"...how can anyone still believe that the US is actually fighting a "war on terror" to "safeguard our freedoms" rather than a war of conquest?"

Corresponding links to the assertions over at the full article.

Sanitizing The War On Terror -- Signs of the Times News:

"For many years now millions of people around the world, including former members of the US and other governments, academics and professionals have known and spoken about the fact that "al-Qaeda", far from being a modern Islamic terror group was the name given to a small grouping of extremist and deluded nut-jobs that the US and British governments hired and trained to fight the Russians in Afghanistan in the late 70's and early 80's. Also widely accepted is the fact that, after that particular conflict, Pakistani intelligence, in league with the CIA, continued to handle and groom these extremists and stage-manage their sporadic attacks around the world in order to conjure up the modern "Islamic terror threat".

Several mainstream media outlets and US government officials have stated that Osama bin laden was a CIA asset who was used to funnel money to these extremists and oversee the establishment of militant training camps, all under the control of Western agents.

A French intelligence report, carried by the mainstream press, stated that Osama Bin Laden met with a CIA agent in the American hospital in Dubai two months before the 9/11 attacks.

Everyone knows, (or should) that the Bush government escorted members of Bin Laden's family out of the US on September 11th 2001...

And finally, several mainstream media outlets, quoting official government sources, have reported that Osama bin Laden probably died many years ago.

Given just these basic facts, the tip of the iceberg of the evidence, how can anyone still believe that the US is actually fighting a "war on terror" to "safeguard our freedoms" rather than a war of conquest and empire expansion, and still lay claim to their sanity? I mean, is the proposition so hard to digest? Remember history class? It's not like this is the first time..."