Fmr. Sen. Mike Gravel Calls For Independent 9/11 Investigation - Video Inside

Former Senator Mike Gravel Calls for Independent 9/11 Investigation and Prosecution of President Bush and Vice President Cheney
http://nyc911initiative.org/index.html

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The former Democratic senator from Alaska discusses his presidential campaign, his role in the releasing of the Pentagon Papers and his support for NYC 9/11 Ballot Initiative Campaign, a grassroots group seeking to place an initiative on the ballot of the November 6th general election allowing registered New York City voters to create a new commission to investigate 9/11.

Former Senator Gravel Backs NYC 9/11 Commission

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Posted by Duncan Meisel at 2:16 PM, June 18, 2008

After two presidential runs in one year, former Senator Mike Gravel is setting his sites on New York City politics, specifically a grassroots effort to have New York City citizens vote to establish a new September 11th investigation commission.

The petition drive needs at least 30,000 residents to give their signatures in order to place a potential amendment to the city charter on the November ballot. The former Alaska senator and lifelong political loose cannon threw his weight behind the effort to establish a second, privately funded investigation into the events of September 11th, in response to what he called a fatally flawed 9/11 Commission report.

“Even the commissioners and their panderers admit it had shortcomings” Gravel said. “This commission will be made up of people with only one stake: finding the truth.”

Petition drive leaders say their efforts began in February, and thus far have gathered around 10,000 signatures in support of the ballot initiative. That leaves another 20,000 signatures that the petitioners must collect before an early September deadline. Even if they collect the needed signatures, they must clear additional hurdles. The City Council must approve the measure, although a council rejection of ballot initiative can be overridden by the collection of 15,000 more signatures. Mayor Michael Bloomberg can also unilaterally veto the measure.

Despite the hurdles, volunteers are pressing on. Coordinator Les Jamieson said that the key would be building a “mass movement” able to pressure the government in the case of a Bloomberg veto. While the petition drive does not presuppose a particular theory of what happened on 9/11, Jamieson cited the influence of web-driven 9/11 conspiracy theory research as a key motivators for many volunteers.

“If you take physics 101, you know that oxygen-fed fires don’t burn hot enough to melt or bend steel” said volunteer Doug Wight. “No one knows what happened, but we know what they’re telling isn’t true.”

Conspiracy theory research has sparked some mainstream controversy already, with Popular Mechanics and the Department of State refuting the major claims of some conspiracy theories.

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The full ballot initiative, which can be viewed at nyc911initiative.org/, would appoint 15 people, including Gravel, former Rhode Island Senator Lincoln Chaffee, activists, and representatives of 9/11 victims’ families. The commission would rely on private financing, with a budget of $10 million a year.

Despite the prominence of 9-11 conspiracy theorists at yesterday's press conference, former Senator Gravel directed most of his comments at supporting his vision of direct democracy in America. “We’re trying to change the paradigm of human governance” by supporting ballot initiatives such as this across the country, he said. “To have power you should be able to vote on all issues that affect your lives.”

Gravel said he supports any efforts to bring accountability to the Bush administration, also claiming that he expects a new commission to uncover crimes committed in the lead-up to 9/11.

“The sooner we put a President, a Vice President, a Secretary of Defense in jail, the sooner things will shape up” he said, adding that “impeachment is too soft.”

‘Pentagon Papers senator’ calls for new 9/11 probe
Former Alaska Senator Mike Gravel, left, and Father Frank Morales at St. Mark’s Church on Tuesday.

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By Jefferson Siegel
6/19/2008

Skeptics of the government’s explanation regarding details of the September 11 attacks are trying to put the issue before a larger audience. In an attempt to place a call for a new investigation on November’s ballot, the 9/11 Truth group welcomed former U.S. Senator Mike Gravel to St. Mark’s Church on Tuesday afternoon.

“It’s crunch time,” Gravel said, noting the group hopes to amass at least 40,000 signatures in the next three weeks for a citywide ballot initiative for the November election. The group already has 12,000 signatures.

“This may be our last hope to bring about a serious investigation,” Gravel, who also ran for president earlier this year, told a crowd of several dozen in the plaza facing the church.

“It’s more of a citizens commission rather than a government commission,” he explained.

“The referendum would allow for a legally sanctioned commission with subpoena powers,” said Reverend Frank Morales, a St. Mark’s associate pastor and a member of the 9/11 Truth movement.

Morales, a former leader of the East Village squatter movement, stressed the effort isn’t just symbolic. “This is a body that, once voted into being, would have lawyers, consultants, hold hearings and issue a report. We’re confident all the people of New York City will vote for a new investigation, given we haven’t had one,” he added.

Gravel wants to subpoena President Bush, Vice President Cheney and former C.I.A. Director George Tenet, among others. Perjury while under subpoena is a crime, he noted.

“We’ll go right down to the bowels of the government,” he vowed, “to the whole cult of secrecy that’s destroying our government.”

Thomas Ruggiero, stepson of Firefighter Peter Biefeld of Ladder 42 in the South Bronx, who died in the World Trade Center on 9/11, came to lend support.

“I was outraged when [Secretary of State] Condi Rice said to the nation they had no idea Osama bin Laden was America’s greatest threat,” Ruggiero said.

“I personally hold the Bush administration responsible,” he added. “Things don’t add up.”

As a U.S. senator opposing the military draft during the Vietnam War in the 1970s, Gravel read large portions of the Pentagon Papers into the Congressional Record.

A voluminous examination of government policies on the war, the Pentagon Papers were first copied by Daniel Ellsberg and made available to The New York Times. Their contents caused a nationwide furor and the Justice Department moved to halt publication.

Gravel read portions of the Pentagon Papers into the Congressional Record until he could no longer physically continue. Gravel’s dramatic move was followed the next day by a U.S. Supreme Court decision ruling in favor of the newspaper’s right to publication.

To sign the petition or for more information on the ballot initiative go to www.nyc911initiative.org.