I can date with accuracy the first time I concluded with some certainty that the Bush Administration was lying though it’s teeth about 9-11.

The date was September 15th 2001 – half a week after the horrifying carnage in New York and Washington DC. The US Environmental Protection Authority’s Administrator was widely quoted as saying that there was “no reason for concern” regarding Manhattan’s air quality. Three days later Chistine Todd Whitman repeated this assurance in an official EPA statement, also widely reported around the world. It quoted Christie Whitman making some unequivocal guarantees:

“I am glad to reassure the people of New York and Washington, D.C. that their air is safe to breathe and their water is safe to drink…. The concentrations are such that they don’t pose a health hazard…We’re going to make sure everybody is safe“

I live half a world away from the east coast of America and had no detailed knowledge of the exact contents of the World Trade Center towers that had collapsed into dust a week before.

Christie Whitman, speaking at a press conference promoting the Clean Air Communities program in NYC on August 6th 2001 (photo/report via Life Magazine)

Even so, on my small TV screen I could see thick dust in the vicinity of the WTC. I didn’t need a huge bureaucracy of experts to tell me it was almost certain to be highly toxic. Reports of asbestos inside the buildings had been frequent in the days following September 11th. (Of course, at that time, I’d never even heard of nanothermite!)

In any event, it was OBVIOUS to Blind Freddy himself that the environment was extremely hazardous in the vicinity of the World Trade Center on the day of 9-11. It was obvious it would continue to be toxic for a considerable time. And it was utterly obvious that rescue and demolition workers subjected themselves to grave danger simply by sprending time close to the hell of Ground Zero.

So I concluded the EPA Administrator was lying.

That was no big surprise to me really. After all, Ms Whitman had been heading the Bush Administration’s sneaky and obfuscatory approach to stalling global consensus on climate change action. They’d already told some real porkies about that… Even so, this did strike me as a very grave deceit. This was lying to traumatised New Yorkers at a time of crisis about the safety of their local environment. It also seemed obvious to me these lies would be exposed before too long.

I wasn’t wrong about that. Exposed they have been. But what I didn’t factor in then was that the mass media would prove themselves, by and large, to be on the side of the liars. I had no idea the western media would systematically downplay the environmental and human health scandal as it developed in the years following 2001 – such that reporting in Russia is more accurate. That was a scandal I didn’t expect. Not back then.

Christie Whitman’s September 18th 2001 statement concluded as follows:

“While careful not to impede the search, rescue and cleanup efforts at either the World Trade Center or the Pentagon disaster sites, EPA’s primary concern has been to ensure that rescue workers and the public are not being exposed to elevated levels of potentially hazardous contaminants in the dust and debris, especially where practical solutions are available to reduce exposure. EPA has assisted efforts to provide dust masks to rescue workers to minimize inhalation of dust. EPA also recommends that the blast site debris continue to be kept wet, which helps to significantly reduce the amount of airborne dust which can aggravate respiratory ailments such as asthma. On-site facilities are being made available for rescue workers to clean themselves, change their clothing and to have dust-laden clothes cleaned separately from normal household wash.”

9-11 First Responders: dressed for a normal day's work

I’ve highlighted a couple of sentences. They underline the abject failure of the authorities responsible for protecting the occupational health and safety of rescue and clean-up workers to fulfil their pledge to the workers. By now, we know just how lethal dust from the World Trade Center’s really was. But they surely had a fair idea then. Why weren’t all workers issued with STATE OF THE ART respiratory equipment and protective gear? Why weren’t they held back until it was made available? The welfare of these heroic people was treated as a disposable commodity by control freaks and war fanatics within the US Government, aided and abetted by a large supporting cast of liars outside government.

All that I find rather shocking. But it gets worse.

At the very least, I imagined, the US Government would eventually make good and take care of the delayed casualties of New York’s apocalyptic atrocity. I assumed workers and residents affected by dreadful respiratory diseases, cancers and other ailments that began to afflict more and more of them as the decade continued would be placated with generous compenation and health care.

After all, back in the heady days of mid-September 2001, the media was overflowing with stories about the ‘heroic first responders’. Photos of their dust-encrusted faces were ubiquitous. They were the legends of the hour. Surely America wouldn’t just forget about them afterwards and leave them to die in misery?

That outcome, as best I can recall, was unthinkable to me back in late 2001. I simply couldn’t imagine the USA could ever be so callous to its own people.

But I was wrong. Broadly speaking, since 2001 the US government has left these disposable heroes to rot. What’s more, the mass media has blatantly failed to convey this to the public as a whole.

Ordinary folk in New York did their duty at the time of crisis. For that, they’ve suffered horribly. Every benefit that’s been granted to sufferers has been hard-fought. Now, as Christmas 2010 approaches – more than 100 moons after 9-11 – Congress is still farting around in a puerile bipartisan game of legislative pass-the-parcel. The result is that, to this day, there’s still nothing in place that resembles reasonable long-term financial settlement of the medical and welfare needs of survivors.

Congress recently approved tax-cuts the nation obviously can’t afford for millionaries and billionaires who can surely manage without them. Republicans insisted on it. Many Democrats demurred – but eventually a compromise was steered through Congress in time for the mid-winter holidays. It was a compromise in which the wealthy got their tax cuts – sold to the public as some form of economic stimulus! God help them for the lies they tell.

