Joining us is david corn, the Washington Bureau chief of mother jones and an msnbc analyst, and quin hillyer, a senior Commentary Writer and editor for the Washington Examiner and contributing editor to the national online. They are here to talk to us about the 9 11 commemorations and the political news of the day. Good morning, gentlemen. Guest good morning. Guest good morning. Host what do you think about the commemorations for 9 11 yesterday and what you think the legacy of 9 11 is the United States . Guest those are two big questions. Let me start with the second. It is something ive been thinking a lot at mother jones and my newsletter. I think we can talk about political, psychological effects of having been attacked and americans feeling insecure. We saw what happened with tsa. If you had to boil it down, in retrospect, history will look at it this way. The biggest impact of that in terms of america were that we launched two relatively pointless wars that led to the deaths of thousands of american soldiers, but also hundreds of thousands of iraqi and afghanistan civilians. We went into afghanistan justifiably to root out the taliban and Al Qaeda, but we stayed there for 20 years, not really ever understanding the country, culture, politics or having any strew true strategic aim that could be accomplished. We have seen a look in the last few weeks what has happened with the withdraw and what we ended up with and is spending trillions of dollars of Taxpayer Money and thousands of lives of americans. In iraq, we went in without any clear idea of what to do once Saddam Hussein was booted out of office. George w. Bush spoke eloquently yesterday, and had no idea what to do once he got into iraq. He greased the way to war with misrepresentations and outright lies about saddam Husseins Relationship with Al Qaeda and the wmd program. We were there for years and it trickled a civil war and the rise of isis. And literally hundreds of thousands of iraqi civilians died in the aftermath of our invasion. Even now you could call it democracy in iraq. Two horrendous wars that led to the deaths of many for no obvious gain are the most lasting legacies of the terrible attacks of 9 11. Host quin, what did you think of the commemorations and what do you think was the legacy of 9 11 in the United States . Guest the commemorations were exactly what was due although frankly i saw some news networks spending an inordinate tomato time inordinate amount of time talking about what we got wrong afterwards. I have to take issue with almost Everything David has said, even though david has always made his case strongly. I would certainly take issue with the idea that afghanistan was something we never should have gone into in the first place. If you had said in the month after 9 11 that we should not go into afghanistan to knock out the taliban and Al Qaedas capability, 90 of the people in america or maybe 85 would say you are nuts. We went in and toppled the taliban and degraded Al Qaeda down to next to nothing. We made one big mistake by not going after Bin Laden when we probably couldve gotten him. But to say in retrospect that we should not have gone into afghanistan is just almost nuts. Guest that wasnt my point. I said it was justified to get the Taliban And Root out Al Qaeda. Im not disagreeing with that. What i am saying is we had no idea of what to do afterward. Great reporting the last couple of days about the possibility of a Peace Deal of some sort with the taliban after we had gotten Al Qaeda out and donald rumsfeld had no interest in doing that. For 20 years, longer than what you described, we had no idea what to do with 19. 5 of those 20 years. And that is the tragedy. Guest i would take issue with part of that. I think the last seven or eight years, we sort of had afghanistan i am one of the few that will not apply retroactive brilliance and assume we knew back then what we know now in terms of iraq. The majority of the american people wanted to go into iraq. The reason was we had every reason to believe that Saddam Hussein still had weapons of mass destruction. And if he did, now we know he did not have those capabilities in full measure like we thought he did. Had we not gone in and it turned out that he did, we would have been in a mess of trouble. It is not fair to say now we know and we should have known then. Host let me interrupt both of you here, because i dont want to get into a backandforth here. I have a few more questions i want to get you to react to you and i will let you talk to each other after that. What has been the legacy of 9 11 on u. S. Domestic policy and foreign policy . What changed . I will start with you first, quin. What changed because of 9 11 . Guest Domestic Policy and david and i will partly agree on this, domestically we have a much more intrusive government in terms of civil liberties. Some of it i would argue is necessary even though i hate it, like the lines at airports, tsa, etc. , but most of that is necessary. We cant allow hijackers to exert their will. But we also have sort of expanded the divisions and the reason for divisions in the country. The fact that we are still having this debate 20 years later shows the terrorists succeeded in at least one of their aims which was to destabilize us. That is not good. It is something we all as americans need to struggle with. There are really no good legacies of 9 11. There are good legacies of the response to it, in that yes we have that are capability to disrupt terrorist networks, we have better capability to protect the american homeland. But at what cost, that is the question. Host david, your response. Guest i agree that it led to in some ways greater division. Initially there was a rallying around the Flag And George w. Bush. But going back to the point you dont want us to debate, and i wrote a book with this, george w. Bush and Dick Cheney made a case in iraq that they knew were misrepresentations they made that biased the intelligence or misrepresented the intelligence and it turned out in the end they were wrong and prevent proven wrong. There was no connection with Al Qaeda and no meeting between the 9 11 hijackers as Dick Cheney implied and said over and over again. That led to once again a renewal of the Credibility Gap and a lot of people could not trust the President And Vice president. When George Bush ran for office again in 2004, about half of the country believed that he had lied knowingly to get us into the war. That led to a lot of polarizations and in some ways that we couldnt get together for the long run after 9 11, we do not study the world around us for what to do, and afghanistan , according to the spectral special specter general for afghanistan construction, things that were reported on a couple years ago said again that we did not understand policymakers and the Bush Administration, the Obama Administration and the Trump Administration did not understand the culture of afghanistan. One legacy here domestically is that we have had debates that have not been honest and debates that have not been predicated on information and facts and knowledge. That is a perfect set up for what we have seen during the trump years. Guest let me jump in. I have not wanted to interrupt like he interrupted me. It is just not fair to say that Bush And Cheney lied. There is a difference between having been information and telling a deliberate lie. Passing on information you believe to be true is a mistake. Host let him finish, david, and i will come back to you. Guest it is absolutely true that Saddam Hussein was harboring terrorists and maintaining terrorists ties. He was paying money to terrorists relatives as a sort of bounty for terrorist acts, so that if the people carrying out the terrorism were killed, their families would get paid. He was violating the sanctions regime, which was eroding because the food for Oil Gamble Scandal in europe. So europe support for inspections was going down. There was lots of stuff that gave us very good reason to go into iraq, and it was not a lie, even though the intelligence was fully even sitdowns own generals. The intelligence was bad but Saddam Hussein had a very, very extensive sort of false Flag Operation to make everybody , including his own generals, think that he did still have the wmds, which by the way were spirited to syria. Guest one example of a Dick Cheney lie. He said repeatedly that mohammed atta, who led the attack on us on 9 11, the key operator, had met with Saddams Intelligence people. That was the big connection. There was no such meeting. He was told repeatedly by the cia there was no credibility but he kept using it. Host let him finish. Guest the second point is in terms of weapons, we had weapons inspectors. They were still working on the job and finding nothing and guess what, they were right. There was no reason not to continue with those inspections for another couple of months or longer because they had the right answer. So bush and Dick Cheney decided to cut out the inspections. People can read my book and we go into all this in great detail. They made misrepresentations knowingly. I call that lying. Host at this point, let remind everyone that our viewers are going to take part in this conversation. We are going to open up our regular lines, which means democrats, you can call 202 7488000. Republicans, 202 7488001. Independents, your line is 202 7488002. You can always text us at 202 7488003. We are always reading on social media. We have been talking about what happened 20 years ago. Lets move the timeline up a little bit. We have seen a lot of people talk about a link between 9 11, 2001, and january 6, 2001. Do you see a link . Guest one link is flight 93 was possibly headed for the capital. I was on Capitol Hill that morning. I have always felt like i had a debt i cannot repay to the passengers and crewmembers of flight 93 because they might have saved a lot of lives. Yet the capitol was not protected and the threat was not from outside the country. The threat was domestic terrorists from inside the country who were revved up and incited by Donald Trumps big lie. I just watched yesterday, not because it was 9 11 but it was appropriate. I did this on 9 11. The New