Richard Gage is unquestionably the most valuable 9/11 Truth activist ever, but 

He gets bad advice.

He, in contrast to 9/11 truth pioneers David Ray Griffin and Steven Jones, did feel comfortable building a movement. Since 2006 he tried to build a movement. More recently, he went along with his staff having AE focus only on organizing architects. With the AE initiative stopped at the AIA convention in Orlando in May 2017, AE thankfully seemed to realize again the value of organizing everyday people. I applaud AE’s interest in reaching out directly for Congress.What is needed is to bring the longtime organizers, 911TAP, back into AE. That way they can benefit in a timely fashion with reaching out by phone to recent petition signers who are the most ready to take action. Keeping them formally separate prevents this. Making sure they only reach out by email overlooks the tendency of people to ignore emails they don’t expect.

It sadly will be difficult to distribute the excellent Bobby McIlvaine Bill quickly because the Capitol Police do not allow anyone to walk from office to office handing out generic material.  In 2011 when AE set a goal of handing out packets on the hill, it took many months. Back then everyday activists were in MUCH greater abundance.

!. Why is AE 911 truth not continuing to work to get its excellent videos on Public Access TV? Dozens of stations showed your videos when AE did have such a team that I originated. If you want to find a member of Congress to introduce the Bobby McIlvaine bill, we need more widespread support BEFORE we can expect even one member of Congress to help. My friend Bill Scott, who was expelled from AE, told me that former Senator Bob Graham told him privately at a book signing that any member of Congress who presents himself as a 9/11 truth supporter is risking his life. While in office, Senator Barbara Boxer once noted Senator Paul Wellstone’s fate as if it had meant to be a lesson.

2. Craig McKee is your primary writer at AE911Truth. Outside of his AE writings he speaks as if the great David Chandler is acting in bad faith because Chandler says AA77 hit the pentagon. Why do you tolerate these personal attacks by Craig McKee on David Chandler, the person who exposed WTC7 as coming down at freefall during a Q & A with NIST lead investigator Shyam Sundar? Craig is talented, but can’t you negotiate with him to reign him in? He regularly makes personal attacks on people he disagrees with. That hardly proves he is police, but that is very much an undercover police tactic.

3. You regularly tell people the words,” Don’t tell Kelly this.” She is second in charge at AE911Truth as COO. She is staff AND on the board. Did you know it is considered less than ideal for staff to be on nonprofit boards? Will you confirm that assertion with people who should know? Why are you afraid of Kelly David?

4. The situation with the AIA is taken a turn for the worse. In 2015 AE got 4% approval in its efforts to get the national architects to call for a real investigation of WTC7. In 2016 the support improved to 11%. In 2017 the vote was again 4%. This was because the AIA would not allow AE to rent a booth at the convention, and the vote was the first day instead of the last day. The AIA has never let Richard Gage present a workshop at their national convention. In addition, the wording of the motion is so impolitic that it accuses NIST of being “fatally flawed”, as if they are daring AIA architects to reject the proposal. Wouldn’t a criticism like “incomplete” work better? What does AE911Truth intend to do to address this situation with the AIA?

 Here are 4 ideas for additional proposals:

1) Proposal to allow Richard Gage to henceforth give workshops at national conventions

2) Proposal to mandate that AE911Truth henceforth be allowed to rent booths at national conventions

3) Proposal to mandate that voting on motions always be the last day of any national convention

4) Replace description of NIST in the primary motion with “ incomplete” rather than the term ” fatally flawed”

Even if it takes years to pass any of these, the chance of passing the procedural proposals would be greater than the primary proposal, eventually helping the primary proposal.

5.  Kudos to AE for showing interest again in reaching out to the grassroots. I was involved when AE initiated the concept of “action groups” to do grassroots organizing.  Last year 911TAP was set up separately, which means that the grassroots organizing in the US will no longer be able to benefit from the decade of effort establishing AE911Truth as a respected brand. None of the 911TAP organizers admit this loss of the AE brand should be a cause for concern.  They confuse the need to respectfully negotiate with Richard as being disrespectful to Richard. A crucial decision was made at the beginning of 2016 to no longer allow longtime AETruth organizers Gage has trusted for many years to receive lists with contact information of petition signers, a practice that had gone on for many years. If there never had been abuse, why not bring the practice back?

DID AE EVER GIVE OUT PETITION SIGNER LISTS WITH CONTACT INFO TO TRUSTED ACTIVISTS WHO THEN ABUSED THAT LIST? 

It is notable in addition that the reason originally given for changing the policy to not allow trusted activists to receive lists of petition signers with contact information was that ONE local organizer had sent out an invitation to attend a coming talk by Christopher Bollyn. Gage and Bollyn appear together on tonight’s panel. If the above question is not allowed at this event, the organizers are quite remiss. 

6. An especially valuable use of the list of AE petition signers would be to seek to reach out to living Nobel Laureates by generating lists of truth activists who are associated with the colleges those laureates teach at or taught at. AE has a category where petition signers mention their association with colleges. It seems reasonable for AE to support this important activity.

7. In October of 2015 AE emailed a blast offering to place their excellent piece Beyond Misinformation in the donor’s local library for $15. At least one friend sent in the $15 but told me AE didn’t even ask for the name of the library. When I raised this 10 months later, Gage responded they had not yet sent the booklets out. Can you name one local library which circulates Beyond Misinformation? Richard is pretty honest. I think this example of AE fundraising being misleading is an unusual botch for Richard.  Earlier efforts taught us that. proposals to local libraries must come from local residents and follow designated procedures. Paperbound self published volumes have an uphill road to hoe. However, if the volume is rejected, you can write the local newspaper accusing the library of being anti-science.

8. When he was Chairman of the Board of AE, Robert McCoy expelled DC area activist Rick Shaddock because Shaddock’s graduate degree was from Maharishi University. Rick deserves credit for reaching out to Trump long before Trump declared. I am hardly a supporter of Trump, but Rick deserves credit for his vision. Rick also provided paper copies for Gage to give Noam Chomsky of the 9/11 truth peer reviewed papers not published by the Journal of 9/11 Studies, though Richard actually kept those copies. Will AE reconsider Rick Shaddock’s expulsion?

9. Richard Gage told me in early 2016 that he thought Jeff Long, a longtime former DC area truth activist, was retired CIA. Jeff had moved across the country to live with Kelly David after knowing her about a month. Gage admitted he never asked his friends in DC if they would vouch for Jeff Long. Jeff had been known as retired military intelligence for years prior to his move across the country. Richard, are you open to seeking privately provided comments about Jeff from longtime DC area activists? Will you even ask who knew him best? I personally have some praise for Jeff. He was the only DC area activist who supported my interest at looking into the anthrax murders in 2006. I am the founder of DC 911Truth.

THE 9/11 TRUTH MOVEMENT DESERVES TO BE CRITICIZED BY SERIOUS HISTORIANS BECAUSE IT IS LARGELY OPPOSED TO OPEN DISCUSSION OF ORGANIZATIONAL PROBLEMS. EXCUSES CAN BE MADE FOR ITS UNFORTUNATE DISTASTE FOR OUTREACH TO NON CHOIR, BUT REFUSAL TO DISCUSS ORGANIZATIONAL CHALLENGES IS INEXCUSABLE. TRUTH SKEPTICS ARE USUALLY COURAGEOUS COMPARED TO MOST PEACE ACTIVISTS. THIS IS AN EXCEPTION. RICHARD GAGE IS QUITE LAUDABLE, BUT HE IS NOT A DIETY.

Contact: David Slesinger dslesinger@alum.mit.edu 704-879-7337 land.410-499-5403 cell