Since That Day
Saturday 11 September 2010
by: William Rivers Pitt, t r u t h o u t | Op-Ed
(Image: Lance Page / t r u t h o u t; Adapted: slagheap, Nicholas Vinacco, Phillip Capper)
I moved into a new apartment last week, and I've since noticed that when there are low clouds in the sky, the airplanes out of Logan fly low over my new neighborhood as they depart for wherever. It is cloudy today and I can hear them overhead, roaring by every few minutes, hidden in the gray weather above.
I think about that day when I hear the engines. Of course I do. It was nine years ago, but still, for me, it is the sound of airplane engines that brings it all back, if only for a moment.
Everyone has a story about where they were on that day. One friend of mine, a cook, was buried in the kitchen for the breakfast rush and had no idea what was going on until the orders dried up. He walked out of the kitchen wondering what was going on to find everyone staring dumbstruck at the television. Another friend of mine was working at a brokerage house in San Francisco. He didn't have a television and liked to listen to music on headphones during his commute to work. He got to work and started calling various extensions at the New York home office in the World Trade Center, but nobody was picking up. It wasn't until his boss came in and told him what had happened that he realized he had been calling dead people.
I was a teacher, and it was the first day of school. I was the first person in the building to find out what was going on, and I ran around from teacher to teacher letting them know what had happened before hauling two televisions out of the library closet so we could all watch together. I was shattered, but the children were terrified, and so I had to hold myself together and reassure them, even as the sound of fighter jets started roaring overhead. One of my students heard the news and turned white, because her father was supposed to be at a meeting in the Trade Center that morning. He survived, many others did not. That night, I bought a bottle of brown liquor on the way home and drank it off in front of my own television as those images were seared into my memory forever.
When all is said and done, someone once said, there's nothing left to do or say. There are 300 million versions of this story in America, and billions more around the world. Everyone remembers where they were, and what they were doing, on that day. Give anyone you meet a chance, and they'll tell you all about it.
Nine years, four national elections, two wars and two presidents since that day, and where are we now as a nation? Broke, deranged and dangerous pretty much sums it up. We have Christian-Taliban pastors in Florida with filthy souls threatening to burn the Qu'ran, as if such an act had any meaning beyond a desire to make money, and a national news media apparatus all too happy to give them all the ink and air time he could ever wish for. We have seething crowds threatening arson and murder because a Muslim community center might get built next to a strip club on the site of a defunct coat store. We have national caricatures like Sarah Palin charging people more than $200 for the chance to meet with her on that day, as if she has any significance at all. We've got stabbings and beatings and firebombings, and this is nine years later.
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We are a nation of euphemisms now. It's not spying on the American people, it is "national security." It's not holding someone in a hellhole without charges or trial, it is "indefinite detention." It's not kidnapping, it is "extraordinary rendition." It's not murder or assassination, it is "targeted killing." It's not torture, it is "enhanced interrogation." It's not wildly and patently illegal and immoral on its face, it is "war."
We are a lessened nation nine years later, and much of the damage has been done by our own hand. It is one thing for people to react with fear and rage after an outrageous act of violence. It is quite another for the leaders of those people to exploit that fear and rage for their own dark and greedy purposes, and nine years later, we are down in the ditch thanks to exactly that sort of behavior. Thousands of American soldiers have died in Iraq and Afghanistan, and tens of thousands more have been grievously maimed. Millions of civilians in those two countries have been slaughtered or shattered, but we may never know the true scope of the carnage, because "we don't do body counts."
It is not all darkness, however, because we also have this, from the second president to take up residence in the White House since that day:
President Obama concluded his press conference today with a statement on the importance of protecting the rights of American Muslims. "We don't differentiate between them and us," he said. "It's just us. And that is a principle that I think is going to be very important for us to sustain."
Obama was asked about the controversial Park51 Islamic center, and said: "I think I've been pretty clear on my position here. And that is: This country stands for the proposition that all men and women are created equal, that they have certain inalienable rights, and one of those inalienable rights is to practice their religion freely."
"What that means," he continued, "is that if you could build a church on a site, you could build a synagogue on a site, if you could build a Hindu temple on a site, then you should be able to build a mosque on the site."
"We've got millions of Muslim Americans, our fellow citizens in this country," Obama said. "They're going to school with our kids. They're our neighbors. They're our friends. They're our coworkers. And when we start acting as if their religion is somehow offensive, what are we saying to them?"
That’s about exactly right, despite the sorry fact that it comes from the same president who has been helpless to refrain from perpetuating – or all too eager to perpetuate – the barbaric and anti-American practices that have become all too commonplace in the nine years since that day. In this, he must not be allowed to lead us, because the grooves of this manner of leadership are too deeply cut into the road for him to easily deviate. In this, we must lead him, and I suspect he will follow if given the chance.
