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Active Thermite at WTC to Fuel Conspiracy Theories

Like the questions surrounding JFK’s assassination, I don’t think we will ever have definitive answers to what happened on September 11, 2001. Scientists, some who have since been released from their university or laboratory jobs, have released a paper "Active Thermitic Material Discovered in Dust from the 9/11 World Trade Center Catastrophe" which will likely have conspiracy theorists once again presenting their arguments that the plane alone could not have destroyed the World Trade Center.

We have discovered distinctive red/gray chips in all the samples we have studied of the dust produced by the destruction of the World Trade Center. Examination of four of these samples, collected from separate sites, is reported in this paper. These red/gray chips show marked similarities in all four samples. One sample was collected by a Manhattan resident about ten minutes after the collapse of the second WTC Tower, two the next day, and a fourth about a week later. … The red portion of these chips is found to be an unreacted thermitic material and highly energetic. [Source, Bentham Open Access,Active Thermitic Material Discovered in Dust from the 9/11 World Trade Center Catastrophe]

For more information on the super-thermite, read The Raw Deal.

Today on Reddit, the question was posed "2,740 Americans died in 9/11, justifying the removal/restrictions of many of our freedoms. How many people died to give us those rights in the first place?" Within the answers, this illuminating comment:

It’s sort of a nationalistic cliche to say that soldiers fight for our freedom but what they really fight for is the sovereignty of our government, which happens to guarantee us certain freedoms.

When we say a soldier died fighting for our freedoms, what we really mean is that he died in a war which threatened the loss of some or all of American sovereignty to a foreign or domestic power which would likely guarantee less rights than the present government.

This distinction is important because in the history of American wars, very few have definitively fallen under that category – and even in those cases, preserving the rights of American citizens was ancillary to sustaining or expanding the sovereign power of the U.S. government.

[Source, Reddit.com, 2,740 Americans died in 9/11, justifying the removal/restrictions of many of our freedoms. How many people died to give us those rights in the first place?]

We now live with a generation that has never known the feeling, the freedoms, we had prior to September 11, 2001. There is a different feeling. I felt more secure! I wish my youngest children could know that feeling and could experience true trust. I have lived with a tension since 9/11 that I had not known prior. The tension is not from a fear of terrorists; they’ve always been around (well, at least from the 1960s First U.S. Aircraft Hijacked, May 1, 1961 and at least 1800BC for the rest of the world). The fear is from my own government! Prior to 9/11 the police were different; now everyone should fear the police.

Question: “The police are here. They want to talk to me. What should I do?”

Answer: “Make no statement to the police under any circumstances.”

– Supreme Court Justice Robert Jackson

[Source, Brasscheck TV, Why you should
never talk to cops
without a lawyer
]

The terrorists won.

The point of terrorism is to cause terror, sometimes to further a political goal and sometimes out of sheer hatred. The people terrorists kill are not the targets; they are collateral damage. And blowing up planes, trains, markets or buses is not the goal; those are just tactics.

The real targets of terrorism are the rest of us: the billions of us who are not killed but are terrorized because of the killing. The real point of terrorism is not the act itself, but our reaction to the act.

And we’re doing exactly what the terrorists want.

[Source, Bruce Schneier – Security Expert, Refuse to be Terrorized]

Whether the terrible incident of September 11, 2001 was foreign or domestic terrorism, whether it was solely the plane or the plane timed with well placed explosives is irrelevant. Our society has dramatically changed, some say irrevocably. We were a better America when we could trust our government. We were a better America when the police were not the enemy. We were a better America before Civil liberties were taken away.

See also: Timeline of Terrorism dating back to 1800BC and History of Terrorism 70s to 2001.
See also: Professor Says "Cutter Charges" Brought Down WTC Buildings (Issue #18 & 19, May 1 & 8, 2006)

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Please vote NO to random searches in our schools

I felt compelled to email each of our school board members (and the ACLU) since tonight they will vote to approve random searching of students in our schools. This is the email I sent. Will you send one?

Dear School Board,

Please vote NO to random searches in our schools. Our money and time will be better spent developing a rapport with the students.

These websites informed me that Knox County School plans to pass a measure to allow random searching of students in the schools:

http://schoolmatters.knoxnews.com/forum/topic/show?id=879777%3ATopic%3A28290
http://www.knoxnews.com/news/2008/sep/30/random-searches-at-schools-studied/
http://www.knoxnews.com/news/2008/oct/01/Knox-school-superintendent-proposes-random-search/

After the Central High School shooting, didn’t security experts advise you that the security cameras were a waste of money and that we’d be better served by having personnel interact more frequently with the students? See this quote from Knox School Matters:

I do not agree, I have a teenage daughter and do not want anyone “doing a pat down” search on her. They had a random metal detector search at Powell the other day and they only ran every 7th kid through it and yelled at the kids to shut up and just go through and dont ask questions. The kids were terrfied not knowing what was going on and being yelled at like criminals. Source, Knoxschoolmatters.com, Cindi

Our students deserve to be treated better than that. The students will not talk to the staff and warn them of impending doom when the student body fears the staff. We gain nothing through fear. In the penitentiary system random searches are to “breakdown” the inmates. Is that our goal? To brainwash and breakdown the children and parents? What legacy will we leave with these children when they graduate and start passing laws for us? For our own safety, will they legalize random searches in our retirement homes? The malls? Our houses?

Random searching is nothing more than theater. It is a waste of staff time, humiliating to the students, and ineffective. Ineffective? The student that wants to bring a gun to school isn’t going to be deterred by the possibility of a random search but I bet that student will be talking and exhibiting behaviors that give warning signs long before the gun comes in. You will pick up on the warning signs by interacting positively with the students. Negativity begets negativity and random searches are very negative.

Random searches at a school are different than random searches at an airport (although equally ineffective and very much theater). At the airport, we have the option to decline being searched and leave. Will our students have the right to decline a search and leave school?

You cannot build trust and safety on a foundation of fear and false suspicion. Please vote no.

Thank you!
Doug McCaughan
phone number

Update: A commenter at Knoxnews has this:

The Supreme Court Case that most directly deals with student searches is New Jersey v. T.L.O (469 U.S. 325). The written opinion states that althought students have not “necessarily waived all rights to privacy in such items by bringing them (legitimate, non-contraband items) onto school grounds,” a search can still be conducted if determined to be “reasonable.” The following describes the factors used to determine reasonableness:

“Determining the reasonableness of any search involves a determination of whether the search was justified at its inception and whether, as conducted, it was reasonably related in scope to the circumstances that justified the interference in the first place. Under ordinary circumstances, the search of a student by a school official will be justified at its inception where there are reasonable grounds for suspecting that the search will turn up evidence that the student has violated or is violating either the law or the rules of the school.”

In other words, officials must have a reason to search (less cause than suspision) a student. Random selection, by definition, is not a specific reason.

No matter how the school board votes, allowing random searches would be in direct violation of a Supreme Court ruling, and state and county law can not supercede federal law.

http://supreme.justia.com/us/469/325/…

[Source, Knoxnews, Knox school superintendent proposes random searches; board to hear plan tonight, zachbest]

Update: No response from any board member. The ACLU called almost immediately!