>If not, then the horror of the televised images must surely make it >clear.
robert,
Unfortunately those images muck it all up and evoke purely emotive
responses, which is something our gov't appreciates. It allows the masses
to be rallied behind a singular ideology.
I certainly don't think that the events of yesterday become any more
shocking or real because a two year old died.
And I am probably among many others who would appreciate not turning any
possible comforting conversation about a tragic event (conversation should
be encouraged) into a mythic discussion concerning good and evil. It assumes
that the US is good and some others are evil (definition through
opposition.) President Bush referred to this when he said that the US is a
"shining beacon" for freedom to the rest of the world. WHO IS HE KIDDING!
It just isn't cut and dry like that. Even if, for example, the Taliban had
some in/direct connection to the attack...The US created the Taliban long
ago in support of Afghanistan against the USSR.
The chickens always come home to roost.
The US has no ground to stand on when it comes to moral discussions
concerning horrific violence aimed at innocent civilians. We grant billions
to countries such as Turkey and Israeal each year so that they can afford to
buy arms from our weapons manufacturers in order to kill innocent Kurds (a
genocide-in-progress, we should note) and Palestinians...we dropped two
bombs on Japan more in an effort to scare Stalin than for any necessity to
"punish" Japan...and then there's internment...and some recent decades-old
stereotyping of the Arab people and the Islamic faith.
Thousands of our friends and families didn't deserve to die...Luckily my NYC
cousin and friends are all OK...no one deserves to be the victim of
terrorist acts. However, we should avoid reducing discussions to who is
right and who is wrong.
The fact that many more may die before we can put this behind us and begin
to heal is AWFUL. Colin Powell spoke of returning to normalcy...maybe we
should be discussing just how we are supposed to act normal.
gary norris
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