Time: "The unity that followed the 9/11 attacks was never going to last"

[Human Torch]

How we have changed since the 9/11 attacks

The unity that followed the September 11 attacks five years ago was never going to last. But the nation has not merely returned to the messy family arguments of September 10. All wars bring a reckoning of means and ends, and the war on terrorism has long since lost its crisp moral lines. Americans may agree that terrorism is wicked, but they're still unsure about how to answer it.

FULL STORY

• Time.com: How the war on terror will be judged

http://www.cnn.com/

This has become the loss with no grave, no chance for mourning, because we still live it every day: the loss of that transcendent unity, global goodwill, common purpose born of righteous anger that wrapped us like a bandage those first months after the attacks: a president with a 90 percent approval rating, a congress working as one, expressions of sympathy and offers of help from every corner of the planet. We are all Americans, said Le Monde.

That unity was never going to last. The world more easily loves a superpower when it's wounded and weakened than when it rises and growls. But we have not merely returned to the messy family arguments of September 10. We are broken, divided at home, dreaded abroad, in need of a hard conversation about America's vital interests and abiding values -- but too bitter and suspicious to have it.

All wars, even the noblest, bring a reckoning of means and ends. The war on terrorism has long since lost its crisp moral lines. Who foresaw that the battle would require a national seminar about when it's OK for Americans to torture prisoners and whether near-drowning counts? Or a debate over which clauses of the Constitution might be expendable? We may agree that terrorism is wicked, but we're still unsure about how to answer it.

---snip---

George W. Bush swats away the judgments that anniversaries invite. "There's no such thing as short-term history, as far as I'm concerned," he said last week. We can't know how the story ends; but we know that there was a time five years ago when every day was Memorial Day, when we never would have imagined that we'd care what Brad and Angelina's baby looked like or dread air travel more for its inconvenience than its dangers.

http://www.cnn.com/2006/US/09/03/coverstory.tm/index.html

[leesa]

1. Of course not, because we didn't do the appropriate thing , which was

to investigate the crime and capture those involved and put them on trial. Instead we carpet bombed a country for 10 months and then occupied it, and then went on to bomb and occupy another nearby country.


We STILL haven't investigated 9-11 and we STILL have no idea who did it.

[kenny blankenship]

2. Ain't that the way? They promise you a thousand year Reich...

and it all come crashin' down in a short six year span, like wot happened 1939-1945.
Ah too soon, too soon, Neo-Fascism, for you to be leavin' these shores. We hardly knew ye!

[baldguy]

3. The unity after 9/11 didn't last, mainly

because Bush reacted to the tragedy by seeking revenge instead of justice. A real leader would have taken the opportunity the aftermath of 9/11 offered to bring actual peace & democracy to the ME, not the war, unrest & anarchy that this administration pretends is peace & democracy.

[Vickers]

4. Yup, George the Idiot squandered a golden opportunity for short-term

political and monetary gain.

What a dickhead.

[DemInDistress]

5. I hated bush on 9/10/01 but supported the president on 9/11

as did 90% of the country, the attacks had the desired effect, uniting a divided country as did the German people after the Reichstag Fire. But as the weeks and months passed into years what have we learned? I learned in Dec.01' Osama was trapped then allowed to escape. Bush then tuned HIS eyes toward Iraq but why I asked myself. The answers became evident,control of the vast oilfields,returning Iraqi oil sales to the US.Dollar and occupying and owning Iraq under the guise of a New Free Democratic Iraq where the Bush Crime Family could continue to implement the PNAC agenda of Global Domination.

Now 5 yrs. later no Osama, 2 fruitless wars, debt that reaches another solar system, massive secrecy from the admis., spying on Americans, whiffs of war in Iran, close to 50 million Americans with no health insurance, much of the world loathing us, and chaos that reigns supreme.

God, how I wish it was just the arabs and fire that destroyed our unity but sadly and with good faith we have reason (good) to believe our government had a hand in 911 whether directly or indirectly that is evidenced by the failure of the BFEE to turn over to the public for inspection all relevant photo's, videos and documents.

One last item, I feel a hint of Martial Law might be coming our way before the Nov. elections. Could you imagine NO MID-TERM elections and no future elections until we win the War on Terror. Wow, scary thought.

[TayTay]

6. That was a false unity, at best.

I never stood with the ones who wanted to 'wage cruel war' on another nation because of our tragedy on 9/11. I never trusted that idiot Bush and never felt more sorrow that Gore had not been allowed to claim his position as President of the United States than I did on and immediately after 9/11.

That's a fake sense of unity, one that easily lends itself to militarism and to jingoism and to war fever. I was never, never, never United behind that.

One of the greatest tragedies in American history is the Gore 'loss' of the Presidency in 2000. We have been, as a nation, fucked ever since.

[ComerPerro]

7. They are trying to blame liberals and Democrats, I imagine

[AX10]

8. You could say that the country has united against Bush.

60% of the country anyways.