***Challenge to all 911 truthers*** Mark Roberts: How is he wrong?

I know some of you believe this is a no-brainer. You might say, "oh, well Mark Roberts is a schill or an idiot" but consider for a minute that he is another human being like all of us. (and for the record I am not a Mark Roberts apologist) However, I just spent well over 5 hours (more than I would have liked to really) reading over his material and I have a simple question; How is Mark Roberts wong? Please do not come at me with disinfo non-sense or any sort of character assault. I have read his material and have my own opinions on the matter. However I am interested in what other people think. If you have never read a word from him, DO NOT RESPOND. I am not interested in immature name calling or unsubstantiated claims. If you do have solid evidence that might be of interest to us all, please share but please do not throw out inflammatory comments that do nothing to address the issue at hand. And to make sure I am making myself absolutely clear. This is not an attempt at Debunking! I am simply encouraging critical thinking and investigation. So please if you would humor me...How is Mark Roberts wrong?

This is his website for those of you who would like to do some research:

http://wtc7lies.googlepages.com/home

“It is especially important to encourage unorthodox thinking when the situation is critical: At such moments every new word and fresh thought is more precious than gold. Indeed, people must not be deprived of the right to think their own thoughts.” - Boris Yeltsin

Just an FYI...

Iconoclast, I have gotten into a few online arguments with Mark Roberts, and he never addresses the issues I raise (nor is it his responsibility to do so, that would be our "elected officials'). I glanced at his site. The first thing I came across was, "Loose Change Creators Speak: My compilation of horrors and falsehoods from the 9/11 "Truth" leaders." Out of the gate, by addressing the Loose Change crew as "the 9/11 Truth Leaders" shows that 1) He is trying to keep the focus on Loose Change 2) He is trying to portray the Loose Change crew as the end all/be all of 9/11 Truth, and that is simply not the case. Sure, they have contributed a lot, and I thank them for it, but they are not "the 9/11 Truth Leaders." To my knowledge, he won't even acknowledge that there is a plethora of cover-ups regarding the 9/11 attacks. How can you be an "expert" on 9/11, and not stumble across at least one cover-up? It's impossible. From that alone, his credibility is highly questionable.


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This is the wrong question to ask, because it puts truth on

the defensive. Since the OCT is obviously the most implausible of all 9/11 conspiracy theories, the appropriate question to ask is 'How can the OCT be right?'. The answer, of course, it can't. This is why the 9/11 conspirators need us to be distracted, wasting our time, energy, thought, and emotion down in the muck,.defending ourselves.

"They took it from the top to the bottom, we're gonna take them from the bottom to the top." - Dan Wallace

For example:

About building 7 he says:
"Of particular interest in the investigation are the two 6,000-gallon diesel tanks installed below grade for Salomon Brothers in 1990. Through pressurized pipes, these fed nine emergency generators on the fifth floor. When the tanks were found beneath the debris, they were empty, but diesel fuel was not detected in the ground below, which seems to preclude leakage directly from the tanks. From NIST NCSTAR 1-1J: Design, Installation, and Operation of Fuel Systems for Emergency Power in World Trade Center 7 (draft) p. 46-47:"
http://wtc7lies.googlepages.com/diddieselfuelforwtc7%E2%80%99semergencyg...

If you actually go to the document he links to, here:
http://wtc.nist.gov/NISTNCSTAR1-1J.pdf
and look at the pages he refers to, 46-47, you can see they do not say what he says they say. I suppose he might have got the page reference wrong. However, the FEMA/ASCE report says the opposite of what Roberts says-that fuel that leaked from the underground tanks in WTC 7 was found in the ground:
"In addition to Con Ed's oil, there was a maximum loss of 12,000 gallons of diesel from two underground storage tanks registered as 7WTC."
http://911research.wtc7.net/mirrors/guardian2/wtc/WTC_ch5.htm

Alternatively, regarding the war games he says:
"NEADS dealt with all the 9/11 hijackings."
http://forums.randi.org/showthread.php?t=76824&page=2#51
He then argues that because there were no drills going on that concerned NEADS (he says there were drills, but they were run by other organisations), the drills could not have affected the military response on 9/11. However, NEADS was not the only organisation involved in the air defence response, and NORAD, the NMCC, General Arnold down in Florida and various other units were also involved. Did the drills slow down their response? We don't know and neither does he, so he deals with the question by pretending it's irrelevant.

He's also still using the old NIST photo of smoke in front of the SW corner of WTC 7 and claiming it is a hole.

