http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=123127032

Debunking Conspiracy Theories In 'Voodoo Histories'

When a co-worker told him that he believed Neil Armstrong's 1969 moon walk actually took place on a Hollywood soundstage, journalist David Aaronovitch was appalled. Aaronovitch had seen the moon landing on TV when he was a kid, and he couldn't believe anyone would think it was a hoax.

"He told me about the photographs that don't make sense, and the stars that aren't there, and the flag flapping in the nonexistent breeze, and so on," Aaronovitch tells Guy Raz.

At the time, Aaronovitch wasn't prepared with evidence to counter his co-worker's claim, but today he is. Aaronovitch spent six years looking into the details behind top conspiracy theories such as the faked Apollo moon landing and has come out with a new book to forensically debunk each of them.

75 years ago today Hitler and the Nazis blamed the burning of the Reichstag (parliament building in Berlin) on (communist) terrorists, despite the lack of evidence, and less than a month later the Enabling Act was passed, giving Hitler dictatorial powers. It didn't take much longer after 9/11 for the Bush gang to get their Patriot Act. Anyone who refuses to see the parallels must be deaf, dumb and blind. See:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reichstag_fire
and
http://www.oilempire.us/reichstag-fire.html

Michael Morrissey

It took 75 years, but the Reichstag Fire patsy, Marinus van der Lubbe, has been exonerated of his "crime". The Guardian covered the news on January 12, and the New York Times mentions it today, 7 paragraphs into this article.

The innocence of van der Lubbe has been common knowledge to some for decades, and the truth of his "crime" was popularized by William Shirer in his classic book, The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich" back in 1960;

"That it was a crime, a Communist crime, they proclaimed at once on arrival at the fire. Goering, sweating and puffing and quite beside himself with excitement, was already there ahead of them (Hitler, President von Hindenburg, etc.) declaiming to heaven, as Papen later recalled, that "this is a Communist crime against the new government." To the new Gestapo chief, Rudolf Diels, Goering shouted, "This is the beginning of the Communist revolution! We must not wait a minute. We will show no mercy. Every Communist official must be shot, where he is found. Every Communist deputy must this very night be strung up."

The whole truth about the Reichstag fire will probably never be known. Nearly all those who knew it are now dead, most of them slain by Hitler in the months that followed. Even at Nuremburg the mystery could not be entirely unraveled, though there is enough evidence to establish beyond a reasonable doubt that it was the Nazis who planned the arson and carried it out for their own political ends.

"An unemployed Dutch bricklayer who was made a scapegoat for one of the defining moments of 20th-century German history has been pardoned for his crime 75 years later.

Marinus van der Lubbe, 24, was beheaded after being convicted of setting fire to the Reichstag, an event Hitler used as a pretext to suspend civil liberties and establish a dictatorship..."

http://www.guardian.co.uk/secondworldwar/story/0,,2239610,00.html

On February 27, 1933, after Hitler came to power, the Nazis burned down the Berlin Reichstag (Parliament) building and blamed it on Communist terrorists to justify a "temporary" suspension of civil liberties to cope with the terrorist threat. This is how Hitler became an absolute dictator. The "temporary" suspension of freedom lasted until Germany was in ruins.

The Reichstag fire was the key event in the establishment of the Nazi dictatorship. On Feb. 28, 1933, the day after the fire, Hitler's dictatorship began with the enactment of a decree "for the Protection of the People and the State," which dispensed with all constitutional protection of political, personal, and property rights....

(I doubt that very many visitors to this site will agree with Mr. Foxman on this one. Take some time to write to Mr. Foxman, take a deep breath, and give him the facts: http://www.adl.org/contact_us.asp

Discussion thread started at the Blogger Board -r.)

First the Rep Keith Ellison video (even though it cuts too soon)

Second: The Anti-Defamation League July 17, 2007
The Anti-Defamation League (ADL) called on Congressman Keith Ellison (D-MN) to retract his comments likening what happened in the aftermath of the burning of the Reichstag in 1933 – the rise of Nazism – to 9/11 and the War on Terror and apologize to the American people.

Abraham H. Foxman, ADL National Director, issued the following statement:

Congressman Keith Ellison's comments comparing the rise of Nazism in the aftermath of the burning of the Reichstag to the War on Terror in the aftermath of 9/11 is outrageous and offensive to all Americans. Whatever his views may be on the Administration's response to 9/11 and the conduct of the War on Terrorism, likening it to Hitler's rise to power and Nazism is odious and demeans the victims of 9/11 and the brave American men and women engaged in the War on Terror. Furthermore, it demonstrates a profound lack of understanding about the horrors that Hitler and his Nazi regime perpetrated.

Congressman Ellison should retract his remarks and provide the American people with the apology he owes them.

Thanks to Mike for sending this in:
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2007/07/14/wbush114.xml

America's first Muslim congressman has provoked outrage by apparently comparing President George W Bush to Adolf Hitler and hinting that he might have been responsible for the September 11 attacks.

Addressing a gathering of atheists in his home state of Minnesota, Keith Ellison, a Democrat, compared the 9/11 atrocities to the destruction of the Reichstag, the German parliament, in 1933. This was probably burned down by the Nazis in order to justify Hitler's later seizure of emergency powers.

"It's almost like the Reichstag fire, kind of reminds me of that," Mr Ellison said. "After the Reichstag was burned, they blamed the Communists for it, and it put the leader [Hitler] of that country in a position where he could basically have authority to do whatever he wanted."

To applause from his audience of 300 members of Atheists for Human Rights, Mr Ellison said he would not accuse the Bush administration of planning 9/11 because "you know, that's how they put you in the nut-ball box - dismiss you".
...