On This Day 9/11

[JustMyOpinion]

Here's a challenge on this day 9/11:

How about we pause for a moment today to remember that we are more then "progressives," or "neocons." We are all Americans, and we need to stand together as one despite our differences. I've been observing the forum over the last few days and am surprised at how fast we can turn on each other over differing opinions/views instead of learning from another's perspective, or at the minimum responding with some level of respect. We should instead remember how lucky we are to have the opportunity to post our opinions freely without dire consequences whether we agree or not.

United We Stand...[/b]

[subdjoe]

Amen.

[harpman1]

As usual, I'll be thanking the U.S. Military for all of my freedoms today.

Freedom:
Citizens want it.
Statesmen propose it.
Legislatures approve it.
Soldiers purchase it.
Citizens enjoy it.

Never forget.

[Mink]

Thanks for posting this JMO and reminding us how we came together during that horrifying and helpless morning.

[The Big Dog]

In the days and weeks immediately following the 9/11 attacks, I became increasingly frustrated by the American news media and the manner in which they collectively covered the story. In many ways, the coverage was soft pedaled. We knew thousands had died, and we knew of some of the stories of heroism, such as of Todd Beamer and his fellow passengers aboard United 93.

Today, as we mark the seventh anniversary of the attacks, I've watched sound bite coverage of somber ceremonies and talking heads pontificating about that horrible day. I sense grief and sorrow, but the anger and resolve that filled that day and the first few days and weeks that followed seems gone. The media is covering our outpourings of grief, but the anger is missing.

Just four weeks after the attack, I wrote a piece called "Why We Fight", and it was posted at my personal web site until I changed ISPs and took it down. If you know how to use the Internet Way Back Machine, it can still be found cached out on the web.

To help remember the events in their proper perspective, I am posting it again here today.

I am good and worked over the sanitizing that the mainstream media in this country is doing with the news of here, while focusing on the "pain and suffering" of non-combatants over in Afghanistan who the Taliban happen to be hugging up to in an effort to keep from getting a bomb dropped on themselves. This amounts to little more than propaganda, and I am just about sick and tired of it.

Thank whatever you hold holy for the Net, my friends and colleagues. Without it, and without our persistent searching for truth and news we would not know, as Paul Harvey calls it, the rest of the story.

How many times in the past few weeks since the air campaign started have you seen stories from some network talking head or another about damage to civilian areas, or non-combatant casualties in Afghanistan? Most of the time, little attention seems to be paid to the fact that the Taliban is purposely strenghtening positions in civilian areas to incur "collateral damage" that they know will be played as the lead story in American living rooms.

But how much have you heard.... really heard, on any mainstream outlet of the victims of the WTC? Or the plane in Pennsylvania. Who, besides the late Barbara Olson has been lamented in the Pentagon crash? Were any of those killed on the ground spoken of? We are treated to sanitized memorial service, after cropped picture. As the event recedes into history, so does our institutional memory. Our media is about the moment at hand, and little more.

In World War II, Frank Capra made a series of films entitled "Why We Fight". These days, it seems like our Fourth Estate is telling us the story of "Why We Shouldn't Fight... Someone Might Get Hurt". Well, no kidding all you powderpuffed talking heads. I am scornful of most, but I am especially un-inspired by Ashleigh Banfield of MSNBC, reporting live from Pakistan nightly with serious intonation on the carnage and damage our air campaign has caused. Remember her? She was a blonde on 09/11 and went brunette for her trip abroad.

Its a war, media people. We didn't start it. Those who terrorize and harbor terrorists did. In war, people die. Its messy and stuff gets broken. But then, other than repetetive mentions and static shots of "ground zero", what are we really being told about what has happened on the homefront. Sure, anthrax is being sensationalized in the media so that some parts of the public are near hysteria. The risk to the average person is so low that it is in fractions of a percent, yet its a crisis and would cry out in blood red headlines if this were still the golden age of newspapers. Of course, now even some in the foreign press are wetting their pants that the US has not the stomach or the will to stick it out.

I was sent a link to this site by a co-worker. Its not so much a site as it is a collection of picture files of images of the WTC attack and its aftermath. They tell only a small part of the overwhelming human tragedy that is 9/11/2001. They tell the story of "Why We Fight".

I'm reminded of an line in an old movie about how when the legend becomes fact, print the legend. The media has so sanitized and made legend of what the attacks were, and meant to those who lived through them, and died because of them. What have you ever heard of the children who must have died in the day care centers on site? The husbands and wives, sisters and brothers, fathers and mothers and children? What of them?

In my research for this piece I came across another example of the media perpetuating the legend. On MSNBC.com I found an article about a biography that is planned of the late Father Mychal Judge, an FDNY chaplain who perished on 09/11. The news item points out that he was killed on that day by falling debris.

Thats Father Mike in photo up above, slumped in the chair. He was already dead when that photo, and a later more famous image, was taken. Remember forever the image of this peaceful man of God being carried away from the scene of his gruesome end to be laid out in honor at a nearby firehouse.

The truth of the matter is that Father Mike was struck and killed by a falling human body. A person who either fell out of the building or jumped so as not to burn to death landed on Father Mike and killed him. But our media elite choose to refer to that human being, yet another precious life sacrificed by this evil act, as "falling debris".

This spoon feeding of information to the American public absolutely infuriates me to my very core and it has to stop. What is the Fourth Estate afraid of... getting us angry? We are way beyond angry, oh media mavens. We should never lose the emotion that will fuel our righteous wrath as a nation and a people to seek justice on the people who helped perpetrate this act and still live, and failing justice then their eradication from the earth.

