CIT "Happy to Oblige" when Asked to Provide "Gossip" to Future Author of Hit Piece Against the 9/11 Truth Movement

CIT "Happy to Oblige" when Asked to Provide "Gossip" to Future Author of Hit Piece Against the 9/11 Truth Movement

By Arabesque

Anyone who has even paid remote attention to the way that the Mainstream Media (MSM) portrays the 9/11 truth movement is sure to notice that it is portrayed in a certain way. Certain issues are ignored in favor of bogus theories and disinformation. A good example of this is exposed in Jim Hoffman's article, Popular Mechanics Attacks Its "9/11 LIES" Straw Man. Hit pieces that rely on attacking obviously suspect "theories" instead of addressing much of the compelling 9/11 evidence as mentioned by Jim Hoffman are frequently seen from the mainstream media. In another obvious attack piece smearing the 9/11 truth movement with the tactic known as "guilt by association", Nick Schou focuses on controversial 9/11 researcher/theorists Craig Ranke and Aldo Marquis. Ranke explains:

When he arrived at Aldo's residence, Nick seemed affable enough. From the beginning, he expressed his intention to focus on our personal back-stories and involvement with personalities within the 9/11 truth movement first in the article. He would get into the evidence later, he said.

What makes this hit piece particularly striking is the fact that it appears that Ranke and Marquis actively offered damaging "gossip" to this reporter. Ranke explains that:

We understood how some of this was necessary for an interesting article and were happy to oblige.

Source: thepentacon.com/NickSchou.htm

In other words, Ranke and Marquis willingly gave "gossip" to a reporter who proceeded to use this information in his hit piece:

Their relationship quickly soured. E-mails posted on conspiracy chat rooms show that what started as a professional disagreement about how to prove that the U.S. government was behind 9/11 had become a highly personal grudge match. Here's a typical e-mail from Ranke to Pickering:

"You are irrelevant, Pickering. . . . You can keep on sucking official
story dick, and we'll keep proving 9/11 was an inside job."

And from Pickering to Ranke: "You are a mentally ill little man, and
until you get some help, you always will be. A disgrace to truth . . . Fuck
yourself. . . . Fuck you."

Even more striking is that I could not find the comment from Pickering on any online sources apart from this article. This meant that it was directly provided to Schou by Ranke himself. Ranke acknowledged this saying that part of the private email exchange was posted online (it is unknown if it was done with permission by Ranke):

It's all right here (although I did take out the quote...)

Ranke admitted he did not publish the quote online, saying, "Schou wanted proof that Pickering really did quit the movement and spiral out of control so yes I forwarded him the exchange." Now, the obvious thing to do would have been to refuse to discuss 9/11 truth member "gossip" in the first place. After all, if CIT was sincerely interested in discussing their theory about what happened on 9/11, they should have stuck to their theory and nothing else. As Ranke explains:

However, despite our desire to delve into the evidence itself, Nick skillfully kept the conversation on a superficial level. In retrospect, his main interest did not seem to be the evidence, but rather juicy gossip or controversial quotes which, taken out of context, could be construed as outrageous claims on our part (with the release of his article, this has proven to have been the case).

Does Ranke think that the mainstream media is on the same side of the 9/11 truth movement and reports 9/11 information fairly? Does Ranke believe that by reporting this "gossip" to the reporter, that he would not cover it? That this information would reflect favorably on the 9/11 truth movement? Does Ranke believe that after the fact, he has the right to complain about a hit piece in which material that he provided was used against him? Apparently, the answer to the last question is "yes":

There can now be no question that Schou went into this article with an agenda and a clear desire to portray us a certain way. It's rather apparent he was unwilling to put in the necessary effort to validate, refute, or even understand the evidence and preferred to focus on gossip instead.

Apparently, Ranke could only figure out this was a hit piece in which a reporter was asking for "gossip" after the article was published. In fact, no one can force anyone to talk about something that they do not wish to discuss. Ranke admitted he was "happy to oblige" in reporting this gossip to this reporter. Clearly, this hit piece was a self-inflicted wound.