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Clock

SOTT Focus: National Academy of Sciences Member Calls for New 911 Investigation

A Signs of the Times reader comments on Lynn Margulis' recent criticism of the official 9/11 conspiracy theory.

Dear Colleagues,

The following appeared today in the UMass/Amherst Daily News Summary for September 6, 2007:
Lynn Margulis, geosciences, is criticizing the official account of the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks on the U.S. and is calling for a new investigation of those events. (Opednews.com, 9/6/07)

Vader

SOTT Focus: Insiders and Outsiders in Everyday Life

We all know stories of qualified and skilled people who can't find work or who are passed over for promotion when someone who specializes in office politics gets the nod. This situation is another example of the insider/outsider dichotomy I discussed in my last article. It not only applies to Washington, it also applies to the facts and events of our daily lives. How many Americans are working for companies that are "offshoring" jobs to India and China? Ordinary people are on tenterhooks with the announcement of each round of layoffs while management have that glassy-eyed glare of bigger stock options and pay-offs when the year's profit margins improve and stock prices soar.

Question

SOTT Focus: Suicide Bombings - A Favourite US Counter-Insurgency Tactic



The true face of Iraqi suicide bombers. Two SAS agents dressed in full "Arab Garb" driving a car full of explosives were caught carrying out a false flag terror attack in Basra, Iraq September 20th 2005

Since 9-11 reports of "suicide bombings" have increased exponentially in the news. We are led to believe by the experts that it is one of the favorite weapons of the insurgency against the occupation forces, since it is a cheap and simple way to create chaos. Hardly a day goes by without at least one bombing in Iraq or Afghanistan being immediately seized upon by the media as the work of Iraqi insurgents.

Penis Pump

SOTT Focus: Rejecting conspiracy thinking keeps it alive and well - Tossell should know!

In a fitting and prototypical example of the conversive thinking that runs epidemic among our hysterized society, Ivor Tossell of the Globe and Mail demonstrates in a recent article the very fuzzy thinking he attempts to deride. If it wasn't so sad, and so pitiful a look into the lengths to which a seemingly healthy mind will go to hang onto a belief system, it would be humorous. For Tossell, in his article, accuses others of the very things he himself epitomizes, as will be shown in my comments below.

Tossell begins:

Comment: Irrational conspiracy theories flourish in the mainstream media. Just how can one tell the difference between a rational conspiracy theory and an irrational one? See comments to Tossell's hit piece to find out.


USA

SOTT Focus: The Big Lie - NATO's Killing Fields In Afghanistan



©AP

"The biggest lesson I learned from Vietnam is not to trust [our own] government statements-I had no idea until then that you could not rely on [them]."James W. Fulbright (1905-1995), former US senator
The misery and wholesale destruction in Afghanistan continues though it hardly makes it to the headlines anymore. The civilian population suffer not only due to lack of basic infrastructure and food, but also because they are becoming increasing targets of NATO aerial bombings. The new commander in chief of the NATO forces American General Dan McNeill is a strong advocate for massive air power, which has earned him the name 'Bomber McNeill'. The consequence is a sharp rise in civilian casualties.

Magic Hat

SOTT Focus: The Art of the Con



©Sekretagent Productions
Spell Game of Confidence

Not one of the people getting on the I-35W Bridge on August 1st had any reason to suspect what was going to happen that night. The day before, and the day before that, the bridge had held just as much traffic as it did on the 1st. The bridge had held up just fine since its opening in 1967. It had a history of holding the weight of vehicles traveling across the Mississippi River without any problems.

If someone with knowledge of the bridge's lack of structural integrity stood at one end of the bridge trying to warn commuters of their imminent demise, he would've been laughed off as a nut case. Political cartoonists would have, if they had the time, probably drawn him as a long-haired, bearded, sandal-wearing lunatic carrying a sign reading "THE END IS NEAR!"

And yet, at 6:05pm on August 1st, the I-35W Bridge did collapse. The collapse was so sudden and catastrophic that some thought explosives had gone off. Cars plummeted into the water, below. A school bus full of children just managed to stop before going over the edge. Panic ensued.

USA

SOTT Focus: Insiders and Outsiders in Washington



©Signs of the Times

You have probably heard the terms "insiders" and "ousiders" used in reference to the people in Washington. The insiders are the people who are members of the exclusive think tanks, policy organizations, lobby groups, and other groups that influence and decide policy. The outsiders are those who aren't.

The insiders are also those with connections to important sectors of the economy like the oil and gas industries, the pharmaceutical companies, the major food conglomerates, the media, the secretive Skull & Bones fraternity at Yale that counts among its members both George W. Bush and John Kerry, and long-time politicos who have made a career out of doing the bidding of the aforementioned groups. And then there is the infamous, and, according to the media, non-existent, Israel lobby, the lobby that is so strong you aren't even allowed to talk about it.

Sheeple

SOTT Focus: First They Came For The Cows - Are The Sheeple Next?




As the smell of burnt cow meat once again wafts across the southern English countryside, the stench is not only casting a pallor across the faces of Surrey farmers, but also threatening to expose the sordid relationship between the UK government, U.S. big business and the little-known world of "bio-terrorism".

Magic Hat

SOTT Focus: Critical Thinking And The War On Terrorism




I suppose it was always going to happen, and I suppose it was the fact that it was always going to happen and that 'the powers that be' knew it, that they exert so much effort in attempting to keep the people distracted. The war on terror has begun to unravel and descend into the only thing it could - farce, albeit a rather insidious and complicated one.

Stop

SOTT Focus: Book Review: The Mythic Past by T. L. Thompson



God said to Abraham
"Kill me a son"

Today I want to review a book I have recently finished reading: The Mythic Past: Biblical Archaeology and the Myth of Israel. Let me introduce my subject with a quote from another recent book by Nachman Ben-Yehuda, the Israeli sociologist, who writes:
"How do we perceive our culture? How do we understand ourselves as beings in need of meaning? We are socialized into and live in complex cultures from which we extract the very essence of our identity, but at the same time, we also construct these cultures. How is this process accomplished? What is the nature of those cultural processes...?