Through much brow-beating, during a visit this weekend, I got my dad (who is an honest-to-goodness rocket scientist and was an air-force pilot in his day, and has lectured on WMD) to watch the pentagon conspiracy theory film and attempt to address some of it's questions.

Though he thought the whole thing was utter nonsense, and brought up the valid point that we have no idea if the pics were doctored, assuming that the pics are real, he brought up two main points:

1) (not having anything to do with his expertise) What happenned to the 757 and all it's occupants? Wouldn't the loved-ones of the pilot, crew and passengers that were supposedly killed have mentioned that they were alive? If the 757 was instead shot down, where is the wreckage?

2) What did hit the pentagon, if not a plane? Air-to-air or surface to air missiles pack only 20-50 lbs of explosives. They couldn't have possibly done the damage seen. They wouldn't have gotten past the 1st ring. Perhaps a cruise missile, with 2000 lbs of explosives, fired from a submarine or ship off the coast could have done the damage, but that would have warranted an enormous and implausible amount of cover-up.

He met with someone who saw the attack, who verified that it was indeed a 757 with it's engines wound all the way up, and he speculated based on what he saw that it bounced right before the pentagon, immediately turned into a massive fireball, and plowed into the pentagon at enormous speeds, with the majority of the fusalage and wings simply burning up with the tremendous heat of the fire, similar to what we saw with the WTC attacks.

It is useless to deny, because it is impossible to conceal, that a great part of Europe--the whole of Italy and France and a great portion of Germany, to say nothing of other countries--is covered with a network of these secret societies, just as the superficies of the earth is now being covered with railroads.

Benjamin Disraeli

Some of the biggest men in the United States, in the field of commerce and manufacture, are afraid of somebody, are afraid of something. They know there is a power somewhere so organized, so subtle, so watchful, so interlocked, so complete, so pervasive that they had better not speak above their breath when they speak in condemnation of it.

President Woodrow Wilson

July 14, 1856

Or President Wilson

Perhaps you recall that the Italian government made a huge anti-mafia effort a while back. With special courts and special prisons for the protection of the justice system, they were so afraid of the mafia...here is one of their conclusions...

The committee feels that the link between Cosa Nostra and institutions is mostly through the "Massoneria" (freemasonry):

The fundamental terrain on which the link between Cosa Nostra with public officials and private professions was created and reinforced is the Massoneria. The Massoneria bond serves to keep the relationship continuous and organic. The admission of members of Cosa Nostra, even at high levels, in Massoneria is not an occassional or episodical one, but a strategic choice. The oath of allegence to Cosa Nostra remains the pivot point around which "uomini d'onore" (men of honor) are prominently held. But the Massoneria associations offer the mafia a formidible instrument to extend their own power, to obtain favors and privileges in every field: both for the conclusion of big business and "fixing trials", as many collaborators with justice have revealed.

Commissione Parlamentare d'inchiesta sul fenomeno della mafia e sulle altre associazioni criminali similari
(CPA: Commissione Parlamentare Antimafia)
Relazione sui Rapporti tra Mafia e Politica, Page 59
Roma, 1993

...now ask youself why the supposed 'war on drugs' is a lost cause. And why the CIA was the source of golden triangle drugs, or why the afghan herion trade is in full bloom, or why Mena Arkansas was a politically well connected drug terminal.

Of course from the patron saint of Mena to the governorships of the drug importation states of Texas and Florida, to the white house the story goes on.

Pre-9/11 FBI Missed Chances to Catch Gorelick
by Scott Ott

(2005-06-10) -- In the years leading up to the September 11 attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon, the FBI fumbled several opportunities to capture Clinton-era Deputy Attorney General Jamie Gorelick, according to a new study by the Justice Department's Inspector General.

The report also details how the FBI missed five chances to uncover vital information about two of the 9/11 hijackers.

Ms. Gorelick is best known for creating 'The Wall', a procedural barrier between criminal investigations and intelligence gathering which hindered the FBI's ability to learn more about Al Qaeda from prosecutors working the 1993 WTC bombing case, and blocked a search warrant to examine the computer of Zacarias Moussaoui, the so-called '20th hijacker'.

"In hindsight, we identified several blown chances to take Gorelick into custody," said an unnamed Justice Department spokesman. "Of course, 'The Wall' also prevented the FBI from sharing with prosecutors what it knew about Gorelick and the risk that 'The Wall' posed to our national security."

A spokesman for Ms. Gorelick, who later served on the official panel investigating why the intelligence community failed to stop the 9/11 hijackers, said, "The FBI should have apprehended me. It is unthinkable that I'm still walking the streets and giving my opinion to journalists on matters related to the 9/11 attacks." - Scrappleface

The eyewitnesses, a husband and wife who wish to remain anonymous for security reasons, say they encountered el-Shukrijumah and other potential al-Qaida operatives, including Aafia Siddiqui, in a small café near Lake Isabella Sept. 7, 2005. They described him as small (approximately 5'4"), thin (about 130 pounds), and clean-shaven with a prominent nose, dark eyes and black hair. They noted that he appeared nervous and spoke English to his Middle Eastern companions without an accent.

They were able to identify the individual as Adnan el-Shukrijumah from a mug-shot that appeared on the front pages of newspapers throughout the country when he became the subject of a BOLO (Be-on-the-lookout) report that was issued jointly by FBI Director Robert Mueller and former Attorney General John Ashcroft at a national press conference March 21, 2004.

The couple became more convinced that the figure in question was the elusive terrorist after reading "The Al Qaeda Connection" by Paul L. Williams, a WND contributor and former FBI consultant.

Several weeks later, they spotted the suspects near the same location and managed to jot down their license numbers.

In compliance with the BOLO report, they made their way to the office of Sheriff Mack Wimbish in Kern County, where they say they filed an official report and were told the anti-terrorism unit would contact them in the immediate future.

But nothing happened.

Judicial Watch, the public interest group that investigates and prosecutes government corruption, announced today that it filed a lawsuit on February 22, 2006 against the Department of Defense to force the release of a video that allegedly shows United Flight 77 striking the Pentagon on September 11, 2001. Judicial Watch seeks the information in part to help put to rest conspiracy theories that a government drone or missile hit the Pentagon rather than the hijacked United airplane.