9/11 Truth Leader Teleconference + Oxysilver = Failure

Last year the NYC CAN ballot initiative was justifiably rejected by the city of New York for having been written without adequate legal preparation, a fact that came as no surprise to myself and others. Feeling quite certain that I could have determined the initiative's problems myself with a day at the library, I think we should be holding someone accountable for deciding to commit a lot of movement time and money to a lost cause.

Unfortunately, instead of accountability we got excuses. "The Turning Point" is a long winded denial of responsibility for the failure of the initiative followed by a big plan to essentially run the public face of the movement. The preliminary outlines of that plan can be found in the minutes of a recent "9/11 Truth Leaders Teleconference."

"NYC CAN will launch:

-a nationwide campaign to pass local resolutions calling for a new investigation, either through local advisory ballot initiatives, or by lobbying supportive city councils where advisory initiatives are not allowed. Other causes like troop withdrawal and impeachment gained and manifested strength through this kind of coordinated national campaign.

-a PR campaign employing former government, military and intelligence professionals and hiring a PR firm to ensure access to mainstream media and a perfectly crafted public image. Writing of grant proposals for this project, an for the nationwide ballot initiative campaign, is underway. We expect to raise significant sums of money to help make 2010 a watershed year for 9/11 accountability to fully enter the mainstream.

-sustained campaign lobbying new Manhattan DA to open an investigation into the destruction of the buildings.

-getting close to a civil suit brought by 9/11 families so that we will have court ordered subpoena power."

Now, such an initiative to put the movement's best foot forward sounds like a great idea. Then again, so did the ballot initiative. As with any group or action in this movement, we should consider the credibility of those involved. Good ideas are often easily undermined by one or more people who are either incompetent or intending to do damage.

"9/11 Truth Leader Teleconference: A coalition of 9/11 truth leaders and groups has been communicating on a monthly basis (via teleconference) about supporting critical campaigns to expose the U.S. government and media cover-up on what really happened."

Have you heard of this group? Do you know who is involved? Do you trust them to be the "reputable" face of the movement? I started digging and was very upset with what I found.

Jonathan Mark facilitates the teleconferences, published the minutes, and seems to be playing a prominent role in group. Mark runs FlybyNews and is an assistant organizer for Valley911Truth. He's also an affiliated vendor of Oxysilver. What is that and why is that a bad thing?

Oxysilver is a brand of 'colloidal silver', a snake-oil cure-all product marketed to the uneducated and more easily fooled. It claims to "eliminate the need for harmful vaccines and anti-biotics." The product is propped up by a rather typical pyramid scheme and has been widely discredited by the medical establishment. It has few established positive effects when utilized for specific purposes and a number of potential negative side effects. Those promoting it generally have little medical credibility.

Now, each of us is free to have internal contradictions. Jonathan Mark is free to make money lying to people while he promotes the truth in his spare time. However, I would hope that it's clear to most that we wouldn't want him to relate his questionable means of income and his 'truth' related political interests.

Well, unfortunately, he's done exactly that.

First of all, he posted an advertisement about Oxysilver to 911blogger (thankfully removed since I published this post). Alex Jones has advertisements for Oxysilver on his sites. But then AJ is not committed to fact based political promotion or the 9/11 truth movement. 911blogger is a site devoted to 9/11 truth and should not be used for personal gain or commercial promotion.

Second, and far more damning, Mark invited the head of the company, Len Horowitz (pictured above), to speak during a conference call!?! The first half of the minutes read like a commercial for the product.

"It was great hearing from Richard Gage, and we tried recapping a very detailed and broad ranging conversation-presentation by Len Horowitz. I wish I had this one recorded; his expertise and connecting the false flag operation of 9/11/01 to this current crisis of a created pandemic is important, but we also learned why his product, OxySilver, and other high quality silver hydrosols, work well in killing pathogens as H1N1.. and most any bacteria, virus, or fungus pathogen.

Dr. Len as clearly warning us of the nature of this "emergency" to pull off a vaccination campaign to spread the live virus and disease, (which could coincide with other crises in the economy and environment), all adding into incentives for the government to place us under martial law "to control the masses." Sounds crazy to me. How would it sound to members of our more skeptical target audience?"

Let's recap. A prominent member of a group that intends to represent the more reputable and credible aspects of the 9/11 truth movement has made it clear that he is comfortable taking advantage of that position for personal gain and also comfortable relating matters of fact with exploitive fallacy.

And what does that say about the "9/11 Truth Leaders" group? Nothing good.

Like the ballot initiative before it, we have people involved who can easily be used to paint a negative picture of the effort. Edgar Mitchell promoted alien encounters and Jonathan Mark wants you to drink silver. Both may genuinely care about 9/11 truth. Neither should play a prominent leadership role in the movement.

Bottom line: We can't let our desire to trust people and to assume the best of their intentions get in the way of a practical view of what is best for the public face of this movement.

Ballot Initiative Reality Check

Since the NYC ballot initiative became a project that many are taking seriously, there have been a number of people in the movement, including myself, who have been expressing a number of concerns about the content of the initiative, some of those involved, and how it's being coordinated.

In brief summary, a central figure and "coordinator" until very recently was Les Jamieson, infamous for his bad judgment and uncooperative direction of ny911truth. The initiative unnecessarily specifies who the commissioners will be. The commissioners are generally supportive of 9/11 truth and likely to be perceived as having bias. One of the commissioners is Edgar Mitchell, a noted UFO enthusiast. It sets the annual budget at $10 million for a period of five years while stating that the work of the commission will not commence until funds required by the budget have been fully secured. It sets the salary for commissioners at $100,000 per year stating that they will only work part time and don't need to live locally. It provides that the commission will also pay themselves for all travel and lodging expenses in addition to their salary.

Many people, not including myself, think securing a new investigation is the ultimate goal of the movement. And in some relatively superficial ways this effort seems like our best chance yet. Many support the effort because of the involvement of reputable or respected movement figures, politicians, and family members. Some support the effort because it seems like the best thing we've got going right now. Some support it for reasons other than it's stated intention, such as increased publicity.

But how many of those people either haven't read the initiative, haven't heard of the concerns stated above, or uncritically support the effort for being a movement project? And why are many who are aware of these concerns ignoring them?

While there is something to be said for fighting a losing battle to demonstrate the strength of our principles, the problems we see so far with this effort could have been avoided. But as they weren't, does it make sense for us to support the effort as though the problems didn't exist? If these problems fundamentally undermine the potential of this effort, as I believe they do, shouldn't we be acknowledging that before more time, energy, and money are spent?

Unfortunately, in a movement about truth and free thought there are many who are subject to group think or the allure of the bandwagon. There is a very real temptation that most of us feel to support the work of others as much as we'd like them to support ours. And very often we feel that criticism will be met with something akin to questioning our allegiance to the movement. I've certainly had my allegiance questioned.

From my experience in the movement I have a lot reasonable assumptions about how this all might unfold. Most important among them is the very real possibility that as the problems begin to become more clear to people, that most will be too invested to jump off a sinking ship. And the result in that case might be a lot of frustration, infighting, and ultimately burnout for many highly invested movement participants. If you think this is the movement's purpose, think it's our best shot so far, put a lot of hope or energy into it, and then it falls apart due to preventable issues, how will you feel?

We might lose a lot of supporters if this goes sour. Or perhaps when they can't raise enough money it will just quietly be put to rest. Either way, as the idea holds some promise I consider it far better to start over with a more solid strategy and initiative than to work with inadequate tools to achieve what for many is one of our most important goals.

Please contact NYCCAN to express any concerns you might have.