Thanks for answering.

For those who are really interested in theses things, please google MASCAL to get a maybe different point of view.

Short summary from Wikipedia:

“The Pentagon Mass Casualty project (codenamed Pentagon Mascal) was a mock terrorist contingency exercise that was held in the Office of the Secretary of Defense conference room from October 24 to October 26, 2000. The exercise required emergency response teams, members of the defense protective services, and U.S. government officials to conduct emergency simulations in preparation for a possible plane crash into the Pentagon.”

Maybe someone should have told Mrs. Rice about it.

In case anyone reads Tom Clancy, for example “Debt of Honor” written in 1994, you will read about a jetliner killing the president.

Ok, Tom Clancy is not the government.

To round it up, I don’t believe in most things some others do, like “missle in the Pentagon” (where is the plane? – burned, as aluminium burns), or controlled demolition (does not affect anything).

But I strongly doubt the official conspiracy theory about 19 (comparably dumb) people killing 3000. This has been done by some very intelligent people.

[[You are resposible for the protection of the Pentagon and all of the people inside, including Mr. Rumsfield.
You are informed of one tower burning. Then the second tower is hit by an airliner. What do you do within the next five minutes?
a) Order protection measures of the Pentagon
b) Evacuate the Pentagon, possibly to under the earth bunkers
c) a + b
d) nothing of the above]]

Probably d, since I would have no reason to think an attack on commercial buildings in New York would portend an attack on government buildings in Virginia.

[[How could it be that a missing jet had 35 minutes time after the worldwide TV tansmission of the second impact to finally crash into the heart of the defense of the USA?]]

Well, if you multiply the jet’s speed by the time involved (35′), you get a maximum value for the linear distance it had to travel to hit the Pentagon. The area is then that distance, called it R, squared and multiplied by pi. Compare the area of a jetliner to the area involved, note that most of the country is not under radar surveillance most of the time, and you’ll begin to understand why it’s a much harder problem than you might think.

The CIA headquarters at Langley, VA has huge plate glass windows in front. They don’t expect a domestic attack (though in fact they did have some crazy guy take a shot at them a couple of years ago). Neither did the Pentagon planners. There hasn’t been an internal war in the United States since 1865.

[[Come to mind are possible hints they ignored of the impending attack (as yet unrevealed) and the reason Building 7 would crumble when no plane hit it and suffered only a few office fires (it MUST have been a controlled demolition).]]

Building 7 was not hit by the planes, true. It was, however, hit with debris from buildings 1 and 2. So no, there’s no way it MUST have been a controlled demolition. From the films, it clearly is not, since in any controlled demolition, they blow out the first floor and let gravity collapse the rest. Have you looked into how controlled building demolitions are done?

anyhow, i had heard about “in the shadow of the moon” but it made its way out of the theaters in a flash. it’s gotten great reviews and i was really excited to see it but missed the chance. is out out on dvd yet?

FYI, chances are I won’t be checking responses to this, since the post has moved off the main page and I generally stop keeping track of conversations at that point.

Was there mistakes made in the handling of the Pentagon before AA77 hit the building? Apparently! But then, you know what they say about hindsight.

My point is that if this were a military strike against the US, then I’m sure that those responsible for the security of the Pentagon would have approached the situation differently. But terrorist attacks generally target the civilian population, because that causes the most hysteria. Even so, D.C. is a virtual gallery of potential targets. To evacuate the Pentagon when all you know is that a plane is coming to D.C., where there are so many targets, would indeed save several lives, but it would also add greatly to the confusion both withing the military and to the observing civilian population. And that in itself could be more detrimental should the plane actual come down somewhere else.

Yeah, if they KNEW that the plane was targeting the pentagon specifically and did nothing, then yeah, I’d agree that that was poor management and just reckless behavior. But as it is, given the information that they knew at the time, I think it was very unfortunate.

Seriously, I’ve lost all ability to function in society now. Thank you, I appreciate that.

Anyway, just discovered this site today and I love it.

Some of the commentariat might be dumb as bricks, but I never usually read blog threads anyway.

You are resposible for the protection of the Pentagon and all of the people inside, including Mr. Rumsfield.

