Most of us would think it strange if the impact of a passenger plane wasn't sufficient to cause a skyscraper to collapse. So there were few who doubted what it was that hit the Twin Towers on the 11 September 2001 or the identities of the perpetrators. However, in the intervening years, several individuals and groups, both in North America and in Europe, began to doubt whether this necessarily constitutes accuracy. For them, a set of contradictory circumstances surrounding the attacks do not correspond with the explanations of the American authorities and the Congress-appointed 9/11 Commission.^[1]

A key reason for this doubt could be that there are witnesses of 9/11 who describe events that do not tally with events in the official story.^[2] An example is provided by onlookers who heard and saw what they believed to be explosions around the Twin Towers before they were struck by the planes. Policemen thought it looked like "planned implosion".^[3] Fireman Richard Banaciski reported that: "It seemed like on television when they blow up these buildings. It seemed like it was going all the way around like a belt, all these explosions." Assistant Fire Commissioner Stephen Gregory claimed: "I saw a flash flash flash [at] the lower level of the building. You know, like when they demolish a building."^[4]


Another controversial witness statement came from maintenance worker, William Rodriguez who was working in the North Tower on 9/11. In an interview with New York Magazine,^[5] he claimed that he first heard a huge explosion when he was in one of the sub-basements of the skyscraper and witnessed the appearance of victims, the skin burnt off their arms by fires in the lift shaft. After the explosion in the sub-basement he heard another one from above. It was a Boeing 767. Williams was the last survivor to be rescued from the World Trade Center's Ground Zero. He was hailed as a hero and invited to visit George Bush and the White House. Later, when he attempted to publicise his story about the sub-basement explosion, it was rejected by the American authorities. He has now filed a lawsuit against these same authorities under the RICO Statute, a legal ruling originally designed to prosecute Mafia families.

Besides witness statements describing a controlled demolition of the Twin Towers with explosives, critics of the Bush administration believe there are several sets of circumstances around 9/11 that give good reason to suspect the official story is incorrect. It is a fact that none of the four hijacked planes were intercepted by fighter planes. That this did not happen, combined with the fact that the majority of the air force was engaged in military exercises, has given weight to suspicion that the American air defence force gave the order to "stand down" so that the terrorist attacks could proceed unhindered. Another suspicious circumstance is that WTC 7 - also known as Building 7 - a 47-storey skyscraper, collapsed without having been hit by any of the planes. Conversely, the buildings that stood adjacent are still intact.

When it comes to any forewarning of the attacks, claims that the National Security Agency (NSA) monitored fully translated conversations in the summer of 2001 - in real-time -between Mohammed Atta and Khalid Shaikh Mohammed have raised concern. In one of the conversations, Atta purportedly gave Mohammed the green light for the attacks; NSA therefore should have been forewarned.


In relation to investigation that could have led to the apprehension of the hijackers, FBI agent Colleen Rowley claims that the FBI's directors intentionally obstructed her investigation of Zacarias Moussaoui - at the time he was attending flight school in Minneapolis. They did this despite having received warnings from French intelligence. Rowley believes that, had the FBI approved the investigation, they could have uncovered Moussaoui's plans as well as those of several other hijackers enrolled in flight schools.^[6] That Pakistani intelligence (ISI) transferred significant sums of money to Mohammed Atta in the days leading up to 9/11 is, some believe, evidence of cooperation between the ISI, CIA, and Al-Qaida.^[7]

It may also seem suspicious that George Bush has maintained that American authorities have stepped down the hunt for Osama bin Laden, the main suspect behind September 11th. General Richard Myers also stated that the war in Afghanistan was not about finding bin Laden.^[8] A former CIA agent, Gary Berntsen, has furthermore claimed that the Bush administration let bin Laden escape when he was cornered in a pocket of the Tora Bora mountains in Afghanistan in 2001.^[9] It is also known that American intelligence were fully aware of bin Laden's whereabouts as early as July 2001 when he was treated for a kidney condition at an American hospital in Dubai, The United Arab Emirates.^[10] A few months later, in September, he also received treatment in a military hospital in Peshawar, Pakistan, under the surveillance of Pakistani intelligence.^[11]

