Hi, everybody. I'm Brian McGlinchey, director of 28Pages.org, and I found this conversation when I saw some traffic to 28Pages.org originating from it.
I thought I'd visit to correct a few things that have been said along the way here, starting with the second sentence: "Some truthers have set up a pretty good page..."
Naturally, I wholeheartedly agree with the "pretty good" part (thanks!), but I'm not sure what to make of your assertion that 28Pages.org is the product of "truthers." My own interest and involvement in this issue springs from an interest in foreign policy, the war on terror and government transparency.
I doubt that, if I had created a site promoting the declassification of, say, the Senate torture report, you'd have claimed it to be the work of "truthers" or "conspiracy theorists," whatever those vague terms mean to you. However, since this issue touches 9/11, it seems there's an automatic presumption that I must be in league with people who tout theories about the towers being felled by remote-control airplanes, directed energy weapons, or---my new-found favorite---a "clandestine remote controlled anti-gravity ball." That's not the case, and prior to my launch of the site, I had no specific interest in 9/11. My creation of 28Pages.org was prompted by watching Capitol Hill press conference on the topic, and I created it without collaborating with or consulting anybody at all.
Judging from some of the comments, it seems some participants in this conversation have spent very little, if any, time actually examining 28Pages.org or the topic. If you do, you'll find the 28 pages to be an issue of government transparency that's firmly rooted in reason, one that has been explored by serious journalists from the New York Times, PBS, the Boston Globe, The New Yorker, MSNBC, CNN, al Jazeera, and on and on...sometimes with my help.
It's disappointing that Oystein implied that only "losers on the far fringe of society" might support heightened government transparency when it comes to indications of foreign government support of the 9/11 hijackers. Some of those most eager to see the release of the 28 pages are 9/11 family members and survivors who are trying to achieve some measure of justice against government sponsors of terror in the courtroom. Others include current and former legislators, FBI and NSA whistleblowers, investigative journalists and individual citizens like me who feel that the release of this material is necessary for the American people and citizens around the world to reach informed opinions about the past and future trajectory of American policies, while better understanding the performance of U.S. national security agencies leading up to 9/11.
Former Senator Bob Graham has said that, by keeping Saudi ties to 9/11 secret---and thus shielding the kingdom from scrutiny of its funding of extremists---the Bush and Obama administrations enabled the rise of ISIS. And a senior White House official told investigative journalists Anthony Summers and Robbyn Swan, "If the 28 pages were to be made public, I have no question that the entire relationship with Saudi Arabia would change overnight." That's not "conspiracy theory," it's geopolitics.
Some posters here seem to embrace a general presumption that classified information is always made secret and kept secret for good reason. Government transparency experts far from the field of 9/11 would certainly beg to differ. Indeed, a Glenn Greenwald column noted that one of the most telling aspects of the vast trove of documents leaked by Edward Snowden was the fact that so many of documents marked "TOP SECRET" dealt with mundane office matters along the lines of the location of the new copy machine. Over-classification is a well-documented epidemic.
Lending some relevant insight into that epidemic at a 28 pages press conference earlier this year, former Senate intelligence committee chairman Bob Graham said, "Much of what passes for classification for national security reasons is really classified because it would disclose incompetence. And since the people who are classifying are also often the subject of the materials, they have an institutional interest in avoiding exposure of their incompetence.”
The 28 pages are part of an 800+ page report that's sprinkled with isolated redactions of names and places. Congressman Stephen Lynch (D-MA), no stranger to reading classified material, has emphasized how extraordinary it is for an entire 28-page chapter to be completely blanked out. Many who have read those pages--like Graham, who essentially wrote them---are adamant that there's no national security reason for that extraordinary level of redaction.
Sabrina makes assumptions about who was responsible for classifying the 28 pages, implying the decision happened well below presidential level by duty-bound minions passing impartial judgement on the risk to national security without political influence. That simply wasn't the case. As Bob Graham described in his book, "Intelligence Matters," the redactions were the subject of intense and prolonged negotiations between the joint congressional inquiry staff and the White House, and President Bush himself made a public statement defending his administration's redaction decisions on the final public version of the report. (And this wasn't a report to the president by subordinates; it was a report of a congressional inquiry.)
Respectfully, Sabrina, it is also incorrect to say that members of congress "have NO, ZERO, NADA, ZILCH authority to make that determination" about whether the material should be declassified. As described on the "Declassification by Congress" page at 28Pages.org, there are rules by which either the House or Senate can vote to declassify information, even over the president's objection.
Finally, it's as far-fetched as a clandestine, remote-controlled anti-gravity ball to suggest that members of Congress who are pursuing this issue do so largely for political gain. As this very thread demonstrates, politicians involve themselves in this issue at the peril of ridicule by people who, without examining the issue with an open mind, assume any 9/11-related inquiry must be the ravings of mindless oddballs. Relative to championing issues like tax reform, education, defense spending, etc, the political risk-reward profile of this issue is positively unattractive. Also, note that Bob Graham left the Senate years ago, but has continued to champion the issue long after he had votes at stake.
If you take a moment to watch press conference video* of the congressional leaders of this effort, you'll better understand their motives and may be struck by their apparent sincerity. I've concluded they are motivated by a sincere belief that 9/11 family members deserve to know what the government knows about those who aided and abetted the murders of their loved ones, and that the American people and Congress, weighing life-and-death decisions about counter-terror policies aimed at preventing the "next 9/11," will be well-served by a fuller understanding of the original 9/11.
To that point, the leader of this effort in the House, Walter Jones (R-NC), speaking remorsefully about his yea vote on the invasion of Iraq, recently said, "Because I did not do my job then, I helped kill 4,000 Americans, and I will go to my grave regretting that." That's a remarkable statement from any politician, let alone a Republican one. I think his 28 pages involvement is driven by a desire to ensure that both Congress and the people have a fuller understanding of the facts as they weigh new decisions on foreign intervention in the name of countering terrorism.
You will, of course, reach your own conclusions about the effort to declassify the 28 pages and my motives for championing it. However, I hope that you can do so absent the kind of preconceived notions, baseless assumptions and confirmation bias that typify the worst types of "conspiracy theorists" you so enjoy lampooning.
Best wishes to all of you, and my sincerest thanks to Mark F for joining the petition.
* Given my new account status, I can't hyperlink, but you can go to 28Pages.org and search "Jan. 7" or "must-read quotes"
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) apply the new law. 