Nine years later, one truth remains: America is an idea, a dream, a hope that has yet to be realized. Take away our people, our cities, our roads, our crops, our armies and navies and bombs and guns, take all of that away and there is still the idea, as vibrant and vital as it was when the Founders first put ink to parchment and changed the world. Everyone you know owns a heritage that began somewhere else; we are all different in so many ways, and all that binds us is the ink on that parchment and the ideas therein contained. We are all our brother’s and sister’s keeper, beholden to one another, all of us children of that idea.
Nine years ago, we were forced into an accounting of how dear that idea is to us, and were found wanting. Nine years later, we still are. The idea deserves better than what we have given to it. We can continue in this fashion, or we can summon within ourselves the will and wisdom to locate those better angels of our nature that are surely there, waiting for us.
Let us try, at least, to locate them, and make them sing. 365 days from now, we will be marking the passage of a decade since that day. What a proper moment to celebrate a new beginning, a renewed focus on how we can dedicate ourselves to the daily creation of that more perfect union we know is possible. What a chance to transform a day of sorrow and hatred into a day of somber recognition of our flaws, our faults, and the boundless possibilities of the idea that is, still, us.
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Comments
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On this solemn day, I do not
Sat, 09/11/2010 - 09:40 — Anonymous (not verified)On this solemn day, I do not want to seem callous about the horror that took place 9 years ago in NY city, a place I had lived in and which I will be in this weekend of 9/11, but I am old enough to recall when Pearl Harbor was attacked. How many recall, remember, honor that day? short test: what day was it?
December 7th. And those who
Sat, 09/11/2010 - 10:34 — Anonymous (not verified)December 7th.
And those who witnessed the event and felt the keen bite of the aftermath do honor it. Yes, it is sad that new generations will forget that. But we know the cost to our country, just like we know the cost to our country that September 11th caused.
If a person who threatens to
Sat, 09/11/2010 - 11:16 — Anonymous (not verified)If a person who threatens to burn the Qu'ran has a "filthy soul", then what could you say about the souls of the many Muslims around the world who have burned Bibles? What could you say about the souls of those who think violence is an appropriate response to a book burning? What could you say about the souls of those who only criticize the threatened book burning, and do not criticize the threatened violent response to it?
And what could you say about
Sat, 09/11/2010 - 11:18 — Anonymous (not verified)And what could you say about the souls of those who actually had a violent response already to a book burning that hasn't happened and has been called off?
@ Anonymous 16:16. It's not
Sat, 09/11/2010 - 12:34 — Saje Williams (not verified)@ Anonymous 16:16. It's not about them. It's about us, and what we are supposed to represent. I don't know--maybe I set my standards a little higher than a murderous militant extremist and those who may revere him. Leadership is about setting an example, not pointing to the other guy and saying "that's what he'd do." And forgive us for having higher expectations of our fellow Americans than the Jihadists.
9/11 is not 12/7 The Pearl
Sat, 09/11/2010 - 12:39 — Realist (not verified)9/11 is not 12/7
The Pearl Harbor attack was more than avenged even before Hiroshima and Nagasaki. 2 permanently destroyed battleships, a couple of hundred obsolete aircraft, and 2800 dead servicemen were more than balanced by the destruction of Japan and the deaths of millions of Japanese.
Unlike 9/11, it was clear who performed the Pearl Harbor attack - a sovereign nation state. 9/11 was perpetrated by a criminal clique which hides behind Saudi money and Wahhabi fundamentalism. Millions of innocent Muslims get to pay the price for the acts of these criminals despite the innocents' having had no control or influence over the attacks. Al Qaeda is NOT a sovereign nation state.
The US has lost its soul by attacking the innocent while allowing the criminals to go free. Remember Tora Bora? And why can't bin Laden be found? Because he is nowhere near where we seek him. There is only one place on Earth where he can truly hide safely, and we no longer have any troops there. They were moved to Iraq to keep the Saud family safe from popular unrest.
The corporatist Bin Laden did his job for the New World Order, and he is thus allowed to be retired in peace while the global conflagration he helped to initiate rages on unchecked.
Anonymous 1 is not
Sat, 09/11/2010 - 12:52 — Quinty (not verified)Anonymous 1 is not suggesting that the 9/11 attack was the Muslim world's version of Pearl Harbor, is he (or she?)
And if there fanatics among the Muslims living in far off place are they the ones we measure the Muslim world by? Are they the ones by which we establish our own standards of behavior?
