A sequel of sorts to Press For Truth was released a couple of years after that film. The follow-up, In Their Own Words, covers several topics not addressed in Press For Truth, using footage that had been cut from that film:
"A unique, balanced look at a diverse group of topics includes: Top
officials' whereabouts and changing stories on the day of 9/11; Insider
trading before the attacks; War games coinciding with Sept. 11th; A
confrontation between the families and FBI Director Mueller; British
reports that some of the hijackers named by the FBI are simply wrong;
Government whistleblowers' calls for accountability; The FBI informant
who lived with 2 of the hijackers; A Defense Department program that
identified 4 hijackers in 2000; The families' push to receive the
Pentagon crash tapes; Bin Laden extradition negotiations after 9/11; The
Project For the New American Century."
This week in class we watched the Internet sensation Loose Change. In the comments below, compare the selection of evidence in In Their Own Words and Press For Truth with the evidence examined in Loose Change. What differences do you notice between Loose Change and these films about the 9/11 widows, in terms of evidence they foreground or omit? Is there a particular topic here that surprised you?
I enjoyed this film more than the film we watched in class. I believe this film and Press for Truth, focuses more on the lack of government involvement. Both films present valid information but I believe that this film presents it in a better way; the information is easier to interpret.
ReplyDeleteThroughout the film, it talks about how the military didn't act in a means of defence until after the pentagon was hit.
I believe both films emphasize how the 9/11 report was changed but I believe the film in class emphasized it even more. This film talks about it later in the movie and doesn't provide lots of evidence with it compared to the film in class.
This film does a good job of talking about government corruption though, it talks about how general Myers lied and still remained in the military.
To cap it all off, this film and press for truth were a lot easier to follow than the film we watched in class.
Michael Richard Walls
I find that the video Loose Change focuses more on the planes themselves crashing at the 4 locations and how the official truth is not the real truth based on evidence; while In Their Own Words and Press for Truth focuses more on the 'behind the scenes', such as what the government did to cover and lie about important facts.
ReplyDeleteSomething interesting that I noticed in this video that wasn't in Loose Change was the betting that went on the day before that shares in United and American airlines would go down; and the possibility that someone got very rich.
Another point that I am kind of surprised doesn't seem to get more attention in Loose Change and this class is the fact that the people on the second building weren't evacuated. Just as one of the wives mentioned, there was plenty of time to get everyone out. Even if they assumed it was a pilot mistake, those kind of chances should not have been taken.
I found “In Their Own Words” focused on some subjects in more detail that were very interesting and had some great behind the scenes interviews. It was simple to follow and clear making it easy to listen to and take in. I've always thought the film "Press For Truth" was a great tool for connecting to people and have watched it a couple times, but felt it was missing important info. I feel this companion piece “In Their Own Words” was a great addition and showed the Bush administration on and after 9/11.
ReplyDeleteThe interesting points I think this video focused on were: Insider trading before the attacks and how some individuals probably got very rich on this day, which also was not covered very strongly in Loose Change. Next the war games coinciding with Sept. 11th were also very intriguing. The British reports that some hijackers names by the FBI were simply wrong, showing even more lack of consideration for the investigation. I also like how it focused on the families’ push to receive the Pentagon Crash tapes. Lastly, it was appealing when it focused on the project for the New American Century.
After watching "In Their Own Words," I found that the film focused heavily on the different organizations involved, and their overall failure to do their jobs. The fact that the CIA, FBI, Secret Service, and the FAA were all basically connected to one another that day and were watching the events unfold on RADAR screens, why wouldn't any of them have called in NORAD for help. They had the means to do so, and when it came down to it, the government gave no orders to ensure the safety of its people. Probably the worst thing that could have happened was that no one that played the role of Director or the sort were ever fired. In fact, most of them were promoted, which raises questions. Why would you ever promote someone who failed in the line of duty? I don't believe that in the years to come we will ever have a full answer as to whom was actually the root cause of this catastrophe. It could be President Bush at fault, Vice President Cheney, any of the directors of the CIA, FBI, FAA, Secret Service, or any other government organization. I believe that the government wanted this to happen so they could gain the support of their people to pursue a war they had wanted to wage for some time; they just didn't have probable cause to go through with it.