York times day of rage video, which is made up of thousands of videos showing exactly what happened. The amount of Hatred And Violence and venom that was whipped up by Donald Trump, rudy giuliani and many others over the course of weeks and months to convince everyone the election was stolen, that there were great conspiracies, that the Qanon Conspiracy was right and white nationalists doing white supremacy and beating the cops with flags and gates and spraying them. You can tell i am still upset about it. As we talked about earlier, the divisions the political and domestic divisions that were prompt after 9 11, have led us to this now, where one part of the political world believes is believes bizarre conspiracy theories that have no basis and not only believing them but acting out on them as violent domestic terrorists trying to stop a constitutional procedure. In some ways it is far more , threatening to the Body Politic of the United States than the awful attack of 9 11. Host quin, do you see any link between 9 11 and january 6 . Guest no, i dont. I come down very hard on the insurrectionists and the sort of sheepish followers of the insurrectionists, but they were not terrorists. They were not trying to destroy the whole society. This was not terrorism and was not domestic terrorism, but i do leave it was, at least among 100 or 200 of them, it was an attempt of insurrection and was absolutely irresponsible. It was borderline traitorous. Conservatives who try to make the case that this was just a protest and a lot of those were good people, that is not right. You do not swarm the capitol and do the things they did and say it was a protest that got out of hand. As god awful as it was, there is a difference between that and terrorism. I do not think it is remotely fair to connect it. Host lets let some of our viewers take part in the conversation. Lets start with mike, calling from reston, virginia on the democratic line. Good morning. Caller good morning. We always turn a blind eye. For saudi arabia, where the 15 terrorists who attacked our country were saudi nationals. Saddam never took one american. But we should have done, go to afghanistan, never go to iraq. I blame cheney for going there and destroying that country and letting iran take over syria. And lebanon, we never did anything about it. Talking about terrorists in iraq, saddam was a secularist. If someone grew a beard he would send them home to shave it. You are talking, mr. Quin, about palestinians objecting to the occupation in israel. You are conflicting things. They did. They did it they did it for business. Look what is happening in iraq. The country disintegrated. It is gone, finished. Syria is finished because we opened the door for iran to sponsor these terrorists in yemen, iraq, and syria. I dont want to hear about republicans always defending Cheneys Decision to go to war in iraq. Host i will let you respond first, quin. Guest we did not kill a million iraqis. The handling of iraq is different than the decision to go into iraq. If we had taken the advice of mccain and gone in the right way and had not completely eroded the middle rank of experienced government, we wouldve had a lot better results but be that as it may, i do want to say we werent just going in there for links to 9 11. We were going and because iraq had ties to terrorists and he was dangerous. He was harboring them and giving the bounties to the terrorist families. And he absolutely did have weapons of mass destruction at one point and did not show definitively he had gotten rid of them. Hindsight is 20 20, but our reasons for going in were justifiable for everything we knew at the time. Host david, anything to add to that . Guest i will just say that while we didnt kill them directly, utterly hundreds of thousands of iraqi civilians died in the ensuing violence triggered by our invasion. We talk about in the book that george w. Bush went in. He had no plan and no idea what to do after the initial invasion and the dethroning of Saddam Hussein. If youre going to go into a country and turn it upside down and you are not thinking about what youre going to do afterwards, your response will for that. I do not care if Mccain Or Anyone else had plans out there. Dick cheney and george w. Bush didnt. They are responsible for the consequences of their actions. Americans are responsible for voting this people into office. They chose not to prepare adequately for what would come after that invasion and hundreds of thousands of iraqis paid for that arrogance with their lives. Host lets talk to arnold, who is calling in from tennessee on the republican line. Caller good morning. I thought i dialed on the democratic line. I am a democrat. Can i still go ahead and speak . Host i will let you go this time. Caller i did dial 8000. It is 8000 for the democrats . Host go ahead. Caller i want to share, the last segment was about the result of 9 11. There is a documentary on youtube and it was free and made by the firefighters of New York city. It is called calling out bravo seven the 2020 edition. You can watch it and this will greatly bring about the legacy of 9 11, which will be Truth And Justice for all. The last time i called in last month, i recited the first verse of the poem by kipling called the gods of the copybook headings. I wont to recite it now. It is a very long poem. It is also on youtube and online. Calling out bravo seven, the 2020 edition made by the firefighters in New York city. You need to listen or read this poem and also watch this documentary. Just one other point, there is a poem called the countdown, by Sofia Snow that is about 9 11. This poem won an international Poetry Contest of the whole world. This poem came in first place. It is called the countdown, by Sofia Snow. Host lets go to another call. Lets go to luke who is calling from New York on the independent line. Luke, good morning. Caller good morning. The legacy of 9 11 is the belief that america is strong, no matter what political group. When it comes to the homeland we always come together. I witnessed that. The problem with the afghan war is the resources that went to large corporations. All of the big, large profits. They didnt go to paying down our u. S. National debt. It went into billionaires pockets, the top 500 companies in the world. I think from now on if we go to war, the spoils of those wars could go to paying down National Debt like it used to. Now with the corporate greed controlling everything from the media on, it is unfair to the american people. That is what is really causing a lot of discourse in our political system is that we are lobbied to keep all of the corporate power in power. Host let me let you respond first, david, and then you, quin. Guest what we are seeing with the end of the afghan war is we spent spent trillions of dollars and at the end of the day we didnt get anything. We did keep the taliban at bay for some of those years, but there were tremendous reports of rampant and vast corruption in the spending of money in afghanistan, spending american money for aid for reconstruction. It shows to me that throwing money at national security as we often do certainly benefits the corporations but is not the smart thing to do strategically and does not always give us results and of course takes money away from other things we could be doing as a country in terms of education, addressing climate change, whatever your favorite thing is. One lesson in the afghan war is we have been really stupid and in how we spend our money and there are some big corporations and contractors that did benefit from that. Host quin, what do you think . Guest well, there was clearly corruption in afghanistan. We also had, for about seven years, reached a fairly good stasis for 10,000 or fewer troops. We had intelligence into terrorists on the ground, capability to deter it. We kept at least the taliban at bay. We had bagram Air Base, which was an extremely valuable Air Base, not just for internal afghanistans, but it gave us deployment capability that could help deter bad action from Russia And China. It was a very, very valuable Air Base there. We now have lost the Air Base. We have lost the on the Ground Intelligence capabilities. Weve had the taliban completely overrun the country. The afghanistan study group, which was one of the true bipartisan groups that was respected across the board, came out with its report in february, and they said, if we pulled out instead of maintaining a 5,000troop force, then it said the taliban would quickly overrun the country, and it said within 18 to 36 months, it was not just possible, but likely that they would have been able to reconstitute, that Al Qaeda would be able to reconstitute enough to attack the u. S. Homeland. Thats 18 to 36 months from now. We could have another 9 11, because of the way we cut and run in afghanistan. We have opened up the pandoras box, and had we stayed there at relatively minor cost, we could have avoided that you now we might reap it. Host I Cant have you two on this show and not talk about the things that are going on in american politics right now. I want to get both of you to comment on President Biden ordering new Vaccine Mandates around the country. First, lets see what President Biden said on thursday as he moved towards these new Vaccine Mandates. Heres what President Biden said. President biden so tonight, im announcing that the department of labor is developing an Emergency Rule to require all employers with 100 or more employees that together employ over 80 million workers to ensure their workforces are fully vaccinated or show a negative test at least once a week. Some of the biggest companies are already requiring this. United airlines, disney, tysons food, and even Fox News. The bottom line, were going to protect vaccinated workers from unvaccinated coworkers. Were going to reduce the spread of covid19 by increasing the share of the workforce that is vaccinated in businesses all across america. Host first of all, quin, what do you think about President Bidens Vaccine Mandate and the threat from g. O. P. Governors to sue over the mandate . Guest well, you will not find many conservatives stronger than i am in favor of vaccines, stronger