Pitt finishes a passionate call for sanity and love and the first thing that pops up here (so it seems to me) is more of the poison. How can we raise ourselves up if we insist upon descending to the lowest among them and ourselves?
The terrorists who
Sat, 09/11/2010 - 13:09 — An (not verified)The terrorists who commandeered our airplanes and rammed them into the World Trade Center have won. The Taliban has won. We are a bankrupt nation, with a government bought and paid for by special interest groups. We are no longer a democracy or a republic, or a free country.
The Founding Fathers endured
Sat, 09/11/2010 - 13:16 — muriel schnierow (not verified)The Founding Fathers endured the stench and heat of Philadelphia in 1787 to write our incredible Constitution and it changed the world .Now all we discuss is a nut job who wants to burn a precious holy
book "or is it" and that is what we discuss endlessly God forbid that radical Islam should not have their rights. Well let us focus on the fact that we got lied into a war that cost us 10 bil a month, got tax cuts for the rich, are going broke, are too gutless to charge Bush-Cheney, and are too gutless to protest a court decisio that will prevent victims of torture from getting justice.
that is much more important than the nonsense about the book burning. And is what the President should be talking about.
Anyone who is not a Muslim,
Sat, 09/11/2010 - 13:29 — Anonymous (not verified)Anyone who is not a Muslim, by definition, does not believe the Koran is a holy book, and does not believe Mohammed is a prophet, and is not obligated to treat either with any reverence. Under Sharia, of course, things would be different. Many in the West think we should voluntarily adopt standards of Sharia. I disagree.
I am not for book burning; however I respect a person's right to free expression. That to me is sacred. The Koran is not.
To me, a soul is filthy if
Sat, 09/11/2010 - 13:32 — Anonymous (not verified)To me, a soul is filthy if the person puts a so-called "right" never to be offended above a Constitutionally protected right to free expression.
The Japanese bombed Pearl
Sat, 09/11/2010 - 14:00 — ronnie (not verified)The Japanese bombed Pearl Harbor, Sunday, 12/7/1941...
And we are STILL at war...
Instead of THINKING - when 9//11/2001 happened - that this was a small group of extremists...we have killed thousands - some say millions of Japanese - Muslims and others not like us...though we started by killing all the Native Americans we could get away with - millions ---- seems to be in the blood wouldn't you say?
Anyone who persists in
Sat, 09/11/2010 - 14:03 — whowouldjesusbomb (not verified)Anyone who persists in believing the official fairy tale should look at this: http://www.washingtonsblog.com/2010/09/anniversary-of-911.html
This country is like a
Sat, 09/11/2010 - 14:07 — Anonymous (not verified)This country is like a person who lost a spouse and does not move on but continually grieves and lives in the past. We actually do need to put 9/11 behind us and even stop using that phrase. Everything did NOT change on 9/11. It was just another barbaric act in the long history of human history. There have been lots of them. What was different was that the USA was attacked, but instead of both resolving to tighten security reasonably and learning what it is like to become a victim we only decided to become aggressors.
Being more vigilant (though not over) is appropriate. Bringing Bin Laden to justice would be. Torture, kidnappings and assisnations are not.
I like the article, and I
Sat, 09/11/2010 - 14:23 — goobagooba (not verified)I like the article, and I tend to agree with the comments.
What seems missing from the whole thing about this day is vision.
It's not just the confusions brought by mixing memory with belief, or the varying emotions raised by the senses of shock, outrage, betrayal and their various attributions of blame on this or that failure of foresight. If there are "lessons" to be ascribed, they are to be found in the plethora of distractions. Clear them away, and something approaching sanity can lead to a greater sense of progress.
Muddying the water has been the mandate of several presidential, not to say congressional terms of office. The principle continues. What might happen if a calm mind approached the whole mess, leashed the loudest voices, allowed actual thinking to take place?
That would be a real revolution.
17:52 You ask, "And if there
Sat, 09/11/2010 - 14:26 — Anonymous (not verified)17:52
You ask, "And if there fanatics among the Muslims living in far off place are they the ones we measure the Muslim world by?"
OK, let's look at Muslim Americans. Surely the most prominent of these would be condemning any violent response to a book burning. What? They aren't?
ISNA has nothing on its front page. Of their prominent links, one article calls the book burning a "particularly egregious offense that demands the strongest possible condemnation". There is no easy-to-find condemnation of the threats of a violent response, however.
CAIR's website prominently says "learn don't burn". Where's the condemnation of those Muslims who have threatened a violent response? If it's there, which is doubtful, it's buried.
