The two main players in releasing the Pentagon Papers were Daniel Ellsberg and United States Senator Mike Gravel.
Senator Gravel is the person who read the Pentagon Papers into the Congressional Record. This act made the papers public record, so that they could not be censored by the government. He was the only member of Congress courageous enough to do so.
Both Ellsberg and Gravel - like many other high-level former officials in the government and intelligence services (including many well-known whistleblowers) - support a new 9/11 investigation. Ellsberg says that the case of a certain 9/11 whistleblower is "far more explosive than the Pentagon Papers". (Here's some of what that whistleblower says.) He also said that the government is ordering the media to cover up her allegations about 9/11.
And he said that some of the claims concerning government involvement in 9/11 are credible, that "very serious questions have been raised about what they [U.S. government officials] knew beforehand and how much involvement there might have been", that engineering 9/11 would not be humanly or psychologically beyond the scope of those in office, and that there's enough evidence to justify a new, "hard-hitting" investigation into 9/11 with subpoenas and testimony taken under oath (see this and this).
Gravel is now backing a California ballot initiative for a new 9/11 investigation. The text of the initiative is below.
The initiative would actually help support the 9/11 Commission and fulfill the desire of the 9/11 Commissioners. Specifically, the Commission was severely underfunded:
•The government spent $175 million investigating the Challenger space shuttle disaster.
•It spent $152 million on the the Columbia disaster investigation.
•It spent $30 million investigating the Monica Lewinsky scandal.
•But the government only authorized $15 million for the 9/11 Commission.
Moreover, many 9/11 Commissioners said they never completed the investigation:
•9/11 Commission co-chair Lee Hamilton himself says "I don't believe for a minute we got everything right", that the Commission was set up to fail, that people should keep asking questions about 9/11, and that the 9/11 debate should continue.
•Similarly, 9/11 Commissioner Bob Kerrey said "There are ample reasons to suspect that there may be some alternative to what we outlined in our version . . . We didn't have access . . . ." . He also says that he had long feared that the investigation depended too heavily on the accounts of Al Qaeda detainees who were physically coerced into talking, and that it might take "a permanent 9/11 commission" to end the remaining mysteries of September 11.
•And 9/11 Commissioner Max Cleland resigned from the Commission, stating: "One of these days we will have to get the full story because the 9-11 issue is so important to America."
The initiative would allow deeper questions to be asked about 9/11, allow the 9/11 debate to continue, investigate the remaining mysteries of 9/11, and help to get to the full story, as the 9/11 Commissioners themselves want. (The Commissioners haven't yet read the initiative).
The initiative is unusual because it would allow other state governments, and even local governments, within California or any other state, two different options to officially express support for the new commission’s investigation pursuant to the initiative’s terms. Under the first option, a state or local government could enter a joint powers agreement with the commission to join the investigation and to share resources with the commission. Under the second option, a state or local government could endorse the efforts of the commission, at no cost to the state or local government, merely by the governing body of that state or local government passing an official resolution expressly supporting the commission’s investigation.
The initiative is also unusual because it goes the extra mile to ensure that the investigation will not be compromised by political considerations like the 9/11 Commission and the Financial Crisis Inquiry Commission were. Specifically, it amends the state constitution to name Senator Gravel as the initial director and ensures that commissioners are appointed on the basis of their qualifications, and not political considerations. The initiative would name former Congresswoman Cynthia McKinney as the initial director if Gravel is unable to serve in that capacity.
Read more:
http://www.washingtonsblog.com/2011/03/pentagon-papers-whistleblowers.html
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