Findcate

by Prof Jones

(911 Blogger)Finally! After submitting a half-dozen papers to established

peer-reviewed technical journals over a period of nearly a year, we

have two papers which have passed peer-review and have been accepted

for publication. One of these was published TODAY! In science, we say

that we have ublished in the literature,?a major step in a nascent

line of scientific inquiry.

And many thanks to the editors for their courage and adherence to

science in allowing us to follow the evidence and publish in their

journal. (Indeed, expressions of thanks along these lines to the

editors will be appreciated, as they will probably get a few letters

chastising them?)

The paper is here:

http://www.bentham.org/open/index.htm (our paper is listed on top at the moment, the most recently entered paper); or go here:

http://www.bentham.org/open/tociej/openaccess2.htm

(Click on 搚ear 2008?then scroll down to the paper and click on it.)

(HTML version below. -rep.)

Yes, it is available on-line FOR FREE, since this is an 搊pen

e-journal.?TOCEJ = The Open Civil Engineering Journal. You may

download the paper and make copies to give to local professors and

engineers (hint, hint). That’s one reason this particular journal was

chosen — open access, free to download and make copies. What do

Profs/Engineers say about it — let us know would you?

In this Letter, we emphasize oints of agreement?with FEMA and

NIST, seeking to build bridges for further communications. Of course,

we will send a copy to NIST for their comment and hopefully open a

public discussion on these crucial evidences and analyses. Note the

title ?but then read morehe paper only six pages long:

Fourteen Points of Agreement with Official Government Reports on the World Trade Center Destruction

The authors are: Steven E. Jones*,1, Frank M. Legge2, Kevin R. Ryan3, Anthony F. Szamboti*,4, James R. Gourley

Approaching this as oints of Agreement?is NEW, I believe

(obviously some 搊lder?quotes are cited in this new context) and we

hope this will be a fruitful approach! Mechanical engineer Tony

Szamboti and I are the 揷orresponding authors,?the ones people are

invited to write to with comments.

With publication in an established civil engineering journal, the

discussion has reached a new level ?JREF抏rs and others may attack,

but unless they can also get published in a peer-reviewed journal,

those attacks do not carry nearly the weight of a peer-reviewed paper.

It may be that debunkers will try to avoid the fourteen issues we raise

in the Letter, by attacking the author(s) or even the journal rather

than addressing the science ?that would not surprise me.

Professor Chomsky wrote to several, who passed it on to me:

揧ou, or anyone who agrees with you, has a very simple

task. Since the evidence is so obvious and compelling, submit an

article about it to Science, or Nature, or even Scientific American, or

more technical journals, say those in civil engineering, where your

article can refute the conclusions of the professional society of civil

engineers?To date, no one has been willing to submit an article — at

least, after probably hundreds of inquiries to Truth Movement

advocates, no one has been able to mention one…?/blockquote>

Would someone who has received this note from Prof. Chomsky please

send him a copy of the downloaded paper? Perhaps we can build a bridge

with him. You might note that the paper is published in a echnical

journal [one of those] in civil engineering,?to use his own words,

which I took as sort of a challenge. I have published before in Nature

(e.g., May 1986 and April 1989) AND Scientific American (July 1987),

and this paper in a civil engineering journal I consider to be a very

significant step in the history.

Further in the spirit of building bridges, I抎 like to quote from

Prof. Fetzer who wrote today ?and I agree: 揑 would appreciate it?if

those who are reaching out to the public would show a degree of

appreciation for those who are trying to figure out how these things

were done? I believe we can succeed if we show more tolerance and less

disrespect for one another.?Agreed! In this paper, the authors are

both reaching out to the public (most can read this Letter with

understanding, I think) AND seeking to progress in figuring out how the

buildings were destroyed?

Now let work together to unify the 9/11 truth movement and show

some mutual respect, shall we? Suggest we seek a focus on getting NIST

(or other technical people) to work with us in doing a thorough and

proper investigation which will include release of NIST-held photos AND

the NFPA-921-mandated search for hermite residues? [Hint- good time

to read the paper if you disagree or don know really what I抦 talking

about here.]

Finally, I should note that the editor that we worked with was

polite and professional throughout the process. We hope others, in

their responses, will maintain that decorum. In the final analysis, all

THREE reviewers approved publication!

Time to celebrate, and move forward together.

Note: another blog will discuss the journal chosen and the Letter

format (as opposed to a typical rticle format?with methods, results

and discussion). Also, I will take note of your comments to this

announcement of a formal publication in a peer-reviewed civil

engineering journal!

HTML version (please note any hyperlink errors in the comments area).

From: The Open Civil Engineering Journal, 2008, 2, 35-40

Fourteen Points of Agreement with Official Government Reports on the World Trade Center Destruction

Steven E. Jones, Frank M. Legge, Kevin R. Ryan, Anthony F. Szamboti, and James R. Gourley

Abstract: Reports by FEMA and NIST lay

out the official account of the destruction of the World Trade Center

on 9/11/2001. In this Letter, we wish to set a foundation for

productive discussion and understanding by focusing on those areas

where we find common ground with FEMA and NIST, while at the same time

countering several popular myths about the WTC collapses.

INTRODUCTION

On September 11, 2001, the Twin Towers of the World Trade Center

(WTC) were hit by airplanes. Total destruction of these high-rises at

near free-fall speeds ensued within two hours, and another high-rise

which was not hit by a plane (WTC 7) collapsed about seven hours later

at 5:20 p.m.

The US Congress laid out the charge specifically to the National

Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) to 揇etermine why and how

WTC 1 and WTC 2 collapsed following the initial impacts of the aircraft

and why and how WTC 7 collapsed?1

The Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) was acting with a

similar motivation in their earlier study of these tragic collapses.2

NIST and FEMA were not charged with finding out how fire was the

specific agent of collapse, yet both evidently took that limited

approach while leaving open a number of unanswered questions. Our goal

here is to set a foundation for scientific discussion by enumerating

those areas where we find agreement with NIST and FEMA. Understanding

the mechanisms that led to the destruction of the World Trade Center

will enable scientists and engineers to provide a safer environment for

people using similar buildings and benefit firefighters who risk their

lives trying to save others.

DISCUSSION

1. WTC 7 Collapse Issue

FEMA: he specifics of the fires in WTC 7 and how they caused the

building to collapse remain unknown at this time. Although the total

diesel fuel on the premises contained massive potential energy, the

best hypothesis has only a low probability of occurrence. Further

research, investigation, and analyses are needed to resolve this issue?2

FEMA analyzed the remarkable collapse of WTC building 7, the

47-story skyscraper that, even though it was not hit by a plane,

collapsed about seven hours after the second Tower collapse. We

certainly agree that FEMA best firebased hypothesis as only a low

probability of occurrence.?NIST final report on WTC 7 has been long

delayed and is eagerly awaited.3 Apparently it is difficult to fully explain the complete and rapid collapse of WTC 7 with a fire-based hypothesis alone.

2. Withstanding Jet Impact

FEMA: he WTC towers had been designed to withstand the accidental

impact of a Boeing 707 seeking to land at a nearby airport厰 2

NIST: 揃oth WTC 1 and WTC 2 were stable after the aircraft impact,

standing for 102 min and 56 min, respectively. The global analyses with

structural impact damage showed that both towers had considerable

reserve capacity?4

Yes, we agree, as do previously published reports: he 110-story

towers of the World Trade Center were designed to withstand as a whole

the forces caused by a horizontal impact of a large commercial

aircraft. So why did a total collapse occur??sup>5

John Skilling, a leading structural engineer for the WTC Towers, was

interviewed in 1993 just after a bomb in a truck went off in the North

Tower:

We looked at every possible thing we could think of

that could happen to the buildings, even to the extent of an airplane

hitting the side, said John Skilling, head structural engineer?

Concerned because of a case where an airplane hit the Empire State

Building [which did not collapse], Skilling’s people did an analysis

that showed the towers would withstand the impact of a Boeing 707.

Our analysis indicated the biggest problem would be the fact that

all the fuel (from the airplane) would dump into the building. There

would be a horrendous fire. A lot of people would be killed, he said.

The building structure would still be there.

Skilling - a recognized expert in tall buildings - doesn’t think a

single 200-pound car bomb would topple or do major structural damage to

a Trade Center tower. The supporting columns are closely spaced and

even if several were disabled, the others would carry the load.

匒lthough Skilling is not an explosives expert, he says there are

people who do know enough about building demolition to bring a

structure like the Trade Center down.

I would imagine that if you took the top expert in that type of

work and gave him the assignment of bringing these buildings down with

explosives, I would bet that he could do it.6

Thus, Skilling team showed that a commercial jet would not bring

down a WTC Tower, just as the Empire State Building did not collapse

when hit by an airplane, and he explained that a demolition expert

using explosives could demolish the buildings. We find we are in

agreement.

3. Pancake Theory Not Supported

NIST: 揘IST findings do not support the ancake theory?of

collapse, which is premised on a progressive failure of the floor

systems in the WTC towers?Thus, the floors did not fail progressively

to cause a pancaking phenomenon?3

Agreed: the ancake theory of collapse?is incorrect and should be

rejected. This theory of collapse was proposed by the earlier FEMA

report and promoted in the documentary hy the Towers Fell?produced

by NOVA.7

The ancake theory of collapse?is strongly promoted in a Popular

Mechanics article along with a number of other discredited ideas.8, 9

We, on the other hand, agree with NIST that the ancake theory?is not

scientifically tenable and ought to be set aside in serious discussions

regarding the destruction of the WTC Towers and WTC 7.

