9/11, WTC 7 revelations

DIE HARD III / Herman Tiu Laurel / 9/11/2013 / Daily Tribune

Twelve years ago today, I was lying on my bed, sick and woozy, as I turned to cable TV, switching from channel to channel. Then the images suddenly froze on the scene of the Twin Towers in plumes of smoke, burning. Replays of the two planes crashing into the tall structures soon followed.

I stopped at one particular channel, CNN, as I was mesmerized by the clips for long, long minutes before I could think of the next thing, which was to rush to the Internet to get the reaction of my geopolitical "guru" at that time, Lyndon LaRouche, a legendary prophetic political-economic American philosopher and leader of the LaRouche Movement, whose analysis then perplexed me.

LaRouche believed that the complexity, not to mention extensive intelligence and resources, required for the World Trade Center (WTC) terror attacks could only have meant that states (governments) were behind it.

And if I recall correctly, despite the many long years since that initial moment of reading his commentary, LaRouche had already identified elements from within the US government or the Israeli Mossad as among the main suspects.

At that time, I couldn't even comprehend the meaning of it. How could the US cause the death of its own citizens? Why would Bush Jr., who had just become President, allow that? Why would Dick Cheney, his Vice President, similarly allow it? Does the Mossad have that capability?
I have to admit I was still skeptical of LaRouche's analysis then even though I was already a follower, but as I learned in the months after the 9/11 incident the many contrived aspects of the said terror attacks, I became convinced.

In the years that followed, thousands of US citizens, scientists, engineers, architects and families of victims who died in the Twin Towers have become convinced that the "terror attacks," including the buildings' collapse, were an "inside job." The evidence just kept pouring in as the worldwide movement demanding the reopening of the investigation into the 9/11 incident has grown.

This year, the movement has launched Rethink9/11.org to focus on WTC Building 7.
If the reader is still skeptical about 9/11 being an inside job, it would take all the columns of the next two weeks if I were to try to explain it here. I would therefore suggest visiting Rethink9/11.org to follow the hundreds upon hundreds of investigations conducted by competent civilian experts of different nationalities.

These individuals were all free to study with objectivity, unlike the investigations conducted by two US agencies, the Federal Emergency Management Administration (FEMA) and the National Institute of Science and Technology (NIST), which reported conclusions that the late American National Science Medal winner, scientist Lynn Margulis (former wife of late physicist Carl Sagan), severely criticized.

We must first bring to the reader's attention WTC Building 7 because it was a 49-story structure one football field away from WTC 1 and 2, and with Buildings 5 and 6 sandwiched between them. Yet it burned and collapsed on its footprint at the speed of gravity, without any plane crashing into it.

Then, the government investigation claimed "office fire" melted and collapsed the building, a conclusion not supported by the history of burning buildings and by thousands of experts. And worse, some 185,101 tons of structural steel from Buildings 7, 1, and 2 were scrapped without being examined and shipped to China and India, with other debris sent to recycling yards in New Jersey.

Margulis thus said of the FEMA and NIST probes: "You can't do science when you are deprived of the evidence, and when your hypothesis is the least valid, instead of the most likely … The most likely hypothesis, in the case of Building 7, wasn't even mentioned. This is not science. So the claim is that it's something else? It's trying to prove preconceived ideas."

Indeed, the WTC official investigation was meant to be a cover-up. But evidence citizens innocently picked up during and after the buildings' collapse soon mounted, and ran the gamut from pictures taken from Ground Zero, to firemen's testimonies of explosions, as well as comparative videos of explosions, melting steel, plumes of dust that only explosions can create, spherical molten iron balls, steel beams cut clean, chemical nano-thermite, etc.

Why should anyone in the Philippines care about the truth in the so-called 9/11 terror attacks? Don't we have enough issues, i.e. pork barrel, Edsa Tayo (a.k.a. Edsa "Sila" of the oligarchy's patsies whom I reject), the Moro National Liberation Front's Zamboanga City attack (thanks to Aquino, Deles and Leonen's brilliant "a-peace-ment" and Edsa II's sabotage of Erap's pacification), bedeviling us?

Everyone should care because 9/11 reveals how power cabals that control money, politics and mainstream media can keep vital facts — such as WTC 7 — out of everyone's awareness and, in the process, murder thousands of innocents by creating decades-long "wars on terror" for profit.

Every Filipino should care because, in the Philippines, this cabal and its local counterparts have kept 100 million Filipinos perpetually addled in a state of perpetual poverty — and they're not about to stop anytime soon.

