Today, September the 11th, marks an ominous anniversary in our history.
I remember stopping in for a coffee at Panera in Sq. Hill when I overheard someone speaking about "a plane that hit a building." I didn't think much about it. I bought my coffee and took the bus into work.
I was still doing my morning routine, setting up for my experiments and turning on the radio. Upon hitting the power switch and hearing Howard Stern speaking frantically, I suddenly knew something was wrong. This shock jock was never serious about anything, but this time he was downright scared.
Two planes struck the Twin-Towers, one into the Pentagon and another downed over Somerset in the same district that where I’m now running for Congress.
We had no idea when the attacks would stop or what would come next. “Will they use car bombs? Will shopping malls or schools be shot up?” We had no idea how long or how varied the 9/11 attacks would be.
Worse of all, our president froze in the headlights of this terror attack. After being informed of the second plane to hit the towers, George W. Bush chose to sit in a school room paralyzed in panic.
In the final count, a total of 2,996 people lost their lives that day, but many more would follow for years to come.
Hunter S. Thompson wrote a prescient piece for ESPN that foretold our future. This one paragraph said everything to me:
“The towers are gone now, reduced to bloody rubble, along with all hopes for Peace in Our Time, in the United States or any other country. Make no mistake about it: We are At War now -- with somebody -- and we will stay At War with that mysterious Enemy for the rest of our lives.”
Because of that day we've put more tax money into war instead of our schools and taking care of our most vulnerable. It's driven our country apart and stripped our freedoms.
Today, as Hunter predicted, we’re still in the same war that was initiated by that one attack. Donald Trump announced a new troop build-up in Afghanistan just a few weeks ago. It’s already America’s longest war, yet he wants to drag it out further with no end-game plan in place.
Billions more will be spent. More lives will be lost. And for what? Does anyone have a single defensible idea why?
The cynic in me says, “It’s more likely the trillions of dollars in ore deposits.” Another war over resources at the expense of the poor who will fight their war and the people who happened to build a house on a site that would later become a mine.
Am I suggesting that the Taliban don’t exist? Am I suggesting that there aren’t people who plot our demise? No, but let’s be completely honest here: there will be people caught in the crossfire. There will be people who’ll be killed because of poor intelligence.
Too often the costs of war are measured in profit margins instead of loss of lives both during, and in the wake of, war.
We must acknowledge that there are people in the world who want nothing more than to live out their lives and watch their families grow up just as we do. We also need to acknowledge that when we accidentally kill a family member of a person who wanted nothing more than to grow old and enjoy their family, that act could inspire the next terrorist that attacks our nation.
We wield great power, but we must use it sparingly and only in times of desperate need. Our soldiers’ sacrifices shouldn’t be taken lightly, nor should any innocents who may also perish in the wake of our responses.
We have an unspoken contract with our soldiers. If we send them to war and ask them to make the ultimate sacrifice, we must be prudent in those decisions. It is an obligation that we must live by.
9/11 should never be forgotten in the American consciousness. We need to remember those who lost their lives. The consequences of poor leadership and the long term effects of our actions for a response.
Being a strong leader cannot be measured in body counts.
----------------------------Tom Prigg for Congress - District 12 PA
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