Fourthly, if you go here:
http://wtc7lies.googlepages.com/canofficefirescauselargesteelcolumnstobu
You can see a picture of a column with the caption: "Conspiracists, you are dead wrong. In WTC Building 5, this large column and beam buckled on floor 8 of 9. The fire was fueled by office materials only."
This is used to counter the argument that we apparently claim that an office fire cannot buckle steel. However, we don't claim fire an office fire cannot buckle steel. What we actually claim is that the office fire cannot have been hot enough to weaken the steel sufficiently for these specific buildings to have collapsed. The column in the picture is still supporting its load, so it actually supports our argument, not his.

In addition, he doesn't specify what amount of combustibles was in Building 5, so the reader has no way of knowing whether he's comparing and apple with another apple or an orange. Neither do we know whether the fireproofing was the same in Building 5 and in the twin towers. It is also possible that the fire in Building 5 burned for longer than 56 or 102 minutes.

Then he says "Now imagine another 200 million pounds (90,718,000 kg.) of building resting on this damaged foundation." Actually, the part of WTC1 above the impact floor weighed about one quarter of 200 million pounds, whereas the part of WTC2 above the collapse initiation floor weighed less than two thirds of this. As far as I can see, he just pulled a number out of his ear because it sounded big.

Great work, Kevin

Much of what passes as "debunking" is just positing alternative explanations (which do not refute the other explanations) or, as you note above, changing the subject.

WTC 1 and 2 mixed up?

"Actually, the part of WTC1 above the impact floor weighed about one quarter of 200 million pounds, whereas the part of WTC2 above the collapse initiation floor weighed less than two thirds of this."

Er... The impact floors were lower in WTC 2 than in WTC 1, so I guess it should be the other way round.

Two thirds of the weight he claimed

The part of WTC1 above the collapse initiation floor weighed approx. 27,000 tonnes. The part of WTC2 above the collapse initiation floor weighed about 63,000 tonnes, which is less than two thirds of what he claimed it weighed. These numbers are just rough ones obtained from multiplying the average weight of a floor by the number of floors in a section; they still need to be adjusted for the tapering of the steel and because some floors weighed more than others.

Who is Mark Roberts? What does he do for a living?

What does he do for a living?

Does he work for the government?

WTC collapsed (exploded) in 6.6 seconds!!! (vs. 6 seconds freefall) to a pile of rubble and he does not seem to mention that on his site:

http://wtc7lies.googlepages.com/home.

Why?

Show "Mark Roberts vs Jim Fetzer" by investigate911

Larry vs Curly

with Mo as the arbitrator.

He like

those from Popular Mechanics are wrong over all, because everyone who supports the official version fail to step up to the plate. To push for a national televised debate on prime tv. One would think with his passion to debunk us he would try to unite those he represents to accept the many challenges that the 9/11 movement has presented them.
Let's end this!

I did not see Mark Roberts

step up to the plate when Thom Hartmann made his challenge (twice) for a fair forum debate between truth folks vs supporters of the OCT. Many truth folks offered to participate. NO OCT adherents were willing. I guess they were not so confident of their position if they had to participate in a - fair - forum. Which you can bet Thom Hartmann would have provided.

==================================================================
"There are none so hoplessly enslaved as those who falsely believe they are free." (Goethe)

Show "I Offered to Debate on Hartmann's Program" by Brainster

Don't you understand...

We're not looking to YOU for answers. When we need to hear or read someone call us names, we'll look you up.


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Sorry that Griffin, a

Sorry that Griffin, a distinguished university level professor and researcher, and Ryan, a degreed engineer, don't want to waste their time debating Gravy, a tour guide. What happens if Griffin and Ryan win? They get to go around saying that they proved 9/11 was an inside job because they bested a tour guide in a debate? That would totally be worth it. //sarcasm

What's he doing here?

I go on a bit of leave and the debunks start cluttering the place...

Impeachment. Accountability. A better world.

Tour Guide

Mark is a tour guide of NYC. I will give him credit for being a good researcher, however, I was able to point out several mistakes in one paper of his on this JREF thread that "they" let die...

http://forums.randi.org/showthread.php?t=82498

I have no idea if he has corrected his errors in the paper.

"I would imagine that if you took the top expert in that type of work and gave him the assignment of bringing these buildings down with explosives, I would bet that he could do it." -1993-John Skilling, Head Structural Engineer WTC Towers

Mark Roberts is a straw-man

While it is true that not every single objection by 9/11 skeptics is true, there are many important questions that have serious merit.

Other times, Mr. Roberts specializes in the "straw-man" argument in which a distorted argument is presented as belonging to 9/11 truth and then debunked--leaving the actual argument unanswered. In fact, I suspect that Mr. Roberts himself is a "straw-man"--to distract those who have better things to do with their time. In other words, the government ultimately is responsible for explaining what happened on 9/11--not Mark Roberts.

