Posted on 07/05/2005 5:57:37 PM PDT by wagglebee
The New York Times, NBC and other dominant media have destroyed the Constitution's Freedom of the Press. Today giant tears are shed at the New York Times because one of their own, Judith Miller, appears to be on the way to prison for up to 120-days because she nobly refused to give up a source. The Supreme Court recently ruled that she, as a journalist, must assist a federal government investigation when ordered to do so.
The First Amendment, in pertinent part, says: Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press. . . .
"Abridging" means placing limits on. The Supreme Court ruled that these words must be interpreted from the perspective of the federal government. The Government's ability to use journalists as agents of the federal government when so desired cannot be abridged.
The American National Security State is supposed to grab all the power it can. Its mission is to project power. It is not entrusted with the mission of maintaining a healthy First Amendment Freedom of the Press. To the contrary, it is in the best interest of the National Security State to whittle, attack, whine and cry at every opportunity to turn dominant media into a tool by which federal propaganda is spewed across the nation twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week.
The Founding Fathers gave dominant media the mission of counterbalancing the State's natural inclination to destroy the Constitution. Dominant media, as envisioned, was to probe and question the National Security State, especially when it displeased the National Security State.
But that takes courage and a willingness to be called very bad names by National Security State propagandists. It means being leaned on by the Justice Department, snarled at by its biggest, meanest federal legal guns; careers threatened, wives intimidated. It means watching your Rolodex go up in smoke.
All those wonderful federal sources who spoon-fed you, the dominant media journalist, story after story for which you were praised and rewarded with even better stories – as long as you did not demand that officially sanctioned stories be backed up with actual documents and other provable facts.
These "sources" would never again be available to you if you ever crossed the Beast, the National Security State. You'd actually have to push away from your desk, get out of your chair, go out into the cold, cruel world, walk past your favorite pub and find sources.
Real sources, not the federal shills that made you a household name and provided a very comfortable living, feeding propaganda you knowingly and willingly placed into the collective mind of the masses. Now you would have to join those journalists you so despise and look down on – the "bottom-feeders," "conspiracy theorists," Internet journalists and other journalistic lowlifes who continually bang away at the National Security State.
So, when the tough stories appeared, stories like TWA Flight 800, you shuddered at the thought of challenging a very determined cover-up, even though you knew the federal propagandists were feeding you garbage. You shuddered and then folded, jumping into the warm, safe lap of the Beast, wagging your tail, whispering "feed me, feed me."
According to three media sources - one deep inside NBC on July 17, 1996, when missile-fire brought the giant 747 down - in the hours after TWA Flight 800 was shot down a bidding war ensued for a video showing missile-fire bringing down TWA Flight 800. The bidding went above $50,000, at which time, the Fox News team, New York, was blocked from further bidding. The video ended up in the hands of NBC, where it was confiscated by the FBI.
The head of the Fox News team in the field on Long Island was then approached by an American military officer who said there was a major screw-up, the White House had ordered a 48 hour "stand-down" while it decided how to handle this crisis. Dominant media had a decision to make. Significant evidence of missile-fire was already in hand. Much more was easily available. There were witnesses who watching TWA Flight 800 as it headed east toward Paris. They then watched as a missile approached and brought the plane down. They didn't see some mysterious light way off in the distance. They were not confused. They knew what they had seen.
We now know the FBI and CIA knew they witnessed missile-fire, according to documents recently unearthed through the Freedom of Information Act.
The New York Times would have had this vital information if it merely conducted an honest investigation. It did not. Instead, it allowed the FBI to feed it an approved storyline, complete with selected facts – a bomb brought the 747 down. A political decision was then made at the top of the Clinton administration. It was an election year. A criminal act might provoke the sleeping masses.
The lapdog New York Times might lose its role as the dominant media "investigative" team. The Beast could lose control of the crisis. Truth could conceivably prevail if the shills at the New York Times ceased running interference for the National Security State.
But it was not to be. Federal propagandists told the New York Times a criminal act did not bring down TWA Flight 800. All that explosive residue was from a dog training exercise. The New York Times did not interview the St. Louis Airport Police Officer who conducted the training a month before TWA Flight 800 crashed. He would have given the New York Times information proving beyond any doubt that the dog training exercise did not take place on the 747 that would later become TWA Flight 800.
