I was supposed to be at Ground Zero today._Instead, I’m waiting for a hurricane in Key West that now looks like it won’t arrive.
I would’ve shared my memories and reflections as best I could during coverage of the ceremonies where the World Trade Center once stood._Instead, I’ll share what I can here.
9/11 was a living nightmare — the worst possible dream I could’ve ever imagined._ I never felt so many emotions so strongly as I did that clear September morning. Anger. Fear. Confusion. Disbelief._Sadness._Rage._Frustration._Pain._I couldn’t believe the day was real, couldn’t process the scenes playing out in front of me, couldn’t understand how the things I was seeing and hearing could possibly be true.
I was there._I stood at the base of the towers as they burned, saw the chaos in the streets, and the shock on the faces of police, firefighters, rescue workers, office workers, and people on street corners.
I stood four blocks away, microphone in hand, camera rolling next to me, as the 300-foot cloud of dust and debris rolled up Church Street moments after the first tower collapsed, and people ran towards us screaming for their lives._I took refuge in our satellite truck with one of the best people I know on this earth, Pat Butler, a FOX Engineer who showed strength, resolve, and courage in the face of this awful act of terror._Four minutes later, we went back out into the street, documenting the events unfolding before us.
I heard stories that day I hope I never hear again._Eyewitness accounts of the planes hitting the towers, people jumping to their deaths, harrowing escapes from 80 stories in the sky.
I also saw the best of mankind._Men and women doing all they could to help save lives and heal wounds, searching for survivors and trying to maintain calm as a disaster unfolded._I watched heroes at work.
We all lost someone, or something, that day._We lost friends, loved ones, and strangers_— everyday people doing extraordinary things. We lost a chunk of the Manhattan sky, a big slice of innocence, and a piece of our freedom and independence.__
No one should ever forget what happened._Because the less we remember, the more likely this horrible past will replay in our future.
This comemoration does not concern only American people. It is a sad day for everyone enjoying freedom and democracy. Indeed we shall never forget.
This tragic event will mark the real beginning of the 21st century for History as the beginning of WW1 did for the 20th one.
I was disappointed that none of the television stations here in Florida broadcast the memorial ceremonies on Saturday. I suppose the idea now is to get over it and move on. But what if we don't want to get over it and move on? What if it's just as important for people thousands of miles away to share in the grief of the family and friends of the victims of 9/11?
I didn't cry on that terrible day in 2001, I couldn't cry. I was too numb and shocked to really absorb what was happening. I had a knot in my stomach for days and when it finally released, so did my tears, but not many of them. I've always felt a greater amount of sorrow that's for some reason being locked up inside. Each year since on the anniversary, I'm able to let it out a little more. This year I cried harder than I ever have. Maybe it was watching the special on HBO or A&E, or maybe my emotions are haywire because of the pregnancy hormones. In either case it felt good to let go again.
All those people, all those innocent people just doing their jobs, earning a living, supporting their families...all those civil servants, the port authority officers, the police and the fire fighters, who selflessly gave their lives to protect citizens, and really not until that day heard much by the way of a "thank you". Those civil servants, who made so much less of a salary than some of the people who's lives they saved that day, but they did the job anyway because they loved it and they loved helping people. All those people on the planes, the last moments of their lives are the kind of moments that nightmares are made of. The sheer terror they must have been feeling is too unbearable to think of.
Yes it was a day that the world will never forget. Or at least, let's hope we all never forget.
Holy War....You're basically killing each other to see who's got the better imaginary friend. - Richard Jeni
Just read some of the garbage in the section <9/11 fact and fiction>.
For his strongly conspiratorial book, von Bülow has cobbled together various more- or less-plausible doubts concerning the events of 9/11. The author suggests a scenario all his own: The hijacked planes were actually remote-controlled by secret agents and directed into the twin towers. However, the impact of the planes alone would not have collapsed the two buildings. Therefore, key load-bearing pillars in the buildings were simultaneously detonated. The point of the action: Israel and the CIA wanted to use the attacks as pretexts in order to be able to continue their anti-Islamic foreign policy unhindered.
Secret agents! Remote-controlled planes! Simultaneous explosions! Scheming, murderous Americans and Jews! It's like a Bond film -- only stupider.
Only the dead have seen the end of war.
Let us win glory for ourselves, or yield it to others.
USA1 said this in post #5 : I watched much of the ceremonies. It made me cry again.
And to think there are people who feel we are not justified. God help them too.
Justified in what? Hunting down the people that did this? Of course we are. Iraq, that's a horse of a different color.
Why is it so important to the forces of reaction and violence to halt Iraq in its democratic tracks and tip it into sectarian war? Why do foreign terrorists from Al Qaida and its associates go across the border to kill and maim? Why does Syria not take stronger action to prevent them? Why does Iran meddle so furiously in the stability of Iraq?
Examine the propaganda poured into the minds of Arabs and Muslims. Every abuse at Abu Ghraib is exposed in detail; of course it is unacceptable but it is as if the only absence of due process in that part of the world is in prisons run by the Americans. Every conspiracy theory - from seizing Iraqi oil to imperial domination - is largely dusted down and repeated.
Why? The answer is that the reactionary elements know the importance of victory or defeat in Iraq. Right from the beginning, to them it was obvious. For sure, errors were made on our side. It is arguable that de-Baathification went too quickly and was spread too indiscriminately, especially amongst the armed forces. Though in parenthesis, the real worry, back in 2003 was a humanitarian crisis, which we avoided; and the pressure was all to de-Baathify faster.
But the basic problem from the murder of the United Nations staff in August 2003 onwards was simple: security. The reactionary elements were trying to de-rail both reconstruction and democracy by violence. Power and electricity became problems not through the indolence of either Iraqis or the MNF but through sabotage. People became frightened through terrorism and through criminal gangs, some deliberately released by Saddam.
These were not random acts. They were and are a strategy. When that strategy failed to push the MNF out of Iraq prematurely and failed to stop the voting; they turned to sectarian killing and outrage most notably February's savage and blasphemous destruction of the Shia Shrine at Samarra.
They know that if they can succeed either in Iraq or Afghanistan or indeed in Lebanon or anywhere else wanting to go the democratic route, then the choice of a modern democratic future for the Arab or Muslim world is dealt a potentially mortal blow. Likewise if they fail, and those countries become democracies and make progress and, in the case of Iraq, prosper rapidly as it would; then not merely is that a blow against their whole value system; but it is the most effective message possible against their wretched propaganda about America, the West, the rest of the world.
That to me is the painful irony of what is happening. They have so much clearer a sense of what is at stake.
—Tony Blair
Only the dead have seen the end of war.
Let us win glory for ourselves, or yield it to others.
09-12-2004 03:58 AM