(Tune in to 1098 AM, Tuesday to Friday, 5 p.m. to 6 p.m.; watch GNN Destiny Cable Channel 8, Saturday, 8:00 p.m. and replay Sunday, 8 a.m., also on www.gnntv-asia.com, this week on "The MNLF rebellion redux"; visit http://newkatipunero.blogspot.com; and text reactions to 0923-4095739)

MRT ghost resurrects

DIE HARD III / Herman Tiu Laurel / 9/9/2013 / Daily Tribune

The public relations operators of this administration probably thought the extortion scandal involving the First Family was finally buried when they put up that act of publicly shaming and "firing" a high-level official of the Metro Rail Transit (MRT) system. They were, after all, busy burying every other vital issue under the continuing avalanche of the Janet Lim-Napoles caper, as well as the pocket rallies against it.

But truth will always out as the saying goes and the truth about the MRT extort try is not about to stay buried for too long.

The high officials they suspended (or sidelined — nobody really knows what action was taken) then put under investigation have been quietly reinstated, as reported by one veteran media man, Deo Macalma of Pilipino Star Ngayon.

MRT general manager Al Vitangcol, for instance, surprised the Department of Transportation and Communications (DoTC) rank-and-file when he reappeared and assumed his old post. Vitangcol was put in the freezer after being named by Czech Ambassador Josef Rychtar as among those involved in the $30-million kickback try for the purchase of new coaches for the MRT.

The explosive report that was originally aired on radio station dzRH two months ago that smashed the lily-white image of BS Aquino, sister Ballsy and husband Eldon was primarily due to insinuations attributed to the Czech envoy, which were not denied until weeks into the scandal.

Eventually, BS Aquino first cousin Jorge Aquino-Lichauco was revealed to be brokering the deal for Inekon, the Czech company. It's all in the family as they say, with an in-law of a close Aquino Big Business ally also acting on Inekon's behalf.

In addition, that controversy (had it been covered properly) would have seriously marred Mar Roxas as it happened under his watch as DoTC secretary. Mar must therefore be feeling a sense of relief over the Napoles scandal as he is spared continuing bad publicity over the MRT case — at least for now.

But before we get too far into the other aspects of the story, it must be recalled that since Vitangcol was the only name mentioned by the Czech ambassador, even when, in truth, three other officials were supposed to be in on the deal, too, it would appear that he was made the sacrificial lamb, with reports, as late as Sept. 2, still depicting him as having gone "on leave" while under investigation.

Alas, Macalma's update on Vitangcol's reentry leaves very serious implications for those who have tried to make him a scapegoat. It implies that the guy is actually untouchable and only one thing could make him so — his knowledge of who the real "brains" behind the MRT extort try are.
Vitangcol may have leveraged this knowledge to get back to his post while DoTC chief Emilio Abaya hopes and prays that the controlled newspapers' front pages and broadcast media headlines will still be so preoccupied with Napoles, the anti-pork hype, and the meager rallies to allow him to tide this over.

This MRT extort try ghost will continue to haunt BS Aquino, his family, and their ruling class allies who feed on the people's blood, sweat, and tears. There will be hell to pay for them when the population finally rises up and drives the stakes into their hearts. The pork plunders certainly pale in comparison to their large-scale looting.

Meanwhile, the Riles Laan sa Sambayanan (or Riles) Network continues to coordinate efforts to organize popular opposition to the threatened fare hikes of the MRT/LRT (Light Rail Transit). Every delay we can deal these exploiters in their effort to hike the fares is without doubt another stake in their blackened hearts.

Elsewhere, on the geopolitical front, particularly in the matter of Philippine-China relations and the Syrian situation, the BS Aquino administration's policy direction is really proving to be a huge liability to the nation. With China, it is too combative to the point of bringing upon us the kind of trade isolation highlighted by that "snub" on BS Aquino at the recent Nanning trade show; but with the US, this government is obsequiously canine. Either way, the consequences are devastating for the country.

Highlighting the first is this text we received: "World's biggest ship the… Triple E, can in one trip, transport 111 million pairs of shoes from Shanghai to Rotterdam or 182 million iPads from China to Northern Europe, boosting record trade between Asia and the West. Maersk of Denmark has ordered 20 of these giant ships. Can we in the Philippines afford to be economically cutoff from China instead of being pragmatic like the Viets, Thais, etc.?"

Highlighting the effect of the BS Aquino regime's canine loyalty to the US is the country's isolation from the BRICS economies (Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa), which is the hope for world peace and prosperity.

In the last G20 meet, BRICS plus Indonesia and Argentina, together representing 3.2 billion people (and 40 percent of the global economy), opposed the impending US attack on Syria, while countries representing only 850 million people signed the ambiguous statement sponsored by the US.

None of these augurs well for our nation's future. It's time to get rid of the economic and geopolitical baggage that is BS Aquino.

