Vanity Fair @ MindSay

Taken from www.prisonplanet.com :

Newly released portions of NORAD tapes from 9/11 featured in a Vanity Fair article do little to answer skeptic's questions about the impotence of U.S. air defenses on 9/11 and if anything only increase focus on the incompatibility of the official version of events with what is actually known to have taken place on that day.

It is clear that the exercises revolving around hijacked airliners scheduled for that morning created so much noise in the system that controllers could not pinpoint the positions of any of the real airliners to orchestrate any kind of intercept.

Errant 'ghost' aircraft such as 'Delta 89' and American Airlines 11 which controllers weren't aware had already crashed into the World Trade Center north tower continually confuse NORAD officials and at one point after Flight 77 has hit the Pentagon, they even intercept their own aircraft.

Several exchanges between NORAD personnel outline the confusion that the drills caused and delayed the response of air defense procedures.

08:37:52
BOSTON CENTER: Hi. Boston Center T.M.U. [Traffic Management Unit], we have a problem here. We have a hijacked aircraft headed towards New York, and we need you guys to, we need someone to scramble some F-16s or something up there, help us out.
POWELL: Is this real-world or exercise?
BOSTON CENTER: No, this is not an exercise, not a test.

8:37:56

"When they told me there was a hijack, my first reaction was 'Somebody started the exercise early,'" said mission-crew commander Major Kevin Nasypany.

The exercise of running numerous war games where planes would be mock-hijacked and crashed into high-profile targets is dismissed as a coincidence by the writer Michael Bronner, with no discussion of the astronomical improbability of the two scenarios colliding, in alliance with similar same target, same time drills which took place during the London bombings.

The tapes betray the fact that NORAD's attention to the fact that Flight 77 was heading towards Washington are virtually non-existent as they struggle to gain authorization to shoot down stray aircraft.

Despite the lies of Cheney in his subsequent TV interviews and statements given under oath to the 9/11 Commission, those shoot down orders never arrived, even after United 93 had crashed in Pennsylvania.

While NORAD struggled to comprehend what exactly was heading towards Washington, in Dick Cheney's PEOC bunker things were apparently a lot clearer. The testimony of Secretary of Transportation Norman Mineta is brought under more scrutiny by the NORAD tapes.

How could Cheney know exactly what was heading for Washington and give clear orders for its path to remain clear, while the very people mandated to defend the skies of America scrambled desperately to make sense of the chaos and get fighters in the positions they needed to be?

"During the time that the airplane was coming in to the Pentagon, there was a young man who would come in and say to the Vice President, "The plane is 50 miles out." "The plane is 30 miles out."

And when it got down to "the plane is 10 miles out," the young man also said to the Vice President, "Do the orders still stand?"

"And the Vice President turned and whipped his neck around and said, "Of course the orders still stand. Have you heard anything to the contrary?"

Secretary of Transportation Norman Mineta's testimony to the 9/11 Commission, May 23, 2003.

The purpose of the Vanity Fair and a similar Washington Post article is to whitewash the entire affair and blame 9/11 on the incompetence of NORAD.

The NORAD tapes, far from dissolving so-called "conspiracy theories," only serve to support the weight of evidence that points directly towards a deliberate plan on September 11, 2001 to make the air defenses of the United States impotent and to enable the planes to find their targets.

Read the entire article. I didn't post the whole thing. Go here.

2003

 
2004 

May 2005

June 2005

Dear Lindsay Lohan,

Hello. My name is Dutchess of Wales and no, I'm not really a fan of yours. While yes, I enjoyed the remake of Parent Trap years ago (even though I still prefer the original), I do not think I have ever seen another movie with you in it, and therefore, I cannot claim whether or not you have talent.

Talent or no talent aside, I am here to write you a letter to beg you to recant your recent statement to Teen People magazine that the interview with you in latest issue of Vanity Fair, of which you are on the cover (see right), is a pack of lies.

