Remembering 9/11

I did my 9/11 post at The Detroit News. I was going to expand on that here but I'm going to post this from my email instead.

I've known Jonathan Z. Souweine for 20 years. For 18 of those I worked for him and with him. I know him well. He's like family to me. I know him as a staunch Democrat and a classic liberal who leans toward the moderate. Thus his words surprised me but they offer a perspective that I want to pass on.

Five years ago I was in Aspen Colorado with a friend/client preparing for an arbitration. He awakened me to tell me that a plane had crashed into one of the Towers. We watched the second and eventually watched both towers fall.

I will never forget it.

We tried to reach our families without much success. I guess everyone in the country was doing the same, so no one could get through. We were two thousand miles away but everything felt out of control; and as a native New Yorker with family living and working near ground zero, I was scared and worried.

And I was furious. At everyone. The people who did it, whatever their perceived grievances., My country for having a lax security system that let this happen and then clearly did not know how to respond. Myself for ever doubting that Muslims or Arabs or most anyone outside of North America and Europe and few other countries wasn't smart enough or tough enough or clever or resourceful enough to implement a successful, violent, terrorist act like this. Never again. If these people could do it with box cutters , I have no doubt that it is a question of when, not whether, the Iranians, the N. Koreans and lots of other can construct and deliver horrific weapons to further their perceived national interests.

So, we need to continue doing what we can to make this country as safe as we can from such terrorists, knowing that there will not be 100 per cent protection. And we have to continue to engage the Irans and North Koreas, working with them when possible, listening always, and stopping them whenever necessary.

The three thousand who died in the WTC were no different than any of us. They got up that morning, went to work and expected to see their families and friends later that day. They never did. I fantacize that some supported some of the Al Queda claims, many opposed them and most did not care. But we know that husbands and wives, fathers and mothers, lovers and friends, who had nothing to do with Al Queda concerns, were denied the right to live their lives, for better and worse. And that cannot be tolerated.

I can't disagree with that but for me the greater question remains, how do we stop it? For myself, I still like the ring of "Food, not Bombs." I don't think we ever gave that strategy a fair chance.

UPDATE: Jonathan emails with further comments on this post.

What we should be doing there is one thing; what we should be allowing here is another. The two are related. The more we screw up there the more they will be trying here. The more we act like every other world power, the more they will hate
us, like we hated the British in 1776.

Good points.