Monday, May 26, 2008

The truth is out there


"The 9/11 Truth movement is really distinguished by a kind of defiant unfamiliarity with the actual character of America's ruling class. In 9/11 lore the people who staff the White House, the security agencies, the Pentagon and groups like PNAC and the Council of Foreign Relations are imagined to be a monolithic, united class of dastardly, swashbuckling risk-takers with permanent hard-ons for Bourne Supremacy-style "false flag" and "black bag" operations, instead of the mundanely greedy, risk-averse, backstabbing, lawn-tending, half-clever suburban golfers they are in real life.
It completely misunderstands the nature of American government -- fails to see that the old maxim about "the business of America is business" is absolutely true, that the federal government in this country is really just a lo-rent time-share property seasonally occupied by this or that clan of financial interests, each of which takes its 4-year turn at the helm tinkering with the tax laws and regulatory code and the rates at the Fed in the way it thinks will best keep the money train rolling.
The people who really run America don't send the likes of George Bush and Dick Cheney to the White House to cook up boat-rocking, maniacal world-domination plans and commit massive criminal conspiracies on live national television; they send them there to repeal PUCHA and dole out funds for the F-22 and pass energy bills with $14 billion tax breaks and slash fuel efficiency standards and do all the other shit that never makes the papers but keeps Wall Street and the country's corporate boardrooms happy. You don't elect politicians to commit crimes; you elect politicians to make your crimes legal. That is the whole purpose of the racket of government."
~Matt Taibbi, in an adapted excerpt from his new book, The Great Derangement, at Alternet
Followed up in comments by 724 howls of outrage and counting...
His sweeping ad hominem attack on the Truthers notwithstanding, his point is well taken : the real conspiracy has always been right out there in the open.
h/t Croghan at Bread 'n Roses

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

Petite bourguois fascism on the march!

West End Bob said...

Good grief! The article had ALL of my favourites featured: cheney, feith, wolfowitz and william (the bloody) kristol.

My head is about to implode . . . .

thwap said...

I don't think that 9-11 was a "black-op" but I do think that someone like Cheney is more than a servant to the ruling class.

The political elite can have their own agendas too. Especially when they're part of the ruling class as well.

Alison said...

Good point.
Plus, as I mentioned at the Beav, "his sweeping ad hominem attack on the Truthers" is overstated - there are important and completely unaddressed questions here after all and Taibbi knows this - but not wanting to be lumped in with the Truthers provides a very convenient excuse not to ask any of them.

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