Proof there are no government conspiracies, ever

[Galt]

Because, for any of them to be believable, one must assume that there are many in the government who have a willful desire to deceive or commit crimes against the public, and that there is a system in place to keep it quiet.

If that were true, then there would have been many weapons of mass destruction found in Iraq by now.

If the government/whoever had the ability to kill JFK and get away with it, to plan 9/11 (or any of the sub-conspiracies....blowing up flight 93, missle in the pentagon), faking the moon landing, or any of the other theories listed in Sir O's conspiracy theory thread, then they would have planted WMD in Iraq.

It would be easiest thing to do. There is no question they could have gotten away with it. As far as the complexity and ability to get away with it, planting WMD in Iraq would have been elementary.

The government could have so easily gotten WMD into Iraq, planted it, and made Bush look like a hero for the last three years.

So therefore, given that this administration hasn't taken advantage of such an obvious situation for government lies and conspiracies, then I posit that not one single large scale government conspiracy has ever occured without being exposed

[Ken'sPen]

you sir are a dope....

reread 1984,

true power doesn't come from planting evidence as proof you were right,

true power comes from getting people to say you were right, when you were wrong.

[Galt]

Read about William of Ockham. He was before Orwell, and therefore smarter.

[Danked]

That seems less like "proof" and more like "your opinion."

And to dismiss all the other alleged conspiracies based on this instance won't change anyone's opinion on previous matters. Administrations change and you have different people in power throughout the decades. Our government today is not the same as the government in power 30 or 40 years ago. Their motivations and fears in terms of dealing with their public at the time could be entirely different.

I am not saying there is any validity to any of these conspiracies, but there is always the possibilty that they are in fact not what they seem to be.

[Galt]

Yes, this is obviously not a philosophically sound argument in that non-existence of something doesn't proove that something else doesn't exist.

But, come on. If the government is EVER going to conspire to deceive or defraud the people, it would be this time, right?

They have nothing to lose and everything to gain, and there would have been virtually no chance of getting exposed.

[Danked]

On the contrary, they had everything to lose. We live in a different world today. Cameras are everywhere.

Look how many unauthorized videos are released from our troops overseas. They photograph and capture video of military operations full of blood, gore, and viscious death. No doubt the military does not want these sorts of images released, but they are getting here through the internet whether they like it or not. Is it better to take the risk of planting evidence, getting caught doing it, and dealing with those repercussions or (somewhat) admitting that you were unjustified in your motivations for going to war and taking solice in the fact that we're saving iraq... blah blah blah.

[Ken'sPen]

as I said Galt,
if you hear a bushbot speak on the issue,
WMD didn't even figure in to the reason we went there.

We went to liberate the people of Iraq,
over throw a monster,
and spread democracy.

[Danked]

Our government will never admit that they were wrong, but at least they can say they never got caught unloading a warhead in Sabib's backyard.

[Galt]

Ken, will you get off your political soapbox for one goddamned post?

This has nothing to do with Bush or his administrations evilness.

My point is that it would have been simple for us to plant WMD in Iraq, and there would be no reprocussions.

To Danked's point, sure, there are cameras and what not. but just look at the other thread about conspiracies. There is a movement that truly believes that it was even commercial airlines who flew into the Towers, but cargo jets; and not even cargo jets but cargo jets that shot missles into the Trade centers, all the while millions of people were watching live on TV.

If you are saying that the existence of TV and media will make it much less likely for the government to try and fool the populace compared to the 1920s, OK I buy that.

But my initial point is that of all the zany consipiracy theories out there, planting WMD in Iraq would be the single best risk/reward in the history of conspiracy theories. That the most simple one ever hasn't been done, just makes it that more difficult to believe all the other BS theories.

[HedCold]

the link i posted was about a jet/cargo plane going into the pentagon, not wtc, and that videos of that were taken away by the fbi. of course, the same place where i found that someone posted that his friend was there and saw the 757 go into the pentagon, and had pictures of the after effect.
the part that annoys me isn't the conspiracy, but that the fbi is holding the videos and not releasing them.
the conspiracy theories about the wtc generally accuse people of finishing up the WTC buildings from the inside with explosives. i don't think i've seen a "credible" conspiracy theory that says a passenger plane didn't go into the towers