4. Massive Core Columns

NIST: 揂s stated above, the core columns were designed to support approximately 50% of the gravity loads?4

he hat-truss tied the core to the perimeter walls of the towers, and

thus allowed the building to withstand the effects of the aircraft

impact and subsequent fires for a much longer time梕nabling large

numbers of building occupants to evacuate safely?10

acific Car and Foundry of Seattle, Washington, fabricated the

closely spaced exterior wall column panels that gave the buildings

their instantly recognizable shape. Stanray Pacific of Los Angeles,

Cal, fabricated the enormous box and wide-flange columns that made up

the core?The core of the building, which carried primarily gravity

loads, was made up of a mixture of massive box columns made from

three-story long plates, and heavy rolled wide-flange shapes.?he

core columns were designed to carry the building gravity loads and were

loaded to approximately 50% of their capacity before the aircraft

impact…. the exterior columns were loaded to only approximately 20%

of their capacity before the aircraft impact?11

We totally agree that the WTC Towers included assive?
interconnected steel columns in the cores of the buildings, in addition

to the columns in the outside walls. The central core columns bore much

of the gravity loads so the Towers were clearly NOT hollow. Yet the

false notion that the Towers were ollow tubes?with the floors

supported just by the perimeter columns seems to have gained wide

acceptance. For example, an emeritus structural engineering professor

asserted, he structural design of the towers was unique in that the

supporting steel structure consisted of closely spaced columns in the

walls of all four sides. The resulting structure was similar to a

tube厰.12

The fact is the Towers were constructed with a substantial

load-supporting core structure as well as perimeter columns ?and on

this point we agree with NIST in dispelling false popular notions.

The fact is the Towers were constructed with a substantial

load-supporting core structure as well as perimeter columns ?and on

this point we agree with NIST in dispelling false popular notions.

5. Essentially in Free Fall

NIST: [Question:] 揌ow could the WTC towers collapse in only 11

seconds (WTC 1) and 9 seconds (WTC 2) ?speeds that approximate that of

a ball dropped from similar height in a vacuum (with no air

resistance)??[Answer:] 匒s documented in Section 6.14.4 of NIST NCSTAR

1, these collapse times show that: 搮 the structure below the level of

collapse initiation offered minimal resistance to the falling building

mass at and above the impact zone. The potential energy released by the

downward movement of the large building mass far exceeded the capacity

of the intact structure below to absorb that energy through energy of

deformation. Since the stories below the level of collapse initiation

provided little resistance to the tremendous energy released by the

falling building mass, the building section above came down essentially

in free fall, as seen in videos?3

We agree with some of this, that the building 揷ame down essentially

in free fall, as seen in videos.?This is an important starting point.

(Because of obscuring dust clouds, it is difficult to determine the

exact fall times, but the statement that the buildings 揷ame down

essentially in free fall?seems correct when accelerations are viewed,

for the WTC Towers and also for WTC 7.)13, 14

Further, we agree with NIST that he stories below the level of

collapse initiation provided little resistance?to the fall ?but we

ask ?how could that be? NIST mentions 揺nergy of deformation?which

for the huge core columns in the Towers would be considerable, and they

need to be quantitative about it (which they were not) in order to

claim that the 搃ntact structure?below would not significantly slow

the motion.

Beyond that, NIST evidently neglects a fundamental law of physics in

glibly treating the remarkable 揻ree fall?collapse of each Tower,

namely, the Law of Conservation of Momentum. This law of physics means

that the hundreds of thousands of tons of material in the way must slow

the upper part of the building because of its mass, independent of

deformation which can only slow the fall even more. (Energy and

Momentum must both be conserved.)

Published papers have argued that this negligence by NIST (leaving

the near-free-fall speeds unexplained) is a major flaw in their

analysis.13, 14

NIST ignores the possibility of controlled demolitions, which achieve

complete building collapses in near free-fall times by moving the

material out of the way using explosives. So, there is an alternative

explanation that fits the data without violating basic laws of physics.

We should be able to agree from observing the near-free-fall

destruction that this is characteristic of controlled demolitions and,

therefore, that controlled demolition is one way to achieve complete

collapse at near free-fall speed. Then we are keen to look at NIST

calculations of how they explain near-free-fall collapse rates without

explosives.

We await an explanation from NIST which satisfies Conservation of

Momentum and Energy for the rapid and complete destruction of all three

WTC skyscrapers on 9/11, or a discussion of alternative hypotheses that

are consistent with momentum and energy conservation in these

near-free-fall events.

6. Fire Endurance Tests, No Failure

NIST: 揘IST contracted with Underwriters Laboratories, Inc. to

conduct tests to obtain information on the fire endurance of trusses

like those in the WTC towers? All four test specimens sustained the

maximum design load for approximately 2 hours without collapsing?The

Investigation Team was cautious about using these results directly in

the formulation of collapse hypotheses. In addition to the scaling

issues raised by the test results, the fires in the towers on September

11, and the resulting exposure of the floor systems, were substantially

different from the conditions in the test furnaces. Nonetheless, the

[empirical test] results established that this type of assembly was

capable of sustaining a large gravity load, without collapsing, for a

substantial period of time relative to the duration of the fires in any

given location on September 11?4

We agree that NIST had actual fire tests completed and that all four

russes like those in the WTC towers?survived the fire-endurance

testing ithout collapsing.?We also agree that he fires in the

towers on September 11 ?were substantially different from the

conditions in the test furnaces;?the test furnaces were hotter and

burned longer. NIST may wish to perform a series of different tests in

an endeavor to discover some other hypothesis for collapse initiation.

As it stands, however, we have no physical evidence supporting the

concept of total collapse due to fire from real fire-endurance tests.

On the contrary, these real-life tests indicate that the buildings

should not have completely collapsed. In addition, we have hundreds of

cases of fires in tall steel-frame buildings and complete collapse has

never occurred.

But experts said no building like it [WTC7], a modern,

steel-reinforced high-rise, had ever collapsed because of an

uncontrolled fire, and engineers have been trying to figure out exactly

what happened and whether they should be worried about other buildings

like it around the country? Although the fireproofing was intended to

withstand ordinary fires for at least two hours, experts said buildings

the size of 7 World Trade Center that are treated with such coatings

have never collapsed in a fire of any duration. Most of three other

buildings in the complex, 4, 5 and 6 World Trade, stood despite

suffering damage of all kinds, including fire.15

Fire engineering expert Norman Glover agrees:

Almost all large buildings will be the location for

a major fire in their useful life. No major high-rise building has ever

collapsed from fire?The WTC [itself] was the location for such a fire

in 1975; however, the building survived with minor damage and was

repaired and returned to service.16

Yet three such high-rise buildings (WTC 1, 2 and 7)

completely collapsed on a single day, 9/11/2001, and could not be

returned to service. There is much left to learn here.

7. Fires of Short Duration

NIST: he initial jet fuel fires themselves lasted at most a few minutes?4

揂t any given location, the duration of [air, not steel] temperatures

near 1,000 癈 was about 15 min to 20 min. The rest of the time, the

calculated temperatures were near 500 癈 or below?4

We agree. But then, given that the fires were brief and patchy, how

did both towers experience sudden-onset failure of structural steel

over a broad area in each tower and how could the collapses of all

three WTC high-rises have been so symmetrical and complete?13, 14, 17 We seek discussion on these points.

8. WTC Fires Did Not Melt Steel

NIST: 揑n no instance did NIST report that steel in the WTC towers

melted due to the fires. The melting point of steel is about 1,500

degrees Celsius (2,800 degrees Fahrenheit). Normal building fires and

hydrocarbon (e.g., jet fuel) fires generate temperatures up to about

1,100 degrees Celsius (2,000 degrees Fahrenheit). NIST reported maximum

upper layer air temperatures of about 1,000 degrees Celsius (1,800

degrees Fahrenheit) in the WTC towers (for example, see NCSTAR 1,

figure 6-36)?3

Agreed. We also find agreement with Prof. Thomas Eagar on this point:

The fire is the most misunderstood part of the

WTC collapse. Even today, the media report (and many scientists

believe) that the steel melted. It is argued that the jet fuel burns

very hot, especially with so much fuel present. This is not true….

The temperature of the fire at the WTC was not unusual, and it was most

definitely not capable of melting steel.18

We are in remarkable agreement, then: the WTC fires were not capable

of melting steel. Of course, NIST then may have trouble explaining the

molten material flowing out of the South Tower just before its

collapse, as well as evidence for temperatures much higher than NIST

reported 1,100 癈.13 We offer to discuss explanations for the observed high temperatures.

9. Destruction of WTC Steel Evidence

NIST: 揘IST possesses 236 structural steel elements from the World

Trade Center (WTC) buildings. These pieces represent a small fraction

of the enormous amount of steel examined at the various recovery yards

where the debris was sent as the WTC site was cleared. It is estimated

that roughly 0.25 percent to 0.5 percent of the 200,000 tons of steel

used in the construction of the two towers was recovered.?he lack of

WTC 7 steel precludes tests on actual material from the structure厰.1

Thus, only a tiny fraction of steel was analyzed from the WTC

Towers, and none of the WTC 7 steel was analyzed by NIST. What happened

to the rest of the steel from the crime scene?

For more than three months, structural steel from the

World Trade Center has been and continues to be cut up and sold for

scrap. Crucial evidence that could answer many questions about

high-rise building design practices and performance under fire

conditions is on the slow boat to China, perhaps never to be seen again

in America until you buy your next car.

Such destruction of evidence shows the astounding ignorance of

government officials to the value of a thorough, scientific

investigation of the largest fire-induced collapse in world history. I

have combed through our national standard for fire investigation, NFPA

921, but nowhere in it does one find an exemption allowing the

destruction of evidence for buildings over 10 stories tall.19

And although only a small fraction of the steel was saved for

testing, it is clear that an 揺normous amount?of the WTC steel was

examined either for or by NIST, and the samples selected were chosen

for their identified importance to the NIST investigation.20

We agree that only a mall fraction of the enormous amount of

steel?from the Towers was spared and the rest was rapidly recycled.

The destruction of about 99% of the steel, evidence from a crime scene,

was suspicious and probably illegal, hopefully we can agree to that.

10. Unusual Bright Flame and Glowing Liquid (WTC 2)

NIST: 揂n unusual flame is visible within this fire. In the upper

photograph {Fig 9-44} a very bright flame, as opposed to the typical

yellow or orange surrounding flames, which is generating a plume of

white smoke, stands out?4

揘IST reported (NCSTAR 1-5A) that just before 9:52 a.m., a bright

spot appeared at the top of a window on the 80th floor of WTC 2, four

windows removed from the east edge on the north face, followed by the

flow of a glowing liquid. This flow lasted approximately four seconds

before subsiding. Many such liquid flows were observed from near this

location in the seven minutes leading up to the collapse of this tower?3

We agree and congratulate NIST for including these observations of

an 搖nusual flame… which is generating a plume of white smoke?4

揻ollowed by the flow of a glowing liquid?having n orange glow?[3].

With regard to the 搗ery bright flame?which is generating a plume of

white smoke? NIST effectively rules out burning aluminum, because

揂luminum is not expected to ignite at normal fire temperatures厰.3

Again, we agree.

The origins of this very bright flame and of the associated flow of

an orange-glowing liquid remain open questions in the NIST report. NIST

opened a very appropriate line of investigation by publishing these

significant clues from the data, 3, 4 providing an important starting point for further discussion which we seek.

11. High-Temperature Steel Attack, Sulfidation

FEMA (based on work by a Worchester Polytechnic Institute

investigative team): 揝ample 1 (From WTC 7)?Evidence of a severe high

temperature corrosion attack on the steel, including oxidation and

sulfidation with subsequent intergranular melting, was readily visible

in the near-surface microstructure? Sample 2 (From WTC 1 or WTC 2)?
The thinning of the steel occurred by high temperature corrosion due to

a combination of oxidation and sulfidation. 匱he severe corrosion and

subsequent erosion of Samples 1 and 2 are a very unusual event. No

clear explanation for the source of the sulfur has been identified?A

detailed study into the mechanisms of this phenomenon is needed厰2

We agree that the physical evidence for evere high temperature

corrosion attack?involving sulfur is compelling. Here we have grounds

for an interesting discussion: How were evere high temperatures?
reached in the WTC buildings? What is the source of the sulfur that

attacked the steel in these buildings? The answers to these questions

may help us find the explanation for the otal collapse?of the Towers

and WTC 7 that we are all looking for.

The WPI researchers published their results2, 21

and called for detailed study?of this igh-temperature?搊xidation

and sulfidation?phenomenon. Yet the results were unfortunately ignored

by NIST in their subsequent reports on the Towers?destruction.3, 4

Their failure to respond to this documented anomaly is a striking

phenomenon in itself. Perhaps NIST will explain and correct this

oversight by considering the high-temperature sulfidation data in their

long overdue report on the collapse of WTC 7. The existence of severe

high temperatures in the WTC destruction is by now very well

established.22

It appears that NIST has inadvertently overlooked this evidence and we

offer to investigate the matter with them, in pursuit of understanding

and security.

12. Computer Modeling and Visualizations

NIST: he more severe case (which became Case B for WTC 1 and Case

D for WTC 2) was used for the global analysis of each tower. Complete

sets of simulations were then performed for Cases B and D. To the

extent that the simulations deviated from the photographic evidence or

eyewitness reports [e.g., complete collapse occurred], the

investigators adjusted the input, but only within the range of physical

reality. Thus, for instance卼he pulling forces on the perimeter columns

by the sagging floors were adjusted…4

he primary role of the floors in the collapse of the towers was to

provide inward pull forces that induced inward bowing of perimeter

columns.4

he results were a simulation of the structural deterioration of each

tower from the time of aircraft impact to the time at which the

building became unstable, i.e., was poised for collapse?sup>4

We agree that NIST resorted to complex computer simulations and no

doubt djusted the input?to account for the Towers?destruction,

after the fire-endurance physical tests did not support their

preordained collapse theory.

But the end result of such tweaked computer models, which were

provided without visualizations and without sufficient detail for

others to validate them, is hardly compelling. An article in the

journal New Civil Engineer states:

World Trade Center disaster investigators [at NIST] are

refusing to show computer visualisations of the collapse of the Twin

Towers despite calls from leading structural and fire engineers, NCE

has learned. Visualisations of collapse mechanisms are routinely used

to validate the type of finite element analysis model used by the

[NIST] investigators. 匒 leading US structural engineer said NIST had

obviously devoted enormous resources to the development of the impact

and fire models. 揃y comparison the global structural model is not as

sophisticated,?he said. he software used [by NIST] has been pushed

to new limits, and there have been a lot of simplifications,

extrapolations and judgment calls?23

Further detailed comments on the NIST computer simulations are provided by Eric Douglas.24

We would like to discuss the computer modeling and extrapolations

made by NIST and the need for visualizations using numerical and

graphical tools to scrutinize and validate the finite-element analysis.

13. Total Collapse Explanation Lacking

NIST: his letter is in response to your April 12, 2007 request for

correction?we are unable to provide a full explanation of the total

collapse?25

This admission by NIST after publishing some 10,000 pages on the

collapse of the Towers shows admirable candor, yet may come as a bit of

a shock to interested parties including Congress, which commissioned

NIST to find a full explanation.

We agree that NIST so far has not provided a full explanation for

the total collapse. Indeed they take care to explain that their report

stops short of the collapse, only taking the investigation up to the

point where each Tower as poised for collapse?4

We offer to help find that elusive 揻ull explanation of the total

collapse?of the WTC Towers which killed so many innocent people, in

the hope that it does not happen again. We have a few ideas and can

back these up with experimental data.13, 22 Our interest is in physical evidence and analysis leading to a full understanding of the destruction of the WTC.

14. Search for Explosive or Thermite Residues

From a NIST FAQ: [Question: ] 揇id the NIST investigation look for

evidence of the WTC towers being brought down by controlled demolition?

Was the steel tested for explosives or thermite residues? The

combination of thermite and sulfur (called thermate) slices through

steel like a hot knife through butter. [Answer: ] NIST did not test

for the residue of these compounds in the steel?3

We agree; there is no evidence that NIST tested for residues of

thermite or explosives. This is another remarkable admission. Probing

for residues from pyrotechnic materials including thermite in

particular, is specified in fire and explosion investigations by the

NFPA 921 code:

Unusual residues might remain from the initial fuel. Those residues could arise from thermite, magnesium, or other pyrotechnic materials.26

Traces of thermite in residues (solidified slag, dust, etc.)

would tell us a great deal about the crime and the cause of thousands

of injuries and deaths. This is standard procedure for fire and

explosion investigations. Perhaps NIST will explain why they have not

looked for these residues? The code specifies that fire-scene

investigators must be prepared to justify an exclusion.26

NIST has been asked about this important issue recently, by investigative reporter Jennifer Abel:

Abel: ..what about that letter where NIST said it

didn’t look for evidence of explosives??Neuman [spokesperson at NIST,

listed on the WTC report]: Right, because there was no evidence of

that. Abel: But how can you know there’s no evidence if you don’t look

for it first? Neuman: If you’re looking for something that isn’t

there, you’re wasting your time… and the taxpayers?money.?27

The evident evasiveness of this answer might be humorous if not for

the fact that NIST approach here affects the lives of so many

innocent people. We do not think that looking for thermite or other

residues specified in the NFPA 921 code is asting your time.?We may

be able to help out here as well, for we have looked for such residues

in the WTC remains using state-of-the-art analytical methods,

especially in the voluminous toxic dust that was produced as the

buildings fell and killed thousands of people, and the evidence for

thermite use is mounting.13, 22

CONCLUSIONS

We have enumerated fourteen areas where we are in agreement with

FEMA and NIST in their investigations of the tragic and shocking

destruction of the World Trade Center. We agree that the Towers fell at

near free-fall speed and that is an important starting point. We agree

that several popular myths have been shown to be wrong, such as the

idea that steel in the buildings melted due to the fires, or that the

Towers were hollow tubes, or that floors ancaked?to account for

total Tower collapses. We agree that the collapse of the 47-story WTC 7

(which was not hit by a jet) is hard to explain from the point of view

of a fire-induced mechanism and that NIST has refused (so far) to look

for residues of explosives.3, 22, 27

Our investigative team would like to build from this foundation and

correspond with the NIST investigation team, especially since they have

candidly conceded (in a reply to some of us in September 2007):

搮we are unable to provide a full explanation of the total collapse?25

We are offering to discuss these matters in a civil manner as a

matter of scientific and engineering courtesy and civic duty. The lives

of thousands of people may very well depend on it.

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

Many thanks for useful discussions with Jim Hoffman, Dr. Gregory

Jenkins, Dr. Jeffrey Farrer, Prof. Kenneth Kuttler, Prof. David R.

Griffin, Gregg Roberts, Brad Larsen, Gordon Ross, Prof. David Griscom,

Prof. Graeme MacQueen, and researchers at AE911Truth.org and STJ911.org.See Reference here.

Tags: blogger, cate, common ground, pace, period of time, premise, spokesperson, us congress

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Locals continue to band together in the wake of the Icepak Coolstore disastrous explosion and fire. Dozens have volunteered their help to feed emergency services around the clock. The Tamahere Hall is the hub of the operation, offering something hot to eat or drink and a place to shower.
Hall committee chairman Andrew Gibson said the hall, built in 2006, had stood up to its first real test.
On Saturday night, Tamahere woman Liz Witehira realised a hangi for the school%26#39;s Pumpkin Night Gala was untouched because visitors were evacuated after the blast in the afternoon.
Helped by the Cambridge Lions, the community put the food to good use, feeding at least 130 emergency services workers at the fire that night.
%26quot;What was misfortune for the school was turned into help for the disaster,%26quot; she said. %26quot;Since then people have been delivering cakes, turning up offering to help - it%26#39;s been excellent.%26quot;
About 100 members of the Tamahere community had dropped in and %26quot;the firefighters seem grateful%26quot;.
The Salvation Army has been at the hall since Sunday morning. Army spokesperson Brian Smith said community support had been overwhelming.
%26quot;It%26#39;s been a tremendous response,%26quot; he said. He expected Salvation Army helpers would remain at the hall today and possibly tomorrow.
At 6.30am today, 14 firefighters and six vehicles were at the fire-ravaged coolstore. Fourteen fresh firefighters were due to arrive at 8am. Taupo Station Officer Al Green said overnight, with the help of contractors, they had removed parts of the building not crucial to the investigation to damp down hot spots.
Last night Assistant Western Fire Region Commander (Fire Safety) Mitchell Brown said an investigation team from national headquarters would begin a cause and origin determination today.
Investigations would also be carried out by Department of Labour, the coroner, a building investigation for insurance purposes and also into the product that was inside the building.
Once the fire was out and there was no further risk of fire or run-off from hazardous substances, the final clean up of the coolstore would be an issue for the building owner.

Tags: Food, spokesperson

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Caracas, March 26 ABN.- The IAPA action, then, is duly documented and has based upon the use of destabilizing schemes which, when being successful, have been repeated and still today are repeated in the whole Latin American region. In these pages we resume some examples, studied by Latin American journalists, regarding how the owners of the media have implemented a tradition of pressure against democratic governments, with fatal results.

We present here the origins of the corporate organization and its early liaison with the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), as well as punctual cases of development of black propaganda on behalf of the IAPA against the governments which have promoted the freedom and progress of their nations, contrary to the silence and complicity showed with the dictatorial regimes of thee region, even concealing the imprisoning and murdering of journalists.

Finally, we will try to explain the manipulations permitted by the IAPA, not only to continue usurping the representation of journalism in the region but also to revoke the rights which correspond to the social organizations instead to a group of powerful media owners. For it, we have counted with the orientation of trustworthy Latin American journalists who have fought for unmasking the media power and have denounced the depravity of the IAPA performance, which made the great press turn its back the nations.

We expect this to be a contribution, among many others, for the development of the needed critic conscience against the manipulations and misinformations of the press lords.

The IAPA and imperial Pan-Americanism

The origin of the Inter American Press Association (IAPA) should be found in the concept of Pan-Americanism. Not in the Bolivarian Pan-Americanism of the Congress of Panama, but in the imperial Pan-Americanism.

At the first Pan-American conference, held in the United States in 1889, was shaped an instrument oriented to organize meetings of governments aiming, according to its creators, to give an incentive to communication and collaboration among the countries in conditions of equality. However, these meetings actually answered to the US concern of drawing the manifestations of imperial control, linked to the domestic oligarchies.

This Pan-Americanism, in fact, is understood as a continuation of the famous Monroe Doctrine in 1823, imposed under the slogan of America for Americans, through which the United States declared to not allow any not American power inside the continent.

Under such ideological sign took place these conference in different countries of the region, and in 1923, at the 5th Pan-American Conference in Santiago de Chile, was stated the necessity of organizing a meeting about press.

This first conference about the press was finally carried out in Washington, three years later, and even when the IAPA official historians insist in pointing that it was all about a congress of journalists, it was essentially a meeting of entrepreneurs. This is remarked by researcher Juan Gargurevich in his book A Golpe de Titular. CIA y Periodismo en America Latina, when affirming that it was been the first time that so many owners of Latin American journals met. ‘It is worth mentioning that the issues tackled by the different tables (at the conference) did not include the problems of journalists themselves. North Americans were interested on employers, not in employees,’ writes Gargurevich.

After this initial conference continued to hold meetings in different countries, without setting the creation of the organization, until in 1943, in La Habana, when finally took place the conference in which was founded the IAPA.

At that moment, Cuba was governed by the tyrant Fulgencio Batista. The planet was shocked by the Second World War and the United States and the Soviet Union were joining to defeat the fascism. This historical climate, permeated by the existence of a anti-fascist front, allows that at the foundation of the IAPA some progressive and leftist publications are included, despite in a minority way, among them the press voice of the Cuban Communist Party, Noticias de Hoy, founded in 1938.

Since that first IAPA meeting, the minority progressive voices tried to boost the unity of press workers in the region and assume the role of criticizers against the role played in Latin America by the great agencies of news, which perform as repeaters of the imperial message.

However, the history changed at the end of the war. By 1947, it began the Cold War which faces the former allies ?the United States and the Soviet Union ? McCarthyism took shape in the United States and that same year is created the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), event that played an essential role on what the Cuban journalist Ernesto Vera calls the CIA-IAPA blow [1].

This blow takes place in 1950 and was promoted a year before in Quito, at the V Inter American Congress of Press, on behalf of the US delegation, which was made by three key characters: a representative from the Department of State, Tom Wallace, and two high rank officials from the CIA, Joshua Powers and Jules Dubois. The trio was apparently headed by Wallace, but actually the main character, as it will be proved, was always Dubois, who coordinated during 15 years after the CIA-IAPA labor in Latin America.

This trio suggested in Quito that the following IAPA meeting took place in the United States because the previous encounters had been hosted in Latin American capitals: Mexico, La Habana, Caracas, Bogota and Quito. A group of Latin Americans, among them Peruvian journalist Genaro Carnero Checa, spoke against the idea of electing the United States as host country, affirming that racial and political discrimination did not ensure the needed guarantees to hold a Congress in there.

The US delegation, after admitting that discrimination in its country was clammy, committed to guarantee the security for the participation of all the delegates, with the independence over their political ideas. Finally, the proposal dominated and it was approved that the following meeting would take place in New York.

Back to the United States, Wallace handed in a report to the Department of State, titled Background of previous Inter American Press Meeting, in which the operation was uncover. In this document, Wallace stressed that the US delegation had achieved the success on the objectives stated at the Quito meeting: working for a new constitution of the original organization and find that the following meeting would take place on US land under the private sponsoring of US publications.

We succeed on both objectives without needing to cause the creation of another split organization, and letting uncover that the US press had had to cause it for being unable to control the organization, explained Wallace to his chiefs at the report quoted by Gargurevich. Thus, the kidnap of the organization had began to develop.

The treasurer’s stories

According to the official story of the IAPA, 1950 was the most important year for the organization. It was precisely in that year when the IAPA was refounded and was conformed as we know it now, without the participation of the few progressive publications which had initially been included at the Society. Since that year, the CIA objectives for the operation of the IAPA in Latin America were made clear.

Despite the guarantees offered in Quito, the representatives of the progressive press organizations were not invited to the meeting of that VI Inter American Congress of Press. To some of them denied the visa to enter the United States under the accusation of being communists. When the complained before the organizers, Wallace ignored them, saying that the visa had been denied by the Government and so they should complain before the Government.

There were others who made to arrive to the Idlewild Airport, just to be detained and made to turn back by the US authorities, following an FBI interrogation. Such was the case of the Cuban Carlos Rafael Rodriguez, who represented the journal Noticias de Hoy, but was also the IAPA treasure, reelected by the third time in a roll and for that reason traveled with a special passport.

In a narration about this event, titled Cr髇ica de un New York entrevisto (Chronicle of a glimpsed New York), Rodriguez explains how he was arrested in Ellis Island; branded a dangerous person due to his ideology; considered ‘inadmissible’ in the United States; ignored by the organizing committee of the congress; and placed by the FBI at a Venezuelan airline which would turn him back to Cuba. In such chronicle, Rodriguez described with details the reasons why the solicitors of the new IAPA were not interested on his attendance.

玏hy was I excluded from the Congress?

獻t was very well known that I was going to New York to denounce all the cases of violation to the freedom of press in America. The North American organizers, working under the dictate of Washington, wanted to condemn only a group, charging the hand of those governments which do not have the approval of the Department of State. In my opinion, Videla is the same of Peron, and the Venezuelan Military Junta is not less guilty than Prio.

獻n second place, it was dread 朼nd it was fine they dread?that I would use the tribune of the Congress to protest against the shameful interference of the US ambassador to Mexico, Mr. Thurton, on the Mexican freedom of press, which he intended to dictate a policy of submission to the Washington’s interests.

玊hese facts have been denounced by the enlightened journalist Martin Luis Guzman and by more than sixty Mexican writers.

獸inally, they did not want me to put into debate the thesis maintained in Quito, the ‘freedom of press’ in the United States in nothing but a formality. At the core of the matter, the North American press is an monopolist instrument of the big companies.

玊hese are the conclusions taken since 1947 by a commission of specialists named by the University of Chicago and paid by the extremely conservative Henry R. Luce, from Time magazine, and by the Encyclopedia Britannica. When I said these things in Quito, Mr. Tom Wallace 杦ho led the Congress of New York?answered angrily that those who would say that were a bunch of fools. That way he described no one but Robert Hutchins, Minister from the University of Chicago; Archibald Mc Leish, Undersecretary of State; professor of Economics in Columbia, John M. Clark; professor Arthur M. Schlesinger, from Harvard; and other known Yankee specialists. But, as I answered back to Mr. Wallace, you may think that university researchers are ‘fools’; however, though we know there are a very great amount of fools at the US Senate, they are not enough to form the majority. And it was the majority, which in a report of the Small Plants Committee, proved that real monopolies dominated the American press.

”In order to hinder that these ideas would be stated, I was retained in Ellis Island. But the Yankee organizers also had an additional purpose. They expected to give 朼nd they gave?a coup. They illegally reformed the IAPA’s statutes. They established 朼rbitrarily?the vote for publications, giving an artificial North American majority. They snatched to Cuba the permanent venue of the Society in order to situate it in New York. They have destroyed, summarizing, the Inter American Society of Press as independent organization, turn it into a simple political instrument at the service of the US international objectives. To achieve this, the presence of some delegates disturbed. I resulted especially undesirable. (Rodriguez, 1950).”

In fact, before the conference in 1950, the IAPA statutes stipulated that each country had a vote into the society, indistinctly of the quantity of press organization affiliates. The change on the statutes allowed to bring down the scheme ‘one country, one vote’ and substitute it by ‘each publication, one vote’.

In an attempt to disguise this coup, the official history of the IAPA indicates that until that year the conferences of the organization took place under the sponsorship of the government of the host country, so ‘the delegations limited to sit down and vote by country, and the members not always were journalists. According to the official language, this decision of modifying the statutes was taken to avoid these patronage and to become independent. However, the truth is that in the practice the United States went from one vote to 424, and gained majority[2]. It implies that those 424 votes make up ‘the small group of journal editors and directors’ from the United States who had added up to the IAPA in 1946, according to the official historians of the company.

For that reason Vera, at a recent interview, insists in that since 1950 until now exists a freedom of press kidnapped by the power of money and logically upon the base of an imperial strategy: ‘That is why I say there is an organized lie and a scattered true. Exists an organized lie because exists an imperialist strategy and it does not exist an organized true because we still do not have an anti-imperialist strategy. That works in detail.’

Reliable voices against the IAPA

The CIA-IAPA beat caused unrest in Latin America. While the IAPA repeated that it represented journalists, the organization’s profile became every time more evident , formed by the great conservative print media of the region 朿learly in favor of the US?and oriented by the imperialist and businesslike interests, not journalistic.

This unrest developed in Latin America was showed up at the following conference, held in 1951 at Montevideo, Uruguay, where representatives from the host country, Brazil, Chile, Peru and Argentina declared to leave the IAPA and endorsed the Act of Montevideo, in which they denounced that the owners of the media had assumed the function of determining where existed or not freedom of press, when that right corresponds, besides to the society, to journalists.

After declaring against the kidnap, the Montevideo Act indicated that it was necessary the beginning of an organization which really join the journalist’s associations, in order to avoid that its functions were usurped by the owners of the great medias [3].

On his book Brief history of the IAPA [4], journalist Gregorio Selser records, among the voices who talked against the IAPA in 1951, the Venezuelan writer and journalist Miguel Otero Silva, owner of El Nacional journal from Caracas. On that occasion, Otero Silva complained that the change on the statutes approved in New York infringed the more basic norms of the organization, ‘giving to it the nature it now has: an exclusively employers’ organization of trade, strictly controlled by paper’s sellers, news agencies and advertisers residents in the United States. Nothing less inappropriate in that environment than a journalist.’

Otero Silva also denounced as biased a IAPA report in which ‘while dedicating 80 or 90 per cent of its content to count in detail the abuses committed by Peron against the freedom of press, a blanket was streched upon the Latin American dictatorships.’

In that same report, continued Otero Silva, appeared the Nicaraguan tyrant Anastasio Somoza ‘as a tutelary angel of the freedom of thought’ and placed as archetypes of democracy the Chilean Gonzalez Videla and the Bolivian dictators. Meanwhile, ‘it was shameful to see in that assembly of Montevideo the thug intellectuals of Rafael Leonidas Trujillo bellowing in the rostrum that Peron was a tyrant and that in his country, on the contrary, they enjoyed a complete freedom of thought,’ affirmed angrily the Venezuelan writer.

This book of Selser, quoted by journalist Jose Steinsleger, appears another testimony of denounce against the IAPA, coming from its own members. According to Selser, in 1958 one of the former IAPA presidents, the Mexican Miguel Lanz Duret (1909-1959), director of El Universal, quit the organization when he knew that the IAPA had requested to register as a corporation established in Dover, United States. With this action, in the opinion of Lanz Duret, ‘the IAPA would depend, to all legal effects, on the US laws, rejecting this way its alleged independence and discrediting in facts the advisable extraterritorial nature granted, for instance, by a mobile yearly host, different from the US.’

More recently, in 2000, a similar position had to be adopted by the Uruguayan journal La Republica and the Posdata magazine, which made public its resignation to the corporate organization after knowing that the former press director of the military dictatorship in that country (1973-1985), Danilo Arbilla, had been named president of the IAPA.

The letter of resignation to the IAPA, undersigned by the director of La Republica, Federico Fasano Mertens, and dated on October 24th 2000, claimed that naming Arbilla as president of an organization which had among its main declared objectives to defend the freedom of press constituted an insult to the democratic conscience of the American people. His appointment before the organism which intends to watch over the freedom of press is equivalent to designate the fox to take care of the hen-coop. Because of all the above-mentioned, the journal La Republica has the high honor of resigning, formal and publicly, as member of this Association while the impostor is at the front, concluded the letter.

My friends, the dictators

As the Cuban journalist Ernesto Vera says, media terrorism has plenty of expressions. Though the majority of times it expresses under the action of the IAPA and its members, not in a few occasions it is expressed in omission. The IAPA silences are equally eloquent, especially when those cover its alliances with dictatorial regimes.

In 2005, this denounced former president of the IAPA, Danilo Arbilla, acted against the government of then president Nestor Kirchner, to whom he charged of handling advertisement in a selective way and treating with lack of consideration the media. Kirchner then recalled Arbilla’s record and recalled as well to the vice chairman of the Argentinean journal La Nacion, Claudio Escribano, his indulgence to the atrocities committed in Argentina during the military dictatorship in that country.

That link of the great press’ owners with the Latin American dictatorial regimes has been documented enough and quoted in several occasions to prove that the IAPA concerns are not aimed to the defense of freedoms but to the preservation of corporate and oligarchic interests.

In Arbilla’s case, he had been press secretary during the last military dictatorship in Uruguay, in which Uruguayan citizens were tortured and murdered. According to the Uruguayan journal La Republica, Arbilla was designated for the post by president Juan Maria Bordaberry and continued holding it after the president eliminated the republican institutions with military support, and even after the dictatorship was fully established.

Thus, the journal recalls that Arbilla was also accessory of the presidential decree on June 27th 1973, which clearly banned the press of spreading any kind of information that direct or indirectly mentioned or referred to the issues stated on that decree, giving dictatorial purposes to the Administration or might disrupt the stillness and the order. Under his administration between 1973 and 1976, 173 media were closed ?4 of these closings were definitive?and it was seized the Uruguayan Association of Press (APU, for Spanish), the unionist organization of journalists. The undersecretary of the weekly magazine Marcha, Julio Castro, also disappeared and were imprisoned and tortured tens of journalists.

A similar character, Dominican German Orné–Ÿ, president of the IAPA Freedom of Press Committee, who with worry addressed letters to the Chilean president Salvador Allende due to fake infringement to the freedom of press. This same Orné–Ÿ was pointed by researchers of different nationalities for performing like a flatterer to the dictator in the Dominican Republic, Rafael Leonidas Trujillo.

Another example of the IAPA performance before dictatorships can be found on its denunciations in 1974, when according to the corporate organization the worst enemy of freedom of press in the continent was the Peruvian nationalist government of Juan Velasco Alvarado because of the measures of expropriation to the great press. Meanwhile, the brutal repression and gagging in the dictatorships of Chile, Argentina and Uruguay remained practically ignored by the lord of the press.

The IAPA blows

Parallel to its link with dictatorial governments, the history of the American great press cartel records a certain number of aggressions against the constitutionally constituted governments, in equal terms to the imperialist interests in the region. Thus, Garguverich stresses the soon conformation of an axis CIA, IAPA and agencies of news as part of the structure of US domination, making a powerful instrument for the destabilizing plans in Latin America [5].

Perhaps the most symbolic case of the destabilizing action of the IAPA has been the dirty campaign against the government of Salvador Allende in Chile, overthrown in 1973 due to the combination of Chilean reactionary forces and the CIA, since the implementation of a strong psychological war.

Chilean journalist Hernan Uribe affirms that along the whole history of Chile, there was no period in which dominated a freedom of information that even fell into debauchery and in clear violations to professional ethics as in Allende’s term in office. President Allende himself, in 1970, declared to Prensa Latina agency that his government would favor unlimited freedom of press, but would also favor that all the social agents and ideological trends had access to opinion.

Currently, those rights were officially established, but its practice appears restricted to the minor sectors which had a prominent situation from the financial point of view, expressed Allende, according the also journalist Ernesto Carmona. His words, obviously, would not please the media magnates. Even less when Allende pointed towards a main topic, indicating that the media in capitalist regimes turned not in instruments of information, but in instruments of misinformations of the people’s interests.

Oriented by the CIA, the Chilean opponent media, headed by the journal El Mercurio, could not answer Allende’s request of informing with objectivity and to maintain with nobility their points of view. On the contrary, they devoted to spread lies and to try to give an image of persecution to the press, adding fuel to the fire in which they would cook Pinochet’s dictatorship. For that reason, Allende claimed, on February 12th 1973, We are obliged to point out the lack of moral authority and the distorted interest of those who shelter on the Inter American Press Association. We are not concerned about the critics. We not only accept it, we also claim for it.

