Friday, June 30

A lack of fact-based argumentation reflects a lack of intellectual integrity

In their rabid desire to condemn government (not that it doesn't deserve criticism) some are plunging into the deep end with libelous conspiracy theories here:
1) ...Bush orchestrated 9/11.

2) I thought conservatives prided themselves on substantive responses and fact-based argumentation rather than baseless emotional retorts.

3) So, we're supposed to believe that the same institution which orchestrated...which lied to the American people about...and still asserts that...was somehow incapable of perpetrating a similar fraud on the American people in 2001? ...The shame lies with Goldberg and company, not Reynolds, even if Reynolds is incorrect.

4) American history clearly indicates that whatever the U.S. government's official story might happen to be, it is a false one.
The fact that some past government officials have lied to and unjustly killed American citizens is not proof that President Bush "orchestrated 9/11," as is conceded here:
I don't know who was responsible for 9/11.
Osama thinks he does.

He admitted to being behind 9/11. Osama and his co-religionists have been killing Americans for at least two decades, and 9/11 was the second time WTC had been hit (the first being during Clinton's presidency in '93, and not even hardcore Clinton-haters claim that was his doing).

From The News Hour (hardly Republican propagandists):
"...bin Laden...said: "Despite entering the fourth year after Sept. 11, Bush is still deceiving you and hiding the truth from you and therefore the reasons are still there to repeat what happened."
Bin Laden said he thought of the method of attacking U.S. skyscrapers when he saw Israeli aircraft bombing tower blocks in Lebanon in 1982.

"We decided to destroy towers in America," he said. "God knows that it had not occurred to our mind to attack the towers, but after our patience ran out and we saw the injustice and inflexibility of the American-Israeli alliance toward our people in Palestine and Lebanon, this came to my mind."

"...To the U.S. people, my talk is to you about the best way to avoid another disaster. I tell you: Security is an important element of human life and free people do not give up their security.

"If Bush says we hate freedom, let him tell us why we didn't attack Sweden, for example. It is known that those who hate freedom do not have dignified souls, like those of the 19 blessed ones," he said, referring to the 19 hijackers.

"We fought you because we are free ... and want to regain freedom for our nation. As you undermine our security, we undermine yours."

...In September 2003, Al-Jazeera aired a tape of bin Laden with his deputy Ayman al-Zawahiri in which he mentions five Sept. 11 hijackers by name."
And from Wikipedia:
In an audiotape aired on Al Jazeera on May 21, 2006, bin Laden said he had personally directed the 19 hijackers.

...Statements of al-Qaeda recorded after 9/11 add weight to the U.S account of who was responsible for the attacks....
President Bush deserves criticism for many things. However, absent actual evidence of the President's planning, supporting, or allowing 9/11, giving any support to the idea that he "orchestrated" it demonstrates a lack of intellectual integrity.

It is good to be jealous of Liberty. Conspiracy theories against a President finally fighting back against--and killing--the jihadists whose god and false prophet command them to kill us does nothing to advance it (or one's credibility).