The existence of circumstances and witness accounts that contradict aspects of the official story has led some individuals and groups to search for alternative explanations for what happened on 9/11. A veritable jungle of theories about what really happened in the US five years ago has sprung up. The theories unfurl in several, interconnected directions. A comparison of different opinions is presented in the book The New Pearl Harbor - Disturbing Questions about the Bush-Administration and 9/11 (2004), by David Ray Griffin, Professor of Theology and the Claremont School of Theology in Claremont, California. A key premise he presents in the book is that the responsibility for the attacks of 9/11 can, to a large extent, be attributed to former members of the neo-conservative think tank Project for a New American Century (PNAC), who are now key players in the Bush administration. In the document "Rebuilding America's defences: strategies, forces and resources for a New American Century" (2000),^[12] written by PNACs members, it is claimed that: "The process of transformation, even if it brings revolutionary change, is likely to be a long one, lacking a catastrophic and catalyzing event like a new Pearl Harbour".

The title of Griffin's book refers to PNAC's statement the transformation of the American military necessitated "a new Pearl Harbour". Griffin looks at this quotation in the light of the legal principle of cui bono? and concludes that 9/11 was precisely the catalyst the Bush administration needed. For Griffin, it is therefore probable that the US orchestrated an incident of this type in order to justify the invasion of Iraq and Afghanistan, as well as the curtailment of civil liberties in the US through the introduction of the Patriot Act. That they have chosen to invade countries in the Middle East he regards as simply an extension of the cooperation the US already had with the power elite in Saudi Arabia, the Pakistani intelligence (ISI), the Taliban regime, and regimes in Central Asia. And for Griffin, the agenda in the Middle East and Central Asia is quite clear: it is about controlling both the production and transportation of oil via pipes and tankers. Griffin does not point to any specific figures responsible for arranging the 9/11 attacks. He states only that there are different opinions about this issue.

For some, speculation about the identity of those responsible surrounds intelligence agencies such as the NSA, FBI, and CIA. Others believe it was the White House. A third group believe that is was individual figures like Dick Cheney, Paul Wolfowitz, Jed Bush, George Tenet, and Donald Rumsfeld who were the real architects of the attacks. Alternatively, other possible combinations of perpetrators and organisations may have worked together. In his paper, "What is your 'HOP' level?"^[13] Nicholas Levis categorises opinions on the attacks under four main headings:
- The Official Story: That Osama bin Laden was responsible, that the planes were hijacked by nineteen Muslim fundamentalists and that the White House did not receive any warning.
- Incompetence Theory: Accepts the official history but blames the White House, FBI, CIA, NSA and others for not following up the many warnings. This was the line taken, with a great deal of cover-up and spin, in the 9/11 Commission's report.
- LIHOP ("Letting It Happen on Purpose"): There are a number of variations on this one. Is mainly about how factions within the American authorities and the private sector were aware of the hijackers' plans but did nothing to stop them, since 9/11 was in line with political objectives.
- MIHOP ("Making It Happen on Purpose"): US authorities or private forces planned and carried out the attacks.

For the sceptics, the common denominator is their belief that at least one of the elements of the official presentation of 9/11 is inaccurate. For those who subscribe to the radical MIHOP hypothesis, a key premise is that the Twin Towers - including Building 7 - collapsed as a result of controlled demolition with explosives: that it was an inside job. The technical/construction part of this claim has been directly refuted in a report of approximately 10 000 pages written by the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST), who claim that it was fuel from the passenger planes that disturbed the structure of the towers and that it was this that eventually caused them to collapse.^[14] NIST is unable to offer a satisfactory explanation as to why the third building, WTC 7, collapsed without having been struck by a plane.^[15] Steven E. Jones, professor of physics at Brigham Young University in Utah, rejects NIST's claims about the Twin Towers. He tells, for example, how eyewitnesses observed that steel from all three skyscrapers had melted (in some cases, the steel was found glowing three weeks after the attack) and was twisted in a way that can only have been caused by what he describes as pre-positioned "cutter charges". According to Jones, these charges consisted of thermate, HMX, or RDX, substances used in explosives used only in controlled demolitions. Another important point for Jones is that the fires in the buildings and the fuel from the passenger planes (the maximum temperature for airplane fuel is 1000 degrees Celsius) did not produce sufficient heat to melt the steel - which would require temperatures of between 1550-1990 degrees Celsius - within the one to one-and-a-half hours it took for the Twin Towers to collapse.^[16] Jones's claims are supported by the data engineer Jim Hoffman. After video and photo analysis of the events, Hoffman concludes that all three buildings fell almost symmetrically, at close to freefall speed, and directly downwards onto their own foundations. According to Hoffman, the speed of the collapse, the pulverisation of the concrete to a "milky" powder, and the presence of horizontal dust clouds observed alongside WTC 7, are associated with the use of pre-positioned explosives in buildings.^[17]