In the interview you admit to your battle with bulemia. You told interviewer Evgenia Peretz that when you were especially skinny, Tina Fey and Lorne Michaels "sat me down, literally before I was going to do [Saturday Night Live], and they said, 'You need to take care of yourself. We care about you too much, and we've seen too many people do this, and you're talented,' and I just started bawling. I knew I had a problem and I couldn't admit it.… I saw that S.N.L. after I did it. My arms were disgusting. I had no arms." You admitted that you were making yourself sick. And when Peretz specifically asked youwhether making yourrself sick meant throwing up, the answer was yes.

I was so happy to hear that you were finally telling the truth. After all the interviews where you denied your eating disorder's existence, after all the times you went back and forth, from one interview to the next, stating that you were "simply eating less," but then claiming that you never watched what you ate. That you did work out and then that you hated working out and never did it. After all the confusing, conflicting answers you gave when someone asked you about your sudden and quick weight loss... I was so glad to see that you were finally letting go of the control your eating disorder was having over you. Sooo glad that you could finally stand up and serve as a role model to many girls out there who has problems just as you do, showing them that these types of diseases are fightable and can be conquered. That bulemia or anorexia will not control you forever.

But then you had to go and recant it all. You had to email Teen People and say, "The words that I gave to the writer for Vanity Fair were misused and misconstrued, and I'm appalled with the way it was done."

And you had to accuse the Vanity Fair reporter of "lies and changing of my words." Then you had to get your publicist, Leslie Sloane Zelnik, as well, to tell Teen People that you never battled bulimia.

You had to go ahead, once again, and tell the young girls of our country that looking the way you look is ok. No, not just ok, but desirable!

Maybe you aren't lying. Maybe Vanity Fair made it all up. Maybe reporter Evgenia Peretz, a well respected and one of Vanity Fair's "most reliable reporters" according to the magazine, made it all up and risked her reputation and career just to make you look bad. Maybe Lorne Michaels really didn't sit you down and tell you that you needed to stop (Although, I haven't heard him come out and dispute the statement). Maybe Vanity Fair's claim that they have the entire interview on tape is a big ol' lie.

Maybe, maybe, maybe... But I doubt it.

Dear, dear Lindsay. I hope to God you get help and don't waste away into nothingness like so many other girls have done. I also hope to God that you will one day be able to stand up and help other young girls get through bulemia.

Take care,

Dutchess of Wales

     Tom Hanks will star in Universal's Charlie Wilson's War as a rogue Texas congressman who oversaw a successful CIA covert operation in Afghanistan that heped bring down the Iron Curtain. Hanks' Playtone Productions will also be teaming with Warner Bros. for the CGI animation flick The Ant Bully, which will hit theaters on August 4, 2006.

     Batman Begins' Christian Bale and Sahara's Steve Zahn are teaming up for Werner Herzog's independent action-drama Rescue Dawn, which is based on the German filmmaker's 1977 acclaimed documentary Little Dieter Needs to Fly. Dawn tells the real-life story of U.S. fighter pilot Dieter Dengler (Bale), a German-American shot down and captured in Laos during the Vietnam War. Disney confirmed July 17 at the San Diego Comic-Con that Bale's Batman co-star Liam Neeson will provide the voice for Aslan the Lion for The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, The Witch and the Wardrobe, which hits theaters December 9.

     Christina Ricci will star in Type-A Films and Stone Village Pictures' modern-day fable Penelope. Ricci plays the titular character, a woman under a curse who tries to end a lifelong string of bad luck. Reese Witherspoon, who started Type-A, will also have a supporting role.

     Box office numbers were up for the second weekend in a row, July 15 to 17, thanks to the draw of new releases Charlie and the Chocolate Factory and Wedding Crashers. Additional support from the previous week's slump-stopper, Fantastic Four, also helped. Matt Dillon is joining Kate Hudson and Crashers star Owen Wilson for Universal's comedy You, Me and Dupree. The movie tells the story of a newlywed couple (Dillon & Hudson) whose relationship problems boil over when the groom's unemployed best man, Dupree (Wilson), moves in and seems to have no intention of leaving.

     Mel Gibson is teaming with Disney to distribute his next film, Apocalypto, which he wrote and will direct. The film is set in an ancient civilization 3,000 years ago, and the film's title is a Greek term which means "an unveiling" or "new beginning."

