On the anniversary of 9-11 I must share my pain with the world.

[tjwash]

Since the beginning of September, we have been deluged by the corporate media shills, telling us all how we should think and feel about the anniversary.

The incompetent bungler in chief will go to the scene of his greatest failure, where he will attempt to lay down a wreath. He will stand on top of the rubble and dead bodies that horrible day produced. He will make a vain and sorry attempt to prop himself up as some kind of a hero, when, in any sane society he would have been tossed out on his ear the second we heard that he had the intelligence on his desk months beforehand.

We will also be told that we have every right to hate. We will be told that we need to have revenge, and closure for the events of that day. We will be told we must persevere above all, and not dishonor the dead until every last one of the vague "those that would do us harm" are obliterated off of the face of the earth. The hatred and bias, as always, will be directed not at at those truly responsible for the act that incurred, but at societies and cultures that we do not understand. It will be directed at countries that few that live here in America have ever been to. It will be aimed at regions of the world that have been civilizations for thousands of years before our country even was created. And finally, we will be ordered and instructed to hold on to our hatred, and to embrace our anger.

I'm reminded of a someone at this point. Someone that lived a couple of thousand years or so ago, in the very region we are bombing, and exacting our revenge on. Someone who was being tortured to death for making a mockery of those in power, and happened to have had his final words recorded by an ancient historian. They were "forgive them father, they know not what they do."

Unfortunately, there are quite a few people that think that Christ's last words actually were "Father-Smite them. All of them. Kill every last fucking one of them, and burn down the fucking city so I can piss on its ashes."

Those same people also seem to be running our country tight now.

Even though I have protested. And I have marched. I have fought the obvious lies and deceit both with words, and have even come to blows on occasion with some people, because I saw all of this coming from the beginning. But I still feel like I have been played. Played like a fiddle by this group of corrupt war profiteering sociopaths.

I remember September 11th 2001. But more deeply, I remember September 12th 2001, and the outpouring of worldwide support and sympathy for the people of the United States. For an entire month afterward, we would actually learn as a people, to put our political and personal differences aside, and get on the same page. That is the rarest of all rare events in America. Something that happens only once in a generation, and usually only comes about on those occasions that something catastrophic enough to remove our personal boundaries happens.

For the next couple of months, the United States had the entire backing of the world, as we gathered up a military force to rip out the heart of terrorism that was based in Afghanistan.Democrats and Republicans alike, both backed the mission to the Afghani region. After all, this was an opportunity to really make a difference in the world. The possibilities were endless. Establish a base of operations in Kabul, flush out the Taliban warlords and terrorist organizations that had so plagued the world. From there, we were going to get to the heart of the problem of worldwide terrorism, by addressing its causes.

We were going to look at the brutal Sheikdoms, that plague the region and keep the majority of their people in abject poverty and hopelessness; the prime conditions of “nothing to lose” that extreme fundamentalist religious organizations like the Taliban prey on, and exploit for recruitment.

We all know what happened afterward, and the results. How we went from total worldwide support and empathy to where we are today. That is the true sadness that I feel. Not the need for revenge, not the need to kill people that live on the other side of the globe, not the need for closure. Just sadness for us here in the United States, of the realization that we have lost our way.

Each anniversary of 9-11 brings that same feeling of sadness to me.

[renate]

1. agreed. September 12th is a special anniversary too

The inspiring, loving, generous way the world reacted to our sorrow still brings tears to my eyes.

[AZBlue]

2. And the way all Americans treated each other.

And how 9/11 put things in perspective for a while and we remembered that the most important things in life weren't Britney & KFed or Survivor's latest cast-off.

[lvx35]

3. Damn good post.

And a pleasure to read. How do you reply to something like that? I went through similar stuff...to be honest, I don't think anything cuts to the heart of what I have been through as well as this:

Unfortunately, there are quite a few people that think that Christ's last words actually were "Father-Smite them. All of them. Kill every last fucking one of them, and burn down the fucking city so I can piss on its ashes."

Those same people also seem to be running our country tight now.

Even though I have protested. And I have marched. I have fought the obvious lies and deceit both with words, and have even come to blows on occasion with some people, because I saw all of this coming from the beginning. But I still feel like I have been played. Played like a fiddle by this group of corrupt war profiteering sociopaths.

I did all the same. I marched. i marched for peace. When the feds started disappearing muslims, I marched with them. They taught me to scream "Allahu akhbar" and I did. And I was watched. Yet there is this feeling of being played...The feeling that I have been screaming the truth, but dealing with people who have no regard for truth at all...just "winning", using whatever lie is necessary for their perceived victory, even though the world they win will be completely rotten and based off lies...


I don't know, I guess I am just babbling, at least to many. Its just so, so good to hear somebody going through the same stuff, and for that, I THANK YOU!!!!

:):yourock:

[The_Casual_Observer]

4. From the beginning it was clear they were going to take advantage

of the opportunity afford by 9/11. The now well documented half ass Afghanistan campaign was a charade. Pressing on with the takeover of Iraq was the goal going back to the mid 90's for members of the wh "team".

[tjwash]

6. Exactly. Unfortunately all of us who saw this coming were...

...denigrated as traitors, and un-American enemy sympathizers. Sad that most of the memories I have of 9-11 are not the awful events of that day, but of the awful behavior that a lot of Americans started to show to each other in the months following it.

[darkmaestro019]

5. Sept 12th...

I tend to think terrible things happen for a reason, and I thought that upwelling of love and the revelations about what really matters was the reason. I thought if I'd been one of those 3000 looking down from wherever I'd have been honored that my death led to such a wonderful thing. I thought this might be enough to save us, really save us, or at least get us on the road and walking towards being saved.

Instead, like almost everything we discover or invent, they immediately started looking for a way to use it to hit each other with. It makes me wish there was a way to officially reject my membership in the human race. It's that bad.

[Withywindle]

7. Beautiful post...

...so well said.

I remember September 12th and 13th too. I remember the headline in the French newspaper that said "We are all Americans"; I remember pictures of Muslims signing condolence books and old Russian ladies weeping and Buddhist monks praying for us and US embassies everywhere covered in flowers and candles. I remember the small Canadian town that took in thousands of people while the airlines were grounded and never asked to be paid back for anything. I remember my expat friends in lots of countries posting online about how kind people were to them.

I remember how my local Borders was totally sold out of Q'uran translations. People actually wanted to understand, so much.

It could have transformed everything, if we'd just had an administration that gave two shits for diplomacy.

Instead, we have...

:cry:

[tjwash]

8. Thanks for your kind words. They mean a lot to me.

:hi: