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For at
least the past three years, news accounts published in
the MadCowMorningNews and in my book “Welcome to
TERRORLAND” have asserted, through evidence developed
from interviews with Amanda Keller, an eyewitness the
Sarasota Herald Tribune has gone to great lengths to
discredit, that while he was in Venice and Southwest
Florida, several of terrorist ringleader Mohamed Atta’s
closest associates were, surprisingly, not Arab
nationals, but German or Swiss.
Today
the Associated Press is reporting that the FBI has a
terror alert in the South Pacific for one of these men,
Wolfgang Bohringer, a German pilot with whom Atta was
“inseparable” during his frequent visits to Southwest
Florida.
It is
Amanda Keller, who lived for several months with
terrorist ringleader Mohamed Atta at the Sandpiper
apartments in Venice—despite what amounts to a campaign
by the Sarasota Herald Tribune to deny it—who ultimately
deserves the credit for identifying an individual who
may pose a serious threat to this country.
It was
she who stated that “Wolfgang,” whose last name she did
not know, but which our investigation discovered to be
“Wolfgang Bohringer,” as someone who had known, and been
close to, Mohamed Atta for what she said appeared to
have been, based on their familiarity with each other, a
long time.
Paper
has proven history of getting it wrong
In
recent denigrating, demeaning, and most of all UNTRUE
stories about the terrorist presence which flourished in
the Sarasota Herald Tribune local coverage area, the
newspaper, which is owned by the New York Times,
has repeatedly referred to me, insultingly, as a
“conspiracy theorist,” which might come as a
shock to the New York Time’s own eminent and august
William Safire, who for the past few years has been
receiving, at his own request, notices on our latest
stories as soon as they appear.
I have identified
numerous
previously unknown individuals who
were involved with the terrorist conspiracy, through the
simple expedient of interviewing eyewitnesses who were
there, and then verifying their accounts.
The result is
a portrait of the terrorists which is much
different, and far more accurate, than that which has been presented to the American
people so far.
The
Sarasota Herald Tribune has, so far, identified
none.
So the
truth is that, instead of being a “conspiracy
theorist,” I am a better investigative reporter
than the entire staff of the Sarasota Herald Tribune…combined.
Demand for Retraction...
and more.
Today
we call on the paper publicly to retract what was (even
then) ridiculous; the so-called “Fifth Pilot” story
published two weeks after the 9/11 attack; and also
their several recent attempts to discredit the truth by
attacking me.
Moreover, more than just failing the American people by
completely falling down on the job of providing an
accurate account of a terrorist presence which
flourished right under its nose, the paper has made it a
priority to attempt to discredit my efforts by
dismissing the eyewitnesses whose accounts I have
faithfully relayed.
I have
every right to feel I have been personally insulted, not
by a single reporter, but by the Sarasota Herald Tribune
itself as a matter of editorial policy.
But
there is a much larger issue involved, which goes to the
heart of the matter. Had the Sarasota Herald Tribune
only investigated and thoroughly examined the terrorist
presence, this country’s citizens would have been far
better informed than they were about the nature of what
happened, and our nation’s conduct would have been
changed.
WHY NO REPORT OF FLIGHT
SCHOOL OWNERS HEROIN BUST?
Finally, the Sarasota Herald Tribune has yet to
report—more than five years later—the fact, not
conspiracy theory, but fact, that during the same month
Mohamed Atta arrived to attend his flight school in
Venice, Huffman Aviation, the owner of that flight
school, Wallace J. Hilliard, had his Lear jet
confiscated on a runway at Orlando Executive Airport by
DEA agents who found 43 pound of heroin onboard.
It
was, said the Orlando Sentinel, the “biggest drug
bust in Central Florida history,” which is a
distinction that I’m sure the editors of the Sarasota
Herald Tribune appreciate was gained against formidable
competition.
I am
urging everyone who read this to demand an
answer—through email, letters, and/or phone calls—to
this question:
How
much heroin would Mohamed Atta’s flight school owner’s
plane have had to be carrying before the Sarasota Herald
Tribune deemed it worthy of mention?
If you
agree with this demand for retraction, as well as a
demand that this New York Times-owned newspaper begin to
accurately inform the citizens of this country the real
news of what happens every day in its coverage area,
please take a moment and email one, or several, or all
of the individuals whose emails are listed below.
For
our part, we feel a certain quiet satisfaction. We knew
all along that Amanda Keller was telling the truth about
Atta; for one reason, there were a good half-dozen other
witnesses who said the same thing.
But we
aren’t gloating. Nor do we plan to engage in any
I-told-you-so finger wagging.
Not
because we’re better than that. We’d like to think we
are… But we do sometimes have our
suspicions.)
But
because there’s 3000 people dead. And more than five
years on we’re still far from having anything like a
coherent narrative to explain how it was they came to
die on a sunny September morning when, in the blink of
an eye... everything changed.
wendy.dial@heraldtribune.com
tom.tryon@heraldtribune.com
mark.zaloudek@heraldtribune.com
diane.mcfarlin@heraldtribune.com
president@nytimes.com
william.safire@nytimes.com
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