pretty soon you'll be teaming up with those anarchists and burning trashcans. (Kidding!)

Seriously, though, I'm with you in wondering just where the outrage went. In the thread on the Nadler interview, I asked why Nadler didn't go through the roof when Mueller blew him off on a question both Nadler and Mueller knew that Nadler would ask and that both Nadler and Mueller knew that Mueller wouldn't answer.

On this Constitution Day, we come not to praise the Constitution, but to bury it.

I wonder when they meet behind closed doors for secret classification purposes, whether the way they act is much different. I bet they still treat Mueller as honorable. Hell, by definition, everybody must be honorable because that is how they require the masses to address them. It is hard to trust the vast majority of our reps in congress when the oversighters require oversight. Most investigative hearings are just theater, unless of course you are a Repug investigating Bill Clinton’s terrible transgression. That required real action- impeachment.

Like I said yesterday, I would really like to believe that this is not a massive conspiracy to cover up the the real anthrax killers, because the implications of that are pretty horrific. So I have been searching my brain for other explanations.

It seems to me that the FBI - like DoJ, the CIA, and most newsrooms these days (not to mention a few boardrooms and even bedrooms) - is divided into pro- and anti-Bush camps these days, so discernible patterns of behaviour can be confusing.

For example, the FBI quickly refused to endorse the neocon lie (repeated by McCain among others) that Iraq was most like behind the anthrax attacks. If it's all a big cover-up job now, why did they bother doing that back in 2001? It was Mueller who was personally "beaten up" during President Bush's morning intelligence briefings back then.

Shortly after the attacks, Francis A. Boyle, an international law expert who worked under the first Bush Administration as a bioweapons advisor in the 1980s, contacted an FBI Agent called Marion "Spike" Bowman, and told him that only a government lab could have produced this anthrax and he suspected people at Fort Detrick were involved.

"Soon after I informed Bowman of this information, the FBI authorized the destruction of the Ames cultural anthrax database," the professor said.

Why did they do that? A question for Robert Mueller! I think the FBI have already admitted it was a mistake, but who authorized it and why?

Without getting too side-tracked, this touches on another concern I have about the evidence that remains. It has all been in the hands of the FBI, so who is to say that the evidence has not been tampered with? I mean, assuming that the FBI's credibility is shot here, as seems to be the case.

And then in 2003, "Spike" Bowman was promoted and given the Presidential Rank Award by FBI Director Robert S. Mueller, despite a protest letter from Senator Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa), and despite the fact that Bowman was also the FBI agent who allegedly sabotaged the FISA warrant for access to Zacharias Moussaoui's computer prior to 9/11.

And then there is the media circus surrounding FBI agent Van Harp's original investigations into Stephen Hatfill. News crews with helicopters were beating FBI agents to the scene of new developments! Did Mueller ever try to find out who was tipping off the media about FBI leads? Did he ever fire anyone?

When an FBI case agent Robert Roth recommended a criminal probe of the leaks, Mueller resisted. Why? Roth said Roth said the case file was "an open book," used by "a huge group of people."

Mueller testified that he did not recall the episode. He said he had backed at least one other leak investigation but did not know if any action was taken.

In fact, Mueller personally instructed Van Harp to brief Daschle and Leahy on the case, in a break with normal strict confidentiality protocol: did the media somehow get access to those briefings? If so how?

Now back to playing Devil's Advocate (not doing a good job, am I?) ...

Rozeff:

There is no FDIC fund. There are only IOUs in it signed by Uncle Sam.

When the FDIC receives its insurance premiums from banks, it invests them in US bonds (what else can it do?). Uncle Sam then spends the money it borrows. It is long gone. When the FDIC needs money, it will redeem the bonds. Uncle Sam will then have to borrow. The budget deficit will then rise.

Shades of the empty Social Security trust fund.

Well, Al Gore and his "lock-box" would be a welcome sight these days, eh?

Jim rightly and soundly suggested an independent examination of the FBI's investigation, evidence gathering process's and so on. Of course this should be instigated and funded by the government.

I mention the last because at great sacrifice of their own unpaid for time a group of people are doing just that with NIST's equally ludicrous report into the collapse of WTC7.

Everything about both 9/11 and the governments attempts to explain them stinks.

Scientists, Scholars, Architects & Engineers respond to NIST

WTC Technical Information Repository

Attention: Mr. Stephen Cauffman

National Institute of Standards and Technology

Stop 8610

Gaithersburg, MD 20899-8610

September 15, 2008

Re: Public Comments on WTC 7 Draft Reports

Dear Mr. Cauffman,

I am writing on behalf of a group of scientists, scholars, engineers and building professionals who are dedicated to scientific research regarding the destruction of all three high-rise buildings (WTC 1, 2 and 7) on September 11, 2001. We have examined the draft reports recently released by NIST purporting to explain the demise of WTC Building 7 (collectively referred to herein as the “Report”). We have found many areas that need to be revised and re-examined by NIST personnel before they release a final report on this matter. We have provided our names and affiliations at the end of this document, in accordance with the guidelines for submittal of comments promulgated by NIST at (http://wtc.nist.gov/media/comments2008.html).

I'm not an advocate of meeting behind closed doors, I expect as many hearings to be open to the public as possible. But it is a fact that things changed when they brought in TV. People started hiring image specialists, hair stylists all the rest, and they do look to do sound bites they can use in the next election. They won't generally hold public hearings and take very unsafe stances as much as they would without TV cameras. They won't use language that could conceivably be used against them out of context. That leads to euphemisms and platitudes. No TV doesn't mean a closed hearing. There's a long way and a lot of alternatives from on camera to in camera.