I was one of the over 800 people who DIDN'T get in to see Michael Moore "inside." But we DID get to hear him "outside," giving a 40-minute speech without amplification, and I tape-recorded and transcribed it. The transcript is available in its entirety elsewhere on the San Diego IMC site, but here's the excerpt towards the end in which he put the five questions to "President" Bush (the quotes are his):

Number one, in the days after September 11, when all the planes were grounded and nobody could fly — remember that? — there was one plane that was allowed to fly around the skies of America. And that was a private Saudi jet that went to four or five American cities and picked up nearly two dozen members of the bin Laden family, and their associates, and flew them out of the country. Are you hearing this for the first time?

This is appalling, that the news media have not followed through on this. Now, I’m not telling you this because I got this off my Black Helicopter Web site. I’m not a conspiracy theorist. This is in the November 12 New Yorker magazine, the New Yorker magazine, in an article by Jane Mayer.

The FBI was furious that Bush allowed this to happen. Why? Because usually, in a murder investigation, when you can’t find the murderer, the police like to go and ask the family members a few questions: “What do you know? Who do you know? Who does he know? Where do you think he might be? Can you help us?” The Bush administration told the FBI, “No. You will ask the bin Ladens no questions, and they will be escorted out of the country with zero interrogation.” Why? I don’t know. I want an answer. I’m an American. I want to know.

Number two: George W. Bush’s first oil company, that his daddy set him up with, a company called Arbusto — which I guess is Spanish for “bush,” or “shrub,” or something — some conglomeration of weeds. Arbusto — Arbusto was funded in part by the bin Laden family. Are you aware of this?

Number three: go to the BBC Web site, 1995 [sic]. It says, “Oil company executives in Houston host delegation from Taliban government to discuss the building of a pipeline across Afghanistan to be built by Unocal.” And to be built — actually to be physically built in part by a company called Halliburton. Chairman of Halliburton in the 1990’s? Dick Cheney. What’s going on there.

Number four: Why did this government give the Taliban, who controlled Afghanistan, $43 million of our tax money in aid last May? Last May. The Bush administration says it was to help the poppy farmers who couldn’t grow their poppies anymore and were losing money because they couldn’t send heroin to the United States. So it was a bail-out for the heroin pushers in Afghanistan.

I love that. I love that. We bail out the airlines, Chrysler and the heroin grower. We’re a generous people, aren’t we? Why — if the Taliban, last May — last May, they told us the Taliban was harboring bin Laden, right? If they were harboring a terrorist, then why did we give them $43 million of our money?

Finally, fifth question: Washington Post, three days after September 11. There’s a paragraph. It says, “Osama bin Laden is on dialysis. And he’s been on dialysis for the last 18 months. He has failing kidneys.” Can somebody explain to me how the Mastermind of All Evil was running from cave to cave, hooked up to a kidney machine? Is there a kidney machine in every fifth cave? What’s that all about?

Mark Gabrish Conlan
e-mail:: mgconlan@earthlink.net
Homepage:: mgconlan@earthlink.net