[ExI] Top ten dumbest remarks

[Lee Corbin]

Samantha writes

> On Oct 7, 2007, at 9:10 PM, Lee Corbin wrote:
> 
>> A decision, at some level, "to allow the widely expected big
>> attack to get through" would leave traces, no?  Again, a conspiracy
>> must be immune to defectors and to people wanting to write a lot
>> of books and become celebrities like John Dean.
> 
> Yes.  If an investigation is allowed to look into them.

What I have in mind are "tell-all" books, trips to the N.Y.T,  and late-night TV.

> A conspiracy  
> needs to control who knows what and prevent to deep a probing for the  
> facts afterwards and be able to discredit defectors adequately.  It  
> does not need to be perfect to succeed.  That history is replete with  
> conspiracies only widely believed long after the event should teach us  
> that even large-scale conspiracies do occur.

It would be helpful if you could think of an example or two
of the kind of thing you have in mind.  I myself am having a
hard time coming up with modern conspiracies at all. (Thanks.)
 
> A handful of people at the top able to give appropriate commands and  
> true believers to do a few necessary bits of work would be sufficient  
> to create the event.

Yeah, examples like that, I mean.  And the necessary example or two
should have occurred in western democracies (they're all too easy in
dictatorships). 

Yet one separate problem I have altogether with 9/11 itself is
that the temptations on Bush the last few years would have been
immense to "allow" another huge event.  One 9/11 size event every
couple of years would keep the Americans in a war fever. (After 
all, everyone agrees that without 9/11 in the first place, neither
the Patriot Acts nor foreign invasions could have occurred.)
So if you believe that (i) the Administration could be so wicked
(ii) it really is practical for them to pull off such things without
getting caught, then why haven't any terrorist events of any
significance happened since?

Lee