiss of death as far as I am concerned.
Brannagyn is just pushing the same truther nonsense, just with intellectual pretensions and really pompous style.

[beachnut]

The idea that the book is complete fiction though?
Being most generous, the book is like the Da Vinci Code is to history, this book is to 9/11 issues. Others are dead on. You will not present what you think is correct in the book.

I win, the book is junk. You like it, you can have it. The thread is closed since you will not and can not present things you think he got right about 9/11.

The book is like the 9/11 report with bs, and the book is like a CT fantasy thing but short and just bs. What else can I say?


You have no conclusions, the book offers zero evidence for 9/11 turth failed ideas.

You have nothing to add; then the book is just like the Da Vinci Code is to it's subject.

End of review.

I think the being like the Da Vinci Code is generous and indicative of the value of the book to 9/11 truth being worthless in adding to evidence. It is a zero evidence thing.
Crucify it with a bad omen? I'm not entirely sure what that means, but go ahead. Crucify to your hearts content.
The bad omen is an endorsement from DRG. The hearsay king of 9/11 false information and lies. DRG, the hearsay 9/11 truth guy, who lies by presenting other people's ideas so he is not the liar. That alone could be used to discredit the book, but the book does a better job.

[MikeW]

Appreciate the comments Mike. Give me chance to look into them and get back to you. Remember he isnt trying to use the book to prove the guilt of a particular party but simply to show that there are enough unresolved issues or unclear areas to justify renewed and more far-reaching investigation.
It seems to me he's going all-out to prove Cheney's guilt, but maybe that's a matter of interpretation. But anyway, even if he's just trying to show doubts then his issues still have to stand up.

I didn't give any references for my points, which was probably a bad thing. They're too long to read them all anyway, but just so you can see where I'm coming from: "Hijackers are still alive" (http://www.911myths.com/index.php/Hijackers_still_alive), Mueller's doubts (http://www.911myths.com/index.php/FBI_doubts_over_hijacker_identities), Cheney's arrival at the PEOC (http://www.911myths.com/index.php/Dick_Cheney_at_the_PEOC), Clarke's timeline (http://www.911myths.com/index.php/The_Richard_Clarke_teleconference), Mineta (http://www.911myths.com/index.php/Mineta), Phantom flight 11 not tracked on radar (http://www.911myths.com/index.php/Losing_Flight_77#Phantom_Flight_11), Intercept rules (http://www.911myths.com/html/hijack_assistance_approval.html), Cheney in charge on 9/11 (http://www.911myths.com/index.php/Cheney_in_charge_of_NORAD)

how would you characterize the 11 chapters that preceeded this? Would you say "Complete fiction" is accurate?
For the benefit of everyone else, this isn't a typical 9/11 book. It lives up to the title "The Road To 9/11" in that it's more of a history, so we have chapters like "Nixon, Kissinger, and the Decline of the Public State", "Brzezinski, Oil and Afghanistan" and "Carter's Surrender to the Rockefellers on Iran". It moves on to topics like Ali Mohamed and "the origins of al Qaeda", but the chapter I picked (11/15) is the first one to focus entirely on 9/11 events, as opposed to the leadup.

As for the content, it seems to me like a synthesis of his previous work with a lot of Nafeez Ahmed's thoughts stirred in for good measure. It all feels quite familiar, he's got an obvious agenda and there are points I take issue with. Although, to be honest, the further back he goes the less qualified I feel able to comment. He goes for sweeping interpretations and analysing all of them properly takes more time and effort than I have right now.

Is it "complete fiction", though? If you're asking me to take that absolutely - is every sentence a fiction - then I'd say no. In my experience the phrase isn't used in such a literal way, though, and beachnut's qualification here is that Dale Scott is leading the reader to fictional conclusions. I'd say there is some truth in that for the reasons I've outlined.

[bynmdsue]

The idea that the book is complete fiction though?

As fictional as an Obama autobiography.Which is too damn fictional.

[twinstead]

That's the whole issue with propaganda, no matter if it is from the left or the right; it's NEVER purely fiction--that's what makes it propaganda.

[roundhead]

Whether his book is full of lies or not, only requires to go to his footnote section (usually located in the back of the book) and where possible track down his source documents for accuracy.

I personally have not read his book, but what claims is he making that are contraversial?

TAM:)



You should spend some time(like i have)tracking down where footnotes take you in regards the 9/11 Commision Report, you might be surprised, like i was.

Sorry, carry on.

[beachnut]

You should spend some time(like i have)tracking down where footnotes take you in regards the 9/11 Commision Report, you might be surprised, like i was.