Uribe also stresses that it was also the CIA the responsible for directing the great Chilean press and the IAPA members in a campaign of black propaganda against Allende, fact proved by unclassified documents in the United States. On this context, the journal El Mercurio, property of Agustin Edwards, who performed as the IAPA vice president, received enough dollars for his campaign against Allende, and he even stopped circulating for a day, pleading threats ‘in order to form a misinformation scandal which claimed ‘for the closing’ of El Mercurio.’

In accordance with this Chilean journalist, the lies were in such a way that the campaign denounced that the press would be assaulted cutting the supply of paper, when the truth that the government had no relation with the business of the paper because the monopolistic producer of that instrument was a private company.

On the research carried out by Gargurevich is proved that this campaign of destabilization at the Chile of Allende included the deterioration on the image of the Unidad Popular (People’s Union) government, as internall as externally. That ‘external front’ was made by the journals members of the IAPA. The news were written by the CIA, spread by the great agencies and published by the IAPA members.

The IAPA got even to meet in Santiago de Chile on October 1972, meeting to which Allende did not rejected even though the opposition of different Chilean sectors, which foresaw the intentions of the organization. That meeting, in which was ‘defended the freedom of press’ again, had, of course, a wide media coverage.

The work of the IAPA and its members on the overthrowing of Guatemalan president Jacobo Arbenz, which occurred in 1954, has also been revealed by CIA documents, unclassified in 1999 and collected on the book The CIA in Uruguay, from the historian Roberto Garcia [6].

The historical research made by Garcia proves that the priorities in the advertising established by the CIA against Arbenz were immediately expressed by the right-wing press in Uruguay. Media as El Pa韘 and El Dia published editorials about the ‘communist infiltration’ made by the CIA, even with errors of the translation from the English language and barefacedly stressed by both journals with only one day of difference.

The proofs can be found in documents like CIA, Guatemala-General Plan of Action (Doc. N?135875, November 12th 1953), which establishes the essential contents of the continental misinformation plan against Arbenz; and ‘CIA, Hemisphere Support of Pbsuccess’ (Doc. N?913376, February 16th 1954), which described the support in the hemisphere for the misinformation plan.

All this operation was headed by the never missing IAPA denounce about the violations to the freedom of press in Guatemela. On its official publication Press of the Ameritas (N?25, Vol. 1, March 1st 1954), the IAPA supported its concerns on a press conference offered by Jules Dubois, president of the IAPA Freedom of Press Committee, after president Arbenz warned that the press was fostering a foreign intervention on his country.

Likewise, Gargurevich established on his research the similarities between the operation carried out to overthrow Allende in Chile with the campaign that achieved the defeat of the prime minister from Jamaica, Michael Manley, at the elections of October 1980, which were charged of fraudulent. Manley had been pointed by the United States as turning to communism ?with all it meant on the context of the Cold War ?after establishing the diplomatic relations with Cuba, joining the Non-Aligned Movement, raising the tax to transnational companies and declaring that his country was oriented towards a democratic socialism.

In this case, the role performed by El Mercurio in Chile was given to The Daily Gleaner, which in 1979 was charged by the Press Association in Jamaica of assuming a non professional behavior, and which savage campaign against Manley’s government was widely spread by the journals associated to the IAPA.

It is as well known the link CIA-great media against the Sandinista government in Nicaragua, denounced in 1981 by Nicaraguan journalists; and, in general, against the nationalist, socialist, progressive governments in the region which take measures that might affect the interests of the local and US oligarchies.

The black propaganda continues

After proving with success these schemes of black propaganda against democratic and people’s governments, the axis CIA-IAPA continues to apply it in Latin America. Its obvious use can be found in the case of Cuba; Argentina, with the administration of Nestor Kirchner and Cristina Fernandez de Kirchner; Bolivia, with Evo Morales administration; Ecuador, with president Rafael Correa; and Venezuela, with the Bolivarian Revolution boosted by President Hugo Chavez.

In 2005, the former IAPA president, Danillo Arbillo, denounced by his link with the Uruguayan dictatorship, charged against the government of president Nestor Kirchner, to whom he accused of handling publicity in a selective way’ and ‘treating with lack of consideration the media. Arbilla’s claim was directed to the disposition of the Argentinean government of distributing official advertisement with criteria of balance among the small, medium and great media.

Against Evo Morales, in 2006, the IAPA expressed that in Bolivia the freedom of press was in risk before the purpose of supporting the formation of a communitarian media network, even though these media constitute a tool for the democratization of communications, through the work of communities themselves.

Regarding Rafael Correa’s administration, the Ecuadorian journalist Alberto Maldonado has denounced that the IAPA describes president Correa as ‘hostile to the press’, just due to his expressions to qualify certain media and press representatives faced to accusations and expressions that those have used against him without any kind of tactfulness.

Regarding Venezuela, the IAPA has charged several accusations along the term in office of Hugo Ch醰ez, reiterating the model of black propaganda, according to which the freedom of expression would be at risk.

The case of the approval of the Law of Social Responsibility on Radio and Television ?Ley de Responsabilidad Social en Radio y Televisi髇, known as the LRS or the Ley Resorte ?in 2004, for instance, the IAPA, loyal to its precept saying that the best law of press is that which does not exists, affirmed that this legislation promoted previous censorship, when it just tried to promote the right of the people to a appropriate and truthful information. However, in April 2002, the IAPA backed the coup against the legal government of Venezuela and did not pronounce about the informative black out of the private TV stations on April 13th, nor about the closing of the state-owned Venezolana de Television during the brief de facto government.

On the other hand, the tie between the corporate press with the interests of the United States has been proved again, as it is remarked by Steinsleger, when on October 13th 2003, then counselor of national security Condoleezza Rice ordered the IAPA General Assembly through teleconference to support the government of Gonzalo Sanchez de Losada, which resignation was claimed by the Bolivian people after a high police repression.

The IAPA defends the old order

The Inter American Press Association has not only unleashed campaigns against legal governments, but it has also touched international organizations of the United Nations system itself which have joined to the Latin American nations in the struggle for the democratization of the communications. It happened on the seventies against the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO), when it promoted the right of the States to establish communicational policies.

During that decade, the non-aligned countries began a lithe movement demanding the creation of a New International Economic Order (NIEO) to overcome the injustices of the order which prevailed until that moment. In joint with this NIEO, the Non-Aligned Movement (NAM), on its Statement of Algiers in 1974, proclaimed the necessity of a New World Information and Communication Order (NWICO), to contribute with the democratization of communications, using among other formulas, the definition of national policies of communication. The NAM denounced the informative system of the moment as an instrument for domination.

The United States’ answer to this proposal was immediate and it constituted a closed defense to the doctrine of free information flow[7], in which the IAPA acted again as its allied. To that doctrine, the so-called Third World countries opposed the demand of a balanced flow, through the restructuring of the information and communication systems, against the one-way messages and media concentration.

Denounces against that free flow found an allied on the report ‘Many voices, One world’, presented in 1980 as a result of the work made by a committee appointed by the UNESCO and chaired by Sean MacBride, Lenin Prize and Nobel Prize winner. In this document, known as the MacBride Report, were exposed the unbalance of information flow and was stated the necessity of more justice on the exchange of information, as well as less dependence in relation to the trends of communication.

The IAPA turned into one of the savagest opposition voices to the NWICO and to the implementation of national information policies (NIP), under a reactionary attitude against any possibility of democratization of communication, which would logically attempt against the interests of the powerful media groups.

The major argument they presented on their offensive against the NWICO was the most trite of the whole Cold War era: that new order smelled to communist conspiracy and was promoted by the Soviet Union.

In order to stop any governmental action favoring the democratization of communications, the IAPA joined to the other employer’s organization of the region: the Inter American Association of Radio Broadcasting (Asociacion interamericana de radiodifusion, AIR). Both of them also attacked in another front by discrediting UNESCO’s action, organization which under the direction of the Senegalese Amadou M’Bow had decided to boost the NWICO, establishing links between communication and development. The pestering against the UNESCO did not cease until the United States and England announced their resignation to the organization, denouncing the politicization of this forum; then the Spaniard Federico Mayor Zaragoza was appointed, a character considered much more docile before the dominant interests. For that reason, the Venezuelan researcher Oswaldo Capriles concluded:

”The punishment suffered by the UNESCO is one of the major lessons to be learned regarding the terrible force that the organizations of western agencies and news media have, especially from the United States, not only regarding the specific capacity to influence the opinion through the twisting of information, but also regarding the capacity of pressing directly the governments and obtaining serious political results in the scene of the organizations of the United Nations international system” (1996, p. 42).

Those in charge for this campaign were mainly The New York Times, agencies of news AP, UPI and AFP, and specially the IAPA and AIR.

The IAPA action was particularly string in 1976 against the Conference of San Jose de Costa Rica, where the Latin American governments met to debate about the national policies of communication. The IAPA, as it did not request the status of observer before the UNESCO, was not invited to the meeting; however, the employer’s organization put forward a campaign affirming that when they did not invite it they rejected the debate and, under a flourish strike, announced a parallel meeting in San Jose, under the loud-voiced direction of a Dominican journalist, former spokesperson of the deceased dictator Trujillo, as Capriles indicated.

In a detailed analysis of the IAPA and AIR campaign against the UNESCO, Capriles expressed that both employer’s organizations achieved to flood the world press with a war of opinions in which dominated the idea of existing an ‘UNESCO thesis’, inspired by the ‘extreme left’ and attempting against the freedom of expression. Besides, the attacks were focused against those countries which supported the conference, while in the great media reduced the negative news about the countries which showed disposition to collaborate.

