Original source URL: http://maxblumenthal.blogspot.com/2006/09/discover-secret-right-wing-network.html Friday, September 08, 2006 Discover the Secret Right-Wing Network Behind ABC's 9/11 Deception Less than 72 hours before ABC's "The Path to 9/11" is scheduled to air, the network is suddenly under siege. On Tuesday, ABC was forced to concede that "The Path to 9/11" is "a dramatization, not a documentary." The film deceptively invents scenes to depict former President Bill Clinton's handling of the Al Qaeda threat. Now, ABC claims to be is editing those false sequences to satisfy critics so the show can go on -- even if it still remains a gross distortion of history. And as it does so, ABC advances the illusion that the deceptive nature of "The Path to 9/11" is an honest mistake committed by a hardworking but admittedly fumbling team of well-intentioned Hollywood professionals who wanted nothing less than to entertain America. But this is another Big Lie. In fact, "The Path to 9/11" is produced and promoted by a well-honed propaganda operation consisting of a network of little-known right-wingers working from within Hollywood to counter its supposedly liberal bias. This is the network within the ABC network. Its godfather is far right activist David Horowitz, who has worked for more than a decade to establish a right-wing presence in Hollywood and to discredit mainstream film and TV production. On this project, he is working with a secretive evangelical religious right group founded by The Path to 9/11's director David Cunningham that proclaims its goal to "transform Hollywood" in line with its messianic vision. Before The Path to 9/11 entered the production stage, Disney/ABC contracted David Cunningham as the film's director. Cunningham is no ordinary Hollywood journeyman. He is in fact the son of Loren Cunningham, founder of the right-wing evangelical group Youth With A Mission (YWAM). The young Cunningham helped found an auxiliary of his father's group called The Film Institute (TFI), which, according to its mission statement, is "dedicated to a Godly transformation and revolution TO and THROUGH the Film and Televisionindustry." As part of TFI's long-term strategy, Cunningham helped place interns from Youth With A Mission's "global training network" in film industry jobs "so that they can begin to impact and transform Hollywood from the inside out," according to a YWAM report. Last June, Cunningham's TFI announced it was producing its first film, mysteriously titled "Untitled History Project." "TFI's first project is a doozy," a newsletter to YWAM members read. "Simply being referred to as: The Untitled History Project, it is already being called the television event of the decade and not one second has been put to film yet. Talk about great expectations!" (A web edition of the newsletter was mysteriously deleted yesterday but has been cached on Google at the link above). The following month, on July 28, the New York Post reported that ABC was filming a mini-series "under a shroud of secrecy" about the 9/11 attacks. "At the moment, ABC officials are calling the miniseries 'Untitled Commission Report' and producers refer to it as the 'Untitled History Project,'" the Post noted. Early on, Cunningham had recruited a young Iranian-American screenwriter named Cyrus Nowrasteh to write the script of his secretive "Untitled" film. Not only is Nowrasteh an outspoken conservative, he is also a fervent member of the emerging network of right-wing people burrowing into the film industry with ulterior sectarian political and religious agendas, like Cunningham. Nowrasteh's conservatism was on display when he appeared as a featured speaker at the Liberty Film Festival (LFF), an annual event founded in 2004 to premier and promote conservative-themed films supposedly too "politically incorrect" to gain acceptance at mainstream film festivals. This June, while The Path to 9/11 was being filmed, LFF founders Govindini Murty and Jason Apuzzo -- both friends of Nowrasteh -- announced they were "partnering" with right-wing activist David Horowitz. Indeed, the 2006 LFF is listed as "A Program of the David Horowitz Freedom Center." Since the inauguration of Bill Clinton in 1992, Horowitz has labored to create a network of politically active conservatives in Hollywood. His Hollywood nest centers around his Wednesday Morning Club, a weekly meet-and-greet session for Left Coast conservatives that has been graced with speeches by the likes of Newt Gingrich, Victor Davis Hanson and Christopher Hitchens. The group's headquarters are at the offices of Horowitz's Center for the Study of Popular Culture, a "think tank" bankrolled for years with millions by right-wing sugardaddies like eccentric far right billionaire Richard Mellon Scaife. (Scaife financed the Arkansas Project, a $2.3 million dirty tricks operation that included paying sources for negative stories about Bill Clinton that turned out to be false.) With the LFF now under Horowitz's control, his political machine began drumming up support for Cunningham and Nowrasteh's "Untitled" project, which finally was revealed in late summer as "The Path to 9/11." Horowitz's PR blitz began with an August 16 interview with Nowrasteh on his FrontPageMag webzine. In the interview, Nowrasteh foreshadowed the film's assault on Clinton's record on fighting terror. "The 9/11 report details the Clinton's administration's response -- or lack of response -- to Al Qaeda and how this emboldened Bin Laden to keep attacking American interests," Nowrasteh told FrontPageMag's Jamie Glazov. "There