ReplyDeleteThis version provides an alternative look at the 9/11 attacks specifically, by allowing the Jersey girls to narrate the questionable sequence of events. There is much emphasis on the lack of accountability portrayed by the authorities. There were no firing of individuals who had knowledge of a possible attack or that had insight on suspicious activity.
ReplyDeleteIn Loose Change, they did not address the issue much surrounding a former FBI translator named Sibel Edmonds. Sibel had knowledge that there were mistranslated documents which indicated a forewarning of attacks involving the use of planes. Sibel was unable to inform the public of her knowledge due to a law being imposed on Sibel, which restricted her in sharing information that was deemed as being classified. This raises suspicion since one may question why she was being restricted in sharing her insight, if it did not reflect any truth or accuracy.
In Their Own Words, targets the authoritive figures such as George Bush and raises the common question as to why Bush would still continue to go sit in the Florida classroom if he was notified of the attacks. It was also questioned why Condoleezza Rice was promoted when it was clear she failed to take accountability for the duties of her current position as the National Security Advisor. The perceived lack of communication is also questioned in regards to authoritive figures not responding in a timely manner as soon as they were notified of the attacks.
Once again, time discrepancies appear to be a significant issue which does not justify some of claims made regarding when authorities gained knowledge of the attacks. Even though the trading activity was deemed as not being out of the ordinary, it was apparent that there was some insider knowledge due to the put options only targeting American / United airline specifically. The financial gain that was made off of the 9/11 attacks, leads one to question who exactly may have had knowledge that these attacks were going to occur.
I noticed that the film "In Their Own Words" focused a lot more on what the government neglected and failed to due to prevent the 9/11 attacks. The film goes over many different time that a high ranking government official ignored evidence that an attack was incoming which prevented anybody to attempt to prevent the attacks. Even after these people neglected this clear evidence, it was shown that the officials were not punished, but many of them were actually promoted.
ReplyDeleteThe piece of evidence that surprises me the most from this film is the betting just prior to the attacks that American Airline's stock would go down and how many people made very large amounts of money. This seems like a very strange thing to do, especially when taking into account the timing of it.
When comparing evidence presented in "Loose Change" and "In Their Own Words" I think that "Loose Change" focused a little more on the actual collapse of the building and eye witness evidence rather than "In Their Own Words" focusing a little more on the failures of the US government.
"In Their Own Words" and "Loose Change" are both interesting interpretations of the events of 9/11 but both with a very different approach. "Press for Truth" and "In Their Own Words" is similar in the fact that they both focus on the flaws of the US government when responding to the attacks. They focus on the fact that the effort and response the government put in on the specific day as well as the following investigations was poor. What is surprising is that there was plenty of time between the first and the second plane hitting the towers, yet no plan of action was put in place in order to evacuate to protect the people, and to intercept. Bush did not feel the need to leave the school until the second plane was hit which is very odd unappreciated by the citizens of the country.
ReplyDeleteAnother flaw of the government is their weak defences in their favour of why they acted the way they acted. It is said that they could not tell the difference between the hijacked planes and regular ones in the air, therefore they could not take any immediate action when informed.
"Loose Change" focused on the planes actually hitting the building and the collapses and how the people responded to it. It involved a lot of witnesses who happened to see the entire collapses. According to me, Loose change is a weaker interpretation than "In Their Own Words" and "Press for Truth" because the events of the actually collapses are apparent to everyone now. Most people are aware of how the planes were hit and what the exact scene was. What is more important is the behind the scenes, and what the American government was up to while the events were taking place and what kind of action was being taking, or not being taken in most cases.
All the movies raised very good points and had may similarities. However i felt Loose Change was completely too focused upon placing the blame on the government and only brought forward facts that held the government accountable. Their search for the truth is flawed because of their previous assumptions and determination to rove government involvement in the events of 9/11.
