On Thursday’s “O’Reilly Factor,” the host invited a New York City detective named Bo Dietl, and author Gerald Posner to discuss some recent developments surrounding the conspiracy theorists. O’Reilly began (video available here, h/t Hot Air):
The far-left fringe has embraced the conspiracy theory that elements of the U.S. government carried out the attacks on 9/11. It's unbelievable, but that's what they're saying. Now some mainstream individuals are buying into it. Rosie O'Donnell discussed it on her blog. And the owner of the Dallas Mavericks, billionaire Mark Cuban, may distribute a movie called "Loose Change." That piece of propaganda may be narrated by Charlie Sheen. And it says the U.S. government was criminally negligent on 9/11.
Posner chimed in:
What goes through my mind, though, is, I get angry. And, then, when I see mainstream figures, like Rosie O'Donnell -- she essentially did a cut- and-paste. She took it from one site and put it on her blog. You know what? You can't do that. It would be like putting on something that said the Holocaust didn't exist. And she has -- she should be socially responsible to know better.
Dietl was next:
But when I hear this nonsense about these movies that are going to be being made about this, what about the victims? What about the firemen and the cops that died down there, their families, and the people who are down there that lost their husbands, wives, daughters, and sons?
This is complete moron stuff now. I saw the engine of the plane that was down there on the ground that went right through the building. I saw people down there when we got down there, when number seven came down. They said about the building number seven coming down the same way. Yes, because so much heaviness came off the World Trade Center coming down on to seven. Seven came down. The foundation was all out of whack because of them coming down.
O’Reilly put an exclamation point on their statements:
I believe that, if Charlie Sheen puts his voice and name on this, he's through. I think that will -- people won't watch his television program. They will hold it against him.
I quite agree, gentlemen.
What follows is a full transcript of this segment.
O'REILLY: "Impact" segment tonight: The far-left fringe has embraced the conspiracy theory that elements of the U.S. government carried out the attacks on 9/11. It's unbelievable, but that's what they're saying.
Now some mainstream individuals are buying into it. Rosie O'Donnell discussed it on her blog. And the owner of the Dallas Mavericks, billionaire Mark Cuban, may distribute a movie called "Loose Change." That piece of propaganda may be narrated by Charlie Sheen. And it says the U.S. government was criminally negligent on 9/11.
With us now, Bo Dietl, former New York City detective, knows about the local investigation on 9/11, from Miami, Gerald Posner, the author of the book "Why America Slept: The Reasons Behind Our Failure to Prevent 9/11."
All right, Gerald, I will begin with you.
When you hear this conspiratorial stuff, what goes through your mind?
GERALD POSNER, AUTHOR, "WHY AMERICA SLEPT": Well, you know, Bill, it use to surprise me. Now nothing surprises me, what these wackos can come up with.
What goes through my mind, though, is, I get angry. And, then, when I see mainstream figures, like Rosie O'Donnell -- she essentially did a cut- and-paste. She took it from one site and put it on her blog. You know what? You can't do that. It would be like putting on something that said the Holocaust didn't exist. And she has -- she should be socially responsible to know better.
Mark Cuban, he may be great at making money. He is worth over a billion dollars. But this was the guy who said, remember, when Kobe Bryant was arrested, it will be good for the NBA. And he says, on this issue, he is agnostic. He does things that are good about 9/11. He also distributes this, because it's on the other side; we don't have a opinion.
But guess what, Mark? You don't get to be agnostic on this. You have to have an opinion. Either 19 hijackers, Muslim fundamentalists, who wanted to destroy the West flew those planes into the World Trade Center and into the Pentagon, killing 3,000 people on 9/11, or, otherwise, you are right and it's a conspiracy. And you know what? You don't get to straddle both sides of the fence. You have an obligation to come clean on this and not distribute that film -- the same with Charlie Sheen in narrating it. It's disgrace.
O'REILLY: All right.
How do you see it, Bo? You were down here when it happened. You actually worked on the World Trade Center when they were building it.
BO DIETL, CHAIRMAN & CEO, BEAU DIETL AND ASSOCIATES: I was an iron worker back in the late '60s, before I became a cop.
And the whole construction of the World Trade Center was heavy, thick, steel walls around the outside, with six inches of concrete floors. And what happened that day is, when that melted, that went down, and it became like potato chips. And I watched the buildings go down. It looked like they were imploding. They were imploding. The steel hit there. They couldn't hold up the weight, and they came right down. Thank God that they didn't come down any other way.