than i am in saying that this pandemic really is bad and it is still raging, and that we need to have some aggressive strategies, and yet to go to the Vaccine Mandate the way that biden did it is absolutely appalling. How do you force a company of 105 workers to get all of its workers vaccinated and punish the company if the workers refuse to get vaccinated . That makes absolutely no sense. I know companies that have offered cash rewards to workers if they will get vaccinated and the workers still turn it down. If the workers turn it down, how do you put a 14,000 fine on the company because the workers refuse . It is absolutely impractical, and it is a violation of all sorts of restrictions on executive power. It is almost certainly unconstitutional. It is exactly the wrong way to go, and i say that as a very provaccine person, but this is an absolutely appalling order. It is creeping authoritarianism, and it has to be stopped. Host david, do you agree . Guest surprisingly, no. I think its said weve got to come to the point where we need mandates, because there has been a push, not from quin, but some conservatives, and we see this on Fox News so not have the vaccines, to raise questions about the authentic isity, the sincerity of people like that, and to promote all sorts of conspiracy theories about the vaccines. And so we have this tremendous hesitancy, a lot of it is politically motivated. On the constitutional point, all you have to do is just read the coverage the last few days. There are plenty of legal scholars who say, no its not obviously unconstitutional. It is constitutional. So that is a debate that will be taken up, but its not a slam dunk, but not in the lyse, and if we look at the nature of mandates, you know, whether the president has the authority or not, you cant sudden your kid to a public school without having a mandate to have many, many vaccinations. I cant, we cant get the economy moving, we cant get this country moving again until we stop the transmission and do something about this pandemic before it new dates again from delta to the next one that may be worse. So i think at this point in the game, mandates are unnecessarily necessary. Unfortunately necessary. And that there will be a fight about this, and the fight is happening because we as a country could not come together on some agreed upon facts such as the pandemic being serious and public health measures and expertise needing to be heeded. That goes back again to Donald Trump, yeah, hes been vaccinated, but he hasnt been out there encouraging people to be vaccinated, and he spent a year and a half telling people that this was largely a democratic hoax, you didnt need to wear a mask, we can open up, and all these things that really set the foundation for this country not being able to come up with a response, voluntary response, a civic Community Type of response that would have helped us smother this he he will dick, this pandemic at a much smother this epidemic, this pandemic at a much earlier stage. Guest you didnt say about the decision of the workers. Host we cant hear when you you both talk at the same time, so well let david speak first, then you, quin. Guest no, let quin finish the question. Guest if the mandate is on the business, but the workers refuse to get the vaccine, is the business supposed to fire the workers . How does that help the workers . Unless, of course, you keep paying them extraordinary amounts not to work. Guest i believe the taxpayers money. Either way, it doesnt get the people vaccinated, and it puts the onus on the business when its not the business fault. Guest well, i believe part of the rule will be if people dont get vaccinated, then you have to have very robust and regular testing. That businesses try and they cant, then they have to have a testing regimen, which is put in place to protect the vaccinated workers. This is a labor protection measure, so people go to work, they dont have to fear that theyre surrounded by people who pass them the virus. And thats the if people arent going to take the vaccination, theyre threatened with national Football League or whatever penalty might be on the worker, then you have to test the worker very rigorously to keep that person separate. But i do believe businesses have the right, if they know that youre infected with something, they can tell you to stay home, and if you dont do what is necessary in order to come to work in a safe way, businesses do have a right to fire you. Host all right, lets get some of our viewers into the conversation much lets start with a caller from lees summit, missouri, on the republican line. Good morning. Caller good morning. Host go ahead. Caller ok, thank you. How would you like me to address this question . I do not want to elongate what youre trying to address. Host just go ahead and ask your question. Caller ok. When it comes to the vaccinations, there has to be a Stop Prevention for many, many reasons. We have immigration coming into this country, and we have always made sure to ensure their health, because locations that come from people here dont have immunities for, havent been vaccinated, just for location. And as immigrants come in, historically always have, we try, the medical community tries, and im in the middle of that ongoing, as well as being from a very strong military background. So, yes, many people dont realize we have skipped an entire virus area. We have vaccinated against what is considered a and b vaccinations since we were hit with what was called the spanish influenza. Since then, it has been a push against polio. F. D. R. Himself, he was behind a lot of that. And its still ongoing, except the viral strain has mutated so fast, we skipped from a and b, and forget c, were d. We knew it was coming. Everybody in the medical field were on high alert, embraced before we ever had cases reporting coming in. I asked one question from one of my best friends for over 40 years that grew up in queens, basically. Host can you get to your question really quickly for us . Caller shes on a fema team. She had to respond to ground zero to have to identify the remains. That hit her so hard, and shes still in medicine today. So I Cant see too much about that, that she is constantly in the same predicament. She has to get vaccinated, even at risk to herself, when we had someone thats bringing the district I Cant virus through our area, and were considered insignificant flyover states where i am, she had to. As an emergency room responder. To see this person in the hospital didnt have the equipment required to even so she put host david, we dont want to take up all of our time, so why dont you go ahead and respond to what she was talking about there, david . Guest im not quite sure what question she was driving at. Im happy to move on. Host quin, anything you want to add to what she was saying . Guest i think she was talking about how important it was to get vaccinated, and i would agree, and that is a message we can join in right center and left if youre responsible, you will indeed join in push forgo people to get vaccinated because it works. Host lets go to deb free roswell, New Mexico october independent line. Debbie, good morning. Caller good morning. You put 9 11, because when i turned this on, i seen david corn on, at first i thought you might have been talking about what we did in 9 11, but i guess we dont want to talk about what we did. Anyway, my question for you, Mre Door for the foundation of the government telling lies to the people and the mega phone that they use by leaking to the New York times, i think it was Judith Miller who would print something and then cheney would repeat it as if it was gospel, and it has just accelerated over the last 20 years to where now how do you find out the truth about anything when our news we used to depend on is nothing but lies and conspiracies and it makes it much more difficult. So i think the tragedy of 9 11 is not so much the deaths, but the Death Behalf we did to the news and telling the truth. I think thats our biggest legacy that nobody knows what the truth is anymore. Host go ahead and respond there, david. Guest i think thats a good point. I would not say that you Cant Trust Anything from the news now. I do think if you look at the runup to the war in iraq, lot of reporters were repeating things that they were not as if they were true, and it created a false foundation for the war, and people were cynical about that afterwards. Its something ive written about. But if you look at whats happening today in which you have you had a president for years say the News Media is fake and you cant believe it, it leads to people not believing it when they put out reports about the need and the necessity and the efficacy of the vaccinations. There are people out there who the president says, you know, expresident , says you cant believe them, you did not believe the media or dr. Fauci or anybody else now. And so we dont have the means by which to have a communal conversation on agreedupon facts, then we as a country cannot really handle a wide a. So of of crises that face us, beyond the pandemic. But i do believe that a discerning individual can look at whats being reported in different media outlets, but it takes a lot of work to come up with a semblance of what is accurate, what is not accurate, who has the better record of telling the truth. But if we take our information according to tribalism and fall into cults of Personality And Belief that the media is all fake and the enemy of the people, then were in trouble because if you dont have agreedupon facts, you cant have an honest Policy Debate about what we should do. Host quin, impact on the media . Guest i would agree actual well most of what david said. I would say, and this could be an entire hourslong debate, media ethics have definitely gone in the tank. Media bias, including things that purport to be straight news, has gotten absolutely out of hand, and the Media News to get back to oldfashioned objective reporting, and it is really falling down on the job. But that said, it is absurd, on the other hand, to say that everything out there is a lie, to say that we cant agree on facts, to say that there are no facts