The communiques issued by the UNESCO were not published by almost any journal, while any document issued by the denominated Commission for the Defense of Freedom of Information, created by the IAPA and by the International Press Institute (IPI) as one of its battle fronts, was repeated by all the affiliated media. The IAPA campaign was repeated in the United States by the journals of the group Hearts and the New York Times[8]. Meanwhile, from the IAPA Newscast they mixed up non related events, accusations of anti-Semitism, denounces of actions of the Russian crusher-Third World to attack the UNESCO.

Despite one of the strategies used by the IAPA was to insisting on an alleged plot against the freedom of expression drawn by the governments of extreme right and extreme left, the truth is as Capriles reveals:

On the countries with dictatorial regimes existed in fact an unspoken agreement between governments and media upon the basis of previous situations of understanding, which proves that besides the commercial media were not demanding democracy or freedom, but defending the oligopolistic privileges for their advertising activities, an activity they considered instead as threat by those countries under formal democracy regimes because on those ?at least in some of them ?had been stated the issue of communication policies as necessary element to progress or improvement of the democracy. (Capriles, 1996, p. 57)

Some of the agreements of that meeting in Costa Rica consisted on creating a Latin American and Caribbean agency of news, establish ways of cooperation for the development of rural communications, forming a Latin American council of social communication, demanding a balanced circulation of communication and information at the international level, and recognizing the right pf communication as a derivation from the universal right of expression. However, all of those purposes were abandoned by the governments before the strong media pressure.

Specifically in Venezuela, the IAPA found support on the employer’s federation Fedecamaras, which on August 3rd launched a declaration about the necessity of protecting the freedom of expression and warning against the totalitarian risk.

Since then until now, the IAPA has kept acting against the attempts of vindication of the right of communication and truthful information. For that reason, by the end of the nineties, it accused the government of Rafael Caldera of having totalitarian trends, seeking to hinder him to present his proposal of right o truthful information at the VII Ibero-American Summit, which took place on the island of Margarita in 1997.

In that summit, despite the violent opposition of the IAPA, was approved for the first time a paragraph about granting the right to truthful information, on the accord 38 of that conference, which is still in force. This principle then found firmer paths on the Constitution of the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela, which confirms in article 58 the right of appropriate, truthful and unbiased information.

IAPA’s speech. Freedom of press or freedom of company?

The IAPA, in its official speech, tries very hard to use concepts to legitimate its behavior and set itself as a referent to define the freedom of press and to decide who respects it and who does not. However, doing so, it is usurping a collective right of the peoples and hiding on behalf of whom this employers’ organization is really acting. Let’s see some examples:

The IAPA tries to appear as the representatives of the journalists, but as people have noticed, it is just an employer’s organization that represents only mass media owners. Therefore, it cannot talk on behalf of the journalists, as it has been denounced by journalists of the whole continent.

The IAPA claims for itself the right to decide who is violating and who is respecting the freedom of speech. As the journalist Ernesto Vera warns, the freedom of speech is an individual right, and the freedom of press comes from it; nevertheless, in mass media’s case, freedom of press becomes into a collective right. Thus, it is a right of the society and does not belong to
the big press owners. If we let this right in their hands would be as if we trust the right of health to be defended and defined only by the big private hospitals’ owners.

Oswaldo Capriles, in his book ‘Poder pol韙ico y comunicaci髇’ (Political Power and Communication), points out that the IAPA uses the freedom of speech to put pressure on public opinion. In the moment that this organization shows itself as the people in charge of defining what countries respect the freedom of press and which ones do not, they put pressure on governments and present themselves to the public opinion with a power they do not have. He also reminds us that the IAPA offers the dominant conception of freedom of speech as an exclusive privilege of media owners.

Who has more right to the freedom of expression than the society itself? For this reason the IAPA is frequently denounced. They pretend to mix together the freedom of press with the freedom of company, which is nothing more than to defend their capability of making business, as it is defined by the Latin American Federation of Journalists (FELAP, Spanish abbreviation):

‘Being this society (the IAPA) a congregation of newspapers’ owners and editors, the freedom of speech that it pretends to defend cannot be other than the freedom of company needed by its members in order to take part in the press business and to use news as a merchandise or a consumption product’ (2006, p. 28).

The IAPA tries to define, without the participation of the rest of the society, the freedom of expression, which is a right that has not been granted to it and that the organization has take over thanks to its economic power. The IAPA made it clear in its Declaration of Chapultepec, in which expresses an apology of a freedom of press’ definition that seeks a prerogative of the mass media. The employers’ organization started the Chapultepec project in 1994 and, currently, it assures that the ten points of the Declaration have been established as the ‘recognized standard for the hemisphere to measure the freedom of expression and press’. In fact, it assures that since 1994, an ‘abstract concept’, as it is the freedom of expression, has been redefined, which has allowed people not to give unclear, sporadic, and incoherent answers, when they are questioned about freedom of expression’s meaning.

The IAPA presents itself as the defender of the independent press. After seeing so many examples of manipulation and misinformation, people should ask themselves, what is that press independent of? It is independent of the people’s interests; dependent of money and power owners.

The IAPA is harshly against the truthful information concept, alleging that if it were accepted, then media would have to account for to the governments, which in turn could censure press defining what truthful information is. This is a false dichotomy, because the society is in charge of denouncing mass media when they lie. The dilemma is not IAPA vs. Government, but IAPA vs. Society.

The IAPA has been always against laws on press, defending instead the self-regulation concept. Nevertheless, if somebody has enough money to own a mass media that would reach hundred of thousands or millions of people that does not place this person above or at the margin of the society. He or she has to answer and assume an ethic and social responsibility, or we would be facing a paradox of an antidemocratic power acting as the comptroller of another power, which is democratically constituted, without accounting for to the latter and without any chance of being modified.

We should have to remember, as Vera does, that the press’ existence is supported in constitutional precepts that were not bought with money, but with the sacrifice and blood of all of those who fought for the independence.

Powerful, but not almighty

Despite of this imperialist alliances, manipulations, and misinformation record, for the past few years, Latin American progressive governments, left-wing or revolutionary ones, have achieved their victories in their electoral processes, even against the will and position of big press media, which represents a major defeat for the powerful people of the IAPA. This evidences, undoubtedly, a growth of the critical people’s conscience, even when black propaganda campaigns keep harming and trying to bend people’s will of advancing to the transformation of our realities.

Ernesto Vera defends the idea, after having several years exercising in the journalism field, that the owners of the mass media companies are powerful, but not almighty. And their weak point is precisely that their message offends human intelligence and it is not identified with the reality of the huge majority of the addressees. For that reason, even with less technological and financial resources, it is needed to insist on the task of developing a critical conscience about what those media mean and about who their owners are, and who are the owners of those owners.

[1] The informations and opinions issued by the Cuban journalist Ernesto Vera came from a personal interview carried out for this paper. Vera is honorary president of the Latin American Federation of Journalists (Federaci髇 Latinoamericana de Periodistas, FELAP) and professor at the Jose Marti International Institute of Journalism.

[2] In 1950, the IAPA had a total 778 members, 424 were from the United States, 314 were Latin Americans and 22 were from Canada and Europe.

[3] The answer to this call came 25 years later because it was in 1976 when the Latin American Federation of Journalists (FELAP) was created, under the principle of always supporting the right of the people to trustworthy information. To found the FELAP it was essential the fighting action of the Peruvian journalist Genaro Carnero Checa, who achieved that then Mexican president Luis Echeverria supported the beginning of the organization. Nowadays, the FELAP actions and declarations continue to be silenced by the great media.

[4] The quotes about Selser’s book are collected by journalist Jose Steinsleger, in the article ‘SIP: Mordaza de libre presi髇’ (IAPA, Gag of free pressure), published by the Mexican journal La Jornada on October 15th 2006. About this matter of the IAPA, Selser is also frequently quoted by Juan Gargurevich. Steinsleger comments that if the IAPA were an organization really committed to freedom, independence and democracy, the building working as head office in Miami should be called Gregorio Selser (1922-1991), instead of Jules Dubois.

[5] Venezuelan researcher Oswaldo Capriles, in a book titled ‘Poder pol韙ico y comunicacion’ (Political power and communication), states that there is no doubt that the US agencies of security have been involved on the conformation of the IAPA, even though the owners of the media do not need much pressure to maintain similar positions with the US industrial-political-military complex, given to its place into the dominant elites. It explains the ultraconservative trend granted by the IAPA.

[6] The notes about Garc韆’s book were published on the Uruguayan journal La Republica, on August 20th 2007, titled ‘La CIA ordenaba; El Pa韘 y la SIP ejecutaban’ (The CIA ordered; El Pa韘 and the IAPA carried it out). The note of the journal recalls that Arbenz headed the second term in office of what was called the ‘democratic spring’ in Guatemala and he was overthrown on June 27th 1954 due to an invasion of ‘a liberator army’ organized, financed and armed by the United States. ‘The CIA operation to overthrow Arbenz was called a ‘Success’ and it was the first which included the implementation of ‘an instrument to construct opinions at a continental level’, in accordance with the definition by the US itself. The operation was authorized by the US president Dwigth Eisenhower and carried out by the then minister John Foster Dulles and his brother Allen, CIA director. Dulles’ brothers were shareholders of the United Fruit Company, owner of huge large states and plantations in Guatemala, affected by the agricultural reform started by Arbenz in order to give lands to the thousands of peasants ans natives deprived from it.’

[7] At the Inter American Conference of Chapultepec, carried out in 1945, the United States had fostered the approval of a resolution regarding the free circulation of news. As the Venezuelan journalist Eleazar Diaz Rangel, in his book International Information in Latin America, these resolutions might be literally unquestionable, but in the practice ‘would only benefit the single country capable to make circulate all kind of communicational messages, aware of the power of information.’ One year later, in 1946, the Department of State informed that an undersecretary of State would be in charge of the communication issues, on the express function of breaking the barriers opposing to the expansion of the US media on the planet, assuming the freedom of press as part of the US foreign policy.