ReplyDeletePress for truth acknowledges the very important role that media plays in getting the facts out to the public and getting them right. It also delves more deeply into the timeline of that day, acknowledging how long it took for the military to become aware of the events and also how long it took for them to act on this knowledge. This film emphasized how many different organizations within the government were involved and leaves you to wonder how all of them could have screwed up so much. With 2 hours between when the military was aware of the planes until the last one crashed how is it that nothing was done to stop a single one of these 4 planes? Especially after the film stated that sending fighter jets out to intercept planes is a very common practice in the United States yet they were no able to get it together on 9/11. It also brings to light a lot of the flaws within the investigation. For example people were not required to testify under oath and when Bush was asked about why he and Cheney would only testify together he seemed very nervous and unable to provide a reasonable or believable answer. The thing i found the most interesting was that there were many previous warnings of the attacks from other countries intelligence agencies and the US never responded in any way to these warnings so as to prevent the attacks.
In Their Own Words looks into how little information about that day the public is provided with. Also a big focus was how all the security measures put in place to prevent such attacks completely failed and so many times. The hijackers supposedly cleared customs a total of 33 times. Also there appeared to have been insider trading taking place involving the airlines that were involved in the 9/11 attacks which is very suspicious. I found it very remarkable that nobody within the military or government or anyone involved with the airlines and FAA were fired after the attacks cause clearly someone really messed up.
To compare Loose Changes with Press for Truth and In Their Own Words, I think Their Own Words and Press for Truth deliver the content in a more appropriate way so that we can follow the timeline, what have been reported by the 9/11 Commission Report and mainstream media, and how the victims’families interpret the event to come out with our version of understanding of entire event.
ReplyDeletePress for Truth and In Their Own Words covered more details about how the government, the FBI and the military failed to respond to the devastating event happened on September 9 th 2001. Neither of the president and vice president did what they supported to do which corresponds with this level of emergency. On the other hand, if they responded properly, how many lives could have been saved? Obviously, the NORAD changed their testimonies so many times but no one charged with obstruction of justice for their misleading of a criminal investigation, nor with perjury for their false statement to the commission, instead of that, the commander of the NORAD stayed on his position for 3 more years. FBI seemed did awesome job so that they identified all the names of hijackers within 48 hours. It is so contradictory with their performance that they overlooked so many warnings prior the 9/11. And the stock market trades are also mysterious unless they knew what would happen on Sep 9/11, otherwise it was extreme unusual the fact that there were so many trades on the two airline companies. Even though more and more questions are raised, there are no valid answers provided by officials.
In Loose Changes, I felt a lot of factors are omitted, and the movie focused on the collapses of the buildings and gives people a general presentation of entire event and talked about the science about how it is impossible that the building collapsed in that way unless there was a controlled demolition.
Ignorance is bliss. There are many issues and "conspiracies" in the world, including 9/11, which are complex, secretive, and unsettling the more information you acquire. Truth is a messy thing that only makes your beliefs more questioned and unclear. When I began this course I was one of the masses who was content by the distractions put in place that prevent us looking at the real issues facing the world. Whether it be sports, reality TV, or celebrity gossip, these are tools used to keep the masses uninformed and uninterested. Once information is brought in front of you and you began learning more about and getting more involved in it, the more nothing is black and white, it is all scales of grey.
ReplyDelete9/11 is one of the most tragic civil casualties in American history that rationalized war, increased defense budget, and stripped civil rights without being questioned. With the ever-evolving infromation age, people are informing themselves and continuing to question the governement in growing numbers following the trend started by the JFK assassination.
There is a false sense of trust and confidence in the American government that this country is the greatest country in the world and we couldn't have third world problems. Guess what, your government is likely the most corrupt and secretive in history, yet are viewed by Americans as untouchable, and by everyone else in the world a completely different way. I in no way support the idea that it was third world terrorists acting alone in 9/11, but seriously you could see why someone would want to. America intimidates, invades, and destroys smaller countries at will, all fuelled by self-interest oil based needs.
The more you look into 9/11 the worse it makes you feel, but at least you feel informed and liberated by the truth. There are very few people that truly know what happened on 9/11, and it is going to take a continued effort by people like the "Jersey Girls" and countless others if we are ever going to get a complete truth.
Loose Change and Press for Truth/In Their Own Words(PFT/ITOW) had some overlapping topics and themes but also were very different. The underlying question each attempts to answer is “what really happened”. This is where the key difference is, what evidence is presented in each case to attempt to answer what question.
