We'll always remember the sheer, relentless horror of that day. As the towers fell, and the Pentagon burned, and planes crashed, we had no idea how much further it was going to go. How much more would happen before it let up? A growing paranoia gripped the entire country.
We'll never forget the heroism of the first responders, and all those who sought to selflessly give help in those early days. Many at the risk of their own safety and health. Many of the first responders who survived, suffered subsequent cancers, diseases and poor health. Thank you, Jon Stewart, for helping a reluctant Congress pass legislation to help provide them support.
I'll always remember how Muslims were treated in this country immediately after, with an irrational, horrible hatred. Actually debating in this country whether Muslims should be racially profiled. In this, and with the Patriot Act, we turned our back on many of the freedoms and liberties we said that we cherished. We were ready to give up so much in order to achieve a false sense of security.
I'll never forget how we let Osama Bin Laden escape from Tora Bora, and then inexplicably stopped making him a priority, but instead focused on a country that had no part in 9/11. And if you raised any objection to this spectacular mis-adventure you considered unpatriotic and could lose your job and your social standing.
It should be remembered that what Jesus said was true - love and understanding are more powerful than hate and intolerance. We solve more by targeting the actual bad guys (the highly disdained police action approach) than we did by throwing a blind hissy, turning potential allies into permanent enemies.
It should not be forgotten that we live in a dangerous world. Sometimes the only answer to force is force. But indiscriminate, brutal force only continues the spiral to oblivion.
Let us remember the fallen. Let us not forget that the forces of evil and destruction must be challenged and opposed. But also remember that love is greater than hate, that diplomacy, as difficult as it may be, matters. And that you have already lost if you are willing to abandon everything you hold dear in order to win.
Very well written, Tom! Thanks.
ReplyDeleteThis comment might be on the wrong post... perhaps it belongs on your post from last year.....
ReplyDeleteSeptember 11, 2001 holds a totally different memory for me... I am slightly removed from the happenings of that day that the rest of the nation sees due to the fact my (now ex) husband and I were racing up Hwy 75 speeding to a father- in-law who was drawing his last breaths of life... we had been told that we needed to hurry.... that he wasn’t doing well... that it was probably “time”... but we thought we had just 15 minutes to stop and catch a TV in a store along the route to see what the radio announcers had been describing for about an hour on the radio news.... we did stop... we did see the film footage of the towers falling... we got back in our truck and continued racing... getting stopped by two State Patrols, offering a hasty reason for our speed and being let go.... 10 minutes distance from my mother in law’s house... we answered the truck phone to my husband’s mother telling us his dad had just died of lung cancer, basically drowning on his own air..... before we reached him for my husband to say goodbye.... It was a fog after that.... no need to speed anymore... a slow walk into the house.... seeing the man who dearly loved history and would have been in the thick of all the news coverage and VERY aware that he was witnessing history sat in his recliner finally at some peace.... The TV on. My Mother in law crying, my sister in law crying... my husband never shedding a tear cuz he was like that. And me, never having seen death before, silently, selfishly, both thanking God I didn’t have to witness what my mother- in- law was describing thru her sobs of the last half hour of Mr. Richard’s life but also feeling very guilty for feeling so. 9/11 brings up those memories cuz everyone talks about “where were you?”. We had the TV on thru out the day... but nobody was really watching... the sound would float to us while people came in and out.... I guess I probably paid more attention to it just because I didn’t know what else to do.... So I can’t help but think of all that first when someone mentions 9/11.
K.D. Cook