Having listened to the interview, is one supposed to conform to the idea that we were attacked because “they hate our freedom?”

Very curious, especially when government analysts are issuing renewed warnings of al- Qaeda attacks on the U.S. and elsewhere.”

Al-Qaeda attacked the U.S. because it wanted to provoke the U.S. government into massive military/security spending, bleeding the country dry financially, which would lead to the downfall of the American Empire and in Bin Laden’s final goal to enable a Muslim superstate in the Middle East.

Both goals are proceeding quite well. The pathetic Americans and their hideous government are taking care of the former, and by attacking several Muslim countries and threatening several more it’s quite possible that a Muslim superstate could emerge in order to better defend Muslims from the Imperial West.

Analysts commonly make the major error of saying that “Al Qaeda isn’t powerful”.

A) Bankrupt the American Empire

B) Muslim superstate

Al Qaeda doesn’t have to be powerful - it just has to achieve it’s goals. Al Qaeda’s greatest ally is the Neoconservatives. They have all the power that Al Qaeda needs.

Secrets can’t be kept when they involve large numbers of people and involve important events. Al Qaeda attacked Americans on 9/11.

Tribalism is the true enemy of humanity. Bill Maher is for all those things mentioned above, as long as you don’t apply the same standards to his own tribe.

i love it when someone says the emperor has no clothes.

Turn on the television and he’s the only individual that dares to speak against the mainstream on MOST issues. You’re all going to call him names because you disagree with him on a few issues? C’mon. This is just as bad as someone that invalidates everything that Maher stands for because he’s a major supporter of animal rights and PETA.

Noam Chomsky, Howard Zinn, Gore Vidal, Amy Goodman, Naomi Klein, Ralph Nader, Cornel West.. Without Real Time w/ Bill Maher - would you get to see and hear these individuals on television? No. Maybe on PBS on occasion. Maher introduces these powerful voices to the rest of the country and that’s extremely important. You’re not going to find that anywhere else on the television.

The guy was on Larry King Live the other night praising Ralph Nader, bashing the corporate two-party system, and spoke against the war. That reached thousands of viewers.

So he’s wrong and dishonest on a few issues, absolutely - but, his positives outweigh the negatives in my opinion.

Many liberal types like Maher think they’re really radical—-but they are really posers.

But on almost every other topic, I find him refreshingly honest and skeptical. It makes his gullibility on Israel all the more disappointing and inexplicable.

To me, it is the sharpest example of the dichotomy I have observed in many (mostly Jewish) progressives I know personally. A tiny minority of my circle voted for Bush, a healthy majority believe he is a lying mass-murderer, but many in the latter category, like Maher, seem to me to be so ignorant of the Arab-Israeli conflict. And, because I’m Jewish, it’s usually assumed that I’m on the same page. There seems to be this gigantic moral blindspot among these people regarding one issue only.

For example, on the question of Israel’s right to exist as a Jewish State, it is virtual heresy to doubt our right as American Jews to move to another side of the world and exercise superior rights over people who were born there but have the “wrong” ethnic background. There may be reasonable arguments to be made in favor of a Jewish State, but even to ask such questions is considered lunatic fringe.

Back to Maher. I think the guy is very impressive, but I do gag every time Israel comes up. What else can I say?

BTW, this bullshit about Israel’s “right to exist” is just that, bullshit. No state recognizes any other’s right to exist. Does the US recognize Iraq’s right to exist as it is turning that country into a balkanized slave/satellite state? Doubtful. People have rights to exist, states do not.

In a very telling part of the interview, Amy Goodman breaks with her reticence to talk about the 9/11 truth movement by asking Shenon his opinion about whether or not he thought that 9/11 “was an inside job”. She also mentioned that the fall of WTC 7 was not included in the Official Commission Report.

Shenon pauses briefly looking upwards toward his left, then spouts the argument that has become popular among those (including Noam Chomsky) who wish to dismiss the possibility. He said that he found it very difficult to believe that the government had the competence to pull off such an operation. He fails to mention Building 7, or its absence from the Commission Report.

Amazingly, and without, missing a beat– Goodman jumps to another question without probing his response at all. There is no follow-through, and the interview soon ends.

Having listened to the interview, is one supposed to conform to the idea that we were attacked because “they hate our freedom?”

Very curious, especially when government analysts are issuing renewed warnings of al- Qaeda attacks on the U.S. and elsewhere.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/sam-sedaei/deafening-silence-on-isra_b_66842.html