He already fully understood that there were many questions and as soon as I told him why I was in the city he about freaked out. He asked a ton of questions and pretty much offered to be my personal driver all weekend for no cost! I stayed right in the city and everything I needed was walking distance or it was too easy to just grab a cab when I needed one so I didn't take him up on the offer. Naturally I gave him a DVD of National Security Alert.
I met up with our fearless webmaster/consultant/editor Adam who had just arrived by train. We checked into Hotel 17 and went searching for a place for a late dinner and found an excellent Thai joint. New York is the best for spontaneously finding awesome restaurants.
The morning, Friday 9/11/2009, was set to get going early with a string of radio interviews. I had to be up at 6:30am which was really 3:30am for me since I was still on west coast time.
Les Jamieson with NY911truth.org was given a two hour segment on WBAI radio from 6-8:00am where he would interview various presenters from the We Demand Transparency conference that I was scheduled to speak at the next day. He had me call in to give a general overview of our findings in a 15 minute interview but I was already scheduled for an in studio appearance at 9:00am for a full hour program with regular radio host Sally O'Brien.
Immediately after my interview with Les I received the scheduled call from the Mancow radio show and was put on hold to go on the air with them in Chicago. It was about what I expected. When introducing me Mancow made the point right away that he thinks what we "believe" is "insane". I kept my cool and repeated the point how we are not asking him to believe us but to believe the witnesses. Overall I was able to get out my main points while getting plugs for the CIT and Pilots for Truth sites. Mancow wasn't abusive and really chose to let his listeners attack me instead. It was well worth it.
So immediately after that we had to try and get a cab in NY during rush hour while it was raining. Trust me, it wasn't easy. We made it to the studio with 3 minutes to spare before the show started.
Right click and "save as" to download a recording of the show here:
http://www.citizeninvestigationteam.com/1/WBAI_911.mp3
The interview went great. Sally was really cool, she chose excellent music for the intro and outro, asked great questions, and handled the callers really well.
After the show we walked over to ground zero. We checked in with the WeAreChange folks who were holding their annual vigil/information spreading gathering. Bruno and Katy from WeAreChangeLA were there from the west coast so we hung out and chatted with them for a bit.
It was pouring down rain which made the day feel appropriately solemn.
We took a cab back to the hotel and while in the cab, Aldo called me for a progress report. The cab driver was from Ghana and overheard me talking about the WBAI interview. As soon as I hung up the phone he said, "Was that you on WBAI this morning talking about the Pentagon attack? Wow man! Great job! I heard that one guy calling in and saying you was a liar. How you gonna call someone who talked to the witnesses a liar!?"
That felt really good and made me realize that there were a lot of people who heard that broadcast.
Obviously I gave him a DVD of National Security Alert as well. All I have to say is that the NY cab drivers definitely know what's up!
After getting back to the hotel we were exhausted so we grabbed some lunch and passed out for a few hours.
That evening we went to the WeAreChange event at a bar/restaurant. Erik Lawyer from Firefighters for 9/11 Truth and Richard Gage from Architects and Engineers for 9/11 Truth both spoke and were on FIRE (no pun intended). Great job by them. There was a lot of energy in the room that night. Daniel Sunjata was there and spoke as well and of course I made sure to introduce myself and give him a copy of National Security Alert.
After the event we grabbed dinner at some awesome non-traditional Mexican restaurant and then swung by the "after party". We didn't stay long, but we did run into Richard Gage as we were getting ready to leave, who came over and greeted us warmly. He mentioned that Michael Wolsey and a few others had been trying to persuade him to distance himself from us, and said that he was interested in getting together at some point the next day to discuss some of the allegations and hear our perspective. Richard has handled the pseudo-"controversy" that Wolsey and friends have attempted to create around our work in a very intelligent, fair-minded, and diplomatic way. He has been careful to get a hold of us when things are said to him instead of simply taking them at face value. We made plans to get together at some point the following evening, and then we headed back to the hotel to get some sleep.
The conference began in the morning at St Marks Church and had a healthy attendance. I was supposed to screen National Security Alert in a back room but the organizer, Sander Hicks, and I determined that it wouldn't be a good idea to break up the conference so he got me a table to set up out front. That way people could talk to me about the info one on one between speakers or if they wanted a break from the conference. We had a bunch of images printed out that we used to help explain everything.
It worked out really well as I was able to get into the details with a lot of people and of course everyone went home with a copy of National Security Alert. I distributed close to 300 DVD's throughout the weekend.
I also gave a concise speech to the crowd that went over extremely well. People REALLY got it and basically swarmed me afterward for DVD's and to discuss the info. I hope somebody video recorded my speech, because we didn't. Adam was actually busy working the table talking to people even DURING my speech!
Canadian Broadcasting was there filming for some Canadian equivalent to "Frontline" type show called The Fifth Estate and interviewed me so hopefully that will eventually be used although we know how media types have a tendency to twist information.
(Edit to add: The show is scheduled to air on Friday November 27th.)
After the conference we went out to dinner with Sander, Richard, Erik, and others from the conference. We weren't able to talk much with Richard over dinner since there were no seats left next to him by the time we arrived, but we did have a great conversation with Justin Martell, another great activist/researcher.
After dinner we took a walk with Richard over to the WeAreChange event at Cooper Union. On the way there we went over some of the evidence related to the Pentagon attack and some of the spiteful and dishonest claims made by Wolsey, Hoffman, Ashley, et al. By the time we made it over to the Cooper Union we were swarmed by people (mainly people wanting to talk to Richard -- he's a popular guy!), so we decided to continue the discussion later.
At that time one of the best experiences of the trip happened...
Outspoken WTC victim family member Manny Badillo made a specific point to come right up to me and said, "CIT??! Manny Badillo. THANK YOU! Thank you so much for your work" and he gave me the biggest most genuine bear hug ever.
That meant a lot to me.
I went inside in time to hear Immortal Technique give a little speech and got to meet him outside. Of course I gave him a DVD of National Security Alert.
After that a group of us moved across the street to a pizza joint that sold beer. We sat down with Richard Gage and Erik Lawyer and a few others and had a chance to REALLY get into all the details about the evidence. It was a very productive discussion.
That pretty much concluded the trip, and the following day was devoted to traveling back to LA.
