Scripps poll: One-third see U.S. hand in 9/11
Conspiracy beliefs reflect anger with government
http://www.rockymountainnews.com/drmn/nation/article/0%2C1299%2CDRMN_16_4889964%2C00.html

RockyTalk: Did the government have a hand in 9/11?
By Thomas Hargrove and Guido H. Stempel III, Scripps Howard News
Service
August 2, 2006
More than a third of the American public suspects that federal
officials assisted in the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks or took no action
to stop them so the United States could go to war in the Middle East,
according to a new Scripps Howard/Ohio University poll.
The national survey of 1,010 adults also found that anger against the
federal government is at record levels, with 54 percent saying they
"personally are more angry" at the government than they used to be.

Widespread resentment and alienation toward the national government
appears to be fueling a growing acceptance of conspiracy theories about
the 2001 attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon.

Suspicions that the 9/11 attacks were "an inside job" - the common
phrase used by conspiracy theorists on the Internet - quickly have
become nearly as popular as decades-old conspiracy theories that the
federal government was responsible for President John F. Kennedy's
assassination and that it has covered up proof of space aliens.

Thirty-six percent of respondents overall said it is "very likely" or
"somewhat likely" that federal officials either participated in the
attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon or took no action to
stop them "because they wanted the United States to go to war in the
Middle East."

"One out of three sounds high, but that may very well be right," said
Lee Hamilton, former vice chairman of the National Commission on
Terrorist Attacks Upon the United States (also called the 9/11
Commission.) His congressionally appointed investigation concluded that
federal officials bungled their attempts to prevent, but did not
participate in, the attacks by al-Qaida five years ago.

The poll also found that 16 percent of Americans speculate that
secretly planted explosives, not airliners, were the reason the twin
towers of the World Trade Center collapsed.

Conspiracy groups for at least two years have questioned why the World
Trade Center collapsed when fires that heavily damaged similar
skyscrapers around the world did not cause such destruction. Sixteen
percent said it's "very likely" or "somewhat likely" that "the collapse
of the twin towers in New York was aided by explosives secretly planted
in the two buildings."

Twelve percent suspect the Pentagon was struck by a military cruise
missile in 2001 rather than by an airliner captured by terrorists.

That lower percentage may result from an effort by the conservative
Washington-based Judicial Watch advocacy group to debunk the claim.

The group filed claims under the Freedom of Information Act and
obtained images from Pentagon security cameras, showing "a plane
hitting the Pentagon at incredibly high speed," said Judicial Watch
President Tom Fitton.

Many conspiracy Web sites have posted the video segments and report the
films are inconclusive or were manipulated by the government.

"Some folks will never be convinced," Fitton said. "But I'm hoping that
these videos will dissuade reasonable people from falling into a trap
with these conspiracy theories."

University of Florida law professor Mark Fenster, author of the book
Conspiracy Theories: Secrecy and Power in American Culture, said the
poll's findings reflect public anger over the Iraq war, realization
that Saddam Hussein did not have weapons of mass destruction and
growing doubts of the veracity of the Bush administration.

The Scripps Survey Research Center at Ohio University has tracked the
level of resentment people feel toward the federal government since
1995, starting shortly after Timothy McVeigh bombed the federal
building in Oklahoma City.

But the new survey found that 77 percent say their friends and
acquaintances have become angrier with government recently and 54
percent say they, themselves, have become angrier - both records.

The survey also found that people who regularly use the Internet but
who do not regularly use so-called "mainstream" media are significantly
more likely to believe in Sept. 11 conspiracies.

The level of suspicion of U.S. official involvement in a Sept. 11
conspiracy was only slightly behind the 40 percent who suspect
"officials in the federal government were directly responsible for the
assassination of President Kennedy" and the 38 percent who believe "the
federal government is withholding proof of the existence of intelligent
life from other planets."

The survey was conducted by telephone from July 6-24 at the Scripps
Survey Research Center at the University of Ohio under a grant from the
Scripps Howard Foundation. The poll has a margin of error of 4
percentage points.

For more related articles goto; http://www.st911.org/