Sunday, December 15, 2013

An Honest Difference of Opinion



Prof. Jim Fetzer invited me as a guest to his internet radio program, Real Deal, to discuss my recent presentation at the DC 9/11 Truth Conference, “The Pentagon 757.” In it, I argue a Boeing 757 could very well have struck the Pentagon on September 11, 2001, although under very different circumstances from those posed in the official story. In my supposition, a group of technically competent planners set up a high-speed impact of a 757 into a hardened wall of the Pentagon. They did so to produce a crash scene unlike any previous airplane crash scene. I can’t offer a reason for carrying out such a spectacle, other than to bring a great deal of confusion to the day’s overall treachery.

My supposition is based on what can be inferred about the cr. 2000 state-of-art in analysis of high-speed airplane impacts into hardened walls. Also, my supposition assumes use of automated aircraft control available by government insiders shortly before 2001.

Our sharp differences of opinion were, I think, quite interesting, in that we both strongly believe the official explanations are completely false. Narrowing in on the specific question, did a Boeing 757 crash into the Pentagon?, Fetzer holds strongly the mainstream 9/11 Truther belief — NO.
In stark contrast, I believe the evidence available to the public is consistent with a 757 crash, and thus, the answer should be a tentative YES. I’m not insisting a 757 did crash, but rather, the evidence that one didn’t crash needs to be very persuasive to overcome that pointing to a 757 impact.
 
Fetzer’s first argument against my supposition was that aerodynamic forces would prevent a high-speed airplane flying that close to the ground. He backed up his opinion with that of a number of commercial pilots, who say it is impossible to fly that close to the ground because of what’s called ground effect. My response is that pilots make that case under the assumption the plane would have been flown by a pilot (according to the official story), and configured as a commercial airliner (again, assuming the official narrative). My supposition is that the plane would have been rigged in advance to make close-to-ground flight possible, and that it was not flown by a pilot, but rather by an automated control system. The rigging might have included center-of-gravity control through use of ballast, which could have included water tanks within the cabin, with pumps to transfer water between tanks.

A second area of dispute was the applicability of a F-4 Phantom fighter rocket-sled crash into a massive solid concrete block conducted by Sandia. Fetzer argued it had no applicability, whatsoever. saying the weights of the two airplanes were so different, there would simply be no relationship between the two. Fetzer furthermore argued that the F-4 was filled with water, which would make it completely unrelated to an airplane filled with aviation fuel. I countered, saying the water was used in the F-4 test to simulate the weight and fluidity of aviation fuel. The overall F-4 test was used to validate the analysis tools, so these tools could be applied with confidence to other airplane-impact situations. Although, we Truthers don’t have the ability to use these tools to model a 757 impact into the hardened Pentagon wall, my guess is that the planners did their analysis in advance, assuring themselves the crash after effects would be roughly what they desired.

The third area of discussion involved the lack of debris on the lawn. Fetzer maintained the lack of debris was evidence a 757 couldn’t have hit. I argued the lack of debris is what should be expected, based on the results of the Sandia F-4 test. Fetzer then did, what I consider to be an “appeal to authority,” by bringing up the opinion of General Albert "Bert" Stubblebine. General Stubblebine is featured on a widely viewed YouTube video stating a 757 couldn’t have hit the Pentagon, because there were no aircraft remains to be seen. My response is, although I greatly respect General Stubblebine, he is not aware of what the validated airplane-impact analysis tools would predict, and therefore, he is “wrong” on this matter.

The last area of discussion caught me by surprise. Fetzer showed a photo of the collapse of the Pentagon structure that occurred some time later, taking down a section of the Pentagon to the south of the alleged impact point. We both agreed that section was probably brought down on purpose. Fetzer concluded, the appearance of the Pentagon prior to bringing it down was apparently “not what the authorities desired.” Therefore, they must have brought it down to make the building appear more like a major impact had occurred. I agreed. However, that put my logic in a bind. Whereas I had been arguing the planners probably achieved the result they wished to achieve, this later “adjustment” suggests they fell short of their objectives.

Oh, if we could only know what the planners had planned.

Saturday, August 24, 2013

A Shift in Reasoning: 757, Pentagon, and heliport debris


The question on the Pentagon airplane or airplanes is, I think, complicated. A number of apparent conflicts in lines of reasoning has made it difficult for me to settle in on one set of consistent answers. For the past several years, I have favored CIT's north-path airplane with flyover. This hypothesis implied, I thought, either no airplane struck the Pentagon, or an airplane struck in tight time correlation with the flyover airplane. 

Recently, I've taken a more careful look at many of the issues, and have gradually shifted my thinking toward an airplane impacting the Pentagon. One shift was deciding the north-path airplane was more likely not time correlated with the explosive event at the Pentagon face.