Well said, William. I'll
Sat, 09/11/2010 - 15:14 — =Eric (not verified)Well said, William. I'll keep the last three paragraphs to quote.
Didn't plan to read a single
Sat, 09/11/2010 - 15:36 — Kym (not verified)Didn't plan to read a single thing today that had to do with 9/11. Then here's this. Surely didn't think I'd ready anything about it that would make me feel better, but you did.
As a jew, I'm appalled at
Sat, 09/11/2010 - 15:39 — Slideguy (not verified)As a jew, I'm appalled at the anti-muslim sentiment that the right is stoking. We should be especially sensitive to politicians and preachers using hatred of others to gain power and money.
Pitt - Show Me Where In 'the
Sat, 09/11/2010 - 15:44 — Bill O'Rights (not verified)Pitt - Show Me Where In 'the parchment' (our Constitution) it says "We are all our brother's and sister's keeper". I think you might have missed the boat on that one - wrong country, wrong Constitution.
Ever been to one of those places where "We are all our brother's and sister's keeper" is the law? Well, I have - They're all equal - and broke - except for the bureaucrats, who live like kings.
google the film "911
Sat, 09/11/2010 - 16:58 — John Pirtle (not verified)google the film "911 Mysteries". Look at the firsthand eyewitness accounts of William Rodriguez, or the firefighters who heard explosions low in the building, or the science of Dr. Stephen Jones formerly of Brigham Young University.
We are a nation of cowards or fools. We haven't got the guts to demand an actual independent inveatigation.
Cheney Bush had a "visit" with the 911 commission. They did it together, not under oath, not recorded, and not taken down by a court reporter. And we Americans are so weak minded, and cowardly as to stand for this!!!
We have already lost the war against terrorism.
The terrorists won and they are running the government apparently.
9/11 was an inside job and
Sat, 09/11/2010 - 17:42 — A true patriot (not verified)9/11 was an inside job and yet the majority of people choose to believe the big lie instead of the truth. Tens of millions of them are fooled into thinking they are being patriotic by supporting and voting for murderous, treasonous felons. And so it goes. History teaches nothing.
Hey, Truthout. How about
Sat, 09/11/2010 - 18:31 — FRTothus (not verified)Hey, Truthout. How about fixing your fucking spam filter?
Yes, 9/11 & the ensuing
Sat, 09/11/2010 - 19:52 — Anonarcmous (not verified)Yes, 9/11 & the ensuing events, another example of man's inhumanity to man. Any answers as to why all 9/11 remnants were all hauled off to China? What truths do they hide?
TRUNCATED TRUTHOUT
Sat, 09/11/2010 - 21:10 — The Whole Truth (not verified)TRUNCATED TRUTHOUT !
Although the writers at TRUTHOUT know 9/11 was a successful False-Flag Psychological Operation ("inside job") they will not say it.
How best to honor those who
Sat, 09/11/2010 - 22:14 — Pikewich (not verified)How best to honor those who died on September 11, 2001?
Are we still a nation that is governed by the rule of law? If so, why not collectively call for a real investigation into the events that caused those 3 building to collapse killing nearly 2500 innocent people?
If we have over 1270 licensed architects and engineers who have reviewed the massive body of evidence in the public record and concluded there is a very real likelihood those 3 building were destroyed by explosive demolition, why don't we add our voices to theirs and call for a real investigation?
I mean it. Why? I don't understand. We can''t just move forward and sweep it under the carpet. We will just get more of the same treatment.
How can we move into our ideals from our current state of denial?
How can we continue to allow murder to be done in our names for a pack of lies?
Until we find out what really happened and hold those accountable who did it to us, no matter who they are, how can we heal our deep wounds of 9/11?
we neverm found any fuckin
Sun, 09/12/2010 - 07:49 — Anonymous (not verified)we neverm found any fuckin wmds in Iraq fuck the govtmnt
Bush and the Republicans
Sun, 09/12/2010 - 08:24 — Anonymous (not verified)Bush and the Republicans left a big stinking shypile at "ground zero" (a nickname we stole from Hiroshima) for seven years.
In many ways they turned America into one big stinking shytpile. And they left a lot of big stinking shytpiles in Iraq, Afghanistan and other places.
But boy!...they made a lot of money.
America lost the war that day.
Bush vowed that Al qeda would not transform America...change our way of life...change our ideals and freedoms...and he was right. Bin laden didn't do those things....Bush and the GOP Congress did.
They fractured the Constitution and all that was achieved since 1776.
It comes as no surprise that the right-wing extremists of America are just like the right-wing extremists of Islam. Their line is, and always has been, that we should become just like Al qaeda...terrorize and kill as many Muslims as possible in an endless exercise of murderous bigotry....the same driving force behind Islamic Jihad.