But when I hear this nonsense about these movies that are going to be being made about this, what about the victims? What about the firemen and the cops that died down there, their families, and the people who are down there that lost their husbands, wives, daughters, and sons?
This is complete moron stuff now. I saw the engine of the plane that was down there on the ground that went right through the building. I saw people down there when we got down there, when number seven came down. They said about the building number seven coming down the same way. Yes, because so much heaviness came off the World Trade Center coming down on to seven. Seven came down. The foundation was all out of whack because of them coming down.
This all -- there could have been more buildings coming down around. Why it happened that way, only architects and only...
(CROSSTALK)
O'REILLY: Well, we went over it with the popular mechanics...
DIETL: Yes. Right.
O'REILLY: ... people who have done exhaustive study.
But I agree with you, that I think that bringing this stuff up, accusing your own country of murdering your own citizens, is painful for people who lost people.
DIETL: You go back with the blind cleric and with Yousef. The connection was right there, when they bombed World Trade Center one and they go to two.
(CROSSTALK)
O'REILLY: Bo, don't confuse anybody with facts.
DIETL: Yes.
O'REILLY: Don't confuse them with facts.
(LAUGHTER)
O'REILLY: But I will tell you this, Gerald. I believe that, if Charlie Sheen puts his voice and name on this, he's through. I think that will -- people won't watch his television program. They will hold it against him.
Now, you said something interesting. You said it makes you angry when these conspiratorialists put the stuff out. They have freedom of speech. I mean, they can say what they want.
POSNER: Oh, no.
CAVUTO: Why does it make you angry?
POSNER: It makes me angry, Bill, because they're making up, in some cases, what they call facts. They're distributing false information. In many cases, they know it.
And the product today is much slicker. You know, in the old days, you use to get a right-wing revisionist who would stand up and say, oh, by the way, the Holocaust is a myth, and they would just deny it, and we all knew they were crazy, and that was the end of it.
But, today, these films that they're putting out are very slick. They tend to show things in a way that, if you watch it, and you are impressionable -- it was like "JFK," that Oliver Stone. Look, it was a good propaganda film.
I view these often as propaganda films, as good as anything that the Third Reich turned out. But they can change impressionable minds. So, the reason I get angry, as a journalist, is the same reason you would as a journalist. You see the historical record here being completely muddied up on a case that should be straightforward. And the Internet allows these theories to explode...
O'REILLY: Yes, sure. There's no question about that.
(CROSSTALK)
POSNER: ... so that they spread fast.
O'REILLY: I just don't understand the hatred for the country. I don't get the hatred for the country, Bo.
And did you ever think about that? Why do they -- I'm not saying Mark Cuban hates America. I don't know what motivates Mark Cuban. He is welcome to come on here and explain.
But most of these people who buy into this, they just hate the country.
DIETL: You know, it's just something that people have to be negative.
Look, we're all not happy, what the president's been doing. I was a Republican. I'm not happy with my president, what's he's been doing and what's been happening. But you want to know something? I'm not going to go against him completely on everything he's doing. There's things that are being done right. The economy's great and everything.
But people are going to be negative. These -- these people that want to develop a film showing that this really never happened, or it happened with a murder, first of all, they had another one, a conspiracy that Israel did it, and wanted to get...
(CROSSTALK)
O'REILLY: Well, that was the Muslims.
DIETL: I mean, it goes on and on and on.
O'REILLY: Yes, the Muslim tried to blame it on Mossad.
(CROSSTALK)
O'REILLY: Right.
DIETL: It's aggravating to me, the one -- the most important thing, Bill, is the people that died there on September 11 and their families.
O'REILLY: You bet.
DIETL: This is a disgrace to them. And Martin Sheen's kid better -- better watch it, as far as people...
O'REILLY: I agree.
(CROSSTALK)
DIETL: I wouldn't watch anything...
(CROSSTALK)
O'REILLY: And this -- we're looking out for you, Charlie Sheen. Don't do this. You're not going to come back from it, if you do. And that's not a threat. I'm just telling you, I know the country. Bo knows the country. Gerald knows the country.
DIETL: We won't watch that two-and-a-half kids thing at all.
O'REILLY: Not going to -- not going to do it any good.
Gentlemen, as always, thanks very much.
