Gannon’s House of Cards
On the one-year anniversary of the Boston Marathon bombing and lockdown, the ACLU has filed a lawsuit against the FBI demanding the release of documents and facts surrounding the FBI’s involvement before and after the tragedy. Specifically, the ACLU is attempting to shed light on the covert “Joint Terrorism Task Forces.” Judging from his reductionist screed (“Black and White Calls the Kettle Gray,” April 10, 2014), Joe Gannon would hand out tin hats to the good folks guarding our civil liberties.
Here are some facts—not theories. For a decade the FBI has conducted a massive covert sting operation to entrap and prosecute Muslim-American men, sending at least 130 to prison for conspiracies hatched and executed by the FBI. In Boston, from 2010 to 2012, FBI operatives ensnared area native Rezwan Ferdaus, a physics grad from Northeastern University, in a plot to bomb the Pentagon using drones. Meanwhile, just across town, Tamerlan Tsarnaev was creating a high profile as a heavyweight boxer by winning the New England title two years running. He was described as a “cocksure fighter, a flamboyant dresser partial to white fur and snakeskin.” In 2010 he embraced Islam and became a fundamentalist nuisance with frequent outbursts at the local mosque. Even after the Chechen emigre visited his homeland in the aftermath of the gruesome “Chechen Style” murder of his friends in Cambridge, the FBI inexplicably didn’t take notice. The Russians did notice, however, and expressed concerns to the CIA. But the FBI did a “background check” and said “not to worry.” So now in the minds of skeptics, such as myself and the ACLU, such questions arise as, was Tamerlan being recruited as an FBI counter-terror operative or was he being groomed as an “asset” for the CIA in the Chechen struggle against Russia? In other words, did the FBI create a monster?
Now let’s climb up and out of Joe Gannon’s hole. I doubt that the hundreds of Architects and Engineers for 9/11 Truth—many holding Ph.D.s and tenured positions—would risk their reputations and careers by engaging, with the “faith of little children,” in conspiracy theories. Instead they follow scientific laws, data and research to arrive at conclusions that may be unsavory but which they face with adult resolve. Joe Gannon, however, builds a black and white fortress from which he hurls barbs, ridicule and unsubstantiated characterizations at any and all facts that may assail his walled fortress. But what lies deep within the fortress, at the very foundation, is a childlike faith that his government is essentially good. In this Joe is not alone. Joe Gannon shares this existential crisis with millions of Americans who react with similar rage at the mention of exposed facts surrounding the JFK assassination, 9/11 and now the Boston Marathon bombing. Sadly, if we as a nation are to retain our democracy and defuse the National Security State, we must follow our intuition down skeptical investigative trails to whatever unsavory truth lies waiting and face it like adults.
Corrections
In last week’s Best of the Valley 2014, we misspelled the name of the Best Insurance Agency in the writeup; the correct spelling is Finck & Perras.
We also ran the wrong phone number for Wealth New England, voted Best Financial Planning Service; the correct phone number is (413) 539-2313.
In the Best Real Estate Agency category, the correct name of the winner is Taylor Real Estate and the website is www.taylorrealtors.net.
In the Best Landscaper category, the correct form of the winner’s name is Treefrog Landscapes, Inc. In our brief item about Treefrog Landscapes, Inc., we created confusion when we referred to Owen Wormser, who left the company in 2009.
In the Best Camera Shop category, the correct address for Hunt’s Photo and Video is 98 Lower Westfield Rd., Holyoke.