rather than just pure opinion. Theres got to be a happy medium, and toward that happy medium, most of what david said is right. We do need to get back to a semblance of agreedupon facts, and it is still possible, even in this Media Environment for a discerning individual to do so. Guest if i can add one point, you look at what Donald Trump has done, and quin, im interested in what you say about this. On the conservative side of the aisle, according to the Washington Post, hes made over 30,000 misrepresentations, sometimes outright lies, when he was in the office of the presidency. He has gotten throughout again and again and pushed conspiracy theories, whether its birtherrism or the deep state being out to get him. Hes really basically told his most loyal followers in the republican party, dont Trust Anything you see in the media on fox, trust what i say, and then he says things that are demonstrably not true. I think thats had a real impact on what i would call the conservative political culture. It makes it harder for to us get to that point, because i think quin and i both like to see where we cannot debate whether the sky is blue or not, but debate what to do about the sky. Host quin, your response . Guest my response is what he says about trump is absolutely right. He lies more than hillyer and i bill clinton put together, which is saying something, because they were and are two invet rate liars. We do need to get back to something, to a situation where we can agree on basic facts, and that was one of the reasons, one of the many things that made Donald Trump a blight on both the country and on the conservative side. Is he regularly, regularly lied and then said believe me and dont believe anybody else. But it is not fair to say that some of the same stuff did not go on on the left, it goes on both sides. Trump was just a master at it. But i have catalogued hundreds and hundreds of hundreds of examples of people on the left doing the same thing. They just didnt have as big a mega phone as Donald Trump. Host lets talk to a few more viewers, chris from the democrats line from california. Caller good morning. You hear he . Host we can. Go ahead, chris. Caller i hold the opinion our invasion of iraq was actually a Bush Family Vendetta against the hussein family. Host all right. Quin, i saw a little laugh from you there. Quin, go ahead and respond to that. Guest well, its tough to get in the W Psychology on that. But since ive got the chance, let me just say one other benefit that came from iraq is that it scared good after Knee Libya into cooperating with us for about 10 years, turning over all his weaponry, stopping his nuclear program, which was much farther along than we thought, and turning over the keys to the nuclear network, which was very, very devastating and was very close to being operational. So that was a benefit from us going into iraq, and it was specifically because, quote froi somewhat they did and it scared me. Guest Theres Nothing compared to the thousands of american lives that were lost from this. But yeah, you can say that he missed with libya, but the end of the day, americans did not bear the cost of that war for the most part. It was the iraqi civilian who is lost hundreds of thousands of their loved ones, and if americans wanted to go through that type of sacrifice to have a foreign Policy Game like the one quin just described, we can have an honest debate about that. Host lets talk to jerry, whos calling from minnesota on the republican line. Jerry, good morning. Caller good morning. I would say about the afghanistan war, we dont know yet what will happen. It will depend on when the inevitable attack comes. It will either be some virus like the China Virus that was released, or maybe a nuclear weapon. When that day comes, then well know whether or not the 20 years in afghanistan was worth it. Secondly, david, when you say you despise all the lying of trump and all that, you didnt make it five minutes into the show before you lied. You said i never interrupted you, but i watched you. You interrupted him twice. Guest i dont believe i said i never interrupted quin. Host yeah, go ahead and respond. Guest you can go back play the tape. Did i say i never interrupted you . I think i interrupted you once, and then i let you go first. So i mean, if thats really the best case this caller can make, im happy to let the jury decide. Host anything to add there, quin . Guest david did interrupt me. I did not hear him say that he did not interrupt me. David is a consummate gentleman, so i am not going to hold that against him. Two minutes later, i interrupted him without realizing it. But back to the point of afghanistan. I really wish everybody would go back and read the afghanistan study report, the bipartisan commission that republicans, democrats both pointed and were very happy with. And then having read that report, decide whether or not we did by getting out of afghanistan was the right thing. Host gentlemen, before january 6, most of us would have said washington, d. C. Can handle any type of protest, any type of march, any type of demonstration. But now we have this september 18 rally coming up, and we see people in congress talking about putting up fences again and police getting ready to mobilize. Are you concerned about anything thats going happen on september 18, and are we reacting in congress properly . You first, quin. Guest there is any violence on september 18, if these protests that happen then turn into any sort of violent attack, every single person involved in the violence should be arrested, prosecuted to the full extent of the law, it is absolutely right to defend the capitol in every way that we can within constitutional limits, and this idea that because you dont like something you go and riot, its wrong on the right, its wrong on the left. I wish the left would call out their own the way that i just called out the right. But either way, this thing has to stay peaceful. Host david . Guest i will say that all political protests should be nonviolent on the left and right. If people on the left do it, thats not going help their case. So there you go, i agree wow that, quin. As i mentioned earlier in the show, i worked my office, when i worked at the Nation Magazine was on Capitol Hill for many years. I spent a good part of my life up there. And it really sanded notice see what happened on january 6. But then in the aftermath, have to walk around up there, it looked like a Garrison State with all the fencing up. So i think this time around, this time around, Theres Plenty of warning in that the Capitol Hill officers, the police in washington, d. C. , national guard troops, theyll be available, can really prepare for this. I also think that the guy running this, who was last seen giving out analysis that was false, that the election had been stolen by Donald Trump. He claimed to be a data analyst, is not necessarily the type of person whos capable of bringing thousands and thousands and thousands of people to the capitol for a protest on a saturday. So my hunching is this is not going to be anything close to the size of january 6, and that the Law Enforcement Community will be able to have it well under control, and that even people on the paranoid far right, which fueled the january 6 attack, a lot of them are saying stay away, this is a false Flag Operation, this is meant to entrap us to bring includes to arrest us and throw us into jail. So the paranoia of these extremists may make this day safer. Guest i hope hes right. Host im sorry, we didnt hear you, quin. Say that again. Guest i said i hope david is right. Host all right. Were getting a lot of agreement here in the last few minutes of the hour. Lets see if we can get a couple of calls in. Lets talk to trent, whos calling from louisiana on the independent line. Trent, good morning. Caller hi, guys. What an honor to talk to both of you, the guide from the left and right i respect. Im a man of the right, but all my life, im in my mid 60s, and when i was younger, it was the left guys that were saying, my leftwing saying there was a Ruling Class. In the last 20 years, because of thinkers like Samuel Francis and gary north, and i got to have howard phillips well, and he said that i just had to admit it at the end of my life. I think there is a conspiracy. Id like to know what both of you think about your definition of the Ruling Class managerial lead, and then one last thought about paul. You guys dont remember, he was one of the few right guys, and square north told me a story that David Rockefeller asked him to come have lunch with him in New York city, and goat there, and they had a long lunch, and David Rockefeller said, paul, is there anyone who can stop our globalist agenda, and he said, yeah, the religious right and the hard money guys. So anyway, thats a true story. Id like to know what you think about the Ruling Class managerial elite. Thank you. Host well start with you, david. Guest well, i think you can define that in many different ways. Donald trump defined it as a deep state that i thought was highly conspiratorial that didnt really exist. I do think that to some degree and let right can sometimes agree that big Money Interests in the american political system unduly influence decision making within the political realm, and that to me its highly, highly unfair that an individual or a corporation can flood a candidate, a campaign, can run a campaign for a candidate, with millions and millions of dollars, and skew the Playing Field while you and I Cant do that. Ive always thought that, you know, a lot of countries do this, england, i think israel does this, whether its public financing of campaigns. So whatever a candidate is saying, you can believe that he or she is saying it, you know, because they believe it or because they think it will get them elected. But not to keep a big Money Interest happy. I hope that we can move in that direction. There are constitutional issues. Its very difficult, but i do think youre concerned about managerial elite, the question there is always money, money, money. So finding a way to diminish, if not remove the impact of big money on american politics is something that would address