Wisconsin politicians display ignorance, paranoia,
and pandering, Scholars say
Madison, WI (PRWEB) October 12, 2006 --- The Governor of
Wisconsin, Jim Doyle, and his GOP rival, Mark Green, both want to fire a
controversial instructor at the University of Wisconsin-Madison for holding
views about 9/11 they don’t like. Kevin Barrett, a member of Scholars for 9/11
Truth, is discussing 9/11 and its impact on relations between the US and Islam
in a course on Islam he is offering this semester.
Barrett has now inflamed political passions by drawing
comparisons between Adolf Hitler and George W. Bush in a forthcoming essay.
“Like Bush and the neocons, Hitler and the Nazis inaugurated their new era by
destroying an architectural monument and blaming its destruction on their
designated enemies,” he writes, where the Twin Towers played a role parallel to
that of the German Reichstag.
“That may sound like an exaggeration if you have never studied
what happened on 9/11,” observed James Fetzer, the founder of the scholars’
society, “but what we have discovered lends considerable weight to the parallel.
The Twin Towers, for example, were brought down by special kinds of
controlled demolition, not by the impact of the planes, the jet-fuel-based
fires, or any kind of pancake collapse.”
According to Fetzer, the buildings were designed to withstand the
impact of similar large commercial airliners, the jet-fuel-based fires burned
too low and too briefly to even weaken, much less melt, the steel, and no
“pancaking” occurred. “Indeed, the
buildings were being blown apart from the top down. Steel beams were being blown outward and even upward. The buildings were destroyed in 10 and 9 seconds,
which is even faster than free fall and would have been impossible without
explosives.”
“Bush himself has acknowledged that Saddam Hussein had nothing
to do with the events of 9/11,” Fetzer added.
“The Senate Intelligence Committee has released a study showing that
Saddam had no ties with Osama bin Laden.
And the FBI has acknowledged that it has ‘no hard evidence’ connecting
Osama bin Laden to 9/11. If neither
Saddam nor Osama had anything to do with 9/11”, he asked, “then who was
responsible? The Bush administration has been lying to us about 9/11 from
scratch.”
Comparisons between Hitler and Bush do not originate with
Barrett, Fetzer said. “If you google
‘Bush Hitler’, for example, you will get 11 million hits. Try ‘The Gallery of Bush-Hitler Allusions’
and you will find hundreds of others who have found parallels between them,
including comparisons of The Patriot Act and The Enabling Act, which enabled
Hitler, who had been democratically elected, to consolidate his power. And both launched wars in violation of
international law and condoned the use of torture.”
Scholars for 9/11 Truth, which Fetzer founded in mid-December,
is dedicated to exposing falsehoods and revealing the truth about the events of
9/11, “letting the chips fall where they may.”
Its members include physicists, mechanical engineers, civil engineers,
structural engineers, aeronautical engineers, and pilots, as well as many with
backgrounds in the social sciences and the humanities. Fetzer himself has a Ph.D. in the history
and philosophy of science and has published 27 books.
“The situation is even more bizarre because these politicians
don’t know why Kevin holds these beliefs and refuse to look at the evidence,
even though it is abundant and easily accessible.” He offered Steve Nass (R-Whitewater) and Scott Suder
(R-Abbotsford), members of the state legislature, as prime examples. Nass has even tried to pass legislation to
have Barrett fired, but was unable to round up enough votes. “Kevin can be provocative, but that doesn’t
make him wrong,” Fetzer said.
Bill Douglas, an expert on parenting fascinated by the
controversy, after discovering that about 1/3 of the American people doubt the
official account, recently contacted Nass’s office to ask if anyone there had
reviewed the studies of 9/11 presented on the Scholars’ web site at st911.org,
only to be told that was something they would certainly not do, because anyone
who holds views like that must be a “Bush hater.”
Douglas was dumbfounded by their response. “They want to fire a
university teacher for presenting facts, many of which are readily available on
that web site—facts that they dispute, yet have no idea what those facts
are—and are unwilling to look at them to find out what they are, which is
insane. This kind of delusional paranoia by elected officials is of particular
concern.” Indeed, this degree of
detachment from reality raises serious questions about their competence for
public office, he said.
“Suder’s case,” Fetzer added, “is even more outrageous. He claims that conspiracy theories are
incapable of scientific study. This
means he has never visited our site. He
has never read any of the peer-reviewed articles we have archived there. He doesn’t understand that our objective is
to take rumor and speculation out of the case and place it on an objective and
scientific foundation. After 35 years
teaching logic, critical thinking, and scientific reasoning, it’s safe to say I
know the difference.”
“Suder even claims that Barrett’s forthcoming book, ‘9/11 and
the American Empire: Muslims, Jews and
Christians Speak Out,’ is anti-Semitic, ostensibly on the ground it includes
harsh criticism of the nation of Israel,” Fetzer said. “Not only does his book
include several essays by noted Jewish scholars but criticism of Israel only
qualifies as ‘anti-Semitism’ if it is confused with prejudice against persons
who happen to be Jewish. Criticism of Israel, of its government or of its
policies is not anti-Semitism.”
“Anti-Semitism is morally objectionable. False allegations like
this one deserve to be scorned. These politicians don’t care about the truth
but appear to be pandering for votes,” Fetzer said. The University, however,
continues to express support for Kevin for encouraging his students to think
about these issues from diverse perspectives.
“I am proud of UW-M for standing up to political pressure and defending
academic freedom, which means nothing if you are only allowed to express
popular opinions.”
James H. Fetzer, Ph.D.
Founder and Co-Chair
Scholars for 9/11 Truth
jfetzer@d.umn.edu
http://scholarsfor911truth.org (st911.org)