Many no longer believe the official explanation, but are convinced that the Towers' collapse was an inside job - either that the authorities "let it happen" or "made it happen". Many who put their trust in other hypotheses have joined forces with the umbrella organisation 9/11Truth^[18] - an ad hoc organisation formed to exist until the last unanswered question about 9/11 has been answered. 9/11Truth has brought together a cross-section of society; members with different political allegiances manage the same organisations and lobby groups. This cooperation is mainly concentrated on meetings, demonstrations, the production of documentary films, Internet forums, online publications, and conferences. In the UK, a local branch of 9/11Truth has been set up called JulySeventhTruth,^[19] so-called because it seeks to piece together what happened during the terrorist attacks in London on the 7 July 2005.

The media spokesman for NY9/11Truth, Les Jamieson, every Sunday helps to arrange demonstrations at Ground Zero or seminars in St. Mark's Church, made available by priest, Frank Morales. Jamieson talked to Le Monde diplomatique:

LMd: Does 9/11 represent further justification for war?

LJ: No. It has recently emerged that, here in the USA, the authorities planned a similarly staged operation, Operation Northwoods: A plan was devised in 1962 by the most senior-ranking military leader in the US. The plan was to arrange a terrorist attack inland, on the coast of Florida where Americans would be killed, a passenger plane shot down, a ship sunk -- and all the blame would be laid on the Cubans. So this is nothing new, it's been done before.

LMd: How cynical can a government become?

LJ: A lie precipitated the Vietnam War too - the events in the Tonkin Gulf. It was reported that Vietnamese torpedo boats had shot at American ships in the Tonkin Gulf. But these reports were fictitious. President Lyndon B. Johnson and foreign minister Robert McNamara exploited these reports to pass the Tonkin Gulf Resolution in Congress - which was really a declaration of war. 50 000 Americans ended up dead, hundreds of thousands tragically affected. The herbicide Agent Orange was used to poison farms and land use. This is what happens when governments and the power elite orchestrate wars. There really is a level of evil, a loathing of humanity. That's why Henry Kissinger said once about the war between Iraq and Iran: "I hope they kill each other," or: "Oil is much too important a commodity to be left in the hands of the Arabs."
LMd: Is it similarly possible to suggest that there could have been a secret group connected to the government, a "state within a state", that planned and brought about September 11?

LJ: Yes. One has to remember that there are private groups of agents, private armies that exist outside Congress' field of vision. They carry out covert operations deep inside the CIA, and have severed all contact with the American government, who for their part, have no knowledge about what is going on. This has been happening since the 1950s. When Dwight Eisenhower left his presidency he said that one should be vigilant over the overarching control of the military-industrial complex. To this day, we still have a shadow government, an invisible government and we believe this one works together with elements within the intelligence agencies MI5, MI6, and perhaps Mossad. MI5 and the CIA definitely work together in translating the agenda for the international power elite.

LMd: Are you not afraid of being labelled a conspiracy theorist?

LJ: The term "Conspiracy Theory" must also be understood as a strategy of the mass media and individuals within the power elite to sew seeds of doubt about this kind of information. The fact is that, on the contrary, there are a range of examples of real conspiracies by the authorities. For example, the Iran-Contras affair was a result of a huge conspiracy that enabled the sale of narcotics to buy weapons for the Contras. And we have the BCCI scandal in 1991 - a massive banking scandal. There's also the vote in Florida in 2000 and in Ohio in 2004. If one studies these things, mammoth conspiracies can be uncovered. What about all the lies that led to the invasion of Iraq? We were told that weapons of mass destruction definitely existed and that Saddam tried to buy "yellow cake" from Nigeria. It was all lies and deception. These kinds of events need a conspiracy! The American government's official version of what happened on 9/11 is a scandalous conspiracy theory; it's not to be believed! In our organisation we are detectives and investigators. We put together a theory and are actually extremely stringent in finding the best possible analysis.