that concern on the left and the right. Host quin, the Ruling Elite . Guest the Ruling Elite, there is something to be said for the idea and the fear of that, i think on both sides, people get Conspiracy Theoryminded, and they overplay it. But theyre on the left as well, academia, big media, the tech giants, etc. , etc. , its there on the left, its there on the right, but to say that theres some sort of cabal that is controlling everything on either left or right is going overboard. We are still individual americans. We still have lots of freedom. And again, i just think we need moderation in a lot of ways, including how we look at questions like the managerial elite. There is such a thing. It is not all powerful, but it is probably too powerful than it should be. Host lets go to pat whos calling from New York, New York, on the democratic line. Good morning. Caller yes, hi. Im calling from actually ground zero, and i just would like to agree with both of these gentlemen it seems to be if the left does not like what you have to say, they call you a conspiracy theorist, if the right doesnt like what you have to say they call you news. I have not heard either of these establishment, i dont know clowns, talk about 9 11 in the context of what wesley clark, who was the Nato Secretarygeneral said many times he testified and i guess this would be in the category of as fact. He would be an authoritative position to know. He said the week after 9 11 at the pentagon he was told that we would be attacking iraq, we would be taking countries in the middle East Region five years. We know about the project for a new american century, you can look up clean Break Strategy for securing the realm. These are documents that play out the plan of what has been going on in the middle east, the destruction of these countries and the renovation of their borders, these are established fact. And then you have their main newspaper had articles more than once about this company that was an instant Message Company that got messages two hours before the Trade Center was going to happen. Is that a conspiracy if it comes out of their . That the legacy of all of this, we are at war for israel and if theres another false flag it means we go and finish up the seven countries in five years and attack iran. What do you think host what do you think . Guest i think to say we are at war with israel borders on antisemitism and i will say that that. I wouldnt call it antisemitism. I dont agree with the premise. She did not mention that is indeed a fact is that the day or two after 9 11 there were people at the pentagon including Paul Wolfowitz and others who had wrongfully advocated attacking Saddam Hussein and overthrowing his merging militarily who said basically we should do this and that should be the number one thing to do even before afghanistan. There was a part of the neoconservative agenda to overthrow Saddam Hussein with force. Unfortunately this on 9 11 is there chance to do that. Host we would like to thank david and for being here and talking to us about current politics and the legacy of 9 11. Gentlemen, i enjoyed this. Thank you for being with us this morning. Thank you. Host coming up next we will go back to talk to you again about the legacy of 9 11. You see the numbers on screen. We are waiting for your telephone [captions copyright national Cable Satellite Corp. 2021] [captioning performed by the national captioning institute, which is responsible for its Caption Content and accuracy. Visit ncicap. Org] tonight on q hyundai, jessica was the chief engineer of the historic Fire Boat John Jay Harvey on september 11 windows called back into service to aid firefighters following the attack on the twin towers. She talks about the community of mariners who came to the rescue of thousands. Had delivered nearly half a million people to safety. It is an incredible example of the goodness of people, when youre given the opportunity to help, you have the tools and the skill set. You have the availability. People made the choice to put themselves in Harms Way for the sake of fellow humans. That is instructive and something we need to continue to remember. Just cut along, tonight at 8 00 eastern on cspan q a. You can also find q a interviews where you get your podcasts. This week on the Cspan Networks, Antony Blinken testified before two committees on the withdrawal from afghanistan. The hearings begin at 2 00 p. M. Eastern. The secretary will also speak at 2 00 tuesday eastern. Dental a. M. Eastern, the Fbis Handling of the investigation into a larry nassar, convicted sex offender. Watch on the Cspan Network or listen on the cspan radio app. Head over to cspan. Org for Scheduling Information or to stream video live or ondemand anytime. Cspan, your unfiltered view of government. Washington journal continues. Us. Host we are talking about the legacy of 9 11. We want to hear what you think the legacy of the attacks on 9 11 were and what you were doing that day. I want to go to a pole from gallup the talks about how the attacks on 9 11 affected the United States. 20 years after the 9 11 Terror Attacks, a record high 64 of u. S. Adults changed the way americans lived because of those attacks. At least one in four americans say they personally have permanently changed the way they lived and a substantial minority continues to express apprehension about flying, going into skyscrapers and overseas travel. The data largely collected prior to the taliban takeover of handstand and before the u. S. Terror attack the Terror Attack on u. S. Troops there. True likewise, confidence in the u. S. Government to protect its citizens from terrorism was nearly two decade low. Concerned about being a terror victim was lower than in the past although that may have changed in recent days. This comes from a Gallup Pole showing americans are concerned about terrorism and how change their lives. Earlier this summer, cspan talks to members of congress about how and what their experiences were on 9 11. One of them was michigan republican peter myers, now a Freshman Member of congress. He was only 13 when the attacks occurred. Here is his story. In 9 11 i was in middle school. I remember walking between two classes and i had to go and grab some books out of my locker. The person of the locker next to me said a plane it at the world Trade Center. I had been very interested in international terrorism, especially after the Uss Cole attack. Id been aware of the kidnapping of group of hikers in central asia, i think it was Al Qaeda a few years before. So the first thought that came to my mind was this was osama Bin Laden. He tried to attack in 1993 and he came back to finish the job. It was a weird day. We were a world away from New York in many senses, but i had colleagues and classmates whose parents were pilots or flight attendants. They were desperate to get a hold of their parents and understand if their parents made been involved in one of those planes. I of their colleagues who had family members who work New York and the financial services sector. Its a very tense day. And a challenging day for the teachers to balance between showing what was happening was unfolding and at the same time potentially traumatizing students or trying to strike the right balance. I do remember when they sent us home from school later that day, i had the Sin Team Instinct to go home and print out on my computer at home and eight and a half by 11 american flag and put it up in the window. It was definitely a startling day and a reminder or at least a lesson for someone that young that things a world away can have strong impacts back at home. Host i want to remind you of the timeline of how events happened on september 11, 2001. At 8 46 a. M. Was one american flight 11 struck the North Tower of world Trade Center. United flight 175 struck the South Tower 9 0 3 00 a. M. At 9 37 a. M. , american flight 77 hit the pentagon. Ed 9 59 a. M. Was the collapse of the South Tower. At 10 03, United Flight 93 crashed in pennsylvania and at 10 28 a. M. , september 11, 2001, of the North Tower of the world Trade Center collapsed. We want to know what you think is the legacy of the 9 11 attacks on the United States. Dawson is calling from st. Augustine, florida on the republican line. Good morning. Guest good Morning Caller good morning. At that time i was in nice. I was with my grandma in the islands and my mom was about to go back to the embassy because she was sorting out our paperwork and then closed the embassy. When they closed the embassy she called me and told me we arent going anywhere anytime soon. She called the school and told me to go home. After that i went home and i saw it on tv i think the legacy of 9 11 should be that we must never forget what is out there that is jealous of america and of its people and our way of life. We must never forget that. Thats how i feel that should be the legacy. Lets talk to christine from middleborough, massachusetts on the democratic line. Caller i wanted to say i am a lifelong liberal, im 69 years old. Absolutely not in antivaxxers. With that being said i do have family that have been harmed by vaccines, a grandchildren with seizures and one permanently deaf in one ear. So what im calling to say is there really does need to be more scrutiny to the vaccine industrial complex and i dont want people to be afraid of what im saying. Remember, it is the experts, the doctors, scientists, the pharmacologists that gave us the opioid pandemic. Host we are talking about 9 11 right now. Do you have anything to say about the legacy of 9 11 . Caller please let me finish. Host lets go to joe who is calling from prichard, West Virginia on the democrat line. Good morning. Caller good morning. The legacy of 9 11 in my opinion is we understand at least 2 trillion and possibly as much trillion dollars was expended. Numerous american lives, disabilities. It created a vacuum to allow the tech companies to change america forever by going to globalization. 