[popillio]

This guy thinks the neocons will aim towards allowing/causing another major event and then just pushing towards even more of a dictatorship. I hope he's wrong, but all things considered, is it that far out of line of a possibility?

I think the American people have proven gullible enough that they could scare the public into giving up more rights. A lot more, if they are scared. Rove has stated that they would create "their own reality" and it appears he wasn't kidding.

One thing I think this author misses is the other thing that the attacks did beside keep Bush in power: their entire Midd East invasion was allowed due to the scare tactics from 911. That is the bigger part of all of this.

A New Pearl Harbor, anyone?


http://mathaba.net/0_index.shtml?x=508445

It looks very much like the United States of America is well on its way to becoming a dictatorship

I have always been concerned about what really happened on September 11, 2001, but I have also always thought that the attacks were the result of a combination of determined action on the part of terrorists and official incompetence. I did not really believe that they might have actually been orchestrated by our own government. Indeed, such a thought, in itself, seemed almost treasonous to me. I am a political moderate, but I am also a strong patriot. I don't believe in condoning anti-government activity in time of war unless it is warranted by fact.

However, a story appeared on Yahoo News on January 30 that has shocked me deeply. (To read it click here.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/prweb/200601.../prweb339303_5

I don't want to believe that our leaders did this to us, that they are responsible for killing thousands of Americans in the interest of restoring the president's then abysmal popularity ratings and enabling them to end many of our freedoms, but a growing number of distinguished academics and scientists do think so, and that has me deeply, deeply worried.

This worry does not end with 911. There is so much wrong that it staggers the mind. In fact, it looks very much like the United States of America is well on its way to becoming a dictatorship. By that I mean that its established institutions will no longer be robust enough to protect the rights they promise its citizens.

On Monday, the story I have linked to above was published on Yahoo News. It's easy to say that the academics involved are just a bunch of liberals, but that simply isn't the case. Some are lefties, but they are mostly political moderates. They have been radicalized by what they have discovered. They are not really promoting a political agenda, but rather demanding an investigation of what increasingly seems to have been not simply official incompetence that led to mass murder, but an actual offical locomotion behind this murder.

That there was official incompetence is now generally accepted. That was even the conclusion of the 911 Commission. But this goes beyond that.

Griffin was a very convincing interview. He had done his homework. His book is carefully annotated, with every claim supported by careful documentation.

Frankly, I was appalled at what I read and heard from this man. I found it difficult to believe that he wasn't right. The thought flickered into my mind that I might live in a country run by a bunch of mass murderers.

Which I rejected. Not on rational grounds, on emotional ones. I guess my feeling is that if the light goes out in the United States, maybe mankind is a failed species.

Other media are just now reacting to the Yahoo article. They are as stunned as I am. Robert Steinback, writing in the Miami Herald, puts it very well:

"The reflexive first reaction is incredulity -- how, one asks, could anyone even contemplate, never mind actually do such a barbaric thing? But before you shut your mind, check the resumés -- these aren't Generation X geeks subsisting on potato chips and PlayStation. Then look at the case they present."

Something that now worries me terribly--in fact, keeps me awake at night--is fear that has arisen from the most recent Osama Bin Laden tape. In it, he states that there is shortly going to be another attack on the United States. He also goes on to condone a book by a liberal author critical of the Bush Administration.

This tape was immediately "validated" by the CIA. Gone was the long period of investigation and the hedging that came from CIA when George Tenet was director. Now, under Porter Goss, confirmation is immediate.

And yet, serious and competent researchers have cast doubt on the authenticity of this tape. So much so that the president has even spoken out against them.

Given what is emerging about 911, what are we to believe? The administration has reached another nadir of unpopularity, one even deeper than the one it was in before 911. However, if there is another terrorist attack at this point, it is going to be blamed, not honored with the support of a shocked nation.

So what would motivate it to orchestrate another attack, if indeed it orchestrated the first one? It knows that what few supporters it has left would abandon it if this was done. Homeland Security would be painted as another FEMA-style farce. Beyond being impeached, the president might literally be run out of town on a rail.

However, it could be that the attack will be so appalling that the administration will, quite simply, end the republic altogether and commence frank dictatorial rule.

If such an attack happens, there seems a distinct possibility that it will have been either officially inspired, actually orchestrated by a government run amok, or allowed to happen. Even if the terrorists are real and they are indeed responsible for such an attack, it wll represent a failure of government so profound that we will need the administration to resign. There will have to be a special election, or a special convention of the Electoral College to choose new leadership.

However, that's not what will happen. If there is an attack, the country will be battened down tight by the administration. It will become a dictatorship, and will remain so until the terrorists are defeated.

But they will never be defeated.