Sorry, carry on.
I was not surprised the poet was able to take simple citations and turn them into the nothing, but implications 9/11 truther would suck up as proof and evidence of something they can't define as their paranoia surges in their fantasy 9/11 conspiracy theory world. It appears if you can write well people will believe any tripe you pen.

[bynmdsue]

P.D.S. went from flogging the JFK assassination conspiracy hoax to 9/11 CT's.

Are we supposed to believe that since he was wrong about JFK he's learned his lesson and won't make the same mistakes twice?

[dudalb]

I think beachnut was using the term "Complete WOrk Of Fiction" not to be taken literally, but rhetorically to indicate how worthless the book is as a history of what lead to 9/11.
And Beachnut is 100 percent right about that.

[A W Smith]

The simple answer is for you to go out, buy a copy of the book....actually no need, just stand for a few minutes in your nearest bookshop and read the very first sentence of the book.



Well I tried that today. But it doesn't even have a place to rest on the shelves of Barnes & Noble and I was not about to order it . Rutgers had one copy, which had already been checked out, Our local public library doesn't have it. Not so popular this book. While i was at the bookstore today I did find The looming Tower the road to 9/11 (http://www.amazon.com/review/product/1400030846/ref=dp_top_cm_cr_acr_txt?%5Fencoding=UTF8&showViewpoints=1)which I may buy tomorrow. also you should check out "Why we hate us (http://www.amazon.com/review/product/0307406628/ref=dp_top_cm_cr_acr_txt?%5Fencoding=UTF8&showViewpoints=1)" which I found interesting in respect to modern culture, "truthiness", and self loathing. how facts are ignored or distorted to fit one cynical world view. Early inaccurate news reports taken as gospel to support conspiracy etc.

[Brannagyn]

It seems to me he's going all-out to prove Cheney's guilt, but maybe that's a matter of interpretation.

Not at all, I read it that way too. Its clear he takes Cheney to be the guilty party not simply due to what he believes is most likely to have occured but from the efforts he feels have been made to obfuscate the specific details of the full record.

The book certainly leads the reader toward that conclusion but I don't think anyone can say it is done in a deliberately deceitful way. His sources are all, as far as I can tell accurate, it is the conclusions he draws from them that may not be.

Is it "complete fiction", though? If you're asking me to take that absolutely - is every sentence a fiction - then I'd say no. In my experience the phrase isn't used in such a literal way, though, and beachnut's qualification here is that Dale Scott is leading the reader to fictional conclusions. I'd say there is some truth in that for the reasons I've outlined.

I think you're being too kind here to Beachnut and too hard on Dale Scott. By saying "is every sentence a fiction" you imply that some, if not most, are. This simply isn't true. As I've said you could argue that he leads the reader to false conclusions but this would be based upon poor interpretation of accurate sources rather than fiction or distortion. Even then, the vast majority of the book is a detailed historical analysis of events in the preceeding 30 or 40 years that he considers relevant to 9/11. Even if you're a diehard 'debunker' I think the book will give you interesting insight into areas other than 9/11.

That was my main problem with Beachnut's wholly over-the-top attack on a book he appeared not to have even read and thus the reason for this thread. He's also missed the chance to respond, as MikeW did, showing clear knowledge of even some of the books contents (The DaVinci Code? Well....I can believe Beachnut actually read that).

"I win, the book is junk..........The thread is closed."

Okay. You win. Well done. Everyone is duly impressed with the depth and breadth of your analysis.

...anyway.

Thanks again for the links above MikeW. Obviously a lot to read. I'm looking through the Mineta one and a couple of things jumped out at me.

In stating that "One immediate issue with Mineta's story is the implausible number of activities he squeezes in to a very short time." They argue that Minetas time to reach the PEOC amounted to 17 minutes and give a list of the events involved and how they would have been improbable within the timeframe.

They then also state that it would have been more probable, though still very rushed, if they use the alternate time of arrival (9.27) that Mineta gave at other times.

One problem in this is that they include Minetas coversation with Clarke as having taken place in the Situation Room. later on though, they argue against Clarke being a witness to Mineta's early presence by syaing their conversation could have taken place entirely while Mineta was travelling in his car. When taken with the 9.27 time (or 9.26, or 9.25, or anything close) the additional 3 minutes raises the probability a little bit more.

Nothing major, just something that might want to be addressed in the article.

The issues of the evacuation is obviously more important. However, they consider that either it began at the time several News reports stated "9.45 - The White House is evacuated" or it began from the CNN statement of a 30 minute evacuation.