12 million jobs, numerous unemployment, what are five children hungry, poverty at record levels. Wagers at record lows wages at record lows. It distracted americans so the rich, the elite are two other guests just talked about could redirect the wealth of america away from the working men and women. Those people in iraq and afghanistan, they dont theyve been killing each other for over 1700 years basically because of one verse in the koran of who succeeded the prophet muhammad. For us to go to war for something like that was pure idiocy on both the democrats and the republicans watch. Host lets go to morgan calling from nashville, tennessee on the independent line. Good morning. Caller im calling about an experience i had february of 2001 that every year on 9 11 haunts me. I spontaneously, it was a very cold winter in tennessee in 2001 and february i spontaneously made a reservation to go to Fort Lauderdale and i was looking for the cheapest hotel possible, i found a little Family Place on the beach that i could afford and on the second day i was on the beach and there were three guys and i was stunned by these three guys, there wasnt anybody else except another couple and i on that little beach. These three guys, i could not figure out what they were doing. They were definitely not tourists and they were certainly not business guys. And they were middle eastern, there is doubt about that. For three days they were there. And they spent all day the fourth day i was at the desk waiting to go to the desk to speak to the desk and they were at the desk, their leader guy. It was obviously a leader. The other two, he was irritating the leader guy. I get to the desk and they are there. He is saying he is talking to them. They leave and i go to the desk and i say are they leaving and the owner says yes. They wanted to stay for a month and i told them it was impossible. Someone 9 11 when they showed the picture of the hijackers, three of them were the guys i was on that beach with. And the irony of it all is the guy in the blue shirt, he had that shirt on every day at the beach. I questioned myself who are these guys and why are they here because it makes no sense. My question is if lowly little me could question their presence , visible to everybody in Fort Lauderdale for some time, what was the government doing . Host lets go to mary calling from philadelphia, pennsylvania on the democrat line. Good morning. Caller good morning cspan. What happened on 9 11, we have to make sure this never happens again. We have the Security Apparatus in place with the intelligence agencies, we have i think 17 now. All the data goes to them, we have to make sure we hold them accountable, they are all looking at the same information, hundreds of thousands of employees that secure our systems. And we have the general public is required by law to use everify. And because this never happened during the 9 11 attacks, we have to make sure we hold everyone accountable at this point, if you are a Learning Institution and failed to report that someone dropped out of college based on them coming from another country, then that needs to be reported. On our database. Everything is secure now. We integrated our intelligence agencies, our satellite systems under president reagan. If people fail to use it, then they also need to be held accountable, we know who is looking at the information and failing to act when these government agencies are in place thinking that it is not under their jurisdiction, it is under everyones jurisdiction. Host lets go to rebecca calling from california on the independent line. Good morning. Caller good morning everyone. I feel the legacy is the patriot act. Everything changed and it did start with i patriot act. But there is another legacy attached that i would like to mention. The night before there was a big concert at madison square garden and it was Michael Jackson and they were doing the billie jean anniversary. The next day a lot of people did not go to work, they did not go to the city. Michael jackson, part of his legacy, he saved lives that day. Because of that concert, people for whatever reason did not get up to go to work the next day and save their lives. I would like to give kudos to Michael Jackson because that concert did definitely make a difference. Host like many people, congress was inside the u. S. Capitol on 9 11 and had to be evacuated during the attack. Congress did return back to the capital on that day to stand on the capitol steps. Here is a video from the evening of september 11 2001 when congress returned to the u. S. Capitol for a moment of silence, a moment followed by members spontaneously singing god bless america. We know as a nation, our thoughts and prayers are with those families and injured in those who are the casualties of todays attack. We also remember those thousands of people who are rescue workers, we ask now we all bow our heads in a moment of silence in remembrance. Thank you. Land that i love. Stand beside her and guide her through the night with a light from above. From the mountains to the prairies to the oceans white with Foam God bless america my home sweet home. God bless america, my home sweet home [applause] host lets go to jean calling from jackson michigan. Caller good morning. I was sure after that attack that we would retaliate and make them pay for what they did. But through the 80s and 90s, china always said the u. S. Was a Paper Tiger and this proved it. We want people to like us and respect us, you can make them like us or respect us. But you sure can make them fear us. They fear Russia And China and you never see an attack like that on russia because they would retaliate instantly, and they knew that the bigger attack they made on the u. S. The less chance we would retaliate. We have to change our way of thinking. I dont care if they respect us or dont like us, but i want them to fear us. When they install that fear, nothing like this will happen again. Lets go to Doris Whos calling on the independent line. Good morning. I just wanted to say i think it is weird than that on the day of 9 11, bush was sitting in a classroom. If there was a national terrorist emergency being announced, wouldnt you tell the families and students to go home because you dont know where its going to go or where they are going to attack. So unless he knew where was going to go he wouldnt have stayed there. You can just Jet Fuel cannot burn steel buildings. Its not possible. Also the pentagon was considered a catchers mitt. It was supposed to sustain bomb blasts and there were no pieces of the plane founded the pentagon. There so many pieces that connect the 911 being an inside job. Host lets go to jeff calling from pacific city, oregon. Good morning. Caller i agree with the last lady, theres a lot to look into here. Building seven first of all and basically if you want to go with what happened here host lets go to brian calling from portsmouth, ohio on the independent line. Caller i was living in the Pensacola Area at the time. I had worked to previous shift and i like to sleep with the tv on. I could just barely hear it. My mom called and said look at the tv. At the time i was in the marine corps reserves. I looked at it and said some unfortunate accident, probably a Tourist Helicopter or something. The second aircraft flew into it and there was a very distinguishable aircraft of commercial size. I told her then i knew we were going to be in serious trouble. Within 20 minutes or so, we got a call from a reserve center, everyone was put on active alert. I wasnt called in that day, but within probably six weeks we were activated and sent off. I had intended on just carrying out my time as a reservist and fulfilling my flight duties as required, but from that point on i was still on active duty and decided to stay because the rotation just kept coming. I gained a lot of flight time, but memories, some were great and some were not so great. These people with the conspiracy theories, i think you need a separate line just for those guys. Host lets go to sean from colorado on the republican line. Caller i think its a massive intelligence failure. We had huge tips called into the fbi in the Intelligence Agency these guys are taking flight lessons in the Apartment Manager said they were training on computers when he went by the window learning how to fly and now we just imported 100,000 more terrorists, the biden regime did so they can fly more planes into buildings. Governments done nothing right. Host lets go to alan from little rock, arkansas. Good morning. I was on Hold Yesterday for a call just before they went to the formal ceremony at the world Trade Center memorial and thank goodness because it turns out im calling now. Just a completely different perspective from yesterday and today. Theres so many things i want to talk about, but im in my 70s, i always loved talking since i was a kid and got a job at a Radio Station when i was 16 and became a News Director 50 years ago at a couple of different Radio Stations. Ive been watching this for 50 years. The legacy for me, and i think all of us americans, listen to this. We all know this is true. I want people to change for this reason. The legacy has been read. I tell you that remembering back to the 70s when this Oil Embargo started. When our wealth shifted out. I remember complaining all the time there is no oil shortage. So weve transferred this wealth, we had our leaders on both sides, democrats and republican leaders have sold us out. We have to reclaim our businesses back to this country, we may not make as much money, you see the price of your homes now, theyve been escalating because of these foreign investors. Theyve escalated across beyond belief. What Wall Street is going up so this isnt a partisan issue. We as americans need to reclaim our businesses, we may not earn as much. That was detroit shifted over the border. Look at all these businesses that have been shifted to mexico. They are our businesses. Host we have had a couple of callers call in and talk about some of what have been conspiracy theories about september 11. I want to bring to you comments from former white House Chief of staff who talked about how he informed president george w. Bush of the 9 11 attacks and what was going on with President Bush at that time. Heres what he had to say. cspanwj [video clip] a pool of press gathered at the back. Just before the principal open the door to the classroom, one