Bensky,
Re: your coverage of the National Commission on 911.
If you continue to disdain and cut off callers who voice opinions and theories that run counter to the Bush administration version of 911 you do a disservice to more than a few of KPFA's listeners.
Yesterday, Tues. May 18, you seemed to take a certain amount of pleasure along with your guest (author of "The Full Rudy"), who is allergic to "grassy knoll" theories (my god, is there still someone who believes the Warren Commission Report that Oswald was the lone gunman?) and your co-host Gail Sheehey (who never misses an opportunity to refer to the 19 Arab highjackers) in demeaning the three or so callers in a row who voiced opposition to the government's own "conspiracy" theory about 911-that it was perpetrated by 19 Arab highjackers under the direction/authorship of Osama bin Laden. You stated that you'd been forewarned that there would be a concerted effort on the part of a small number of "those" people who'd be trying to swamp you with their crackpot conspiracy views (my interpretation of your words). I think you know that "Guns and Butter", the one program on KPFA that consistently and actively offers information contrary to the government version of 911, is also one of the biggest money earners on pledge drives, which suggests it has more than a few devoted listeners. Persons, like myself, who find many of the government assertions about 911 deficient in logic and details and who look to your leadership for support in challenging the government's version of 911 events.
I have never called in to you before but I tried yesterday. I was angrily motivated by your arrogant, dismissive vanity to demonstrate that only you have the acumen to perceive the truth about events of 911. When you ask callers who proffer questions and theories that run counter to the administration line, "what evidence do you have for saying that?" it demonstrates to me that you have a seriously flawed double standard and a lack of self reflection on your part. I ask you, what evidence do you have to support the administration's claims about the events of 911? You have their evidence, which dozens of websites and authors are actively disputing with varying degrees of reasoned and documented questions, facts and theories. The Bush administration's hallmark is, and has been from the beginning, secrecy and above all deception and patently bold propaganda. Why on earth would you be accepting by default the self-serving, 19-Arab-highjacker version from a government which has yet to make any major pronouncement which turns out to be true?
Many months ago you were similarly dismissive and disdainful of callers to your Sunday Salon program who voiced concerns about potential fraudulent elections and the susceptibility of electronic voting machines to unscrupulous manipulation. While I haven't heard you apologize for your boorish behavior toward those callers, you do seem to have changed your views on this critical issue. I hope you will similarly open your mind and heart to those views about 911 which are not current with prevailing left-of-center politics.
There are myriad unanswered questions to the events of 911.
I urge you to stop being such an arrogant, damn bully to we listeners who refuse to take the government's version of the events of 911 at face value and are finding cogent alternative explanations. You might begin to inform yourself of such alternative info by starting at www.physics911.org.
Thank you, otherwise, for simply being arrogant but sincere and for not being a government agent.
Peter Teichner
Cc: KPFA station board and many other concerned listeners