Letters to the Editor

by Inlander Readers & r & & r & The 9/11 Files & r & While answering questions and comments by members of an audience at North Idaho College, Erin Smith, assistant to 9/11 commission chairman Thomas Kean, said that she and the commission had viewed surveillance video of Flight 77 approaching and crashing into the Pentagon. The questioner then suggested to Ms. Smith that since there is evidence indicating that it was something much smaller than a Boeing 757 that hit the Pentagon, the controversy over this issue could be resolved by releasing to the public those surveillance videos. Ms. Smith's response did not give any hope that the videos would be made public.


This spring, however, four photos were released which pretend to show a 757 approaching and crashing into the Pentagon. Even so, only by an unreasonable leap of imagination can I see a Boeing 757 in these four frames.


I am left wondering what is to explain this decision to keep the surveillance videos from the public?





J. W. Taylor & r & Athol, Idaho





Hands-Free Nukes & r & Your article about new interest in nuclear power ("The Nuclear Option," 7/13/06) ends with an ominous line: "I'm very, very concerned that the public is not being presented with all the facts." Yet the article itself omits significant and readily available facts. "Smarter Use of Nuclear Waste," in the December 2005 issue of Scientific American, describes fast-neutron reactors and recycling of spent fuel using pyrometallurgical processing. These methods would produce about 60 times as much energy from available fissionable materials as current reactors, turn much of what we now describe as nuclear waste into fuel, and operate with materials inherently difficult to use for nuclear weapons. What little waste fast-neutron reactors produce is so depleted that it only needs secure storage for a 100 years, not the 10,000 cited in the Inlander article. Modern nuclear reactor designs are often described as "walk-away safe," meaning they will be safe no matter what the operators do.





Jim Dettwiler & lt;BR & Spokane, Wash.





The Art of War & lt;BR & As a member of the 9/11 Visibility Project-Idaho Chapter, I am thankful The Inlander chose to feature the article by R.V. Scheide entitled "Truth Seekers," (7/20/06). Your readers need to know that dozens of well-researched and referenced 9/11-related books and documentaries have been released by independent journalists, scientists, professionals, public officials and laypeople in an effort to answer the unanswered questions surrounding the events of Sept. 11, 2001. A CNN poll from March 28, 2006, showed that 84 percent of Americans believe the government is withholding information about 9/11. A recent Zogby poll revealed that about 50 percent of New Yorkers believe the Bush administration is involved in a cover-up of 9/11.


It was interesting that you chose to pull out and enlarge two quotes from the article -- one from UC Davis physicist Thomas Cahill and the other from author Kathryn Olmstead.


It is apparent that Cahill either never analyzed the structural features of the World Trade Center (WTC) towers 1, 2 and 7, or is part of this ongoing cover-up. In either case, Cahill did not apply the most basic principles of physics, like the law of falling bodies, to his analysis of those buildings' collapse. No steel building in the entire world has ever collapsed due to fire alone. And the south tower came down into pulverized rubble in less than one hour -- an outcome that cannot be ascribed to jet fuel alone. We suggest that your readers visit the Web site at www.scholarsfor911truth.org and read the peer-reviewable scientific report on the WTC collapses by Brigham Young University Professor Steven Jones.


Olmstead admitted there were "conspiracies" behind Watergate and Iran-Contra. But she did not mention how the crimes committed (particularly Iran-Contra) caused the crack cocaine epidemic of the '80s, caused immeasurable suffering in war-torn Central America and financed the illegal sales of arms into the Middle East. If the 9/11 conspiracy turns out to be real, as mounting evidence strongly indicates, what repercussions would Olmstead be omitting then? Wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, the global war on terror, the war on American civil liberties and levels of public indebtedness that can never be repaid?


The Idaho chapter of the 9/11 Visibility Project is sponsoring a presentation by artist and Ground Zero Survivor Janette MacKinlay at 7 pm on Aug. 7 at the Silverlake Motel Convention Center in Coeur d'Alene. MacKinlay lived (and still lives) in a fourth-floor apartment across the street from the Twin Towers. MacKinlay will deliver her Ground Zero account of the attacks from an artist's perspective with photosand art. For more information, call (208) 263-3322. The event is free and open to the public.





Ingri Cassel & lt;BR & Spirit Lake, Idaho