Jamieson is not the only one subscribing to such theories. The participation of many community groups and service personnel connected to 9/11Truth has generated a trail of research and articles. A group called "Scholars for 9/11Truth" describes itself as "...a non-partisan association of faculty, students, and scholars, in fields as diverse as history, science, military affairs, psychology, and philosophy, dedicated to exposing falsehoods and to revealing truths behind 9/11."^[20] It was established by philosophy professor James H. Fetzer and professor of physics Steven E. Jones - the movement's foremost expert on the collapse of the Twin Towers. The latter's work will be published in September, a contribution to the anthology 9/11 & American Empire: Intellectuals Speak Out (eds. David Ray Griffin and Peter Dale Scott, 2006).

Nafeez Mosaddeq Ahmed^[21] wrote one of the first books published to question the official version of 9/11: The War on Freedom: How and Why America was Attacked, September 11th, 2001 (2002). It expresses profound criticism of American foreign policy, both leading up to and subsequent to 9/11. Paul Thompson, from Scholars for 9/11Truth, is the author of The Terror Timeline. A Comprehensive Chronicle of the Road to 9/11 and America's Response. This is a comprehensive collection of news articles about 9/11. Thompson works at the Centre for Cooperative Research. Another much-talked about member of Scholars for 9/11Truth is David Ray Griffin (see above). Griffin is also a dynamic force behind the organisation MUJCA-net - a discussion forum for Christians, Jews, Muslims and other believers who are sceptical of the official explanation for 9/11. The head of the organisation is the intellectual, doctor and imam Faiz Khan, who works at a Jewish hospital in New York. In the essay "The Paralysis of Discourse; The Incompetence of Academia, and The Need for an Accurate Diagnosis",^[22] he argues that 9/11 precipitated a simplification of language and ideas about what it means to be Muslim and Arab - especially when Muslims the world over are to be held responsible for actions a small minority of terrorists have carried out. Khan believes the hijackers were most probably "fake" Muslims, i.e. that they were not Muslim in their beliefs in the way that American foreign policy is American. That the blame for the terrorist attacks is attributed to something as diffuse as a "military Islamic network", he believes, is tantamount to an abdication of responsibility by the US, since the latter worked in tandem with the ISI (Pakistani intelligence) and Saudi-Arabia to build those networks up.

This article is made on the initiative of the Norwegian edition of Le Monde diplomatique only.

• ^[1] The Commission's full title is: The National Commission on Terrorist Attacks Upon the United States. Their report can be downloaded from: http://www.9-11commission.gov/report/index.htm
• ^[2] Read a variety of similar witness accounts in transcripts of recordings made by New York's Fire Department: http://graphics8.nytimes.com...
• ^[3] See article: "Everyone was screaming, crying, running. It's like a war zone", The Guardian 12 September 2001. http://www.guardian.co.uk/...
• ^[4] Witness accounts from both firemen are presented on this site: http://www.911truth.org/...
• ^[5] Jakobson, Mark, "The Ground Zero Grassy Knoll" in New York Magazine 27 March 2006. http://www.newyorkmetro.com/...
• ^[6] See article, "Why Didn't the FBI Fully Investigate Moussaoui?" in Time Magazine, 23 May 2002. http://www.time.com/...
• ^[7] Griffin, David Ray (2004): The New Pearl Harbour - Disturbing Questions about the Bush Administration and 9/11, Ariss Publishing, 109-110.
• ^[8] Ibid. 107.
• ^[9] See article, "Eksagent saksøker CIA", Aftenposten, 29 July 2005. http://www.aftenposten.no/...
• ^[10] Sampson, Anthony: "CIA agent alleged to have met Bin Laden in July", The Guardian, 1 November 2001, http://www.guardian.co.uk/...
• ^[11] See article, "Overt assistance from Pakistan may bring dire consequences" in Jane's Intelligence Digest, published 20 September 2001. http://www.janes.com/...
• ^[12] Fra Kap.V, "Creating Tomorrow's Dominant Force in the Document Rebuilding Amercia's defenses: Strategies, Forces and Resources for a New American Century", published September 2000 by Project for a New American Century, 50-51. http://newamericancentury.org/... (PDF)
• ^[13] Nicholas Levis, "What is your 'HOP'-level?", cited by Jakobson, Mark: "The Ground Zero Grassy Knoll" in New York Magazine 27 March 2006.
• ^[14] See: http://fire.nist.gov/...
• ^[15] This is claimed by Dr. Sunder who headed the investigation into Building 7 for NIST, in the article "The Ground Zero Grassy Knoll" in New York Magazine, 27 March 2006.
• ^[16] See:http://www.physics.byu.edu/...
• ^[17] See: http://en.wikipedia.org/...
• ^[18] See: http://www.911truth.org/
• ^[19] See: http://julyseventh.co.uk/
• ^[20] See: www.scholarsfor911truth.org
• ^[21] Executive Director of the Institute for Policy Research and Development (IPRD), also connected to 9/11Truth, media critic and human rights activist in London. He was previously a researcher for the London-based Islamic Human Rights Commission (IHRC).
• ^[22] See: http://www.mujca.com/...

