No hoax

Autumn is writhing away, and the weather has gotten colder. So I find that my gaze is kept strictly to the ground as I hustle from one class to the next.

Instead of marveling at the leaves as they changed colors or watching the squirrels scurry among the trees, I am staring at the sidewalk and trying to keep warm.

Unfortunately, somebody has decided to graffiti this campus with statements about how the American government orchestrated the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11. Covered with different chalk colors, the pathways between many of the school buildings are littered with question marks, directions to visit 911truth.org and statements such as “synthetic state sponsored terrorism."

Now, I do not consider myself as someone with strong pride in my country. Don’t get me wrong, I like the good old United States of America, but I would never put my life on the line to defend its values.

However, there were people on Sept. 11 who unwillingly gave up their lives in an attack on American soil, and I do find it outrageous that there are coalitions of people out there aimed at discrediting those deaths. To assert that this democratic government had a hand in the death of more than 2,000 deaths of its own citizens is absurd. It is one thing to hate the Bush administration, it is another altogether to accuse it of murder.

The chalking around campus asks, “What happened to WTC #7?” Instead of bothering to look at facts, it seems these people would rather stick with the conclusion that because no plane hit the building there was no possible way it could collapse.

Apparently I missed that day in class when we were taught that buildings could only be destroyed by planes crashing into them.

In fact, it is true, no plane collided with 7 World Trade Center. It fell as a result of “progressive collapse” in which damaged parts of the structure subsequently put more strain on the building, causing it to fall. This was not due to an inside job, but to a design flaw where the destruction of one pillar would bring the whole building down.

Doubt has also been cast on the legitimacy of the destruction of the Pentagon. Again, these conspiracy theorists find it probable that a government has more to gain from attacking their Department of Defense than terrorists would.

It is asserted on freedomfiles.org that a plane could not have accomplished the damage done to the Pentagon because there were no wing marks on the building.

Again, when reviewing simple physics one can see that a plane does not “punch a cartoon-like outline of itself”, instead what happened was one wing was shorn off from the force of the impact and the other hit the ground.

In the limited space of this column I can only begin to list out the arguments that the events of Sept. 11 was not a diabolical plot of our government. But at the very least, it will rain again soon and wash away all the chalking claiming things that just are not true.