Yet no ‘compromise could be negotiated over H.R.847 – the proposed James Zadroga 9/11 Health and Compensation Act of 2010

The  House of Representatives passed the Bill in late September. But earlier this month, Republicans in the Senate blocked its passage through Congress.

Most Democrats supported the legislation; most Republicans did not. Shame on them! It would be mistaken, however, to see this just as a partisan clash with good guys to the left and bad guys on the right. Democrats controlled the Senate and House for two years during the period a Democratic President has been in office. If they’d really wanted legislation to assist New York’s 9-11 sufferers, there have been ample opportunities already to pass it. Cynthia McKinney raised the issue years ago, pleading for urgent action.

John McCain, the plutocrat's friend. Likes: tax cuts for the rich; Dislikes: 'Dream Acts' for pesky first responders

The possibility remains some variant of the Zadroga 9/11 Health and Compensation Act will be passed. There’s even a chance this will happen very soon – see this report today: Senate hopes rise for passage of 9/11 health bill

I wouldn’t be surprised if it does pass, not because my faith in Congress has increased, but because I suspect the politicians know deep down they’ve pushed their luck to the limit in this case..

Republicans who care about re-election down the track won’t feel as bold as John McCain who sneeringly dismissed the legislation as New York’s ‘Dream Act’. Leaving first responders to wage legal battles from their wheelchairs is a bad look – especially if Democrats and the media start pushing the story. Jon Stewart recently showed how compelling a pitch it can be – check out the audience reaction when he recently discussed the Congressional gridlock with four 9-11 first responders!

There’s another factor. Congress keeps endorsing ever-growing sums to beef up ‘Homeland Security’, but even the cosseted elite must realise their security is undermined if they behave like greedy, evil trolls in too conspicuous a manner.

Politicians caught out treating the public with utter contempt do well to fear the lynch-mob. They might find the armed grunts employed to protect them switch sides and join in.

The populace will only put up with so much crap. That limit has been reached.
________________________________

UPDATE 1: 23rd December 2010

Several hours after this article was published, the US Senate passed a scaled-down version of the 9/11 Health and Compensation Act.

The BBC reports US Senate passes health bill for Ground Zero workers:

After a high-profile campaign by television personalities – including Comedy Central presenter Jon Stewart and Fox News presenter Shepard Smith – as well as former Republican New York City Mayor Rudolph Giuliani, the bill won the backing of Republicans who had opposed on cost grounds.

To win passage, Democratic negotiators led by New York Senators Kirsten Gilibrand and Charles Schumer agreed to lower to $4.2bn (£2.7bn) healthcare aid to Ground Zero workers, from the initial $6.2bn, and other concessions.

“Every American recognises the heroism of the 9/11 first responders, but it is not compassionate to help one group while robbing future generation of opportunity,” said Republican Senator Tom Coburn of Oklahoma, who had led Republican opposition.

“This agreement strikes a fair balance.”

The legislation agreed on Wednesday also keeps a compensation fund open for victims of the attacks for another five years to cover economic losses of ill workers, and provides about $4bn (£2.6bn) for monitoring and treating illnesses caused by 9/11.

Now it’s back to the House of Representatives. With growing celebrity support, maybe they’ll get that done it before Christmas.

The most priceless comment of the entire sorry saga was by Senator from Oklahoma: “it is not compassionate to help one group while robbing future generation of opportunity“.

Presumably Senator Coburn voted last week against tax breaks for billionares? Not.

UPDATE 2: 24th December 2010

Yesterday (US time) the House of Representatives finally passed the Bill approved by the Senate which provides a scaled-down package of assistance to victims of ill-health resulting from the 9-11 atrocities.

Here are extracts from the report from New York public radio WNYC:

The bill has been in the works for years, pushed by New York politicians, fire fighters and police officers, but had stalled in the Senate earlier this month. After its sponsors agreed to scale down the cost of the bill considerably, from the $7.4 billion price tag approved by the House of Representatives in September, to $4.2 billion, it passed quickly.

………….

The bill will continue to provide health care and monitoring for tens of thousands of first-responders, construction workers and Lower Manhattan residents who were exposed to World Trade Center dust in the weeks following the attacks.

But instead of continuing that monitoring effort for 10 years, the scaled-back bill provides only enough funding to last for five years. That’s still an advantage over the present system, which mandates federal funding for the effort be renewed on a year-by-year basis.

Jill Fenwick, from Staten Island, was caught in a dust plume caused by the collapse of the towers on 9/11, and continued to work downtown afterwards. She said she struggles with a range of chronic illnesses. “I’m happy that the bill passed because it gives us a reprieve, I guess for five years. I’m not happy that many of the people who may have the same diseases as I do are already dead,” she said. “It gives one pause.”

The bill also sets up a Victims Compensation Fund that will give monetary awards for to emergency workers and others who fall ill and lose wages as a result of exposure to the dust and to their families in case of death. The fund will be similar to one set up for people who were killed by the actual attacks.

In the original House version of the bill, the Victims Compensation Fund was to remain open until 2031, but now it will last only five years and close permanently in 2016.

………..

Steve Cassidy, president of the Uniformed Firefighters Association of Greater New York, said the bill is a big victory. “A five-year extension was not what we were looking for but it is certainly a huge step in the right direction, and what needed to get done now,” he said.