It is a pointless exercise to "debate" "straw-man" Roberts if his positions do NOT represent those of the government. In other words, if Roberts presents FALSE arguments in support of the official story, then debating those false arguments is a straw-men that the government is off the hook for.

The US government does not have to be held accountable for misleading arguments presented by those who do not represent the government. This is why I call Roberts a "straw-man".

Does the government support the opinions of Mark Roberts? Has it issued a press release accepting the views of Mr. Roberts? Has it elected Mark Roberts as their White House spokesperson/tour guide?

When it does so, then I will take his positions seriously. Granted, if he can make legitimate arguments I will also accept them, but I do not agree with the premise that he has done so (for the most part).

The 9/11 official story is disinformation by omission/distortion: See David Ray Griffin: http://www.911truth.org/article.php?story=20050523112738404

The Family Members have a signed position demanding answers to the following questions:
http://www.911truth.org/article.php?story=20041026093059633

1. Why were standard operating procedures for dealing with hijacked airliners not followed that day?
2. Why were the extensive missile batteries and air defenses reportedly deployed around the Pentagon not activated during the attack?
3. Why did the Secret Service allow Bush to complete his elementary school visit, apparently unconcerned about his safety or that of the schoolchildren?
4. Why hasn't a single person been fired, penalized, or reprimanded for the gross incompetence we witnessed that day?
5. Why haven't authorities in the U.S. and abroad published the results of multiple investigations into trading that strongly suggested foreknowledge of specific details of the 9/11 attacks, resulting in tens of millions of dollars of traceable gains?
6. Why has Sibel Edmonds, a former FBI translator who claims to have knowledge of advance warnings, been publicly silenced with a gag order requested by Attorney General Ashcroft and granted by a Bush-appointed judge?
7. How could Flight 77, which reportedly hit the Pentagon, have flown back towards Washington D.C. for 40 minutes without being detected by the FAA's radar or the even superior radar possessed by the US military?
8. How were the FBI and CIA able to release the names and photos of the alleged hijackers within hours, as well as to visit houses, restaurants, and flight schools they were known to frequent?
9. What happened to the over 20 documented warnings given our government by 14 foreign intelligence agencies or heads of state?
10. Why did the Bush administration cover up the fact that the head of the Pakistani intelligence agency was in Washington the week of 9/11 and reportedly had $100,000 wired to Mohamed Atta, considered the ringleader of the hijackers?
11. Why did the 911 Commission fail to address most of the questions posed by the families of the victims, in addition to almost all of the questions posed here?
12. Why was Philip Zelikow chosen to be the Executive Director of the ostensibly independent 911 Commission although he had co-authored a book with Condoleezza Rice?

The US government (and Mark Roberts) have never supplied satisfactory answers to these serious questions. In fact, there has been no serious effort by the government to even acknowledge these glaring anomalies. That is a conspiracy FACT.

“We're an empire now, and when we act we create our own reality."

While I haven't read all his stuff...

...I did watch one of his videos of himself harassing truthers at ground zero.

A truther talks about how Griffin eviscerates the 9/11 Commission in his second book, "Omissions and Distortions."

Roberts says, "Name one omission or distortion he got right."

Truther: "The Collapse of Building 7 wasn't even mentioned."

Roberts: "Is the Commission Report an engineering report?"

Then Roberts' video shows a screen of text saying, "The 9/11 Commission was created to examine how the attack could have been prevented. WTC 7 was an engineering failure. Of course the Commission didn't mention it. Why should it?"

Then the screen cuts back to the truther: "EXCUSE ME?"

Message on screen: "WRONG ANSWER!"

So, one only needs to take a cursory glance at Mark Roberts' materials to know he is full of crap.

With Regard to Roberts' WTC 7 claims...

I have to give credit to "Dan R" on the Randi Rhodes forum for this excellent thread:

http://forums.therandirhodesshow.com/index.php?showtopic=113577&hl=

Right, Mark Roberts--what's wrong with him..

Uh, he's a manipulative, pushy bully....sorry that covers it. I got nothing else.

Yeh, I have "met" him online. At this site. From videos I've seen, he tries to physcially intimidate people he's arguing with. In a debate, when the facts turn against him, he pulls out some emotional distraction like, "I think these questions are really disrespectful to the famillies."

Need more? Just watch the wanker. Better yet, email him and get the complete "THX surround-sound" experience.

Have fun with that...

Impeachment. Accountability. A better world.

Dear ICONOCLAST........

So what's your opinion on the matter? Whats his responce to Mineta's testamony?