If the New York Times had interviewed the pilots who were onboard the 747 at St. Louis during the entire time the dog training exercise took place, it would have quickly become apparent that the dog training took place on a 747 parked at the adjacent St. Louis Airport gate. Mere competence would have exposed the cover-up.
At that point courage would have been required. The New York Times had neither. It was the Beast's official lapdog.
In all probability, 9-11 would never have happened if the New York Times had merely done the job the Founding Fathers assigned. In the aftermath of TWA 800, with a fully informed citizenry, America's masses would have demanded real protection based on real facts, not federal propaganda.
We can reasonably infer that today's constitutional crisis, the Supreme Court's removal of the First Amendment's Freedom of the Press would not have occurred. The Supreme's are political creatures; dare we suggest political whores? Would they dare destroy this most vital portion of the First Amendment if they knew they were attacking journalism's junkyard dog?
The Supreme's knew they were destroying a National Security State lapdog that did not need or deserve special protection under the First Amendment.
Unfortunately, non dominant media journalists who do sally forth to battle the dreaded Beast now do so without any pretense of a constitutional amendment protecting them. And now the ultimate irony – New York Times reporter Judith Miller now gets to go to prison because of the failure of the New York Times to protect and defend the First Amendment's Freedom of the Press.
No terrorist organization ever took credit for it, which is the reason they commit these acts.... for publicity. It was most likely a government SNAFU.
But I certainly don't believe that the facts of the case point to what the author of this article suggests.
George Will looked as if he was going to fall out of his chair. Subject was changed quickly and to my knowledge no one ever called Steph on his statement again.
I don't generally go in for conspiracy threories, and I also doubt that if the Navy had been involved everyone could have successfully kept quiet, unless the nature of the exercise was such that only a few people in command and control were in a position to know what happened with the missile (I don't have anywhere near the knowledge of how these things are done to speculate). Still, Steph's statement should have at least triggered an embarassed "uh...I mean blew up" or something to the effect. That it was quickly passed over and "forgotten" has always stuck me as very suspicious. That, and my understanding that simply hanging out in the sit room is not standard behaviour.
Somehow it just smells very strange, and I would never put anything past Clinton and his team. I suppose we'll never really know for sure unless someone does talk, maybe a deathbed confession or whatever.
I'd like to see this alleged tape that was taken from NBC by the FBI. Can anyone confirm such a tape exists?
I don't agree. The investigation could have been diverted by a mere handful of people, IMO.
Part of the story that is never really questioned very hard are the a.) altitude of the plane and b.) the type of missile that a terrorist might have used.
Everybody seems to just accept that the missiles available to terrorists couldn't reasonably reach the 13,000 feet of the plane. Maybe there's something wrong that *that* part of the story.
that's an interesting stephanopolis story.
hillary was the one in charge of damage control.
i remember hearing on the radio live interviews with people who observed 800.
one was a military helicopter pilot who was in the air. he said it was a missile rising from the surface of the ocean to the plane. i told a college instructor this and he said, "you can't trust the u.s. military".
another was a woman who was entertaining on her patio on the beach. she had her camera in hand, saw the same thing, and shot a series of photos. she offered them to the fbi and they weren't interested.
He can say it as many times as he likes but that's not what happened.
TWA Flight 800 was shot down
See above
a video showing missile-fire bringing down TWA Flight 800.
There's no such video because there was no missile fire.
The bidding went above $50,000, at which time, the Fox News team, New York, was blocked from further bidding. The video ended up in the hands of NBC, where it was confiscated by the FBI.
Sanders doesn't cite a single named source for any of this. Based on his past performance, he's probably making it up (or similar cranks are resonating with him). As far as video confiscated by the FBI, I don't know if that happened, but if it did, bear in mind that the FBI was investigating whether a crime had been committed. Which is the FBI's job, as much as criminals like Sanders may not like it.
The head of the Fox News team in the field on Long Island
Conveniently nameless
.. was then approached by an American military officer who said there was a major screw-up, the White House had ordered a 48 hour "stand-down" while it decided how to handle this crisis.
Here Sanders, a former male stewardess, slanders the military, by imputing some kind of criminal behaviour to a (once again nameless) military officer. He doesn't even identify what service this alleged, phantom officer is from... an officer is commissioned into a branch of a service and would never ID him or herself as a generic "military" officer.