The film has caused a split among evangelicals. Some say it's designed to demonize. Others have embraced it, including Fischer, who's helping promote the film.

"I never felt at any point that I was exploited," Fischer said.

"I think there is a push right now in a lot of evangelical churches to definitely keep the teenagers and keep the children in the faith," said Heidi Ewing, co-director of "Jesus Camp." "And this is one version of that attempt."

A Growing Movement

This camp is, by many accounts, a small - and perhaps extreme - slice of what some say is a growing, intensifying evangelical youth movement.

Over the past decade and a half, enrollment at Christian colleges is up 70 percent. Sales of Christian music are up 300 percent. Tens of thousands of youth pastors have been trained.

Young people are targeted through Christian music festivals, skateboard competitions and rodeos.

"This is an enormous youth movement," said Lauren Sandler, a secular, liberal feminist from New York City who spent months among the believers researching her new book, "Righteous."

Sandler says the evangelical youth movement will have a negative impact on the country's future, because even the most moderate young evangelicals are inflexible on issues such as abortion and gay marriage.

The U.S.-led war in Iraq is in its fourth year with no end to bloody sectarian violence in sight. International support is dwindling for imposing sanctions against Iran for defying U.N. demands that it halt certain nuclear work. The repressive Taliban regime toppled in Afghanistan is showing new signs of resilience. The Israeli-Palestinian conflict continues and Lebanon's government has, so far, proved too weak to rein in the Islamic militant group Hezbollah.

At home, Bush's approval rating, while experiencing a recent uptick, stands at just 40 percent. Americans are growing weary of the war. The White House is in a showdown with Senate Republicans over the interrogation and trying of terror suspects. And elections that will determine which party controls Congress are seven weeks away.

The president's so-called freedom agenda is the theme of his speech to the U.N. General Assembly on Tuesday. He will focus on democratic reforms in Iraq, Afghanistan and Lebanon and elsewhere in the Middle East. He'll seek to quell skepticism about U.S. motives in the Middle East by working to avoid the impression that he wants to see a U.S.-style democracy imposed on any nation.

In his speech, Bush is expected to say that while military and law enforcement actions are needed to curb terrorism, the ultimate weapons are freedom and opportunity. He is to note two type of states in the Middle East - those with an absence of freedom and weak ones with fragile democracies, such as Iraq and Lebanon.

"I think the president sees this ... as a struggle between the forces of extremism and the forces of moderation in the Middle East," National Security Adviser Stephen Hadley said, previewing Bush's speech. "And it's really a crucial time."

The president also is expected to firmly denounce Iran and
Syria, two nations that Bush says are working to thwart freedom in the region. Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad also planned to be at the United Nations, but Bush had no intention of talking with him.

On Tuesday, Bush will meet with French President Jacques Chirac, who is part of the coalition of nations working with the U.S. to try to stop Iran from doing work that could lead to a nuclear weapon.

Chirac, who is balking at the U.S. drive to sanction Iran for defying U.N. sanctions, proposed a compromise Monday to kickstart talks between Iran and the international community. Chirac suggested that the threat of U.N. sanctions be suspended if Tehran puts a freeze on its uranium enrichment work.

"I am not pessimistic," Chirac said. "I think that Iran is a great nation, an old culture, an old civilization, and that we can find solutions through dialogue."

On Tuesday, Bush also meets with Iraqi President Jalal Talabani and U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan. Annan has been critical of the U.S.-led war in Iraq; Bush, on the other hand, says Americans are frustrated that the international body has been slow to reform.