of the staffers for the national Security Staff came up to the group gathered at the door and said mr. President , it appears a small twin Engine Prop Plane crashed into one of the towers of the world Trade Center in New York city. The reaction was what a horrible accident. The pilot must of had a Heart Attack or something. The principal open to the classroom. The president went in with the principal and the doors shut. That same staffer came to me and said sir, it appears it wasnt a small twin Engine Prop Plane was a commercial jetliner. And my mind flashed to the fear that mustve been experienced by the passengers. You had to know the Plane Wasnt going up and thats what my mind flashed to. A nanosecond later, they came to me and said another plane hit the tower of the world Trade Center. I then knew it was not an accident or coincidence. I performed a test the chiefs of staff have to perform at the time, it is president need to know. I made the decision, it wasnt that hard of a decision but yes he did need to know. I decided to pass on to facts and make one Editorial Comment and that i would do nothing to invite a question. I opened the door to the classroom and it was very unusual for me to enter a venue the president had already entered so it was unusual. I open the door and look up and i saw and compton in the Press Pool and she spotted me, the president and the teacher, i think her name was sandra daniels, was speaking to the class. Ann mouthed to me whats up. There was a break in the conversation and i walked up to the president and i leaned over and whispered into his right ear a second plane hit the second tower. America is under attack. I focused on getting word to the president , i did not stay in the classroom long. I stood back from the president and i thought he reacted and hopefully the right way because he did nothing to introduce fear to those kids. He did nothing to demonstrate fear to the press corps that wouldve translated to the satisfaction of the terrorist around the world. And then i moved into Operation Mode and i said get the secret service, get the motorcade turned around, get the crew back on Air Force one, get lines of communication open to the fbi director, the situation room, condoleezza rice, the secretary of defense, we have to get some remarks written for the president and we have to get the word to the secretary of education who was about ready to leave that classroom and go speak to a group of people gathered in the gymnasium. I moved into operational Mode Right after i left the president while he was sitting in the classroom. Host lets see what some of our social media followers are saying about the legacy of the attacks on the states on september 11, 2001. One text says the legacy of 9 11 is that only us are entitled to attack and invade countries. Heres another text that says we had to give up freedoms to fly and be more aware of our surrounding. Another text said i just wonder if it was worth 6 trillion in military Redistribution Wouldve been such a big deal. Another text says we are all vulnerable because of the policies of our government. It is made is more likely involved in how our government operates. If you want to know what you think the legacy of 9 11 was . Lets start with the rose from North Carolina on the independent line. Caller i just finished reading new confessions of an economic hitman by John Perkins originally published in 2004. I would recommend it for everybody to read because he actually claims he was one. There is no doubt in my mind 9 11 is directly related to men who has their profession invite investment potential overseas with numbers to justify to bankers the potential with the express purpose of increasing that countries debt, so our bankers calling the debt and have to give us their resources that we are actually wanting in the first place and when they refused to pay the debt, jackals are sent in to assassinate the leaders and replace them with puppet leaders and he lists all the history involved in which weve done that. I have a recommend will read that. Never forget 9 11, they struck the buildings the bankers owned and rented and our military were complex stops the nationbuilding projects run by economic hitman. Lets go to eddie from peoria illinois. Thank you for accepting my call i was eligible for the Vietnam Era when i joined the service. The legacy i think happened is the United States stopped policing the world. And stop declaring everything a war thats not a war. Our legacy will stop policing the world and unite the united nations to police the world. Thank you. Host lets go with alexis calling from wilmington, North Carolina on the independent line. Caller thanks for taking my call. I see it on a very visceral level. The woman on the independent line before me, i liked what she had to say. The day it happened i was at work. I cant believe anybody at atv there. So i think it was over the internet. I had a close friend of mine who was from israel and the next day they were supposed to have some kind of cultural event about 200 people, people it cooked large amounts of food and so everybody was dressing up and they were afraid to go out because their goals are too much like muslim garb and people were being attacked in the street for no reason because of how they were dressed or how they looked. It doesnt appear to be any different the virus now and people attacking people of asian descent, its very frightening. For me the big picture is where does this come from . We were attacked, what was our part in it . Where does this come from that we provoke somebody. We Cant Control with those people do. We can only control ourselves. What did we do, that side that is my question. Host pugh did a Research Poll on exactly how americans remember and who americans remember 9 11. I want to read a paragraph. The enduring power of the attacks is clear. An overwhelming share of americans old enough to recall the day remember where they were and what they were doing when they heard the news. Yet an Evergrowing Number of americans have no personal memory of the day. Either because they were too young or not yet born. 93 of those 30 and older say they remember exactly where they were on september 11, 2001. The number drops to 42 of those age 25. As we move into the future, fewer and fewer people will remember exactly where they were on september 11 which is why we have these conversations about what you think is going to be the legacy of 9 11. Lets go back to the phone lines and talk to ryan on the democrat line. Caller thanks for taking my call. First the criticism of cspan. I dont think your coverage of 9 11 has been very fair. I think over the years you had more callers talk about alternative explanations for how the buildings collapsed then just about any other topic. Looking back in the archives only see maybe one or two videos including Richard Gage from architects and engineers for 911 truth talking about these theories. Not a Conspiracy Theory to ask questions. Among them that i could ask are where the wreckage . Where are all the planes. Can those be investigated . Is there a computer simulation out 20 years later they could show how those buildings fell down because the one that nist produced was a complete farce. He didnt use the real inputs and according to their own analysis, of the collapse of building seven was highly unlikely. Why would any testing he thought immediately it was another terrorist attack. No testing for explosives was done. Does that not raise any questions that cspan could look into . Where the people from 9 11 architect from 9 11 truth. Host as ryan brings this up, we have covered on Washington Journal several times conspiracy theories and why americans seem to enjoy talking about conspiracy theories and we have had a show specifically on september 11 conspiracy theories. You can find all the segments if you go to cspan. Org, you can find this segment we did specifically on september 11 conspiracy theories. You can find them if you go to cspan. Org. Search for september 11 conspiracy theories. Lets go back to the phone lines and talk to kelly calling from pittsburgh, pennsylvania on the democrat line. Caller good morning. I have a personal story, my mother was in the air returning to italy along with my grandfather and great aunt and another friend and they are all older. They were rerouted to newfoundland. Newfoundland embraced everyone. They put thousands of people up, they took care of them. It took a month for my mother to be able to get on a plane to return home. There was a play based on newfoundland and i encourage anyone to see that. It provides such an alternative opposite reaction of what was going on. Secondly, i feel we were at war for so long yet you could walk around the u. S. And not tell we were at war. Any other time in history people were talking about it constantly. Years later they were still talking about the war. But it seemed as if life just went on here and we had thousands of soldiers who gave up their lives and i just feel there was a loss of interest and personal interest and i feel there should be for any future war there should be an automatic draft so that if my son is drafted i have a vested interest and i would be more interested in what was going on and what politicians were doing and how safe the soldiers were all these other things that should have never happened and i think we as americans really dropped the ball by not staying interested in what was going on. Host lets go to paul from kansas city, missouri. Good morning. Caller before i make my point i will say one thing is consistent 20 years later. 