(Tune in to 1098 AM, Tuesday to Friday, 5 p.m. to 6 p.m.; watch GNN Destiny Cable Channel 8, Saturday, 8:00 p.m. and replay Sunday, 8 a.m., also on www.gnntv-asia.com; visit http://newkatipunero.blogspot.com; and text reactions to 0923-4095739)

Billions of dollars lost, yet Napoles rules

Herman Tiu Laurel / DieHard III / The Daily Tribune / 09-04-2013 WED

The failure of BS Aquino III to develop good relations with the rising economic power in the region--and the world--will cost the Philippines billions of dollars in lost economic opportunities. Still, all that BS Aquino, his government, Pinoy "social media" operators, and their mainstream media cohorts are focused on is the Napoles scandal. If they were truly intent on doing better for this country, they would have promptly focused on the message sent by China to the Philippines--that the present attitude displayed by the leader of this country toward its Asian neighbor is unacceptable.

The Department of Foreign Affairs (DFA) is alleging that China's snub of BS Aquino's trip to the 10th China and Asean Expo is due to unofficial conditions it imposed on the Philippines. These conditions were supposedly not to be publicized, namely, the Philippines' withdrawal of its case against China before the United Nations Arbitral Tribunal and the pull-out of its military presence in Ayungin Shoal.

Analysts have noted that the Chinese conditions and the subsequent cancellation were made when the Philippines and the United States started talks on a new framework agreement and when Defense Secretary Voltaire Gazmin offered all Philippine military bases for US troops' "rotational" presence.

Vietnam, which has similar territorial disputes with China and had experienced more physical encounters with Chinese maritime and naval elements, did not receive such a snub. That should be a dead giveaway that the territorial dispute alone is no major reason for China's tiff with BS Aquino--neither should negotiations for increased presence of US troops in the Philippines be as the US has also had similar talks with Vietnam since 2009 (when former US Defense Secretary Leon Panetta lauded the "tremendous potential" of US ships again becoming a common sight at the deep-water port of Cam Ranh Bay).

In the months leading up to the September trade meet, BS Aquino had already publicly enthused about attending the expo in Nanning, capital of southern China's Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region. And so, the unwelcome mat that China sprung late last month had a shock effect on almost all observers such as this writer, who could recognize the primordial significance of this act emanating from the Chinese side. For China to do so is indeed earthshaking, as it has not even acted this way with another Asean country with which it had drawn blood in the past. Vietnam's Prime Minister Nguyen Tan Dung, in fact, attended with over 100 Vietnamese businessmen.

To wit, three other prime ministers from the Asean (i.e. Cambodia, Laos, and Thailand) attended while Myanmar and Singapore sent their Vice President and Deputy Prime Minister, respectively. Although others such as Brunei, Malaysia, and Indonesia merely sent cabinet-level representatives, the Philippines' embarrassment emanated from its president announcing enthusiastically his attendance last August 28 and the DFA reversing this the day after on the 29th.

Ellen Tordesillas gives a good account of the timeline of the fiasco:

July 24: DFA Undersecretary Evan Garcia informed Chinese Ambassador Ma Keqing that Aquino wants to visit China; subsequently Garcia and Chinese Vice Foreign Minister Liu Zhenmin met to discuss Aquino's possible visit at the Nanning expo on September 3 and for Garcia to "feedback" the Chinese side on their talks. Reportedly, Garcia never communicated to Liu or to the Chinese Embassy in Manila.

August 23: Just a week before the event, the Chinese Foreign Ministry informed the Philippine Embassy in Beijing that since no formal preliminary meetings on the President's trip to Nanning transpired, China "can't guarantee that it would be fruitful," which apparently in diplomatese means "you're not welcome."

Tordesillas' account points to a failure of the DFA to coordinate the affairs on the Philippine side that could have resulted in the embarrassing situation. China expert Chito Sta. Romana also referred to this when we corresponded with one another about this incident. He, however, additionally pointed to the alleged Chinese conditions, wondering if these would be indicative of a "hardening in China's position and diplomatic tactics."

If true, I agreed that it may be an overreaction. But, at the same time, it sends a "crystal clear message," which should lead one to ask: Does this mean a "shut out" of Philippine trade efforts with China for as long as BS Aquino and his Cabinet's policies prevail?

Chinese tourists visiting the Asean region increased from 3.9 million in 2007 to 7.3 million in 2011. The Philippines got only around 150,000 of that.

Over the past 10 years, China-Asean two-way trade reached $400 billion, a six-fold increase, which now makes China the largest trading partner of the Asean bloc. Mutual investment is over $100 billion.

In the next five years, China's overseas direct investments will increase by $500 billion, while its imports will reach $10 trillion, with its outbound tourists jumping to over 400 million.

Therefore, we ask: Is the combination of increased US troop presence, together with BS Aquino and his Cabinet's incompetence, as well as the presence of US gofers in the elite, the bureaucracy, and media meant to sabotage Asean economic collaboration and progress for the Philippines?

(Tune in to 1098 AM, Tuesday to Friday, 5 p.m. to 6 p.m.; watch GNN Destiny Cable Channel 8, Saturday, 8:00 p.m. and replay Sunday, 8 a.m., this week on "Architects and Engineers for 9/11 Truth"; visit http://newkatipunero.blogspot.com; and text reactions to 09234095739)