You are informed of one tower burning. Then the second tower is hit by an airliner. What do you do within the next five minutes?

a) Order protection measures of the Pentagon
b) Evacuate the Pentagon, possibly to under the earth bunkers
c) a + b
d) nothing of the above

Fact is, a part of the pentagon has been destroyed due to the complete lack of any protection and Mr. Rumsfield could have been killed.
Fact is, no evacuation has been made.

Possibly because the plane was believed to have crash by one of the control centers. There was less then 20 minutes between the time that people bang to second guess the crash and the actual impact at the Pentagon. Then, you have to take into account that it takes time to scramble planes. Plus, planes had already been scrambled, but had to be ordered back to D.C. (I’m assuming that they originally were ordered elsewhere). That was only 5 minutes before impact.

“Can you imagine how far a military fighter flies in 30 minutes time even without the afterburner?”

F-16s are not incredibly fast. Max speed is dependent partly on the variant, but usually falls around Mach 2ish. Whether or not the airborne fights should have been able to intercept would be depenant on where they where when they were order to D.C.

“Do you think there are no suface to air missile defenses for the Pentagon?”

I don’t know. The US capital is situated in a location where most military attacks against would not come as a surprise. You either have to come across miles of ocean via carrier, or launch a long range mission from abroad. Both would surely be noticed and intercepted. Or at least, I’m sure whoever is deciding whether the budget should be spent on AA at the Pentagon or some air superiority fighter might conclude that. Can you tell me that you know that their are such defenses?

“Do you think they would have left Mr. Rumsfield sitting in his office waiting for his death?”

There are several places in D.C. that could have been targeted (oh, and to all the spooks now reading these post, Hi!). Of all of them, the Pentagon is probably the safest, and, let’s face it, with the Capital and White House in the area, those would be my concerns in a terrorist attack.

“Do you think they would have left Mr. Rumsfield sitting in his office waiting for his death?

Was nobody responsible for the protection of Mr. Rumsfield and the Pentagon?

…

Did anybody even try to do something, like getting Mr. Rumsfield out of the Pentagon?”

I’m sure that there were probably people around him thinking that they should leave. “We’ve analyzed their attack, sir, and there is a danger. Should I have your ship standing by?” “Evacuate? … I think you overestimate their chances.” I’m sure that there was some decision to stay for some reason, but to suggest that it was because of conspiracy? “Never attribute to malice what can be adequately explained by stupidity.”

“Who was in charge, has he been questioned on why he so terribly failed his job?”

Given that this question came in the middle of three other discussing Rumsfield being at the Pentagon, I’m not entirely sure what you’re asking. If you’re asking why did someone fail so miserably at protecting the Secretary who refused (?) to leave the Pentagon, then I don’t know whether that could be considered a terrible failure, since Rumsfield lives.

But if you mean who was suppose to take care of the whole events of the day and why did they fail to stop the attacks, well, that’s a valid question, and a terrible complex one. That that merited a commission, several months of media coverage, hundreds of books, interviews, press release, etc. Their are probably hundreds of people who are accountable, ranging from small fries who to this day probably hold themselves accountable for not doing something, all the way to top brass and politicians whose policies and failure to recognize a growing problem were a significant factor. As for the chaos day itself, keep in mind, an attack like this is not what our military has spent the last 6 decades preparing for. I’m sure that there was a lot of protocols in place that people failed to follow that day. And I’m sure that there are several protocols that were not in place because we did not see this coming, or at least, give it serious merit.

Daniel, you asked for one question which would be hard to answer. Here it is:

35 minutes is the time between the second impact into the towers shown life on TV and the impact at the Pentagon, where Mr. Rumsfield was, the leader of the biggest military power of the world.

How could it be that a missing jet had 35 minutes time after the worldwide TV tansmission of the second impact to finally crash into the heart of the defense of the USA?

Can you imagine how far a military fighter flies in 30 minutes time even without the afterburner?

Do you think there are no suface to air missile defenses for the Pentagon?

Do you think they would have left Mr. Rumsfield sitting in his office waiting for his death?

Was nobody responsible for the protection of Mr. Rumsfield and the Pentagon?

Who was in charge, has he been questioned on why he so terribly failed his job?

Did anybody even try to do something, like getting Mr. Rumsfield out of the Pentagon?

Okay, this is more than one question, but it all boils down to one argument: 35 minutes of doing nothing to procted the Pentagon.