20 years ago Donald Trump was lying in the news about muslims celebrating the attack. And he is still lying in the news to make an part of the current story. But i think our last lasting legacy as far as 9 11, George Bush came out and made a statement. He said you were either with us or you were against us. And i think america has embraced that to a point where everyone with the slightest disagreement is an enemy. Im not saying thats George Bushs fault, im not attributing the blame of that attitude, but over the past 20 years if Theres Anything weve seen is that if you are not with us on any level, you are the enemy. Host once again there were commemorations at all three crash Sites Yesterday which was the 20th anniversary of the september 11 Terror Attacks. President biden made appearances at all three crash sites and also released remarks on twitter. I want to show you what president Joe Biden had to say. [video clip] the days that followed september 11, 2001, we saw heroism everywhere. In places expected and unexpected. We also saw something all too rare. A true sense of national unity. Unity and resilience, the capacity to recover and prepare in the face of trauma. The generation in the face of terror to get this terrace a to responsible. To show everyone seeking to do harm we will hunt you down and we will make them pay. That will never stop. Today, tomorrow, ever. We also witnessed the darker forces of human nature. Fear and anger, Resentment And Violence against muslim americans. We saw national unity bend, we learned unity is the one thing that was never break. Unity makes us who we are. America at its best. To me thats the central lesson of september 11. At our most vulnerable, in the Push And Pull of all that makes us human and the battle for the soul of america, unity is our greatest strength. We dont have to believe the same thing, we must have a fundamental respect to faith in each other and in this nation. We are unique in the history of the world because we are the only nation based on an idea, an idea that everybodys created equal and should be treated equally throughout their lives. That is the task before us. Host lets see what some social media followers are saying about the legacy of 9 11. One tweet says 9 11 legacy, the department of homeland security, Flight Check in. Another says never forget rings hollow when you contemplate how we treated first responders who got sick after 9 11 and we shrug at an attack on our capital. Another says 9 11 spurred the biggest Government Coverup in the history of this nation. One tweet says i will saying something extremely unpopular. I think its time put 9 11 in the past and look to our future instead. Weve been stuck for 20 years mulling over this disaster. We want to know what you think about the legacy of 9 11. Lets start with sean from massachusetts calling on the democrat line. Caller thanks to cspan. I want a legacy to be about people bonding as americans and working together to make our country a beautiful place to live and everybody can have equality and freedom. What i have seen happening is this fracturing of our society, you listen to some callers and they strongly believe things they may have heard somewhere, they have done their own research and feel confident in that research and i understand it. The first time i heard about the story we never went to the moon happened to be in a Hotel Room in russia. 10 years before it became a mainstream. I wondered did we go to the moon. We went to the moon. Whats happened is and the reason for these conspiracy theories and the mistrust. I believe is due to the fact of secrecy, that we have secrecy in our government, they are still secrets from Pearl Harbor and there still secrets of 9 11. That we may not know for another 40 years. It had to be Nano Thermite or the planes were remotely controlled. We do know for a fact that it started in afghanistan with Al Qaeda and with osama Bin Laden. This fracturing which is culminated has led to the january 6 insurrection is because of secrecy. We are not telling the people the truth all the time. Host lets go with sean calling on the independent line. Glad i came behind my namesake because im going to continue the conversation. 9 11 was where the misuse of what you saw started. People saw the same thing but nobodys really talking about the same thing. 9 11 happened, lets look at the facts. The fact after 9 11 happened, a certain group of people became very rich. Im going to stick with the facts. The fact after 9 11 happened, all the buildings that got hit in the crash sites, there was Clay Debris and all of that. The pentagon only had that one little picture with one little piece there in front of this big hole. Nobody in the pentagon can claim they saw debris. The pentagon, and has video of the plane hitting that building. Those are facts. When you look at those facts and you look at the story thats been told about 9 11. 9 11 was the start and they continued it now all the way to this coronavirus all the way down to covid all the way down to weapons of mass destruction and theres so much Stuff Weve been lied about. Theres so much stuff we have not been privy to, that we want to focus on what we dont know. Lets look at what we do know. The lack of evidence, the fact so many people got rich off of 9 11 aftereffects. Host lets go to andrew from ohio on the republican line. The legacy of 9 11 is what happened on the day when four airplanes were hijacked within 74 minutes, american 11 at the North Tower, united 175 hit the North Tower and in american 77 hit the pentagon. United 93 saved her capitol building. Saving the capitol building, the highlight of Washington Journal in the background. The Uss Cole bombing, the 93 world Trade Center bombing, the san bernardino attack in 2013. We have a problem with terrorism and 9 11 reminds us of how the threat, its a dangerous threat and we need the government to stop it. Host lets talk to diane at calling from fayetteville, New York. Caller i want to talk about purity and the significance of what and how many paid for what happened on 9 11. I dont care about conspiracies, i dont care who was involved. It happened, lives were lost. It hurt so many people around the country and the legacy has been tainted this year by this new administration. The president not even speaking, the Vice President not speaking. Nancy pelosi, its all about them and it should be about americans. It should be about american lives lost. It shouldnt be about anything else. As far as memory, this has been tainted by this administration and it saddens me so much. Host let me correct you real quickly. Vice president Kamala Harris did speak in pennsylvania yesterday. Caller i know, but there has been only speaking, there has not been any kind of questions or answers and its been all about the Reconciliation And Everything else. There should have been more against what government is doing and more pro against what we as a nation lost. I dont care who spoke, it is zero felt words when they have put their ideas above and they wanted to make the host lets go with atrios from pennsylvania. Go ahead. Caller i just wanted to say im a black man and i was in the military, i would fight and die for this country because this is all i know. I hear people calling in calling the Truth And Government lies. The government is never told the truth about anything. They wont even tell you the truth about ufos. One thing i want to say, and ive said it, its not associated with this, but of two rich white men arent safe, who is . Host lets go with tom calling from san jose, california on the democrat line. Tom, good morning. Caller i read an article in the Washington Post and he pretty much summed it up by the divisions. He said Joe Biden is the president who surrendered to the enemies who attacked us on 9 11. He not only surrendered but did so with dishonor. He went on to say it would be an insult to the memory of those who died on 9 11 if you were to visit ground zero. What a little man. Maybe he should remember the Bush Administration was warned by the clinton administration, specifically by Richard Clark in 2001 that a group presently in the United States was planning a terrorist attack. In fact the June 22 Daily briefing warned Al Qaeda strike might be imminent. And then Paul Wolfowitz dismissed the warning about Al Qaeda being led by Bin Laden and how it possessed an immediate and serious threat to the u. S. I think maybe these conspiracy theories are more strawman arguments and they just do this to distract. Host we would like to thank all of our callers, all of our guests and all of our social media followers for being with us for another edition of Washington Journal this morning. Join us tomorrow at 7 00 a. M. For another Washington Journal. Have a great sunday. [captioning performed by the national captioning institute, which is responsible for its Caption Content and accuracy. Visit ncicap. Org] [captions copyright national Cable Satellite Corp. 2021] cspan is your unfiltered view of government, funded by these television companies and more, including sparklight. The greatest town on earth is the place you call home. Sparklight is our home too. We are facing our greatest challenge. That is why we are working roundtheclock to keep you protected. We are doing our part so it is easier to do yours. Sparklight supports cspan as a public service along with these other television providers, giving you a front Row Seat to democracy. Tonight on q a, Jessica Delong was the chief engineer of the historic about John Jay Harvey on september 11 when it was called back into service to aid firefighters following the attacks on the twin towers. In her book saved at the seawall, she toast a story of the community of mariners who came to the rescue of thousands. Jessica the maritime evacuations that delivered nearly half a million people to safety is an incredible example of the goodness of people that when you are given the opportunity to help, you have the skill set, you have the availability, that people over and over again made the choice to put themselves in Harms Way for the sake of fellow humans, and that is very instructive and something that we really need to continue to remember. Jessica Delong Sunday Night tonight at 8 00 p. M. Eastern on Cspans Q and a. You can also find interviews wherever you get your podcasts. Up next, canadian party leaders, including justin trudeau, take part of a debate i had of the September 20 Federal election in canada. Ahead of the September 20 Federal election in canada. Justin trudeau has served as prime minister since 2015. The two Hour Debate takes place at the canadian museum of history in quebec. Debate. We are coming to you from the grand hall in the canadian using Love History on the traditional unseeded territory of the algonquin people