Significant evidence of missile-fire was already in hand.
No, there wasn't. There was never (and is still) nothing more than speculation supporting the supposition of a missile strike. The physical evidence absolutely, positively proves that the aircraft was not struck by a missile or missile fragment. On the other hand, there is a mountain of physical evidence for a fuel-air explosion.
Much more was easily available. There were witnesses who watching TWA Flight 800 as it headed east toward Paris. They then watched as a missile approached and brought the plane down All 700-odd (!) witness reports are part of the complete docket and I have read them all. About 150 saw a "streak of light." There is no consensus on which way the streak was going.
They didn't see some mysterious light way off in the distance. They were not confused. They knew what they had seen.
First, Sanders here is asserting that all the witnesses saw the same thing (ask any cop how often this happens). Next, he's asserting that people know what a missile looks like.
We now know the FBI and CIA knew they witnessed missile-fire, according to documents recently unearthed through the Freedom of Information Act.
We know no such thing. Sanders has made these assertions right along. In his book, he claims that the White House had a meeting in the SItuation Room which began BEFORE the plane went down, and he implies that Clinton had it shot down.
Clinton was not my favorite president, but he didn't do this, and once again Sanders slanders the military by suggesting that they'd (1) carry out such an order and (2) keep it secret. Didn't happen.
A political decision was then made at the top of the Clinton administration. It was an election year. A criminal act might provoke the sleeping masses.
OK., now he is suggesting that someone else shot the plane down and the Administration covered it up. This is simply loopy.
Truth could conceivably prevail if the shills at the New York Times ceased running interference for the National Security State.
Is it just me, or is that a little paranoid?
Federal propagandists
Ah, which Department is that, Jailbird Jim?
...told the New York Times a criminal act did not bring down TWA Flight 800.
Ah, he means the hundreds of FBI agents and dozens of NTSB investigators and such facilities as the scientists of the Explosion Dynamics Laboratory at Cal Tech. Yep, they're all gummint shills, and the only true torchbearer of truth is a simple ex-stewardess from New Jersey, James Sanders. Excuse me, flight attendant. And felon.
All that explosive residue was from a dog training exercise.
What explosive residue -- the stuff that was on the piece of seat that James D. arranged to have stolen from the NTSB has the same composition as... wait for it... bottom sand.
The New York Times did not interview the St. Louis Airport Police Officer
Here, Jailbird Jim is standing up and knocking down a strawman. The report of a dog training exercise was a media report, not any part of the actual investigation.
I could go on and on... about the only thing that's true in this pathetic loser's writing is his bitterness and rage. He's destroyed his life, and the lives of people close to him, and cast doubt and fear into the hearts of people who were already bereaved, and he makes a good living at it, but you can see the hate is eating away at him.
And hate what? His collossal conspiracy now includes the NTSB, FAA, FBI, CIA (which was not even involved in the whole thing except to lend a computer graphics lab), Boeing, TWA (and American, TWA's successor), the NYT, Fox News, the military, and two of the most different administrations the country's ever produced, BJ Bill's and Cowboy George's. Think about a conspiracy that big (which I guess I am part of because I disagree, to put it mildly, with this loser). For crying out loud, when did Washington ever keep anything secret? Mark Felt's identity as Deep Throat must have been one of the longest-running ever, and nobody died when Nixon fell (except three million Cambodians). And that was a conspiracy between four people - Felt, Woodward, Bernstein, and Bradlee.
Jailbird Jim posits a conspiracy of four thousand people. Cue Napoleon XVI, they're coming to take him away.
d.o.l.
Criminal Number 18F
>"What does that have to do with the facts of the case?"
these two journalists attempted to take fabric samples from the seats.
these samples were to be chemically analyzed to determine whether the residue from a missile was present.
Do you think an entire Navy crew of a couple hundred Sailors would participate in a conspiracy ot protect Clinton? C'mon!!!! I personally know at least ten Chiefs that refused retirement ceremonies because they didn't want the certificates signed by the man!
Mark
They don't have to reveal a source except for criminal proceedings. This investigation is a criminal proceeding.
And .. it was the media who INSISTED on an investigation. Now they're whining because they've been caught in their own net.
I wonder what the moonbats at DU were saying about this(downing of flight 800) when it happened.