ReplyDeleteLoose Change questions the actual events much more heavily, including the collapse of the WTC buildings (and presenting evidence towards the controlled demolition theory), the “missing plane” theory at the Pentagon, and the events that occurred at Shanksville, Pennsylvania, directing a very critical eye towards all of them, while PFT/ITOW does not even question the actual terrorist events of 9/11. One of similarities here between the two documentaries is coverage that the government had potential foreknowledge of the attacks and they could have possibly been prevented. I feel that although it is not directly suggested by Loose Change, the overall theme of the film makes you feel the ignoring of the foreknowledge of 9/11 and the highjackers prior to 9/11 ends up giving more of a feeling that the ignoring was not accidental or incompetence but rather purposeful and tied into the larger conspiracy that the film portrays or attempts you to question. PFT/ITOW however leads you more to believing the opposite.
This difference is quite stark when you move to In Their Own Words and Press For Truth from Loose Change. There is no questioning of the official story of events but rather a focus on the events leading up to 9/11, and whether there was a large failure of the systems in place to protect the people from events such as these. I thought it was quite interesting to see even with all elements of conspiracy aside, there were many things that went wrong on 9/11, as PFT/ITOW showed. There seemed to be many signs that something major was going to occur which was triggered through many warning signals, but they seemed to be largely suppressed or dismissed by management and superiors within organizations such as the FBI. There is also the feeling that the 9/11 commission report did not address these issues as much as they should have. The juxtaposition of interviews of the Jersey Widows and others from their group speaking passionately about these issues, along with clips of top officials speaking about the same ones was quite powerful as well.
In Their Own Words is a documentary that focuses largely on the organizations present during 9/11, and how they reacted to the event while it was happening, and what happened afterwards. This contrasts Loose Change, which is a documentary focused on the physical evidence associated with the attacks.
ReplyDeleteOne of the most interesting examples of some inside workings of the attack, are how the stock markets reacted. Many of the stocks for the airlines involved in 9/11 fell, but this was assumed by many stockholders before the attack even occurred. This happened on such a large scale, it can only be concluded that there was so background knowledge that this event would occur.
Another piece of evidence used in the documentary is the fact that the officials associated in the many organizations involved with defending the US from terrorist attacks had an unprecedented amount of warnings, which were largely ignored. There were so many chances that the attack could have been stopped, it is almost impossible to think that this is just a mere coincidence. Not only that, but people involved in the failures of the defense were not even punished (and some even rewarded) for being unable to protect the country.
I found that “in their own words“ is organized well and really helps you understand the story behind what happened before and after 9/11 in the bush administration. It also gives you a clearer understanding from “Press for truth” in uncovering even more aspects of each event.
ReplyDeleteI also find this film looks a lot at what the government didn’t do, and the questions that are raised by the jersey girls which I believe many people question when given this mixed up information over and over.
Something I find very interesting that is outlined a few times in this film and was also outlined in class is the fact that there was nobody held accountable. Both from NORAD and the FAA nobody was fired for their lack of performing their job. This is a huge issue because if this is what they are doing, defending American skies and they fail to do so it raises a number of questions as to why they were not “punished” for this action. As well as a few questions regarding why this was not seen as important in such a huge failure. What is also confusing at this point is that there was open communication between FAA and NORAD and the secret service all during and after the first attack then as the film describes, the CIA director is also informed during a lunch. The order of events explaining these issues raises a lot of awareness to the fact that many people did know yet nothing stopped the 2, 3 or 4th plane, especially given the time between 8:46 and 9:02 when the first and second WTC was attacked.
The Linkage of stories, also discussed quite frequently in this film is also very alarming and inconsistent, one of many outlined in this film is when exactly fighter jets were initiated into the 9/11 attacks. Given that the first two NORAD timelines are completely incoherent with all other timeline reports is one large problem but the fact that 3 completely different timelines were even given up to 2004 is just unbelievable. This instantly creates doubt for American citizens and is an immense inaccuracy.
