Good points. The horrific events of 9/11 produced an unprecedented and almost universal international outpouring of compassion and sympathy for this country. One might have hoped that this would have provided an opportunity for this country to realize the need to work together cooperatively with other nations, to re-evaluate our role in the world, to de-escalate existing conflicts in the Middle East and elsewhere, to a new appreciation of the freedoms we have fought for, to a reevaluation of the need for Anti-Missile Defense and even the tax cut.

And with a different “leader,” this might have come to pass.

Instead we find ourselves as a nation more isolated than ever in a world more hostile to us than before 9/11, unrestrained jingoism and war-mongering, more broken treaties, new restrictions of our constitutional rights, a bigger, more distorted defense budget, huge new budget deficits and a government whose solutions to every problem are more tax cuts and invading Iraq, and justifying it all on lies.

This is a day for thinking about not just what happened, but what could have been.

Agreed. 9/11 was a horrible incident. But, it shouldn't cause people to think that the U.S. has a monopoly on suffering in the world. At some point, an event like that has to be put into a world perspective. And there are many tragic situations and deaths taking place daily around the globe that will never receive any scrutiny whatsoever.

It was inevitable that 9/11 would become another political prop for use in campaigns. Everything in this country is governed by politics, whether we realize it or not. It's the increasing religious fervor of those political beliefs, and the hostility to viewpoints opposed to those held by the establishment, that is weakening our democracy and stifling civilized debate and constructive discourse. The administration is still shamelessly voicing that mantra, "If you disagree with the president, you're aiding the terrorists." No, I say if you disagree with the president, you're standing up for the values this country was founded on-- free speech and tolerance of a variety of political perspectives, not to mention open debate of policy.

Where are the monuments and remembrances for the Afghan and Iraqi civilians killed in the American bombings, whose numbers by all accounts exceed those of the 9/11 victims by many thousands? Are they to be considered lesser victims than those who died on 9/11? Oh, whoops, I forgot, they're just collateral damage in the war on terrorism. So it's considered evil when some lunatic crashes a jet into a building, but not when a country drops thousands of bombs and uses horrific weaponry on clueless civilians who had nothing to do with 9/11, in a fruitless attempt to exact revenge?

People still view casualties coming from irresponsible government military action in a totally different moral light than terrorist acts. But, killing civilians is killing civilians, whether the intent is there or not. It's the end result that counts.

I wonder how much remembrance there will be today of the 30th anniversary of our subversion of Chilean democracy. (Of course, back then, our government was both objectively evil and competent...)

Twice during a service at the Pentagon today I heard 9/11 referred to "Patriots Day." When did I miss hearing of this special designation. Furthermore, I am sure Osama thinks 9/11 was "patriots day". The use of words can work both ways.

Thank you.

There already is a Patriots Day, though those outside New England may not have heard of it. So far as I know, it is celebrated in April in two ways: holding the Boston Marathon and having the Boston Red Sox play a baseball game at an absurdly early hour in the day.

Nice Hillel reference, Nathan.

Huh? Caring more about the deaths of your compatriots than the deaths of foreigners isn't narcissism, it's normal. How much did Europeans care about Americans during our own civil war? Not much.

By far, the best 9/11 rememberance I have read. Yes, it was a terrible tragedy, but it is not unique in being so. After 9/11, we, the leaders of the free world, had a quite unique oportunity to unite the globals powers against all of these other tragedies. Our administration instead chose to go for the money, and we are now almost universally despised.

It is quite different when some country in Africa makes a mistake. Their mistake may be severe, but the suffuring is only local. But when we make a mistake, it is always global in its implications.

I am not some idealist who thinks we will appologise for all of our mistakes, but for this one, totally public as it is, we need to do exactly that. Unfortunatly, we will need a new administration before that can ever happen.

irezz, do a google search for "Patriot Day" and you'll learn that 9/11 was declared such last year. You'll also find a post from Angry Liberal calling it "The New Republican Holiday."

Walt, your analogy regarding the U.S. civil war doesn't hold up to scrutiny. The Europeans had absolutely no role in that conflict. However, the U.S. is directly responsible for thousands of civilian deaths during the Iraq and Afghan wars. THat means we should care, because it was our tax dollars that payed for the weaponry used, and it's our government that exploited the anger of the populace over 9/11 and created numerous lies to justify invading Iraq.

Nasrudin: Both England and France were backing the South in the Civil War, since at the time the South was the major source of the world's cotton. One reason Lincoln issued the Emancipation Proclamation was to make it politically embarassing for the either country to offer direct aid to the South.

Anyway, that's not my point. Thinking about this thread, and some others I've seen on the Internet, I've come to the conclusion that a certain number of Americans simply didn't experience 9/11 the way the rest of us did. It's like telling someone after their brother died that they should be equally upset that someone in Sweden died. It's just not _possible_. As tragic as the death in Sweden may be, no one experiences the death of a stranger the same way they experience a personal tragedy. Most of us experienced 9/11 as that kind of personal tragedy.

I hate all of these 9/11 remembrances, and I think wallowing in the tragedy is turning into a kind of pathology. But to suggest that it's wrong for people to be more upset by 9/11 than they are by the civil war in the Congo is absurd.

Walt- I specifically said "There is nothing wrong with mourning one's own deaths and suffering." And I'd add there's nothing wrong with being more in mourning on those deaths closer to you.

What is wrong is to focus so much on those local deaths so as to ignore and marginalize the rest of the suffering of the world.

I have this odd half-Jewish status, so my Sedar-going has been sporadic, but many of the Sedar's I've gone to very clearly talk about the suffering of Jews-- from the oppression in Egypt to the Holocaust-- while then universalizing the lesson to include the suffering of many different peoples, both historically and contemporaneously. I think that kind of rememberance-- one that in the same ceremony identifies the suffering that is closest to you personally, while linking it to the broader suffering in the world -- is exactly what should be done, and what is largely missing from the 911 ceremonies.

What bothers me is that so many Americans don't expect people in other lands to mourn their own deaths more; they expect them to have experienced 9/11 exactly as if it had happened in their own major cities and as if it overshadowed their own real tragedies. And therefore, these Americans do not appreciate just how profound their outpouring of grief on our behalf really was.

Nor do they appreciate that the rest of the world has far more experience dealing with terrorism and that some countries - such as Britain - have done so more effectively and with fewer costs to the quality of life (and freedom) within their borders. And when they have gone overboard, even to a far lesser extent than Bush has, it quickly became obvious that it was a mistake.

We are now supposed to regard failure to recognize such mistakes as a virtue.

Nathan: I don't think an annual 9/11 memorial would be healthy, but I don't have any particular objection to what you're saying.

Avedon: Any American who expects that people in other countries do not mourn their own deaths more than they mourn the deaths of Americans is a fool. I will ignore the obvious absurdity of your Britain comparison.

I'm looking for comments and articles related to native americans and the 911 incident. Feelings, patriotism, etc.
Please respond ASAP. I'm working on a project for school.

Thanks, Jack