The Decline and Fall of Jim Fetzer

[Tracy Riddle]

I should reply to Mr. Poe.

I have stated more than once on BOR that my work on the sixties assassinations, plus my film and book reviews for Bob Parry are quite enough for me.

So I really do not want to enter another of these fields. Just too time consuming.

In fact, I have only read maybe two books on the subject.

Understandable. 9/11 is as big and complex a subject as JFK, and just as frustrating.

[Tracy Riddle]

Fetzer is so frequently mentioned by official-story-defenders (JFK, 9/11, whatever) in online debates. I can't tell you how many times I've been lumped in with him by people who only know that I'm a critic of official stories. Instantly I'm compared to Fetzer, Alex Jones, David Icke, etc. And he manages to show up often enough in corporate media outlets...



...it makes you wonder why he and Alex Jones are their go-to guys for all their conspiracy needs? Have we ever seen Peter Dale Scott or John Newman on CNN or Fox or the BBC? I saw Harold Weisberg interviewed a couple of times in the MSM 25 years ago, but only to help attack Ricky White and Oliver Stone. David Ray Griffin was interviewed once, I think, having Tucker Carlson accuse him of blasphemy for questioning the 9/11 story.

But when the corporate media uses you repeatedly, it's for a reason. They know you will help them - intentionally or not - make other critics look ridiculous.

Even when they invite someone like David Talbot, he is paired with Bugliosi and WC shill Chris Matthews. Fair and Balanced!

[Albert Doyle]

I'd like to respectfully disagree about Janney being lumped in with Cinque and Fetzer. I think there's many people who believe and respect Peter Janney and his attempt to expose Mary Meyer's obvious CIA assassination. Frankly, I don't think they should be subjected to any attempt to marginalize their credibility by being thrown in to the Fetzer hamper because they recognize the credibility of Janney's effort. It is my personal opinion that Jim over-reaches here and risks denying a serious victim.


I also think Jim may not have thought hard enough on Gary Webb. He would do himself well to familiarize himself with the full capabilities of CIA and realize they have the ability to drive someone to suicide and make it look like it was done solely by the victim. Just because Fetzer backs something doesn't necessarily make it wrong (though you are going against the odds when it comes to Fetzer).


Jim covers Israel's involvement in too limited terms. A read of Piper's book Final Judgment and its highly detailed evidence, that involves 500 pages of serious DiEugenio-level detail, will show why Jim's simple propaganda-level dismissal doesn't live up to that complex detail that involves Permindex, Tibor Rosenbaum's BCCI bank, The French Connection, and the US mob's connection to CIA that was directly connected to the main assassination players. Most people haven't read Final Judgment so they don't realize what Jim is ignoring. An avenue into this is to analyze the USS Liberty incident. Saying "no reputable researchers claim this" is tantamount to what the NY Times does to Jim himself.


It's easy to criticize Fetzer since most assassination researchers realize he's gone off the reservation. However I find it unsound to attach personally disliked assassination claims to Fetzer in order to disparage them. Just sayin'.


Greg Parker is one of the most uncredible researchers out there. He is a rabid anti-Armstrong theorist. His ROKC website is a troll-infested farce.



.

[Matthew Poe]

​Please do not even try and insinuate I won't study it because somehow I am afraid of what it would do to me. I mean, I understand what it is to be marginalized because of what I have chosen to do already. I have accepted that.

I think our wires got crossed somewhere. I was picking up the idea that you somehow should do 9/11 research from you. My initial disappointment only stemmed from the fact that you seemed unwilling to even discuss your thoughts on it. But you explained that, and I understand the reticence. I do indeed know how much work it takes to put out CTKA (or Probe) or just as you say the two essays you wrote on Fetzer. So I wasn't trying to be snide or insinuating.

I wasn't aware of Summers' book.

[Matthew Poe]

Anthony, thanks for the info I was unaware of most of those additions except for Scott's, who indeed is of some stature (as is Russell, Mellen, Newman and everyone else you mentioned.) By the way, I do think people of great talent have invested incredible time into researching the event, or we wouldn't be where we are. On the hard science side, I'm especially impressed by Gage and Dr. Jones.