simply was no response. Nothing." A week later, ABC hosted LFF co-founder Murty and several other conservative operatives at an advance screening of The Path to 9/11. (While ABC provided 900 DVDs of the film to conservatives, Clinton administration officials and objective reviewers from mainstream outlets were denied them.) Murty returned with a glowing review for FrontPageMag that emphasized the film's partisan nature. "'The Path to 9/11' is one of the best, most intelligent, most pro-American miniseries I've ever seen on TV, and conservatives should support it and promote it as vigorously as possible," Murty wrote. As a result of the special access granted by ABC, Murty's article was the first published review of The Path to 9/11, preceding those by the New York Times and LA Times by more than a week. Murty followed her review with a blast email to conservative websites such as Liberty Post and Free Republic on September 1 urging their readers to throw their weight behind ABC's mini-series. "Please do everything you can to spread the word about this excellent miniseries," Murty wrote, "so that 'The Path to 9/11' gets the highest ratings possible when it airs on September 10 & 11! If this show gets huge ratings, then ABC will be more likely to produce pro-American movies and TV shows in the future!" Murty's efforts were supported by Appuzo, who handles LFF's heavily-trafficked blog, Libertas. Appuzo was instrumental in marketing The Path to 9/11 to conservatives, writing in a blog post on September 2, "Make no mistake about what this film does, among other things: it places the question of the Clinton Administration's culpability for the 9/11 attacks front and center... Bravo to Cyrus Nowrasteh and David Cunningham for creating this gritty, stylish and gripping piece of entertainment." When a group of leading Senate Democrats sent a letter to ABC CEO Robert Iger urging him to cancel The Path to 9/11 because of its glaring factual errors and distortions, Apuzzo launched a retaliatory campaign to paint the Democrats as foes of free speech. "Here at LIBERTAS we urge the public to make noise over this, and to demand that Democrats back down," he wrote on September 7th. "What is at stake is nothing short of the 1st Amendment." At FrontPageMag, Horowitz singled out Nowrasteh as the victim. "The attacks by former president Bill Clinton, former Clinton Administration officials and Democratic US senators on Cyrus Nowrasteh's ABC mini-series "The Path to 9/11" are easily the gravest and most brazen and damaging governmental attacks on the civil liberties of ordinary Americans since 9/11," Horowitz declared. Now, as discussion grows over the false character of The Path to 9/11, the right-wing network that brought it to fruition is ratcheting up its PR efforts. Murty will appear tonight on CNN's Glenn Beck show and The Situation Room, according to Libertas in order to respond to "the major disinformation campaign now being run by Democrats to block the truth about what actually happened during the Clinton years." While this network claims its success and postures as the true victims, the ABC network suffers a PR catastrophe. It's almost as though it was complacent about an attack on its reputation by a band of political terrorists. # posted by max blumenthal @ 5:21 PM Comments: A mention, plus where you might want to look next. http://thepremise.com/archives/09/08/2006/48 # posted by Anonymous : 8:16 PM My biggest objection is that the show doesn't hold the Bush regime accountable for its lack of effort to even try to prevent the 911 attacks, despite numerous warnings. # posted by libhom : 8:17 PM Eventually, you'll see a made for TV movie purporting to explain how the democratcs lost the Iraq war. # posted by Anonymous : 4:46 AM When is the pitiful right wing ever going to stop running against Clinton? I mean, they couldn't beat him in the real world, so they try to beat him in the fantasy world. I feel sorry for them, the big dog just keeps on beating them up. # posted by GOPHater : 5:03 AM What also amazes me is how little, as in NEXT TO NOTHING, is being reported about this huge controversy in the mainstream press. I think I saw a back page article in the online NYTimes yesterday, but that's it. The majority of TV viewers are going to watch this with absolutely no notion that the film is controversial. And, of course, let's not forget how the TV moguls killed Farenheit 911 before the 2004 elections. What "left wing" bias are the wingnuts talking about? I am so frustrated, really. http://dustydoggie.blogspot.com The new beta won't let me publish as a "Blogger" # posted by Anonymous : 5:55 AM Perhaps the most important aspect of the interview with Front Page is this: "Nowrasteh: Early last year (2005) I was approached by ABC and asked if I'd be interested in writing/producing a miniseries based on the 9/11 Commission Report. I met with executive producer Marc Platt and Governor Kean, Chairman of the 9/11 Commission, who agreed to serve as a consultant on the project. I was provided an incredible amount of research materials and high-level advisors from the FBI, CIA, Secret Service, Diiplomatic Security, etc......" Just who set up all these contacts including Kean? Was there government involvment with Disney in setting up the whole project? This needs investigation. # posted by mdog218 : 6:16 AM Uh, excuse me for noticing, but Nowrasteh looks like a pretty healthy man in his prime. If the "War on Terror" is so important, such a huge threat, why is he here making movies? Why isn't he in uniform? If grandmothers