Reply #43: A word about investigations (i.e., JFK, 9/11, Plame, Wellstone, etc.):

[Peace Patriot]

Investigations are good. I'm not dissing them. And developing theories about events that seem always to favor fascist rule and war--especially given quite blatant coverups, government secrecy, and obvious benefit to war profiteers--is essential to any investigation (to trying to FIND OUT the facts), to maintaining freedom of thought (often against great odds), and to maintaining one's sanity. (What the hell is going, really? --because the 'official stories' are obviously crap.)

A simple example: A lot of investigation of the Bush junta's claims about Iraq occurred right here on the internet, and was extremely important to understanding what was going on, and to influencing public opinion. Nearly 60% of the American people opposed that invasion, way back in Feb. '03, AFTER Colin Powell's speech. They didn't buy it. Some probably had a gut feeling of distrust of Bush, and didn't need to be shown the many ways he was lying; but others needed info, and got a lot of right here, from bloggers who posted and analyzed documents and other information.

Investigations are good. Truth is good. And truth is never found by the safe thinkers. It's found by the bold; by those willing to entertain wild hypotheses, and to engage in hot debate on all sides of a topic.

Investigations are also ESSENTIAL to democracy. Without them, fascists and other powermongers ALWAYS lie and steal. That's why we have (or are supposed to have) access to gov't information and open meetings. Secrecy = fascism. And if the gov't is PREVENTING investigation, you have to find out why and break through that blockade.

So I'm all for investigations--especially those aimed at understanding events that seem designed to turn our democracy into a fascist state. And, currently, the work of such investigations has to be done by ordinary citizens, BECAUSE those who are part of this fascist state, and those who are co-opted by it, are not interested.

However, I think it is more important to address the mechanism of power by which things are covered up. And, to me, that is--quite obviously--non-transparent, Bushite-controlled vote counting. I don't even particularly want to know who did it, and how it happened--except in so far as it can help us CHANGE it. (To some people, WHO is counting our votes--the rightwing powers behind Diebold and ES&S--is even more horrifying than HOW they are counting our votes--in secret.) Transparent elections may not ever help us solve the JFK assassination (although it DID result in a SECOND investigation, by Congress, that debunked the "lone shooter" lie). But transparent elections are ESSENTIAL to investigation of the Bush junta--on all issues, 9/11, Iraq war, massive theft, outing of CIA agents, etc. And the corollary is also true: NON-TRANSPARENT elections have been used, and are being used, to PREVENT investigations.

So, I'd say, look to the power mechanism. What power do we have to find out the truth? We certainly have a right to know the truth. What has happened to our power to get it? Why DON'T we have that power? And how to get that power back? Bottom line: our right to vote IS our power. And we MUST get it back.

We can expend a lot of brain-power on trying to figure certain events out--meanwhile, our right to obtain information is more and more curtailed. Why? Because there are people in the White House, running our agencies, and in Congress, who achieved power illegitimately, do NOT represent us, and do NOT believe in our right to know. How did they get there? How did they retain power? Ask your local county election official to SHOW you the votes that kept these fascists in power in 2004! They can't!

A 9/11 investigation by private citizens can show the ENORMOUS holes in the official story, but it can't get find out what happened and who did it because of illegal and unethical blockades on information. To bust through those blockades, we need to elect people who represent us. And to do that, we have to get our votes counted in the open by neutral parties. Otherwise, we're just spinning our wheels.