DL Open Thread Sunday, Sept. 12, 2021
Thank whatever you believe in that the 20th anniversary of 9/11 passed with as little flag-waving horseshit as it did, but Jesus Christ on a tandem bike, can we stop mourning the loss of national unity? You know what unites people? Grief. It wasn’t patriotism, or feeling for our fellow Americans. It was heartsick sadness. I’d just as soon forgo the unity, thanks all the same, because the only thing that ever brings it about, and for only brief periods, is large-scale disaster. National unity? No, thanks, I’m trying to cut back.
The Golden Age of Unity wasn’t the only gag-worthy manure peddled by the 9/11 thumbsuckers. David K. Shipler at Washington Monthly repeated a particularly noxious trope about the resulting wars causing partisan division: “Without a war tax, without a military draft, the burdens were borne by a tiny fraction of Americans and their families.” Bullshit. Vietnam both drafted and taxed Americans and there was no unity in sight, something Mr. Shipler didn’t live through but might have read about somewhere.
The only worthwhile story I saw published about the 9/11 attacks (if you saw any, post them in the comments) was by the Intercept, who looked into the lawsuit against Saudi Arabia filed by 9/11 survivors and teased out evidence of collusion by high-level Saudis. Funny, I don’t remember any axiom claiming “the truth will set you at each other’s throats,” so maybe the unity would have lasted longer if we had gone after the worst monarchy left on Earth rather than a couple of countries that weren’t behind the attacks?
The right’s long-running war against abortion is, obviously, about control of women — Catholicism is about nothing if it’s not about the control of women — but why did protestant evangelicals take up the cause? Like everything else with Southerners, it’s the racism. Just an observation: People don’t act this threatened by folks they truly feel superior to. They act threatened by people they feel inferior to, whether they admit that to themselves or not. Just sayin’.
I have to admit I’m surprised by how tightly the rubes continue clinging to Donald Trump — you’d think he were guns or religion, they love him so. The same does not hold true for his acolytes, though. A rally in Kentucky featuring crackhead pillow salesman Mike Lindell and gallows-escaping traitor Mike Flynn expected 10,000 people to attend. It drew 300. Yes, with two zeroes. Naturally, they were all interviewed anyway, the so-called “thoughts” of this group being of endless fascination to journalist/stenographers. One said that he and his cohort felt like the outcasts of the country, so apparently they’re not all as stupid as they look and act.
The floor’s yours.
Revenge also united Americans for a spell. I wonder, really wonder if we had adopted the opposite of revenge as our response to the murderous 9-ll attack if we had taken an entirely different response from “eye for an eye”, we might have come out alot better? Yes, I know, possibly a delusional idea, but imagine for a bit, won’t you?
I may say you’re a dreamer, but you’re not the only one.
I’ve had my fill of this new national pasttime of handwringing and the obsession with avoiding amnesia about the ugly events of 9/11. Isn’t 20 years of weeping, wailing and gnashing of teeth just the lifeblood of terrorists who want to make sure we’re all perpetually sad and angry and morose over their airplane stunt? I for one really want to forget this nasty event, which didn’t ultimately unify America but turned it into a failed state that can’t even agree to public safety measures against a virus that’s killed more than 100 times the people the people who were lost to this criminal act. Yes, I want to forget 9/11 and I’m tired of all the collective memorializing of people who were innocent bystanders that day. Yes, it was awful. Move on folks, nothing to see here. Stop giving terrorist what they want.
I caught mercifully little of the media celebration. But I did happen to catch former ABC anchor Charlie Gibson congratulate himself for keeping his cool as events unfolded.
Your are the real hero, Charlie!
My most poignant anecdotal memory of the weeks after 9/11 was the South Asian folks at my local Dunkin Donuts. Apparently weary of American ignorance, they went out and got some USA flag bumper stickers and pasted them across the chest of their uniform shirts. Brown skin = terrorists. End of distinction.
EXACT same thing happened at a newsstand owned by a Pakistani family in Claymont. They put up more US flags than you’d see at a Lee Greenwood concert. Or NASCAR race.