They state: "First, there's nothing to explain how they know the White House evacuation began 30 minutes ago, around 9:22. As all other accounts place the evacuation much later, about 9:45, how can we be sure the CNN version is accurate? The idea that officials would have decided there was enough of a threat to evacuate at 9:22, but somehow ensured that evacuation lasted half on hour, makes little sense to us."

That the evacuation of a few thousand people (politicians, tourists, support staff, etc.) from a sprawling and politically sensitive facility would take so long is hardly strange. It also makes sense that the 9.45 figure would be after the evacuation was complete. Do you stop to inform the media of your evacuation before or after its complete? If so, its perfectly reasonable that the evac lasted from the period Mineta states he was arriving until 9.45.

Another possible flaw is the comment regarding the BBC'S "Clear the skies":

"The programme does repeat Mineta's story, then. But it also says Cheney wasn't evacuated until after 9:33, "

If Dale Scott's comment on the NEAS recognition of Flight 77 at 9.21 is accurate (p.202, also states it never appeared in the 9/11 report) there is every reason to believe the Secret Service might have evacuated Cheney before 9.33.

Of course, all this aside the damning point is Mineta's testimony that he saw people rushing out of the building, something that apparently didn't occur until the end of the evacuation process. This seems to be the point that renders his testimony unreliable, which in turn may delegitimize Dale Scott's take on Cheney entirely.

The question remains though whether the 9/11 Report gave enough attention to these conflicting timelines. While they took Mineta's testimony that he was there from 9.20 on, after that they draw purely from the timeline as it accords to Cheney's coterie (Libby, Lynne Cheney, Ari Fleischer, etc). It seems highly unlikely they followed the same process of judgement the link you provided did, based as it is on several years of additional reserach and discussion. As such I'm still of the opinion that there were several significant ommissions or obfuscation in the 9/11 report. However, as far as Mineta goes his reliability is looking severely doubtful.

Once again, thanks for the comments and links. I'll enjoy looking through them at a more leisurely pace and will leave any comments here on issues I might have with them. Any other links to critiques of the accuracy of the books conclusions are also welcome.

[Brannagyn]

This has no doubt come up before but I was wondering what the standard view is on Bush's recollection that he watched the 1st plane hit on tv before he went into the classroom on 9/11. Confusion with what he later saw replayed on tv I'm guessing.

Why couldn't the same thing be said about Mineta's recollection? Wouldn't it be as least as likely in Mineta's case, considering he actually saw people leaving the White House and would simply be misremembering the haste with which they were doing it?

Doing my best to look at it from both sides here.

[MikeW]

The book certainly leads the reader toward that conclusion but I don't think anyone can say it is done in a deliberately deceitful way. His sources are all, as far as I can tell accurate, it is the conclusions he draws from them that may not be.
I think the problem here is that he treats truther sources as unquestionably accurate, when they're nothing of the kind. So he presents Ruppert's conclusions about Cheney achieving great powers through the Office of National Preparedness like some great truth, when if you look Ruppert's words you find he has no evidence to support that at all.

He also selects the sources he needs. So we read via Kevin Philips that GW Bush's Arbusto "probably" received $50,000 from Salem bin Laden or Khalid bin Mahfouz, but we don't hear Bath's claim that it was his own money, or Craig Unger's comment that there isn't the evidence to support that.

And I see over the page a line that "KuWam backed the security firm for the World Trade Center on 9/11: Securacom" (cue Marvin Bush connection). He's just parroting a line that Securacom "ran security at the WTC on 9/11" which now even most truthers accept isn't correct.

I think you're being too kind here to Beachnut and too hard on Dale Scott. By saying "is every sentence a fiction" you imply that some, if not most, are. This simply isn't true. As I've said you could argue that he leads the reader to false conclusions but this would be based upon poor interpretation of accurate sources rather than fiction or distortion.
Is the Cheney and the Office of National Preparedness issue simply a matter of "poor interpretation of accurate sources"? I don't think so. He's accurately reporting the Ruppert source, but the Ruppert source plainly has no substance on this issue. The failure to notice that is a problem.

Is the Arbusto issue I mention above a matter of "poor interpretation of accurate sources"? No. It's selective interpretation. He is aware of Craig Unger's work (it's sourced elsewhere) but he's failed to mention it. Dale Scott similarly fails to mention all kinds of counter arguments to his interpretations, it's like they don't exist. I think that's a problem, too.

To be honest, the phrase "poor interpretation" also doesn't sit well with me as a justification. How can you know that this "poor interpretation" isn't an intentional effort to mislead by using selective sources to produce a false conclusion, as opposed to the idea that it was just somehow an innocent mistake?