     The Weinstein Co. is teaming with Warner Bros. to distribute the first all-CGI-animated Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles film, which will be released in 2007. Awesome!

     Universal and Imagine Entertainment are teaming up for an untitled heist comedy to be directed by Rush Hour's Brett Ratner and starring Eddie Murphy and Chris Rock. The movie is about a couple of blue-collar guys who aspire to pull off the perfect heist. Murphy came up with the idea and has expressed a desire to work with Rock.

     The life of Notorious B.I.G. is being made into a feature film with a script written by journalist Cheo Hodari Coker, the last person to interview the rapper before his untimely death. The biopic, produced by Fox Searchlight, will be directed by Training Day's Antoine Fuqua.

     Sin City's Rosario Dawson will star in and produce the psychological thriller Descent. Dawson plays Maya, a college student who turns into a vengeful seductress after a shocking act of violence.

     Memento's Guy Pearce and Constantine's Rachel Weisz will star in the Houdini drama Death Defying Acts. Based on true events during escape artist Harry Houdini's 1926 tour of Britain, the film follows his relationship with a woman he encounters in Scotland.

     An Officer and a Gentleman's Louis Gosset Jr. will star as a Miami police detective battling drug traffickers in the film Caribbean Manhunt.

     Melissa Gilbert has made the decision to not run for a third term as President of the Screen Actors Guild because she wants to spend more time with her family.

     Selena producer Moctesuma Esparza is building a chain of movie theaters called Maya Cinemas that aims to serve the 41 million Latinos living in the United States. The first theater opens July 29 in Salinas, California.

     Jude Law has issued a public apology to fiancee and Alfie co-star Sienna Miller, admitting that he has been having an affair with Daisy Wright, the nanny of one of his kids. "I want to publicly apologize to Sienna and our respective families for the pain that I have caused," Law said in a statement released to the British Press Association.

     Tom Cruise's couch-hopping antics on Oprah has topped TV Guide's poll to determine the Wildest Celebrity Meltdown. Runners-up include Michael Jackson, Courtney Love, Farrah Fawcett and Mariah Carey.

     Salma Hayek appeared at a Judiciary Committee Hearing on the Violence Against Women Act July 19 in Washington D.C. to speak about the importance of lending support to battered women.

     Filmmaker David Lynch has announced that he'd like to raise $7 million to launch the David Lynch Foundation for Consciousness-Based Education and World Peace, a massive transcendental meditation program. The program would begin in the United States and later spread worldwide, teaching school kids stress-reducing techniques which he believes will go a long way toward achieving world peace.

     Roman Polanski has won his libel suit against Vanity Fair, which published a 2002 article claiming he attempted to seduce a woman en route to wife Sharon Tate's funeral. The Pianist director was awarded about $87,000 in damages. Polanski viewed the proceedings via video link from his Paris hotel room in order to avoid extradition to the United States.

     A Los Angeles judge issued a restraining order July 19 against a woman who is allegedly trying to distribute a sex tape involving Colin Farrell. The actor filed suit July 18 seeking to block the sale of a 15-minute sex tape featuring the actor and the woman, former Playboy playmate Nicole Narain. A hearing has been scheduled for August 10.

     A hearing has been scheduled for Freddie Prinze Jr.'s lawsuit against his former manager, Ric Beddingfield, whom he alleges gave bad business advice, costing more than $700,000.

     Tom Sizemore admitted to using a prosthetic device in an attempt to fake a May 25 drug test in an L.A. court July 22. A judge ordered the actor to be confined at a Pasadena rehab facility pending a September 15 court hearing.

     James Doohan, who played Scotty the engineer in the Star Trek TV series and movies, died July 20. He was 85. His final request was that his ashes are scattered in space. "Beam me up, Scotty."

Quote of the Week: "American popular culture is my culture, and I don't just live in it; I love it madly, and writing about it seems as natural - and as necessary - as breathing." -Stephen King, in his column "The Pop of King" in the July 29 issue of Entertainment Weekly

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