This film really emphasis the discrepancies between all given reports by the government, the lack of accountability, the confusing timelines, and where exactly everyone important to defence was at the times before and during the 9/11 attacks. Whereas ‘loose change” focuses a lot of the actual hit and collapse of the buildings and some of the bombing evidence.
When comparing the Press for Truth and In Their Own Words to Loose Change, I would definitely say the the first two took the approach of criticizing the people involved rather than look at some of the physical evidence. In Loose Change we certainly saw some aspects where there were criticisms of the government and their ability, or lack their of to prevent the attacks on 9/11, but the majority of the movie was trying to prove a conspiracy based on the events that occurred after/during the attacks rather than prior to. A large portion of the second half of the movie was spent analyzing whether or not there was bomb residue in the dust from the aftermath. This was a very scientific and mathematical approach in attempting to determine if in fact there was a conspiracy. Where Loose Change lost some credibility for me, was their attempt right at the onset of the film to use past historical events like the burning of the Reichstag or the Assassination of JFK to persuade the viewers that this was another conspiracy in history. I believe that that inclusion was unnecessary and had no relevance to the particular attacks on 9/11.
ReplyDeleteAs for Press for Truth and In their Own Words we saw the investigative work of a group of women whom of which had husbands that were victims of the 9/11 attacks. While I don't doubt the information that they able to come up with, I do question the accuracy of some of their sources. These are for the most part normal women who have no experience in investigative work, trying to convince the public that one of the most devastating attacks in history was an inside job. In saying that, I was much more receptive to their approach taken in In Their Own Words. I thought that they put a heavier focus on the fact that the attacks occurred because of a lack of attention and was a failure to acknowledge the information prior to and during the day of the attacks. I agreed with their points made about the individuals involved who make crucial errors in judgement so be held accountable.
The film “In Their Own Words” focused on topics that went in to depth. The way they interviewed the wives made it easier to understand how the government plays a role in the cover story for that day.
ReplyDeleteIn the films “Loose Change” and “Press for Truth” seemed to focus more on the lack of evidence and how the government did not have a lot of involvement in trying to prevent the attach from happening.
This film for me was a lot easier to understand the story line compared to the film we watched in class. The film in class made me feel lost at some point and could not follow the reasoning they gave for a couple different subject discussed in the film.
All the videos are very similar in various ways, including the fact that they both address the Government's inability to protect the country properly, and that they don't give them all the information or the true information about the timeline of what happened on 9/11. Month after month, the media releases a different timeline each time infuriating the families of the victims and confusing everyone about the hijacking and attacks. They seemed to be either doing their jobs badly or part of the attacks on the WTC and Pentagon.
ReplyDeleteThe difference I see is that in this film, the families were more focused on the Government than on the attack itself. In Lose Change, there were more investigations on the buildings and on the planes and the timeline on 9/11, while in this movie, it's very evident how the families feel towards the Government. It could be because the reports were enraging and unsatisfying, but the families could not shake the fact that the Government and the CIA as well as the FBI were hugley responsible and that the people who were supposed to send scramblers and fighter jets failed to do so even after the first attack on the WTC.
I find numerous things surprising about what happened on that fateful day. One is that the president knew about the first attack, did nothing as a result and then lied about when he received news of the plane crash afterwards. To me that makes no sense. Was he afraid? Was he so scared that he could not think of a suitable reaction but to continue reading to those children at the school? Or was he under the impression that that the issue would be resolved and that the country wasn't REALLY under attack? Another issue that shocks me is the confusion in the timeline history. By the end of the video, all I could conclude as a justifiable reason of all the mix-up is that NORAD knew about the hijacking but didn't quite get the news about the crashes. That's the only thing I could think of. And at that time, I can imagine the panic and terror that could have confused everyone about the information they were giving/receiving that they were misinterpreting everything. Still, that is no good excuse. It would be too much of a coincidence (as I believe was mentioned in this film) that they couldn't stop FOUR hijacked planes from crashing in a space of almost and hour in between. And how is it that nobody got fired from their job after that? I suppose the FBA CIA and 9/11 were all busy formulating reports to fire anyone and blame the control towers and NORAD general and such.
The evidence in the Lose Change video were more focused on the buildings and the plane crash sites on the WTC, Pentagon and Pennsylvania and little on the alleged hijackers (until the very end).