I'm not saying that is the case, just that it could be. Let's not dwell on this, though. I don't really care what Peter Dale Scott's intentions or motives might be. What matters is whether he's right or wrong on individual issues.

One problem in this is that they include Minetas coversation with Clarke as having taken place in the Situation Room. later on though, they argue against Clarke being a witness to Mineta's early presence by syaing their conversation could have taken place entirely while Mineta was travelling in his car. When taken with the 9.27 time (or 9.26, or 9.25, or anything close) the additional 3 minutes raises the probability a little bit more.
It's not "they", it's "me" (my fault, I forget newcomers won't know it's my site)

I include Mineta's conversation as occurring in the Situation Room because that's what he said. I say that Clarke's report of the call could easily have taken place while Mineta was in his car, but I'm not then saying that Mineta wouldn't have come to the Situation Room as well. It's almost certain that he did, as apart from saying so he explains that the conversation lasted "4 or 5 minutes" - I don't believe Clarke would have had that time to spare to stay on the phone with someone who had nothing to add.

Of course, all this aside the damning point is Mineta's testimony that he saw people rushing out of the building, something that apparently didn't occur until the end of the evacuation process.
Here's what CNN said at 9:52 (all quotes sourced here (http://www.911myths.com/index.php/Mineta#Evacuating_the_White_House)):

I'm standing in Lafayette Park, directly across the White House, perhaps about 200 yards away from the White House residence itself. The Secret Service has pushed most people all the way back to the other side of the park. I'm trying to avoid having that done to me at the moment.

Just moments ago they started slowing evacuating the White House about 30 minutes ago. Then, in the last five minute people have come running out of the White House and the old executive office building, which is the office building right directly across from the White House.


Here's Richard Clarke describing the scene after the Pentagon was hit:

Stafford's order to evacuate was going into effect. As the staff poured out of the White House compound, the Residence, the West Wing, and the Executive Office Building, the Uniformed Secret Service Guards yelled at the women, "If you're in high heels, take off your shoes and run-run!"

And here's Mineta:

And so anyway, we drove into the White House on West Executive Drive. People were coming out of the White House, pouring out of the Executive Office Building, running over towards Lafayette Park, and I said to my driver and security person, I said, "Hey, is there something wrong with this picture, cause here we are driving in and everybody else is running out."

So he a) sees enough people that he assumes the evacuation is occurring now, and b) reports people "pouring out" of the Executive Office and White House buildings, just as CNN and Clarke say, and c) says that were heading over towards Lafayette Park, just as described by CNN and others. What he saw matches up very well with other reports of the evacuation. One CNN report says that a) happened earlier (although they seemed to recant that the following day), but even they agree that b) and c) only followed after the Pentagon was hit.

Another possible flaw is the comment regarding the BBC'S "Clear the skies":

"The programme does repeat Mineta's story, then. But it also says Cheney wasn't evacuated until after 9:33, "

If Dale Scott's comment on the NEAS recognition of Flight 77 at 9.21 is accurate (p.202, also states it never appeared in the 9/11 report) there is every reason to believe the Secret Service might have evacuated Cheney before 9.33.
My point in discussing Clear the Skies was to answer David Ray Griffin and others who say it supports Mineta's account. As you say, it doesn't in terms of Cheney's evacuation, it says he didn't leave his office until after 9:33. You can argue that some other issue means he might have been evacuated later, but that's not what the program says, and people shouldn't (as Griffin does) try to pretend that it supports Mineta beyond repeating his own story.

The question remains though whether the 9/11 Report gave enough attention to these conflicting timelines.
My own take is that they didn't mention Mineta's timeline because they discovered it was incorrect. Perhaps they also thought that highlighting issues like him not giving the "ground stop" order as he stated, and being around 30 minutes out with his timeline, would be unkind. And also unnecessary, as they were giving the correct timeline anyway.

Of course we can argue that they could have come up with some form of words to kindly say that he was mistaken... But I think that would change nothing. Truther pages on Mineta would simply begin "The 9/11 Commission said he was mistaken, but..." and people would go on making exactly the same arguments that they do now.

[funk de fino]

This has no doubt come up before but I was wondering what the standard view is on Bush's recollection that he watched the 1st plane hit on tv before he went into the classroom on 9/11. Confusion with what he later saw replayed on tv I'm guessing.

he is an idiot

Why couldn't the same thing be said about Mineta's recollection? Wouldn't it be as least as likely in Mineta's case, considering he actually saw people leaving the White House and would simply be misremembering the haste with which they were doing it?

Doing my best to look at it from both sides here.

