Don't Listen To Thomas Kean

Jon Gold
7/28/2022
UPDATED: 8/14/2022

From the first public hearing of the 9/11 Commission...

"As I said, our purpose is to find out why things happened, how they could have happened, and what we can do to prevent their ever happening again. We will be following paths and we will follow those individual paths wherever they lead. We may end up holding individual agencies, people and procedures to account. But our fundamental purpose will not be to point fingers..." - Thomas Kean, March 31st, 2003

Later during that hearing, a 9/11 Family Member responded to the idea of not "pointing fingers."

"I'd like to make a comment about something that Mr. Ben-Veniste and one of the witnesses said about not pointing fingers. I think this Commission should point fingers. I'm not suggesting that you find scapegoats, someone to hang out to dry, but there were people, people in responsible positions, who failed us on 9/11. They didn't just fail us once; 9/11 occurred because they were failing us over a long period of time. Some of these people are still in responsible positions in the government. Perhaps they shouldn't be. And that's one of the things I think you need to look at and think about." - 9/11 Family Member Stephen Push, March 31st, 2003

When the 9/11 Report was released, we were essentially told that everyone was to blame, therefore no one is to blame. That there was blame across the entire Government, at all levels. In other words, no one was held accountable. Who knows how many "mistakes" individuals that made "mistakes" for 9/11 made after 9/11? George W. Bush wasn't held accountable and his next big mistake was the Iraq War.

On 11/26/2008 a series of terrorist attacks began in Mumbai, India. On 11/29/2008, they finally ended. On 12/1/2008 it was reported that "the top domestic security official resigned in disgrace yesterday for the failure to thwart or quickly contain the horrific terrorist attacks in Mumbai last week."

THAT is something we should have seen throughout our Government, but didn't. Just recently the Uvalde school district's police chief "stepped down from his position in the City Council just weeks after being sworn in following allegations that he erred in his response to the mass shooting at Robb Elementary School that left 19 students and two teachers dead."

If you own a business, and one of your employees loses $1,000,000.00 do you reward and promote that individual or do you fire them? YOU FIRE THEM!!!

Accountability is so damn important, and for 9/11 we didn't see it. Currently, 9/11 Family Members are attempting to sue Saudi Arabia for their role in the 9/11 attacks. They're trying to get SOME accountability for what happened to their loved ones. Former 9/11 Commissioner Thomas Kean thinks "that evidence of Saudi government links to the 9/11 attacks are not as conclusive as many 9/11 victims' relatives believe." In other words, he doesn't want to "point fingers" at Saudi Arabia for their role in the attacks. He doesn't want the families to see some semblance of accountability for what happened to their loved ones.

Many of the 9/11 Commissioners had conflicts of interest. As William Rivers Pitt pointed out in December 2002 it was Thomas Kean's "association with Hess that has drawn concern from 9/11 victims groups, because Hess has business agreements with Saudi Arabia and oil exploration facilities in Indonesia and Malaysia." 9/11 Family Member Kristen Breitweiser said "I'm collecting all the information so when we meet with all the commissioners we'll be able to properly ask all the questions. I'm not even at a point where I'm considering whether or not he would be good at it."

Let's not forget the time that Thomas Kean said "this was not something that had to happen... There are people that, if I was doing the job, would certainly not be in the position they were in at that time because they failed. They simply failed," and then backtracked a few days later. I think it's safe to say he had a "talking to" by someone with authority. Showing he was answerable to someone or maybe a group of people (so much for an "Independent 9/11 Commission").

Thomas Kean should NOT be listened to, and as a matter of fact he should be investigated for what he did as Chairman of the 9/11 Commission.