Bush attended a reception Monday evening at the Manhattan home of Henry Kravis where he helped raise $1.4 million for the Republican National Committee. He spent the day with leaders from Malaysia, a democracy with a moderate Islamic government; El Salvador and Honduras, two Central American nations that have moved from military dictatorships to democracies; and the emerging African democracy of Tanzania.

Bush, who in 2003 warned that the United Nations could fade into history as an "ineffective debating society," now finds the United States relying more on the United Nations to help resolve problem in Iran, Lebanon, North Korea, Sudan and other global hotspots. On Wednesday, the president will meet with Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas.

It is, in any event, with that image of you in mind that I write to you now. For I believe that you are in a unique position at this historical moment to help America come into better alignment with the ideals you and I both cherished back then.

There's an issue on which I wish to ask you to speak out. It's the Bush administration's use of "the war on terror" for its own political advantage.

As you doubtless know, suspicions about this "fear-mongering" have been around for some time, but they have lately been increasing in intensity.

Just weeks ago, on his MSNBC program, Countdown, Keith Olbermann laid out a timeline that painted a suggestive and disturbing picture. Olbermann delineated a highly suspicious correlation between those times that the Bush administration faced political difficulties (and thus would have wanted to change the public's focus) and those times when a terror-related announcement was made that changed the headlines and usually lifted the administration's poll numbers.

And then there was the recent, much-publicized bust of an alleged terrorist plot in Great Britain. Even as the American people were being re-awakened to fears of terrorists attacking our air travel, reports were widespread that the Bush administration had pressured the British to make the arrests precipitously, well before the British investigators themselves felt that the time was right.

No plausible explanation has been offered as to why the Bush administration was so eager for the arrests to be made immediately despite the now-evident fact that there was no immediate threat of an attack and despite the danger that premature arrests might jeopardize a successful prosecution. This failure to offer some legitimate reason clearly suggests the possibility of an illegitimate reason, such as how the "terrorist plot" story could serve to overshadow the extraordinary defeat of Joe Lieberman by his own party of for being too supportive of the Bush administration and of its war in Iraq.

Surely you'll agree, or at least the young Tom Ridge I thought I knew would have agreed: it would be hard to find words too harsh to describe the perfidy of leadership that deliberately played politics with such vital matters of national security. How terrible it would be for a president of the United States to evoke and cultivate fear in the American people-not to serve the people's needs but to serve his own at their expense.

But while many Americans harbor such suspicions of this president and his administration fear-mongering about the "war on terror" to increase their own power, almost half of the country continues to be swayed whenever the Bush administration plays the terror card, hypnotized by the fear intentionally evoked by those declaring themselves to be the people's only possible protectors.

If the trust of Bush supporters is being betrayed, their knowing of this betrayal would be a matter of urgent national importance. But people who still turn to the Bush administration for protection are not going to listen to Bush's critics. In this deeply polarized society, such critics have long since been dismissed by the president's supporters as "Bush-bashers."

But they would listen to you.

So I call upon you to come forward and tell the country what you witnessed during your tenure as this president's head of Homeland Security.

Were the movements to higher states of alert announced by your Department ever politically motivated?

One of your public statements since you left office certainly certain suggests you saw something amiss in that system of public warnings. "More often than not," you've been quoted as saying, "we were the least inclined to raise [the threat level]. Sometimes we disagreed with the intelligence assessment, sometimes we thought even if the intelligence was good, you don't necessarily put the country on alert. There were times when some people were really aggressive about raising it. And we said, 'For that?'"

But your saying that you didn't see a good reason for the alert is not the same as your telling the country about a perceptible bad reason behind it. So, if you told us all you know, would the full truth confirm to the country that the Bush people used the raising of the threat level for their own political purposes?

How about the threat system itself: was it legitimate? After all, as the American people discovered, there wasn't really anything that the ordinary citizen could do with the information that the threat had become greater, more immediate. In fact, we were told not to stop going about our ordinary business. And there really was no way that we could rally to protect the country better.

Was the only point of that whole color-coded threat system just to provide the administration with a mechanism to increase the fear of the citizenry -a fear that, though useless for our national security, might prove politically useful for the Bush administration?

You were there. There is an urgent need for America to hear what you witnessed.

Even now, as the mid-term elections approach, the president's strategy of heightening our fear of terrorism, while claiming we need him to protect us, is on full display.

