9/11 was a conspiracy?

[acidca]

One of my friends is constantly running his mouth about how 9/11 was a coup d'etat designed by "the government" and is really obsessed with conspiracy theories. Usually I just ignore him and let him convince my idiot gullible buddies that the evil republicans designed the whole thing, but he is becoming frighteningly successful.

He rambles on about heresay and circumstantial evidence which "proves" his [censored] theories. For example he supposedly interviewed the last person to leave the towers and survive, who told him he "heard loud noises in the basement" before the first plane hit (implying that there were explosives planted there). He also says that Cheney insisted the air force or something stand down as the plane was about to hit the pentagon, etc. He has a ton of "evidence" to support his claims.

So when I get past my breaking point and start arguing with him, I eventually just give up and end up making him look right because I haven't spent 500 hours on conspiracy websites soaking up [censored].

My guess is that plenty of the people on this forum have the knowledge it would take to shut this guy down badly. Pretend I'm him and just made a long-winded post. Shut me down. Feel free to quote conspiracy websites and tell me what's idiotic about them. Convince me that there is no [censored] conspiracy. I will point my friends who buy into this BS towards this thread.

All efforts appreciated,
acidca

edit: I've found some pretty good stuff now so I'm ok