are fighting in Iraq, why can't he? Is it possible that we have another member of the 101st Flying Keyboard Chickenhawk Brigade here? Is it possible that Nowrasteh and his partners on this project, all healthy looking young men in their prime, are personally profiting off of the "War on Terror" and the deaths of 9/11? How much money is Nowrasteh making off of 9/11? # posted by roooth : 8:37 AM The Neo-Cons can only survive by creating these huge organizational conspiracies that whitewash their mistakes and slander their opponents. The rest of the Right is just as guilty because they sit back and enjoy the results. The way ABC - Disney conspired to hide the nature of this film from the Left was as pathetic as it was stupid. I heard there is no "My Pet Goat" scene and no "Bin Laden determined to strike in the US" scene... America knows who dropped the ball. # posted by Anonymous : 8:39 AM These people have no limits to how low they will go. 9/11 should be an untouchable subject of history, they have attempted to rewrite this catastrophic and sad day in OUR history! We know the truth, these people who claim to be godly people are the backwash of our country. # posted by Anonymous : 8:45 AM As someone in the film business who knows the history of 9/11 I wonder why they felt they had to create composite characters and scenes for "dramatic' purposes. They were already there. Where is the scene depicting the utter amazement of the anti-terror speciialists when John Ashcroft presented his budget for the Justice Department in 2000 and terrorism had been dropped from the list? As I recall that provided quite a bit of grist for the dramatic mill and shows exactly where the Bush Administration was when it came to fighting terror and preventing a 9/11! # posted by Anonymous : 9:07 AM The F.B.I. states that Bin Ladin had nothing to do with 911. Bush has a bro who was security chief at W.T.O. # posted by Anonymous : 10:41 AM RE Clinton google these key words mena cocaine cia and understand he was govenor of AR the entire time. RE Bush If no one in the govt had any idea that the 911 attacks were going to occur why did the Secret Service allow him to stay in the classroom and continue reading to the kids when his presense there had been annouced days before and he was within 5 miles of an airport? RE WTC 7 Do you think they will even touch on this building falling at the end of the day in the same fashion as 1 and 2? Look up Larry "pull it" Silverstein perhaps one of the luckiest Americans alive on that horrible day. Anything that is shown on regular televison is only going to further the "official truths" that have been served up to a gullible American public. # posted by Anonymous : 11:04 AM I have emailed the GM of the ABC affiliate in Atlanta, that this household will boycott their station for two weeks if this slanderous piece of crap run on his station. # posted by Anonymous : 11:13 AM Who watches network TV any more? It's 99% trash, with partisan lies in the mix-usually in the "news" segments. This "documentry" is obviously aimed at the Homer Simpsons of the US,of which there are, tragically, far too many. The timing is significant in that the mid-term election is just around the corner. With nothing but one dismal failure after another to look back at, this regime is left with no choice but to attempt to smear everyone opposing it, including Bill Clinton. "It's all HIS fault, yasee; perfect people like us don't make mistakes". There are plenty of fools who'll swallow this poison pill, being too lazy or dim-witted to seek the truth. # posted by Bill Mac Bean : 11:32 AM You people sound like a crowd at a WWF wrestling match. Wake up, because that's what your little false left-right paradigm is. Do your homework, the Clintons and Bushs are one and the same. They golf and vacation together for Pete's sake. Look at the Oklahoma City bombing and Waco... both inside jobs... just like 9/11 was. The only thing I'm unsure of is who is responsible for enabling the import of the most cocaine by way of law enforcement, the DEA and CIA: George Sr. or Clinton? Whatever this miniseries contains, I really doubt it will explain how WTC Buliding 7 collapsed on it's own footprint at freefall speed when it was never hit by a plane, why many important people were told not to fly on 9/11, the massive insider trading in airline stock right before 9/11, the humongous insurance policy taken out just prior to the attacks, how bomb sniffing dogs were removed from the WTC in days leading up to the attacks, all of those explosions heard by everyone after the planes hit the towers, the fact that they lied about "we just couldn't connecting the dots" and now it comes out that drills for a scenario where planes would be flown into the WTC were going on THE DAY OF 9/11, or how about those Israelis in the white van that were arrested as they cheered and filmed the attacks near the George Washington Bridge (later were confirmed to be Mossad agents). # posted by Anonymous : 1:09 PM -- -------------------------------------------------------- Escaping the Matrix website http://escapingthematrix.org/ cyberjournal website http://cyberjournal.org subscribe cyberjournal list mailto:•••@••.••• Posting archives http://cyberjournal.org/show_archives/ Blogs: cyberjournal forum http://cyberjournal-rkm.blogspot.com/ Achieving real democracy http://harmonization.blogspot.com/ for readers of ETM http://matrixreaders.blogspot.com/ Community Empowerment http://empowermentinitiatives.blogspot.com/ Blogger made easy http://quaylargo.com/help/ezblogger.html