[8] The reporter of the New York times, Deidre Carmody, stated the IAPA arguments and complained about the impossibility of presenting the UNESCO pleas affirming that it had not been possible to get in touch with any of its officials at the Costa Rica conference; however, it was later discovered that she was not only accredited as correspondent for the event, but she was neither in San Jose.

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Terry, like the rest of the squad, had not been told whether he would be in Avram Grant’s side to face Tottenham at Wembley. But the centre-half, who had been omitted from the Champions League game against Olympiakos the previous Tuesday, was included in the team along with Frank Lampard.A Chelsea spokesperson dismissed the row suggestions saying: “All our focus is on our next game.” That game is at West Ham on Saturday when Chelsea hope to shake off the memory of their Wembley defeat and continue their push for a third Premier League title in four years.One eyewitness to Terry’s spat with Ten Cate had told the Sun: “The session was supposed to put the finishing touches to the final plans for Wembley - but it just descended into a massive row. There was a lot of unrest among the squad because no-one knew what the team was going to be for Wembley. Everyone was trying to guess what was going on and in the end the frustration became too much. But the intensity of the row took everyone by surprise.”John and Ten Cate were right in each other’s faces and when it became clear that neither was going to back down, other players jumped between them to pull them apart. To make matters worse, Mr Abramovich was visiting the training ground and saw the whole thing.”Dutchman Ten Cate was appointed first-team coach last October but despite the row, Terry insisted yesterday that the preparations for the final had not been affected by the doubts over team selection. “The manager keeps it all very close to his chest and none of us knew until Sunday and that is how it has been in every game,” said Terry. “So there was no change or excuse. That is the way it has got to be, it keeps everyone on their toes and as a group of players we have to deal with it.”

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Luyanda Makapela

11 March 2008

The three electricity experts from Electricit?de France (EDF)

arrived in South Africa last week and will help to define the country’s

most pressing needs in terms of power generation, capacity and

maintenance.

The focus of their fact-finding mission is the de-mothballing

of coal power plants, as well as assessing and providing the technical

skills needed, the French embassy’s Caroline Jansen said in a

statement.

Following the results of their appraisal, more experts from

Electricit?de France will visit South Africa to assist their South

African counterparts.

This follows French President Nicolas Sarkozy state visit to

South Africa last month, during which he announced that he would be

sending three engineers to work closely with the state utility in

addressing the country’s electricity challenges.

French company Alstom has also sent four engineers to South

Africa to investigate the maintenance of boilers and turbines at

country’s power plants. Alstom recently signed a R13-billion deal with

Eskom to provide steam turbines for the construction of new coal power

plants.

Twenty-five technicians from the nuclear power company Areva

are also in the country, working with Eskom to increase the generation

capacity of the Koeberg nuclear reactor.

Major new projects face delays

Eskom announced last week that major new construction projects in the country will be halted for the next four to six months.

However, the utility said the construction of the Gautrain and

those projects surrounding preparations for the 2010 Fifa World Cup

will not be affected because they had already been approved by Eskom

before the power shortage crisis hit the country.

Eskom spokesperson Sipho Neke has said that only projects such

as new townhouse developments, petrol stations and factories, which

needed to obtain electricity certificates from Eskom in advance, would

be delayed by up to six months.

The government has committed itself to working with mining and other

industries to ensure that industry challenges that emerged from the

electricity emergency were addressed without any job losses, said

government spokesperson Themba Maseko.

Maseko was speaking about large electricity consumers having to

cut their usage by 10%, putting strain on businesses such as mining

companies.

Maseko also said that Cabinet had resolved that concrete steps

should be taken by Eskom and municipalities to accelerate the

maintenance of the electricity infrastructure to secure the

distribution and transmission side of the electricity supply chain.

However, the main message is that we must continue to save

energy, and not become complacent because no extensive load shedding

took place over the past few weeks, Maseko said.

Source: BuaNews

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Some contacts are brief. Some are long. Some are hospital horror stories. Others are testaments to the compassion and skills of those who care for the sick and the dying. For some readers, their experience involves the trials and worries of life under stress at the bedside.
People like Ann Treadgold of Murrays Bay. Her letter, prompted by the column on %26quot;the secret sickness%26quot;, as it has been called, was one of a number of reactions. It was a very personal account which also summed up much of what was written by others.
Her experience was far from typical both in its medical complexity and in the time involved. And yet, at the same time, her memories involve patterns of hospital life and practice which many others will recognise %26ndash; for better or worse:
%26quot;On reading your column I thought back over hundreds of hours I spent in local hospitals over the last few years as support for my mother. Over eight years of ill-health, she spent the equivalent of about four years in Auckland and North Shore hospitals. After 70 years of near-perfect health her pancreas ruptured, causing the destruction of most of her pancreas, a third of her bowel and her gallbladder.
%26quot;We were told that she would die, however a senior surgeon at Auckland hospital set about a near-impossible mission to operate five times over two weeks to save her life.
%26quot;Her treatment involved seven major life-saving operations. The initial operation and complications caused a stay of 14 months in hospital during which she could neither eat nor drink and was fed intravenously.
%26quot;She had full access to intensive care facilities, x-ray, CAT scan, MRI, gastroscopy services, diabetes services, dietitians, rehabilitation services and district nurse services, I imagine amounting to hundreds of thousands of dollars.
%26quot;Staff were excellent on the whole. The senior surgeon made himself available by cellphone any time of the day or night in case of emergency. The senior surgeon treated our family as equals, thoroughly explaining and consulting with us about our mother%26rsquo;s condition.
%26quot;Mother%26rsquo;s case became very well-known and was used as a teaching tool. She made herself available for students to study her case.
She attended a lecture in front of hundreds of students while a patient in hospital. She answered their questions %26ndash; and the students gave her a standing ovation for her courage in the face of such extreme medical difficulties.
%26quot;Staff became very attached to mum %26ndash; as they do to many long-term patients %26ndash; and became like a family away from home. The surgeon and many of the staff from the ward at Auckland hospital attended her funeral.
%26quot;There were mistakes. One major operation was delayed when blood for a possible transfusion was not ordered.
%26quot;She was sent home too early while still suffering severe medical problems because the main surgeon handling her case was away and another registrar decided they needed mum%26rsquo;s bed. She was readmitted after two days and spent another eight months in hospital.
%26quot;During time when her main surgeon was overseas, she was left to sip liquids for about a week with no intravenous fluids given. Finally, she collapsed and almost died. Adhesions from previous operations had fused together, completely blocking the bowel. The appropriate tests had not been carried out quickly enough to pick up the problem.
%26quot;Unfortunately, she also broke her hip and needed a hip replacement. Necessary anti-diarrhoea medication was not given before the operation which had to be cancelled when diarrhoea occurred on the operating table.
%26quot;There was a tendency by some staff to treat mother as though she was suffering from senility instead of recognising that the pain and discomfort she was suffering was the cause of her confused state of mind. Some nurses were a bit too rough in their handling of her fragile body. Some did not give mum enough respect.
%26quot;Most of these problems were the result of extreme pressures on the hospital staff and resources and an inefficient system for communicating information.
%26quot;I spent hours at a time sitting in the ward with her or attending various procedures. Overall, she was given excellent medical care, but some things became glaringly clear.
%26quot;Shortage of staff meant that agency nurses were regularly brought in to cover the shortfall. Trainee doctors were obviously carrying an enormous case load and often appeared plain exhausted.
%26quot;Communication seemed to be a big problem. My mother%26rsquo;s case was extremely complicated.
The nurses and doctors did not have time to thoroughly read the notes %26ndash; in my mother%26rsquo;s case, several folders thick %26ndash; every time they visited her bedside, and they constantly asked her to explain her condition. My brothers and I had to be there almost every day as her spokespersons to make sure the staff were fully familiar with her condition.
%26quot;I also found myself advocating for other patients in small ways %26ndash; finding nurses when a patient was immobile or unsteady and desperate to go to the toilet, needed pain relief, or a container to be sick into, etc, and no one had responded to the bell.
%26quot;I often cut up food for stroke patients or helped someone change position in bed. Of course, there were always the patients who were lonely and afraid and needed a listening ear.
%26quot;I came up with the idea that it would be good for each ward to have a patient advocate working fulltime. They would visit each person on the ward every day, checking if they had any concerns that were not being met and reporting back to the charge nurse.
%26quot;I guess this would be unacceptable because of cost, but people in hospital are at their most vulnerable and need a strong advocate to ensure their needs are met. They have social workers, but I am not sure how often they are able to visit individual patients.
%26quot;Summing up the care my mother received %26ndash; and some of the mistakes %26ndash; I want to make clear that I have nothing but respect for the medical teams that cared for her. Their job is extraordinarily difficult. Every day doctors and nurses make decisions that are potentially a matter of life or death. They deserve the utmost support.
%26quot;I agree with you %26ndash; it%26rsquo;s time politicians stopped fighting about whose fault it is that our hospitals are not operating perfectly.%26quot;
- Very true, Ann. Then, perhaps the health system would be healthier and so would the people it is there to serve. Thanks for other readers%26rsquo; letters received which are filed for reference.

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There has been a National Nurses Day, a National Leisure suit Day and even a What You Don’t Know Day.

But next week the United States will observe the first ever National Dietitian Day. Dietitians have great jobs. They get to play with food and are paid for it. So go out Monday and hug a dietitian.

Licensed to reduce fraud

You can thank a dietitian for protecting your safety. The majority of states have enacted laws which regulate the practice of dietetics. Should you plan to