Don, I agree with your analysis and look forward to reading your book. I only buy from Amazon 3rd parties because I don't want to feed the behemoth (although I probably am somehow.) Is there a better way to buy it from your end?

[Jim DiEugenio]

AT: And yet I can count the number of really good and reliable JFK sites on probably one hand, and I can count the number of people doing really long, detailed reviews of new JFK books on one hand and still have most of my fingers left over. If Jim decided to dump his JFK work and start blogging about WTC7 we'd lose probably the one guy with his finger in the dyke holding back the ongoing tsunami of crap from flooding the JFK research community and drowning us all.


Thanks Anthony. That is what I mean. There are not any other sites that do what CTKA does, since its a combination of reviews of recent work, a news blog, and an original research journal. And unlike Morley, we do not allow nut cakes to pollute the area.

And it also takes days, sometimes weeks, to do a review for Parry. Because when I do a movie review for him I have to read the book on which the film is based and take notes, e.g. The Big Short, and 13 Hours. (Which is what I am doing now BTW.) But I feel that is important since it reaches a more generalized and wider audience, plus film criticism today has really gone under from its heyday in the sixties and seventies. So I feel its kind of necessary and sets an example.

BTW, the only two books I read on 9-11 were Ruppert's and Ahmed's. I thought Mike's book was really interesting. I was especially impressed by the stock market killing.

Do you know how many copies Ruppert's book sold? Well over 200,000.

[Don Jeffries]

Don, I agree with your analysis and look forward to reading your book. I only buy from Amazon 3rd parties because I don't want to feed the behemoth (although I probably am somehow.) Is there a better way to buy it from your end?

Alex Jones sells my book through his Infowars store, if you think he's outside the behemoth. Otherwise, I think you can buy directly from Skyhorse, the publisher. Thanks.

[Matthew Poe]

BTW, the only two books I read on 9-11 were Ruppert's and Ahmed's. I thought Mike's book was really interesting. I was especially impressed by the stock market killing.

Do you know how many copies Ruppert's book sold? Well over 200,000.

I'm puzzled at the positive reference to Ruppert's 9/11 work. He turned his back on it (going so far I think to repudiate his own thesis) to further develop his Peak Oil theory which I think we can all agree is bunk given recent oil prices. Recall that he had, in his "truther" mode, cited Peak Oil as the motive for a false flag 9/11 attack. Hadn't others presented information on 9/11 inside trader before him? If not I laud him for that discovery, as I do for his brave concurrence--as an LAPD insider--with the Dark Alliance articles when Webb needed support the most. Ahmed's book sounds good.

[R.K. Locke]

You don't need to know every detail about 9/11 to offer a firm and decisive opinion about it. If you can understand that the single bullet theory is absurd and implausible then you can also understand this:




Once you have come to that understanding, certain incontrovertible truths necessarily follow.

[Jim DiEugenio]

Matt:

That is not the only argument Mike made in his book of course. I mean the thing is 600 pages long. He begins the book with the very astute acknowledgement that there were about 3-5 war games going on that day. And that only two people knew about all of them, Cheney and Rumsfeld. And that this was a very good reason for the late response by air.

To my knowledge, Mike never backtracked on his book at all. In fact, he actually told me once that he thought Cheney was behind the whole thing. (Although I do agree he was wrong about Peak Oil.)

Mr. Locke, when you have been involved in these wars as long as I have, you will understand that the other side will always come up with arguments against even the most simple and visual indications of skull dugggery. This is why Mike did not like to argue in that direction. See, the HSCA did just that, they justified the SBT with a trajectory analysis guy from NASA.

So it took us decades to come up with something better than that, the fact that CE 399 was substituted, and we can prove that today. (See Reclaiming Parkland, pgs. 224-26)

I mean you have seen the whole thing about steel being severely weakened at 1700 degrees right? And the magazine reply to Loose Change? Mike actually predicted the latter based on the JFK case.