President Bush is using this strategy to pressure Congress to legitimize his use of interrogation methods that are understood around the world to be torture, methods forbidden by the Geneva Conventions which as part of a ratified treaty are, according to our Constitution, the law of the land. This, despite the fact that the U.S. military has itself determined that statements elicited by such methods are unreliable.

He is also using this strategy to pressure Congress to legitimize his conduct of warrantless surveillance, despite the finding by a federal judge (and the American Bar Association) that such a practice is unconstitutional. This, despite the fact that the administration has offered no plausible arguments as to why it could not both protect us and obey the law and the Constitution.

"Trust us" has been this administration's continual response to accusations that it is violating the restraints the Constitution places on the executive branch, weakening the system of checks and balances that have protected the American people from tyranny for more than two hundred years.

If you know that they do not deserve our trust, if you know that they have misused these threats for their own political purposes, the American people need for you to come forward and tell what you know.

Of course we need to be protected against external enemies. But as our Founding Fathers understood, what we most need to be protected against is the rise of tyranny from within.

I can imagine, Tom, that even if you do know something that the rest of the country should hear, you might feel inhibited from coming forward by a sense of loyalty-loyalty to your party and loyalty to the president who appointed you.

But if this president has indeed done what many suspect, you can owe such a president no loyalty. If you know that this administration routinely puts their quest for power ahead of service to the nation, then it is your duty to put loyalty to America ahead of any other loyalty.

As Colin Powell has just come forward to call attention -albeit too tactfully- to the truth that the administration is trying to obscure (that its position represents an assault on the Geneva Conventions against torture), even saying that "the world is beginning to doubt the moral basis of our fight against terrorism," so also should you help the American people to understand the destructive and dangerous things that are being done in the name of that "war."

I can sympathize, Tom, if you're afraid of retaliation -from people who shamelessly use character assassination against whistle-blowers-for your telling a truth that hurts your party. But the possibility of such a political cost surely would be an acceptable risk to a man who was awarded a medal for "gallantry" in Vietnam.

We have entered in our sixties now, you and I and the rest of the class of 1967. We've still got productive years left, but this is hardly a time -if ever there is one-to put ambitions ahead of one's principles and ideals. It's time to think of one's legacy.

You have served your country in many ways in the past almost forty years. But I would wager that nothing you have done so far would serve your country better than coming forward now and speaking plainly to the American people about what you have witnessed about this administration's uses and abuses of this "war on terror."

"Compared with men, women faculty members are generally paid less and promoted more slowly, receive fewer honors, and hold fewer leadership positions," the Academies said in a statement.

"These discrepancies do not appear to be based on productivity, the significance of their work, or any other performance measures."

Female minorities fare the worst, the study found. And the expert panel said the discrepancies are costing the country many talented leaders and researchers and recommended immediate and far-reaching changes to change the balance.

"We found no significant biological differences between men and women in science, engineering and mathematics that could account for the lower representation of women in academic faculty and scientific leadership positions," said Donna Shalala, president of the University of Miami and head of the committee that wrote the report.

The study was compiled by all the National Academies -- the
National Academy of Sciences, National Academy of Engineering, and the Institute of Medicine -- which advise Congress, the federal government, and various institutions.

"It is not a lack of talent but an unintended bias ... that is locking women out," Shalala, a former secretary of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, told a briefing.

"Fundamental changes in the culture and opportunities at America's research universities are urgently needed."

EVERYONE IS BIASED

"A substantial body of evidence establishes that most people -- men and women -- hold implicit biases," the report reads.

And it noted that the problem is not restricted to academia, or even to science.

"The underrepresentation of women and minorities in science and engineering faculties stems from a number of issues that are firmly rooted in our society's traditions and culture," the report reads.

Many arguments have been made to explain why women do not excel in math and science -- that they are not as good as men in mathematical ability, that female brain structures are different or that hormones affect performance.

Lawrence Summers resigned as Harvard University president after he made widely disparaged remarks in 2005 suggesting that women were biologically less able in math and science, and that women chose to pay more attention to their families and thus failed to put in enough effort to succeed at work.

The experts looked at many different studies on the issue.

"The committee found no sound evidence to support these myths and often good evidence to the contrary," said Ana Mari Cauce, Executive Vice Provost at the University of Washington in Seattle.

"In fact, female performance in high school mathematics now matches that of males. If biology were the basis of that, we've seen some major evolution in the past decades."