Clinton was running for re election and the summer olypics in Atlanta was more important so the coverup--NO TROUBLE HERE IN AMERICA-NOT HERE,NOT NOW UNDER BILL!
I was in the military, and I have a little knowledge of how it operates. Let's speculate that this was a US Navy ship that shot the airliner down. Maybe an Aegis class cruiser, with a crew of 24 officers and 340 enlisted. Now, you have to get ALL these guys to to forget they fired a missle off the coast of Long Island or wherever they were supposed to be. Even the dimmest bulb in the most remote compartment is going to put two and two together when they hear the news that an airliner was shot down WHILE THEY WERE SHOOTING LIVE MISSLES OFF THE COAST OF THE USA RIGHT NEAR THAT AREA!
But, you say, the government could go in and make them all swear secrecy or they are going to go to jail for life. Maybe. But I doubt it.
I don't buy it. There aren't enough black helicopters involved here.
I hear you. I don't like any of the fact sets, frankly. While none of the various missile theories really add up, I still am left with a quandry. This means it was caused by a spark in low-voltage wiring in the fuel tank.
How many 747's have been re-wired to remove this threat from the fuel tanks?
you're right.
the iranian civilian plane, for example.
if the u.s. navy shot 800 down, the nyt and wawa post would have been all over it.
in addition, many of the people on the plane were french nationals and they'd want compensation.
we paid iran big bucks.
the guy who was an authority on fuel tank explosions died several years ago.
Exactly. We really don't even KNOW if the 13,000 ft. figure is accurate.
So what do we know?
A lot of people were killed in a "crash".
Witnesses saw a missile.
Planes, trains, and automobiles log many miles every day with electrical circuits in their fuel tanks and don't blow up.
Sailors talk.
If the Clintonistas were in cover up mode for a terrorist attack, they would need to "muddy the water". Peter Salinger?
.
I say again,
...why did TWA Flight 800 just have to go down the very evening before HILLARY-hired White House Security Chief CRAIG LIVINGSTONE's highly publicized TV appearance before a U.S. Senate Investigating Committee..? A Committee that was trying to find out if HILLARY hired him in order to get her FBI Files on Republicans in Congress for blackmail purposes..?
I wonder which event you saw wall to wall TV Coverage on your TV's the next morning..?
It couldn't have been CRAIG LIVINGSTONE because Congress quickly cancelled all its work that morning out of respect for the now suddenly dead passengers of TWA Flight 800.
CRAIG LIVINGSTONE's pleading of the 5th against self-incrimination in FBI Filegate came 3 weeks later away from TV Cameras.
"It's the TV, Stupid, no matter what" =
The CLINTONS' real lifetime Motto
...still.
.
Here is the alt.disasters.aviation newsgroup FAQ. It includes a section on TWA800 that provides backup for some of my statements in previous posts:
http://members.optusnet.com.au/~philmil/ADA_FAQ/ADA_FAQ.htm
Here is some technical information on the CalTech EDL studies that established how the event occurred without a doubt.
http://www.ntsb.gov/speeches/ve981021.htm
http://www.galcit.caltech.edu/EDL/projects/JetA/background.html
the Misconceptions page is specially good:
http://www.galcit.caltech.edu/EDL/projects/JetA/misconceptions.html
You also need to read the entire docket on the NTSB website, especially the structures report where they address a possibility of a meteorite by demonstrating that (1) the structural breakup began with the fuel tank explosion, and (2) there is no path from outside the skin of the airplane into the tank. No meteorite, no missile, no shell, no fragment. When the people writing the report wrote about a missile, they just said, "see the meteorite bit." It never occurred to them that there would be people with no scientific training writing books, who wouldn't even read the accident report docket. (It takes about a week, and it's clear from Sanders's writing that he hasn't taken the week, or maybe he has too little education to follow the report).
Someone may say, what about a bomb? Even Jailbird Jim knows it can't be a bomb. Basically, high explosives leave a distinctive signature when they do their work. It was no problem seeing where HE had worked on Pan AM 103, and that plane was nearly as fragmented (and more burned) than TWA 800. There's no such signature on the TWA 800 wreckage.
Sanders and his crowd have asserted that the wreckage was disposed of. Actually GWU has it and uses it to train grad students in accident investigation.
http://www.gwu.edu/~aviation/safetyandsecurity/safetyandsecurity.html
d.o.l.
Criminal Number 18F
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