Another shift came relative to the "no debris on the lawn" issue. I was bothered the "no-Boeing" folks didn't have much of a comeback to the Sandia F-4 sled test implications. That test provides empirical evidence suggesting that "confetti" is what should be expected when an airplane crashes at high speed into a hardened wall.

An "ah ha" moment occurred when I ran across a photo in a different setting with "confetti-like" debris on the ground. I was familiar with the photo, as Jim Hoffman described the photo as "...portion of the lawn near the heliport." I stumbled across the same photo in the book, Pentagon 9/11, but the ledger read, "...debris-covered helipad."  The helipad, it turns out, is in the exact right spot for deflected debris from a plane flying directly over the cable spools before impacting the Pentagon centered on column 14, the official impact column. This gave a boost to the 757-on-south-path hypothesis.

Thursday, February 28, 2013

Battling Media’s Pro-Keystone Advocacy



San Diego's mainstream newspaper, U-T San Diego, recently published an opinion piece advocating approval of Keystone-XL pipeline. I quickly submitted a letter to editor arguing against that project. The letter was published, along with three others in U-T’s print edition, but my letter did not get included in the online edition.  The other three were included. My letter follows:
U-T San Diego’s editorial supporting Keystone XL is penny-wise and pound-foolish.
Getting construction jobs in the U.S. or circumventing a Canada-China pipeline partnership are going for pennies. The real issue not even mentioned in the editorial is the massive quantity of greenhouse gasses that would be released from the Alberta tar-sands. The U.S. should be taking the lead internationally against such foolish projects as extracting bitumen for usable oil. Obtaining useful oil in that manner releases three times the greenhouse gas per barrel as does conventional oil. 
The pound-foolish part of this will push global climate over the tipping point. To achieve climate safety (getting CO2 in the atmosphere below 350 parts per million) will require leaving four-fifths the current fossil fuel reserves in the ground. The Alberta tar-sands project says, “safety be damned.” 
Shortly thereafter, another opinion piece was published, again strongly advocating the pipeline. It almost seamed as if they were shouting louder in response to those opposing their viewpoint.

I followed up with a second letter, assuming it would not be published because it was too soon after my previous letter. Nevertheless, I wanted the editor to get the message I was still against it. True enough, it was not published. This letter said the following: 
If all we did was reject Keystone XL, it would be “the end” for our grandchildren and beyond. And by “our” grandchildren, I mean all grandchildren. More importantly, we must transition completely away from fossil fuels well before extracting even half the conventional reserves still in the ground. But failing to reject Keystone XL would make it dramatically more difficult to bring a halt to fossil-fuel burning. Rather, it would open the pipe filled with even dirtier fossil fuels, three times dirtier than conventional reserves. 
On the one hand, it would be fairly easy to transition away from fossil fuels thru establishment of an ever increasing price on CO2, coupled with an equal dividend to all legal residents. It could be revenue neutral. But no, Keystone XL pipeline would take us in the opposite direction.

In response to these two opinion pieces, several letters opposed to Keystone XL were published. Of these, the predominant message was, given a rejection of the Keystone by the U.S., Canada would not likely build a pipeline to the west coast and ship the oil to China. There is strong opposition by the Canadian citizens and indigenous peoples to such a pipeline.

Tuesday, January 8, 2013

Counter Climate Change Now. It’s Urgent!



LA Times published a Bill McKibben opinion piece calls out President Obama for not really understanding the importance of countering climate change. Failure to get this right will take away all hope for our grandchildren’s children. We must stabilize greenhouse gas emissions in this century's first quarter, and steadily reduce emissions in its second quarter. 
To do this, the global community must leave four fifths of current fossil fuel reserves in the ground [McKibben]. There is a solution according to the leading federal scientist on this subject, Dr. James Hansen -- immediately institute an ever increasing price on oil, gas, and coal extractions. Collect fees at the wellheads domestically, or equivalent tariffs for imports. Exempt imports from countries with similar policies [Hansen]
How best to distribute the fees? Referred to as "fee-and-dividend," return 100% in equal parts to all legal residents (full shares to adults, half shares to the first two children). This would put the money directly back into the economy, letting the market choose among energy alternatives. Those who use fossil-fuel energy least will be net winners overall. Energy corporations would see the futility of continuing to invest in fossil-fuel explorations. You can count on them to redirect their massive current-day profits into alternative energy technologies.
Admittedly, taking the logical path will not make it an easy path. Special interests will do what they are prone to do -- attempt to get it rigged to their benefit. That is why the 100% distribution is so important. Anything less would surely be a sign special interests had success in rigging the system. Cap-and-trade is such an approach. In general, this approach facilitates rigging to benefit some special interests. The system can be and probably is gamed, and is viewed with suspicion by many. Because of these deficiencies, it will not provide the necessary greenhouse gas reductions, which, in turn, extinguish hope for our grandchildren’s children.