September 11, Ten Years After

We, as human beings, are wont to mark significant occasions when a landmark period of time has passed.  So it is that the tenth anniversary of the senseless destruction of lives will be marked today by numerous and somber occasions for all to remember.  I had wanted to put together a cohesive essay on the day, along with a meaningful and didactic observation on the day ten years after the fact.  But the ideas are still too scattered, the emotions are still too real.  There are others who are going to try to tie this up in a neat package and present a uniform, albeit too tidy view on this day.  I don't believe that is possible in my case, because life and reality are just that unsettled and chaotic.  Here are some random observations.

Heroism
In the aftermath of the tragedy, we have, rightly in my opinion, lionized all of the people who acted heroically in the aftermath.  The firemen and police who selflessly performed their duties and entered the twin towers in a valiant and yet futile effort to try to get more people out.  The passengers of flight 93 who, in an effort to save the lives of others sacrificed their own lives.  The people at the Pentagon, who fought to save their comrades in arm.

Yet inevitably, in our haste and emotional response to the tragedy and the true heroic acts that happened time and again in the aftermath of the attack, we lionized all thing remotely related to the attack.  Everyone who wear a public service uniform are now considered heroes, everyone who are in the military are heroes,   everyone who makes a sacrifice are heroes.  It cheapens heroism, and more importantly, it de-emphasizes the true sacrifices of those who gave their lives because they made a life and death decision, and for most of them, a death decision, on a moment's notice with no thought given to their own lives. 

People choose their professions with eyes wide open.  They don't become soldiers, police, firemen on a whim.  They walk in knowing that their a pretty good chance that they will get injured, maimed, or die in the line of duty.  They are willing to make that decision without really thinking that they are heroes to the rest of us.  They really don't need or want that accolade, that needs to be reserved for those who perform those duties above and beyond the responsibilities of the everyday.  By making everyone in that profession heroes, we are making heroism an everyday occurrence, much like giving out trophies to every kid in the league.  It's cheap sentimentality, the people gaining the so-called honor knows it and their sature are diminished.

How are we treating people after the tragedy.
Those very people who tend to lionize are the very same who go out of their way to not take care of them.  The politicians, particularly who got the most accolades for being leaders are the very ones who refused to pay the health bills of those who dared to enter the remnants of the twin towers in an effort to find a final resting place for those who perished, those who are now suffering from the diseases incurred while rummaging through the wreckage  in the vain hopes of finding bodies while braving the man-made environmental disaster that is the modern skyscraper.  The very same Republican administration officials that was so smug in their claims of doing the right thing are doing the wrong thing by returning to their true nature of corporate butt-boys by denying health and benefits to those who did the dirty work.  In addition, the party who trumpeted the heroism of the public service employees are now seeing to destroy the unions that serve those very public service employees, all in service to their corporate masters and those who give them their election campaigns.

Blue Skies
The day of September 11 is seared in my mind.  The day of standing around TVs and computer screen, worrying about loved ones and the horrific images are engraved vividly in my mind.  But it is the days after, the beautiful fall days of blue empty skies and the preternaturally silent  days that is most prominent in my mind.  It is a reminder that all is not the same, that our society has changed indelibly, and that life will never be the saem ever again.

Unity
Actually the lack of unity.  For a period of time, the nation was held together with one thought, one strain of patriotism.  Indeed, the world was unified in its reaction to the horror.  But that all pulled apart quickly when the Bush the Minor administration decided to take advantage of the worldwide sympathy to advance the agenda of the cabal of neocon hyenas and Bush the Minor's personal goal of whitwashing his father's reputation.  What he did not realize was that by embarking on his agenda, he made his father's timid but sure handed administration seem noble and constrained in comparison.  The world was with us, even through Afghanistan.  Most people thought going into Afghanistan was nearly suicidal, but all knew that we had to do it.  But when we went into Iraq, with no immediate reason to do so, we lost the world.

