What I'm about to say might come across callous; it is no way intended to downplay the tremendous loss that family and friends of 9/11 victims have felt over the last two-and-a-half years. You are not forgotten, and you do not grieve alone.
But, daganbit, it's time somebody said it. When people say that "9/11 changed everything," they're simply wrong. It's time for me to vent some steam...
For over two years now, we've heard that our previous expectations and views are obsolete. It's been used by the President to justify an ill-advised occupation of Iraq, tax cuts, malicious assaults on our civil liberties, and all kinds of other things. It's been used by Republicans to defend the President's indefensible agenda. It's been used by the media. It's even been used (implicitly) by Democrats jockying for political advantage over on another.
The idea that America went through a fundamental transformation in September 11, 2001, has had infinite utility for anyone who stood to benefit by insisting that the old rules no longer apply to them.
On Sept. 10, 2001, Americans went to sleep in a nation where 45 million people don't have health insurance; where millions are unemployed or underemployed; where one in five children were living in poverty; where the poor were getting poorer and the rich were getting even more obscenely rich.
And you know what? On Sept. 12, 2001, Americans woke up in a nation where 45 million people don't have health insurance; where millions are unemployed or underemployed; where one in five children were living in poverty; where the poor were getting poorer and the rich were getting even more obscenely rich.
And even today, this President and this Congress haven't done anything about that.
(I guess that just goes to show you how, the more things change, the more things stay the same!)
The "9/11 changed everything" meme has been most useful in justifying the invasion and occupation of Iraq, as if what happened to our country that day gave us permission to abdicate our ethical and political responsibilities to the rest of the world.
Did you know, that many of the claims made about weapons-of-mass destruction in Iraq were pulled from weapons inspector observations and intelligence estimates made well before 9/11? If the available evidence so clearly suggested that Saddam Hussein's Iraq was a "grave and gathering threat," then why did we need to wait until September 11 to do anything about it?
(Incidentally, as you probably know, none of the 9/11 hi-jackers, and none of their close associates, were Iraqis).
So you see, I think it's pretty clear that everything did not change after 9/11.
Admittedly, though, some things did:
- We now live in a country where we are given color-coded instructions as to how afraid we should be...
- We now live in a country where American citizens are being held without trial...
- We now live in a country where our armed forces are overstretched and put in harms way for no compelling reason...
And the list goes on.
But please, stop to think for a moment about whether this was bound to be, or whether these are simply more indictments of this Administration's blatant incompetence.
It seems to me, that if anything changed, it was that too many people lost the will-power and moral fortitude to stand up for our country's deeply-held convictions.