Mineta states that Lynne Cheney was in the PEOC when he arrived there. She was evacuated from downtown by the SS because of the attack at the Pentagon. This means he arrived after 77 hit the Pentagon. The countdown he saw was a ghostrack of another flight not flight 77. The early evacuation could refer to the VPs and members of the house etc who were moved for continuation of govt, not to the carpark across the street as in the later evacuation.

[beachnut]

I think beachnut was using the term "Complete WOrk Of Fiction" not to be taken literally, but rhetorically to indicate how worthless the book is as a history of what lead to 9/11.
And Beachnut is 100 percent right about that.
You are right.

I stand by my Da Vinci Code analogy. It is the Da Vinci Code for CT minded truther and will not increase the evidence to support the truth movement; unwavering at zero.

[MikeW]

This has no doubt come up before but I was wondering what the standard view is on Bush's recollection that he watched the 1st plane hit on tv before he went into the classroom on 9/11. Confusion with what he later saw replayed on tv I'm guessing.

Why couldn't the same thing be said about Mineta's recollection? Wouldn't it be as least as likely in Mineta's case, considering he actually saw people leaving the White House and would simply be misremembering the haste with which they were doing it?
I'd say it was less likely.

In the Bush case the issue is when he saw those TV images.

In Mineta's case, he very specifically ties these to his personal experience with statements like "When I got to the White House, it was being evacuated" amd "I said to my driver and security guy, 'Is there something wrong with this picture? We are driving in, and everybody else is running away.'"

He also gives a more detailed description of what took place, as I mention above, including where people were coming from and where they were going.

It doesn't seem likely to me that this came from a confusion with TV images. And arguing that it was begins to pose another problem, as you're forced to say that this part of his testimony is wrong and confused, but that part is accurate. (Arguably I'm doing that too, but I'd say my view that the 9:20 arrival time is incorrect is more plausible than the idea that Mineta didn't personally witness the evacuation scenes he describes.)

[Brannagyn]

I agree completely that its a stretch to use misremembering as excuse I just raise the point that its about the only effective counter-argument I'm currently aware of (and as such leaves the ball very much in the court of anyone hoping to present Mineta as reliable).

Thanks again for the links to the site. From what I've read its well laid out with a fair appraisal of opposing points of view.

I don't agree that Dale Scott's book is aimed at pushing an agenda he knows is false or wholly inaccurate but then, after I've read through your site a bit more perhaps my opinion will change.

[MikeW]

I agree completely that its a stretch to use misremembering as excuse I just raise the point that its about the only effective counter-argument I'm currently aware of...
Okay. With regard to "The Road to 9/11", though, what we try to establish here doesn't have to be the absolute truth or otherwise of Mineta's account. I think it should be a) are there sufficient arguments against his timeline to raise serious questions about it, perhaps b) could Dale Scott have known about these beforehand, and c) does the absence of these counter arguments from the book mean Dale Scott is (perhaps unwittingly) giving his readers a significantly misleading impression of the events surrounding 9/11?

I don't agree that Dale Scott's book is aimed at pushing an agenda he knows is false or wholly inaccurate but then, after I've read through your site a bit more perhaps my opinion will change.
To be clear, I'm not arguing that either. I just mentioned it before as I didn't think your defence of Dale Scott against beachnut ruled that out. My own position is I don't really care, the facts are more important.

[HereticHulk]

... to show that there are enough unresolved issues or unclear areas to justify renewed and more far-reaching investigation.



http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2096439/posts

The FBI has blocked two of its veteran counterterrorism agents from going public with accusations that the CIA deliberately withheld crucial intelligence before the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks.

FBI Special Agents Mark Rossini and Douglas Miller have asked for permission to appear in an upcoming public television documentary, scheduled to air in January, on pre-9/11 rivalries between the CIA, FBI and National Security Agency.

The program is a spin-off from The Shadow Factory: The Ultra-Secret NSA from 9/11 to the Eavesdropping on America, by acclaimed investigative reporter James Bamford, due out in a matter of days.

The FBI denied Rossini and Miller permission to participate in the book or the PBS "NOVA" documentary, which is also being written and produced by Bamford, on grounds that the FBI "doesn't want to stir up old conflicts with the CIA," according to multiple reliable sources.

But Rossini and Miller, who were assigned to the CIA-run Counterterrorist Center during the run-up to the 9/11 attacks, are prepared to describe on camera how the CIA blocked them from sharing crucial intelligence with FBI headquarters - and then later pressured them not to tell the truth to investigators.

[dudalb]

Heretic Hulk is reverting to Twoofer mode now that he has finally come to the bitter conclusion that Ron Paul will not be President in 2008.