Originally Posted by JeremyZ
Here's the thing. The hijackings were the proximate and actual cause of all the deaths in the WTC. The report you refer to indicates that the buildings performed up to standard.
But it was well known in the building trades that WTC 1 and 2 were marvels of lightweight engineering, based on Yamasaki's triumphant IBM building in Seattle. And lightweight engineering allowed for a huge building to be built relatively cheaply.
(Did you know that until 1990 WTC 1 and 2 had no sprinkler system? Was the building truly strong enough to support the "several 5,000 gallon (18,927 liter) storage tanks" that were added? They weigh 42,500 pounds each!)
Oh, and guess what business the bin Laden family is in; he knew exactly why to choqse WTC 1 and 2 as opposed to other skyscrapers.
Originally Posted by JeremyZ
Why you continue to resist admitting that all of those people were murder victims of terrorism is beyond me. Aside from being inaccurate, it's insulting to suggest that while there were some direct victims, others really died in an accident due to an engineering oversight.
I don't disagree that the stuff in Boston, and airport shoe checks are stupid. Your general argument that the effort and funds could be deployed more effectively holds water completely. I can't, however, see why you get off on insinuating that if any murders occured in the WTC, they were basically by the PANYNJ.
Seriously, it is callous, but, more importantly, it's incorrect.
OK, I've dug myself into a hole because I posed the question of "what would our reaction to Sept. 11th have been if "only" 300-odd people had died, which
might have been the case if the Twin Towers had not fallen. (Kudos to FEMA for a great report BTW). Glad you debated this with me.
Why are we starting the ID checks now? Why not after Egyptair 990 which was also deliberately crashed, but into the Atlantic 100km south of ACK? Why not after the gas attack on the Tokyo subway system?
Why now?
Is it because we understand that aircraft can and do crash, even though we soon after realized that it was a deliberate act of murder by the (possibly-fundamentalist) pilot?
Or is it because we can accept losing 200-300 souls in a split-second, but somehow not 3,000 in 2 hours?
P.S. All 19 of the fundamentalists who caused the events of September 11th, including the collapse of WTC 1 and 2 were carrying ID and would not have been discernable to the typically-equipped MBTA police officer. (Two of them were listed in the San Diego phonebook!)
As others have stated, this is all for show.