Al qaeda terrorized America on 9/11/2001.... Bush and the Republicans terrorized America every day since.
I lost friends on 9/11.
Sun, 09/12/2010 - 09:07 — Anonymous (not verified)I lost friends on 9/11. This day for me is about truth and community.
The former insists that we go beyond what the media and government would like us to believe about WHO did this horrible act and why. This writer believes it was a ploy to distract our attention to what is really going on in this country and the world. It was also an attempt to herd us into a state of fear and control us. Think about the Patriot Act. Has it been repealed? Hardly.
The latter makes me ponder about us. We came together for a crisis and quickly scattered. Recently I was watching Susan Boyle's (I Dreamed a Dream - Les Miz) debut. Remember the audience's initial response to her? Remember their ugly faces full of disparaging unlike looks? Why wouldn't anyone welcome someone living their dream?Only when she reached the notes they deemed acceptable could they cheer her.
We should be cheering one another, encouraging our personal growth, coming together as a community for the highest good. Instead it is all about greed, power and money. Did we not learn anything from 9/11?
Dr. Stephen E. Jones has
Sun, 09/12/2010 - 12:44 — FBuckley (not verified)Dr. Stephen E. Jones has competently, under peer review, outlined the content of dust from the WTC Buildings' collapses. With the collapse of Building 7, not mentioned or investigated by the 911 Commission or even a jot in the Report, the obvious appearance and similarity to building demolition was more than apparent. The statements by Silverstein (?sp.), the new building Owner, were telling and actions on his part from insurance to secretive maintenance personnel and issues were indicative of cover-up. The dust, with nano-thermite, an extremely explosive nano-engineered material, is the evidence that warrants consciousless, unfeelinged investigation for its presence and assessment. ....and not by the likes of the NIST, CIA, NAS or politically corrupt elements of our government. The presence or testing for explosives was not even attempted by the NIST. Nano-thermite is a new and rare man-made material. It was only made or contracted by OUR government...a telltale of the extent of this event in our history.
Transparency is rapidly disappearing under the Obama Administration....but the truth shall set all of us free...to stop the ridiculous blame and hate and lies by searching for the individuals that pulled off this misadventure in coup-de tat"land" (the realm of the corrupt elite).
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LDVWlUy0BWo
The Link for 12 Clips, 8-9 minutes each. View ALL and Share with ALL.
Mr. Pitt, I gravitated to
Sun, 09/12/2010 - 22:07 — Marq (not verified)Mr. Pitt, I gravitated to you and your like soon after 9/11. I am surprised and disappointed that you have omitted the glaring fact that we do NOT know what happened, who was behind it and who allowed it to happen.
Secondly, I am hearing now on BBC about the Blitzkrieg on Britain in WWII. It amazes me that Americans can feel so devastated that "we were attacked" when, not only are there others who have been bombed 24/7 for a whole year straight, but that those who feel "so devastated" by 9/11 also celebrate "shock and awe" when we bomb others.
Mr. Pitt, I'm sure you are fully aware of the atrocities we have done to others from Chile "11 September, 1973 - The Day Democracy Died in Chile" to Viet Nam and beyond. Why is what "they" do called terrorism and what we do called foreign policy?
Mr. Bush said "those who terrorize, who support terrorists, who train terrorists or in any way aid a terrorist is a terrorist." How often has the US fit that bill perfectly?
9/11 was a big slap in the face to US from someone who was really fed up. Not only that, but some real high up folk knew it was coming and said in a nutshell "bring it on!"
So please mourn the loss of YOUR loved ones. Then remember what we do to "others".
All these truthers would
Sun, 09/12/2010 - 22:36 — Anonymous (not verified)All these truthers would make wonderful birthers. All you have to do is care whether or not Obama is Constitutionally qualified and kind of wish he isn't, and then you will find at least as good of evidence to support that hypothesis as the "inside job" hypothesis.
For pity's sake, Anonymous
Mon, 09/20/2010 - 14:10 — Frances in California (not verified)For pity's sake, Anonymous on 9/13 at 3:36 - obviously by this timestamp (3AM), you need more sleep . . . your logic is faulty to the point of non-existent. There's nothing wrong with asking questions, of demanding the truth. Once you get the truthful answer? SHUT THE F UP! Obviously, Birthers have had the answer for some time if they weren't too lazy to read it. 9-11 Truthers however, can't get answers because the truth has been obfuscated, buried, classified or assassinated. 9-11 didn't have to be an "inside" job; not with rogue agencies capable of creating and continuing the School of the Americas, etc., keeping the truth from being known.