Urgent change is needed, said Cauce, if the United States wants to compete internationally in science.

"This is about more excellence. This is not about changing the bar or lowering the bar," Cauce said.

Trustees, university presidents and provosts need to make it clear from the top down that recruiting and promoting women is a priority, the report said.

"Nature's given us pretty much the most powerful and reliable early warning center out there," said Bill Lawler, co-founder of Intelligent Automation Corporation, a Southern California company that makes and sells the bluegill monitoring system. "There's no known manmade sensor that can do the same job as the bluegill."

Since Sept. 11, the government has taken very seriously the threat of attacks on the U.S. water supply. Federal law requires nearly all community water systems to assess their vulnerability to terrorism.

Big cities employ a range of safeguards against chemical and biological agents, constantly monitoring, testing and treating the water. But electronic protection systems can trace only the toxins they are programmed to detect, Lawler said.

Bluegills - a hardy species about the size of a human hand - are considered more versatile. They are highly attuned to chemical disturbances in their environment, and when exposed to toxins, they experience the fish version of coughing, flexing their gills to expel unwanted particles.

The computerized system in use in San Francisco and elsewhere is designed to detect even slight changes in the bluegills' vital signs and send an e-mail alert when something is wrong.

San Francisco's bluegills went to work about a month ago, guarding the drinking water of more than 1 million people from substances such as cyanide, diesel fuel, mercury and pesticides. Eight bluegills swim in a tank deep in the basement of a water treatment plant south of the city.

"It gave us the best of both worlds, which is basically all the benefits that come from nature and the best of high-tech," said Susan Leal, general manager of the San Francisco Public Utilities Commission.

New York City has been testing its system since 2002 and is seeking to expand it. The New York City Department of Environmental Protection reported at least one instance in which the system caught a toxin before it made it into the water supply: The fish noticed a diesel spill two hours earlier than any of the agency's other detection devices.

They do have limitations. While the bluegills have successfully detected at least 30 toxic chemicals, they cannot reliably detect germs. And they are no use against other sorts of attacks - say, the bombing of a water main, or an attack by computer hackers on the systems that control the flow of water.

Still, Lawler said more than a dozen other cities have ordered the anti-terror apparatus, called the Intelligent Aquatic BioMonitoring System, which was originally developed for the Army and starts at around $45,000.

San Francisco plans to install two more bluegill tanks.

"It provides us an added level of detection of the unknown," said Tony Winnicker, a spokesman for the city's Public Utilities Commission. "There's no computer that's as sophisticated as a living being."

The parents were scheduled to be arraigned in Salem District Court. A call to attorney Mark Sisti was not immediately returned.

"Her parents chased her out into the yard, grabbed and tied her hands and feet together," Salem Police Officer Sean Marino wrote in a court affidavit. "Katelyn states that her father then carried her to their car and they headed toward New Hampshire."

Investigators said rope, duct tape, scissors and a .22-caliber rifle were found in the Kampfs' Lexus and Nicholas Kampf had a loaded .22- caliber magazine clip in his pants pocket.

The Kampfs were upset that their daughter was pregnant by a man who is now in jail, police said, and before leaving Maine on Friday they had an argument at the parents' home.

"Katelyn stated to me that upon her parents finding out that she was pregnant, they told her she had no choice but to get an abortion," Marino wrote in his court affidavit.

Katelyn Kampf escaped from her parents in Salem after persuading them to untie her so she could use a Kmart bathroom. After her father went into the men's room, she used a cell phone to call for help, then ran to a nearby Staples store, where police found "a hysterical female hiding in the back of the store," according to the affidavit.

She got into Marino's cruiser while Sgt. Kristin Fili pulled over her parents.

"They told us initially they did take her here against her will, but they denied tying her up initially," Fili said. "Obviously what happened was a crime. She was taken against her will."

Authorities in Maine said the parents apparently thought that, in light of their daughter's stage of pregnancy and the different abortion laws in each state, the abortion should be performed in New York. Fili said she did not know how many weeks pregnant she was.

Maine law prohibits abortions once a fetus is able to live outside the uterus unless the mother's life or health is at stake. The law does not specify when that is, but it generally is 20 to 27 weeks, said Dr. Dora Ann Mills, director of the Maine Center for Disease Control and Prevention. New York law prohibits abortions after the 24th week of pregnancy unless the woman's life is at stake.