Sure it is under humor. Sure this actress said some stuff that you don’t agree with, (I don’t agree with her either) but this post comes across as if you are ridiculing her. (due mainly to the words and the picture ;p) Ridicule is akin to desperation, and sure, you and many others want desperately to debunk this whole moon landing issue to the whole world.

A post like this is actually a ‘double edged sword’. Sure you got your point across to many, mainly those that already agree with you, but second, you block out many viewers of this post by the ‘apparent’ ridicule of their non-critical thinking abilities, which is not really fair at all, and will only result in the people you are trying to reach becoming less responsive to your coherent arguments.

If you aren’t ridiculing her, my sincere apologies, but it sure looks like it.

I don’t believe that Bush is stupid. He isn’t blessed with an inquisitive mind, however. I have read some interesting essays by a father and son Psychologist team (one teaches, the other practices) on Huffington Post on why his behavior is so bizarre. And I’ve read enough data about the Florida and Ohio election irregularities to convince me that the R’s did in fact steal the first, if not the second, election. And I do believe that the American public, for the most part, is NOT a well read group, and they don’t respond to intelligence in a candidate so much as his personality, charisma, or image. All the negative data on R. Reagan – his huge budget deficit he left as governor in CA, his pandering to the Christian conservatives, his divorce – was available before he ran for president. All the deliberate lies to cover the mistakes his administration made during his terms as president, the enormous tolerance those who adore him stlll show for his truly awful presidency (he is the original “Teflon Don”) says volumes about why conspiracy theories find fertile ground with some folks.

I myself am a creative thinker with delusions of realist-sanity

there is more to reality than can be encopassed by the meager wit of man

Peace,

My point exactly.

IQ(Read: talent associated with success in an academic environment) seems to have little direct relationship with success in life. I’ve known people who could not read, yet successfully ran a business(a small business, to be sure). I’ve known Mensa members who were barely able to keep food on the table. I’ve also known really bright people who chose to appear dumb as bricks because, as one(Donny Boldman) told me, “When people think you’re too dumb to comprehend them, they’ll say things in your presence they think you won’t understand. I learn a lot about what people really think that way,,,”.

I guesstimated Dubyas’ IQ based on his public utterances but that is hardly more than a very rough indicator. He did manage to obtain a business degree, was gov. of Texas and a businessman. Granted, he had the advantage of family wealth to draw upon but, one definition of intelligence is the ability to take the circumstances you’ve been born into and run with it. He has definitely run far with those attributes.

Still, I seriously doubt he would be a fun guy to sit with and have a beer. My conversations tend to the esoteric. His probably run to sports, which is of little interest to me. That doesn’t mean he’s dumb, just not in a league I would consider interesting.

Gary 7

Not that I take any pleasure in defending the W but…

IQ notwithstanding, the Shrub is the president, and nobody here has achieved that level of success, unless Queen Elizabeth or perhaps Vladimir Putin reads (and comments on) this blog. That kind of says something about the value of IQ. Yeah, I think he’s dumb as a stump, but I’m pretty sure he’s a brighter bulb than Ronald Reagan.

Say what you want about the clown, he’s still president, and that’s got to be worth something.

The “stole the election” mantra is stale, sour grapes. He won, get over it. Best of all, his time is almost up. Maybe next time, the people whose will has been the victim of this alleged affront, will get off their lazy butts and vote instead of sitting back and whining about the results of the election.

…and the answer to that is…nothing.

Why anyone would rely on a french actress for information regarding scientific matters is beyond me.

(It can be argued the human species needs a sense of community and with the rise of large cities that people now feel isolated, being in a swarm of strangers. By people watching movies, television, interviews, celebrities tap into a sense of community, pseudo-intimacy, and therefore whose opinions are valued.)

In short, you can argue about how Atta & Co. came to act, and what happened afterwards, but there is no doubt – NONE – that the planes brought the towers down.

Congress, not the President (no matter who is in office), has the Constitutional duty to provide and control 99% of what the President is blamed for. They get away with not doing their duty because Joe and Susie Sixpack do not know who they are and get off on hating someone for things they cannot control.

Just watch. Something about Eta Carinae’s next eruption will be the fault of “the Bush Administration”. It’s a symptom of mental illness.