That is what this war is about, and we must not forget it. If the media would simply tell us the truth, instead of trying to sugar coat and spin because we "must be protected", then no one, not even the hand-wringing British press, would have any doubt as to our resolve to see this through to the end. But the press seems to feel that we can't handle the truth.

I say we can handle the truth, and that we must handle it. We owe it to the victims and their families to never forget the awful truth of the reality, the suffering and the horror that was 09/11. This is truly why we fight.

Since I wrote that piece seven years ago a lot of water has gone under the bridge. Time marches on. We're still fighting the terrorists, even though a lot of folks might think otherwise. I've been to Ground Zero. It was perhaps the most sobering single moment of my life.

Soon, we're going to elect a new president and the fight will go on. We've been lucky since then and have not had another attack on our soil. Yet, and perhaps because there has been no further attacks on our soil, today I feel that far too many have forgotten why it is that we must fight the terrorists, and fight them to the death if necessary.

This is why we fight...



And this is why we fight...



And this is why we fight...



And so no one ever has to go through this again...



We must continue to fight.

And as long as I draw breath I shall never forget what happened that day, nor will I ever let anyone who can hear my voice or read my words forget what happened that day.

[Mink]

Big Dog, that was touching. I, too will never forget the morning getting ready for work, then realizing our country was under attack. Waking the children, and how does one explain the predicament was beyond me. Do I go to work? Do I send the kids to school? It is still hard for me to imagine what all the families who lost loved ones that day, must have experienced.

The weeks afterwards the country saw unity, flags all around us, people cringing at any plane flying above and yet no one knew what we could expect. They said the economy would definitely feel the loss, but what was worse was the fear of another attack.

So much has happened since then and without taking away from the horrific memory of that horrendous morning, how can we find closure unless we hold those accountable?

[subdjoe]

Also, keep in mind that the FIRST attack had come 8 years earlier, on 2/26/93.

[Mink]

Yes, no one can forget the first attack either, which should have raised a bigger "redder" flag to the next president, given the prior intelligence walking into office.

Regardless, the memory of 9/11 should drive the US to hold the perpetrators accountable and that has not been achieved. We know who attacked us.

[The New Guy]

magnificent post, mr. dog. you get a well deserved exaltation.

mink, pardon my forthcoming harshness but here goes.....

mink said,

Yes, no one can forget the first attack either, which should have raised a bigger "redder" flag to the next president, given the prior intelligence walking into office.

how the hell can you use this thread of all threads to take a shot at president bush? are you out of your mind? that was so uncalled for , so wrong, and so inappropriate! you are damn right that the WTC attack of '93 should have raised a big red flag......with CLINTON. he ignored it and other attacks (embassy bombings in africa, khobar towers, USS Cole, etc.) the red flags were all around but your boy was too busy getting blown in the white house hallway to even notice or to even care enough to take action. for SEVEN years he witnessed attack after attack on his fellow citizens and he did NOTHING, NOTHING, NOTHING!

the responsibility for 9/11 rests squarely upon his shoulders! i'm so pissed off right now and i can't believe that you would think to bring politics into this thread.

my only regret is that i can only smite you once for this.

[ferrous]

And what of the next president?

Do we lower the "Red Flags" and once again are lulled into a sense of false security because of the president's following his third "Doctrine?"

BTW, Gibson got it wrong when he asked Sarah Palin about the Bush doctrine.

It has been, now seven years since the 911 attack by radical Islamic terrorists. It's quite right that the President has gotten it right.

The next president will also hae to get it right in order to prevent innocent American blood from being spilt at home.

Bravo, President Bush understanding this and for keeping us safe in our homes and places of work.

[The Big Dog]

Sept 13, 2008 1:46:18 GMT -5 The New Guy said:

magnificent post, mr. dog. you get a well deserved exaltation.

Thanks! Sometimes I write..... well.

how the hell can you use this thread of all threads to take a shot at president bush? are you out of your mind? that was so uncalled for , so wrong, and so inappropriate!

Which is why I am not conversing with her........... I'm beyond tired of it.

[Mink]

Sept 13, 2008 1:46:18 GMT -5 The New Guy said:

magnificent post, mr. dog. you get a well deserved exaltation.

mink, pardon my forthcoming harshness but here goes.....

mink said,

Yes, no one can forget the first attack either, which should have raised a bigger "redder" flag to the next president, given the prior intelligence walking into office.

how the hell can you use this thread of all threads to take a shot at president bush? are you out of your mind? that was so uncalled for , so wrong, and so inappropriate! you are damn right that the WTC attack of '93 should have raised a big red flag......with CLINTON. he ignored it and other attacks (embassy bombings in africa, khobar towers, USS Cole, etc.) the red flags were all around but your boy was too busy getting blown in the white house hallway to even notice or to even care enough to take action. for SEVEN years he witnessed attack after attack on his fellow citizens and he did NOTHING, NOTHING, NOTHING!

the responsibility for 9/11 rests squarely upon his shoulders! i'm so pissed off right now and i can't believe that you would think to bring politics into this thread.

my only regret is that i can only smite you once for this.

TNG, of all things I didn't intend to do was to piss anyone off as we all share the same memory of 9/11. I agree, this wouldn't be the thread to attack each other. I responded to subdjoe's post:
"Also, keep in mind that the FIRST attack had come 8 years earlier, on 2/26/93."

The first attack was also shocking however the perpetrators of that job were caught and are now serving time in the pokey.