Sunday, October 21, 2007

A Funny Thing Happened At Bill Maher’s Forum

If Bill Maher isn’t going to take any bull from an elected official, he sure as hell isn’t going to take it from 9/11 conspiracy theorists.

This past Friday on his HBO show, “Real Time with Bill Maher,” 9/11 conspiracy theorists from the studio audience interrupted the program by shouting that Maher should talk about the “truth” of what really happened on 9/11. Using colorful metaphors, Maher went down to the audience and helped kick these nutty jokers out. And it’s gotten quite a bit of hits on YouTube.

Now, these people are more out of it then your normal, run of the mill conspiracy theorist. But on second thought, maybe not. These people believe that either President Bush, the U.S. government or the evil “establishment,” according to some the “establishment” and the government are two separate beings, planned the 9/11 attacks.

These “9/11 Truthers,” as they call themselves, also claim everything from that there were no hijackers aboard the planes to that a missile really hit the Pentagon. And trust me there is a whole smorgasbord of other things that these yahoos claim but who has the time to name and debunk them all? Well, thank goodness Popular Mechanics has already done that for us.

But there are little things that really fly in the face of these anti-government crusaders and they’re called facts. As my father likes to say, a little common sense goes a long way. For example, the theory that there were no hijackers on the planes. It’s really funny, because there are many things that contradict this claim. There are cockpit recordings of the hijackers and cell phone recordings of the passengers telling their loved ones or 911 operators that radical Muslim terrorists have taken over the planes.

Or the little theory that a missile really hit the Pentagon. It’s a really interesting theory and it would make a great suspense movie, except for that pesky little fact that hundreds of eyewitnesses saw American Airlines Flight 77 slam into the United States Department of Defense building.

But if you present the 9/11 Truthers with these facts, or even mention that they should talked to the family and friends of the nearly 3,000 victims who died that fateful day, expect to be called a government shill or a sheep that should stop watching FOX News or any other news organization, even if it’s a liberal one.

Sadly, these people have no credibility. They don’t even have one government official who can back up even one of their absurd claims. At least the Roswell UFO conspiracy theorists can whip out retired government officials who claim to either have seen the alien craft or its pilots, such as Air Force Major Jesse Marcel or Elias Benjamin, an MP with the 390th Air Service Squadron.

With 9/11 Truthers though, what they say is an insult to what really happened that day and to the victims’ family and friends who suffered a great loss.