“In Their Own Words” and “Press for Truth” follows the evidence gathered by women who have lost their husbands to the 9/11 tragedy. These two documentaries focus on their opinions towards the actions that the government took that very day. From their point of view, they believe that the government’s reaction time to the plane crashes was slow and unacceptable. They believe that those who could not stop the attacks should have been fired. In general, the documentary focuses more on analyzing the evidence found by the government. The widowed wives tend to criticize the actions that the government took that day and tend to ask questions like “Why couldn’t the government respond to the attacks fast enough”? In other words, they do not pay much attention to how the buildings collapsed, and focus more on the government’s actions.
ReplyDeleteOn the other hand, “Loose Change” focuses more on the attacks themselves, and how the towers collapsed. A majority of the documentary is dedicated to proving the fact that the towers had collapsed because of controlled demolition. The documentary’s main focus is not on the government’s reaction time during that day, but instead It compares the collapse of the 9/11 buildings to other buildings that have been burned in the past. It does this to emphasis the fact that the World Trade Center buildings could not collapse because of the plane crashes. It does this throughout the whole documentary with the buildings, and the plane that crashed in Pennsylvania.
In “Loose Change”, there was a part where they would zoom in on the WTC buildings to point out certain explosions that could have happened because planted explosives. I found this surprising, because the idea of controlled demolition doesn’t look so crazy as before. Others said that these certain explosions were happening because of the elevators crashing into certain floors, but I think that it could also have been explosives.
Both "Press for Truth" and "In their own words" do a good job of integrating official information with witness testimony. I felt that both of these films were substantially more effective than loose change in providing an official opinion of what failed during 9/11. These films do not contain the same conspirational aspect that loose change has. These films are not as easy to follow as loose change and while they are chronological in their own manner, press for truth and in their own words use more a technical outlook on what actually happened and point out flaws. The heavy focused on the organizations and their individual failures and well as a certain component of victim impact. The tangible deception in In their own words and Press for truth was more influential for me in persuading me that the United States government immensely failed this day. Loose change (whether is be the intense soundtrack or not) has a false feeling to it, which leaves the viewer less convinced, while Loose Change does have compelling evidence, my favorite is the controlled demolition explosions, Loose Change does not do as effective of a job narrowing down what the real flaws committed on 9/11 were.
ReplyDeleteI find that this film focuses heavily on the failures of the various organizations to perform their jobs and to implement the protocols that were put in place for this kind of situation. It also goes over the fact that the timeline has never been consistant each time NORAD presented it and that nobody was ever charged for obstruction or perjury despite this fact. The film also mentions how those who were in charge and gave the reports were never fired from their positions and got to keep their roles within these organizations despite the massive failures that occurred under their command. The issue of insider trading is also looked at in this film, and how there wasn't a true investigation launched in regards to it.
ReplyDeleteLoose Change focused less on the governments failures and more so on the lack of footage of the Pentagon crash and how the timeline doesn't seem to properly reflect what actually happens. It goes into more detail on the different flights and what the producers think happened in each crash. Loose Change also gets into possible reasons as to why the towers collapsed. The favored theory being that they were brought down by controlled demolition.
Press for Truth featured the same women as In Their Own Words and emphasized the lack of proof from the government and the government's unwillingness to cooperate with those in the public who have questions. The film goes on about how the governemnt refuses to release key footage of the crash at the Pentagon and avoids answering any questions that may reveal any unreleased details and any details that may contradict the Comission's report.
The film “Their Own Words’”, suggest that 911 occurred due to a failure in the chain of command. Specifically the lack of effort brought forth from government agencies to prevent these attacks. It is stated this was Americas “greatest failure of defense”. It directs the blame on the White house, and their lack of effort to prevent the attacks, and further investigate the events that had takes place. A point that stuck out was the fact that 2 fighter jets that could of intercepted the flights, but were not given the order. These orders would have had to come from the president, but he was preoccupied at the time.
ReplyDeleteComparing to loose change, the video focuses much more on the failure of agencies. Furthermore it looks specifically at the involvement of Politicians and how they have benefitted from 9/11. Its focus is not to explain the events that had takes place but rather the politics.