We also lost internal coherence and unity of purpose when Bush the Minor decided on the : My way or the Highway policies.  In fact, that is the right approach to get things done.  There can only be one voice atop the government, and that is the voice of the commander in chief.  But he soon lost that authority to that voice when it became apparent that he did not have the best interest in mind, but the best interest of some academic foreign policy wonks, none of whom had ever served in the military but are the most giddy in placing service men and women's lives in peril for the sake of their own mythological theories. 

By taking his approach to a personal vendetta level, Bush the Minor drove a permanent wedge into the national psyche.  In the history of the United State of America, political disagreements happens often, and all quite noisy and nasty.  But when it comes to getting things done, most are willing to check their egos at the door.  A pissing contest is a pissing contest, it had nothing to do with the governance of the nation, especially when the nation is in crisis.  No more.  The pissing contest is now the MO for governance.  This could be a fatal sea change.

Tolerance
It was abundantly clear that we have not learned from the lessons of world war two.  We put Japanese citizens in concentration camps, much like the Nazis did with the Jews.    It does not matter that we did not treat them as the Nazis did, it matters that we put them in the camps.  While we did not put all Muslims into concentration camps, we as a nation put ourselves on the road to re-enacting the great crusade.  We let our fears and ignorance guide our reasoning.  The ignorance of others, their culture and religion, came back time and again in the ensuing decade.  Suspicion and vigilantism ran rampant in our minds if not our actions. 

Representative Democracy in a multilateral, multicultural society is nearly impossible, the easy out is to give in to our fears, and we have taken the easy out most of the time.

On this day of remembrance and emotional outpouring.  Many will vow to keep this day living in infamy, to quote FDR.  But 66 years after the end of the second world war, the horrors of Auschwitz and Buchenwald is slowly fading with the deaths of its survivors.  There are many who dispute the facts of the actual existence of these death camps.  So it is that we can look at that historical predecessor and see the future of this day of remembrance.  Revisionist history is rampant and it would not surprise me to see that September 11th will be revisited time and again by various re-interpretations in the future, not all of them rooted in reality.   So the question is: what can we do to preserve the lesson.  An even more important question is: what is the lesson?
 

Memorial Day 2011-American Hypocrisy

Memorial Day is probably the one holiday in the American holiday schedule that exposes the state of American hypocrisy.  While all holidays are celebrated by commercial sales, television series marathons and all kinds of commercial reminders to consume massively.  Memorial Day is one day where we are supposed to be contemplative and remember the services of those who came before and their sacrifices for the nation and its people.

So we are innundated with meaningless rhetorics and empty promises about how we are honoring those who served in our wars and died in service to the nation.  Politicians, national and local, elbow their way to the front of the television lines to profess their love of country and particularly the military.  They will piously thunder and weep over the sacrifices and make promises they never keep promising to take care of the vets.  They will swear on their bibles and their forebears that their love for the military is second to none, yet their understanding of who makes up the military is limited to how the bright and colorful uniforms can forward their own re-election.  Colorful uniforms make great television.
Yet when it comes down to it, we and our politicians, are unadulterated hypocrites.  Look around you.  Do you see the guys standing on the highway offramps with the cardboard signs, asking for a few bucks?  Why are there disproportionately more vets standing and begging?  Remember the Walter Reed Hospital scandal?  The hospital where we take care of the living veterans, wounded emotionally and physically?  Why was it the hospital that had intolerable conditions for the majority of its patients?  Why did the Bush administration try to rachet down veteran benefits while we were in Afghanistan and Iraq?  What has happened to the veteran benefits?  Why did the Obama administration allow the banks foreclose on military families while their loved ones are overseas serving the country?  Why aren't we going after those banks, those parasites who depended on government bailouts, for making our soldier's lives so miserable while they are powerless while overseas?  Why aren't we taking care of our own.

It does not matter how you feel about the political and military actions ongoing.  If Vitenam has taught us anything, it has taught us that the footsoldiers are not the policy makers, they are the implements by which our politicians are able to execute their policies.  The men and women put their lives on the line and on hold in order to serve the nation, to defend our lives.  All that they ask is to be taken care of, for their families to live in quiet but comfortable anonoymity while they are serving us.  They have upheld their end of the bargain, while we have been sadly and glaringly deficient in our end.  We have abdicated our duty to them.

Get with it America.