Vidal on McVeigh (OKC Bombing)

[jakeXT]

I'm surprised he is defending him....

I'm aware of the report that McVeigh was still breathing and blinking after he was pronounced dead. http://www.apfn.org/movies/mcveigh-lives.WMV
And I've heard of the multiple local reports of unexploded devices being found inside the building, but to have Gore Vidal defend McVeigh and probably the official story, while claiming Bush had something to do with 911 is strange.

I try to pull him back. Yes, it's clearly the case that 9/11 was in part a blow-back response to US crimes in the Middle East, but he goes much further, and says the Bush administration was "probably" in on it.

...

IV. A Noble Boy

On 19 April 1995, a former US soldier called Timothy McVeigh planted a massive truck bomb outside a government building in Oklahoma City, at the heart of Vidal's grandfather's old constituency. Some 168 people died, including a kindergarten full of children. McVeigh wrote to Vidal, saying he had been motivated, in part, by studying his work. He said he believed the US Constitution had been usurped by a National Security State that had to be defeated by force. Vidal wrote back – and they became friends. He started mounting passionate defences of the bomber in public. He says he was not crazy, but "too sane for his place and time".

"He was a dedicated student of the American way, of the Constitution itself," he says. "You should read his writings – they're very good. Particularly on the Posse Comitatus Act of 1876, which forbids the Federal government ever to use its troops against the American people – but which they proceeded to do at Waco . They killed more people than he managed to kill when he blew up that building in Oklahoma City. He was a noble boy."

Noble? The man who consorted with far right militia groups and blew up all those children? Vidal scowls again, and almost hisses: "He didn't kill them deliberately! But the American government killed all those people at Waco, men, women and children deliberately! It was his gesture against the government he loathed. You know, he swore to me he had no idea there were children there. He said, 'How would I know? I walked by the place once and I knew that there was some kind of dining room, families might be there, or they might not be there,' and he wasn't counting, he wasn't out for a big count. But he was trying to tell the government – look, you have done this arbitrarily, contrary to the Posse Comitatus Act, contrary to American law, you've killed American citizens. Remember he was an army boy, and he loved it, and he was longing to get back in the army and the army was longing to get him back, he was the best sharpshooter they'd seen in years. But it was not meant to be."

But he knew he would kill scores of innocent people: that was the point. Doesn't that show a callous disrespect for human life? "So did Patton, so did Eisenhower!" he says angrily. "Everybody's rather careless about it once you start getting involved in wars. He saw this as a war to preserve the Constitution! You know what he said? But you don't, so I'm going to tell you. The judge quite liked him, and he was intrigued by the fact that this rather talkative kid who wrote tons of pieces for the press had not defended himself. So he said – Mr McVeigh, could we hear more from you? said, 'Well, your honour, I will base my case on Justice Brandeis, one of our most brilliant jurists, in his opinion in Olmstead. There, he writes that when government ceases to lead by example and actually provides a bad example, anything can happen. Government is the last teacher. Everything I did, I learned from my government."

..

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/gore-vidals-united-states-of-fury-1798601.html