Lets be more accurate with the deductive reasoning.
1. Censorship of rudimentary details in MSM coverage correlates to the protection of powerful interests
2. Rudimentary details were censored in 911 MSM coverage
3. Therefore the censorship of rudimentary details in the 911 MSM coverage indicates the protection of powerful interests regarding these details.
We'll leave it there as I must go to bed, but this is how the deductive sequence should look.
By using the term "correlates" you appear to have greatly weakened your first premise. Correlation does not imply causality in either direction, so you are now no longer saying that the censorship results in the protection of powerful interests, nor that protection of powerful interests causes the censorship. Only that they correlate; where one is observed, the other tends to be more frequently observed. That could be accounted for by, for instance, both phenomena increasing in frequency under more authoritarian governments. Perhaps that's not what you mean to say.
(If if is what you want to say, then statement 3 as stated does not follow. A more accurate statement 3 would be: "Therefore it is statistically more likely that the protection of powerful interests is also occurring." Nothing in your premises as stated supports the conclusion that the details being censored are what the powerful interests are being protected from.)
But while you think about whether that was what you meant to say, I'm more interested in the answer you gave when I asked you to define the "powerful interests" in question. You answered that the powerful interests were the ones who benefitted from the events of 9/11.
Is this association between being a powerful interest, and benefitting from the events, a conclusion based on evidence of the events of 9/11, or is it an a priori assumption? I ask because I've mentioned at least one interest, the insurance industry, that clearly resembles a powerful interest in all outward aspects. It's a large industry, dominated by large companies that control vast fortunes, it appears influential in setting policy, it has close ties with law enforcement, and so forth. You dismiss that claim, calling the insurance companies insignificant. If your evidence for calling them insignificant is that they did not benefit from 9/11, then it would appear that we're dealing with an a priori assumption that "benefitted (and only benefitted) implies powerful."
The problem is, such an a prior assumption will always lead to conspiracy-minded thinking, whether a conspiracy exists or not in any particular case.
Here's the Royal Road to conspiracist thinking:
1. Something significant happens.
2. Some people benefit.
3. Those who benefit are powerful interests.
4. The powerful interests caused the event.
5. The powerful interests act to prevent anyone finding out that they caused the event.
Since #2 is always true, it's important to be skeptical about #3. Otherwise you will constantly be leaping to #4 and you will start seeing conspiracies everywhere, causing hurricanes and school shootings and everything else that happens. Some powerful interests do benefit from some events. But cases when this happens have to be evaluated in the proper perspective.
As listed above, #3 is poorly stated in a way that invites misinterpretation and equivocation. It can be taken to imply that
all who benefit are powerful interests, but that is never true. It can be taken to imply that
all powerful interests benefit, but that is never true.
It is much clearer and more accurate to say:
3. Some powerful interests are among those who benefit.
I will point out:
- There are lots of powerful interests. Therefore,
some powerful interests are likely to benefit from
any given significant event.
- Likewise, some powerful interests are likely to suffer from any given significant event. You cannot ignore these, or assume a priori that if they suffered they must not be significant.
- Some interests
that are not powerful are likely to benefit from any given significant event.
You cannot assume a priori that anyone who benefits must be powerful. That is one of the most catastrophic forms of careless thinking in human history, and it's driven by envy. (Some people benefitted from the Black Plague. Some of the people around during the Plague were Jews, so naturally enough, some of those who benefitted were Jews. Because of this, mobs concluded that Jews must be powerful interests [and thus, because they had no visible power, must be engaged in conspiracy, witchcraft, etc.] and had caused the Plague. From this sloppy thinking, tragedy resulted.)
9/11 did great harm to many interersts that I would call powerful. Whole industry sectors declined. Vast fortunes were lost when markets fell. Some of the world's largest corporations and banks had their operations disrupted when their buildings throughout the financial center were rendered unusable for months or longer. Meanwhile, six years later, the so-called benefits are looking dubious as the "Neocons" continue losing political influence and the Bush cabinet is all but gone.
The powerful interests that suffered instead of benefitting belie the notion of "the powerful interests are the ones who benefitted." You can claim that those who suffered weren't really powerful, or didn't really suffer, but that just makes all distinctions between "powerful" and otherwise, and/or between "benefit" and otherwise, meaninglessly circular. The truth is that powerful interests oppose one another. Otherwise the Military-Industrial Complex would have long ago made the Agro-Industrial Complex stop pushing fattening foods on Americans, so that trillions of what's now going to Medicare could help fund wars instead.
You can claim that the powerful interests who benefitted acted successfully against the powerful interests who suffered, but why would the powerful interests who suffered do so in silence? Even if they were initially fooled into thinking terrorists did it, would not the evidence amassed by the Truth movement have opened their eyes? Or does some kind of secret chivalric code forbid any powerful interest from publically tattling on any other, so that they conduct a secret war against each other?
Or maybe, sometimes people (and powerful interests) just happen to benefit from events that they did not cause?
Respectfully,
Myriad
i got your dog laugh right here.
