9/11 Didn't Change EVERYTHING, but what did it change for YOU?

[nostamj]

We've heard the bushies invoke the phrase '9/11 changed everything' to justify everything from pre-emptive war to lop-sided tax cuts to suspension of civil liberties.

As a long-time NYC resident who was in midtown that morning and could still smell the noxious smoke from my apartment in Brooklyn that evening, I've thought a lot about what exactly changed for me.

I couldn't think of much. I certainly didn't retreat into a cocoon of fear. In fact, I was back in the city the very next day. I certainly didn't slap a flag on my forehead and lead commuters in 'God Bless America' on the subways.

I cried a lot in those days immediately following the attack. In NYC, you could not avoid the thousands upon thousands of fliers put up by family members of the lost. As the days passed, and hope was crushed by the inescapable reality, the increasingly tattered fliers remained to break your heart over and over.

I got angry. Angry that heartbreak and horror were inescapable. And angry that the same heartbreak and horror were actually being merchandised. Then furious and despondent that terror and loss would be the rallying cry to unite the nation and legitimize and illegitimate administration.

To this day, I don't live in fear of terrorism. (Fear of the neo-con agenda and other fascist facets of the current administration are a different matter altogether.)

So, while I did not become fearful in the weeks, months and now, years following 9/11, I did become more serious.

The fifteen minutes between arriving at my office and the first reports of the plane striking the North Tower were the last time I started my day listening to music. And to this day, I rarely put in a CD when there's something worth seeing on C-Span or elsewhere.

On September 10, 2001, I knew the hot bands and hit tunes of the moment. I also knew what the top sitcoms were. I cared about who got booted from Big Brother or Survivor. I look at some of the websites still in my 'Favorites' directory and wonder how I could have ever spent time visiting them.

That seriousness, fueled by revulsion and anger at how the tragedy of 9/11 was being manipulated for political (and financial) gain by the very people whose disinterest and ultimate failure in fighting terrorism, turned me into a politically-focused activist as never before.

Even creatively, I changed. I could not put any passion behind the musical comedy projects that had consumed me over a 20-year collaboration with my composing partner. Indeed, when we finally did complete a new project it was the political and social satires that made up The Question W Revue.

I am hopeful that a change in the administration will bring about a change in the national spirit.

It is stunningly perverse that the dog who made the mess continues to rub our collective noses in it and not the other way around.

The WTC rubble Bush stood on to 'define' his presidency is long gone. Rebuilding has begun.

Bush will never look forward. And I, for one, would like a change to hope.

9/11 the event and 9/11 the political tool have darkened my life. I'm ready for hope and light.

How did 9/11 change you?

[WilmywoodNCparalegal]

1. It was the reason I wanted to move to NYC.

I was still in NC when 9/11 happened. I cried a lot. I felt terrible for the people on TV looking for their missing relatives. After that, I wanted to move to NYC to "prove" that life goes on, that terrorists win when we give up and act fearful.

So I moved to NYC, to an apartment 3 blocks away from the WTC, whose window frames were still encrusted by black goo. I refused to act fearful and I refused to bow down to the campaign of fear that Bush and his ilk began.

I began to despise the way Bush and Rudy Giuliani were using the tragedy of 9/11 to further their own political ambitions. When the Iraq war occurred, I was sick to my stomach that so many people would be so gullible to believe everything that came from Bush's mouth, as long as he tied it with the 9/11 terraists...

I longed for Nov. 2, 2004, as an opportunity to begin healing anew, to look forward through hope and not look backwards to fear.

[napi21]

2. It made me realize the people IN CHARGE can't do thier job!

All the things I believed in for years, like the effectivness of NORAD, FAA tracking systems, fighter planes at the ready in strategic spots, the CIA & FBI being good at what they each do....

The events of 9/11 destroyed my trust in all of them! If all of those agencies can't or won't do their job, it makes me even more doubtful about the rest of the govt agencies I already knew were inefficient, or downright BAD!

[featherman]

3. The only thing it changed for me

was long "security" lines and taking my shoes off in the airport. All because a handful of crackpots got very, very lucky with a bold and crazy plan one day 3 years ago.

[randome]

4. The only thing that changed for me...

...is that I joined DU. That's ALL that changed.

The terrorist attack on WTC was just that -a terrorist attack. Treating it as some kind of new, never-ending war is total bullshit.

[MichiganVote]

5. I'm sick of hearing about it. We have todays problems to solve

[nikatnyte]

6. For me, 9/11 was a confirmation

that we are truly in a different world than the one in which I grew up.

The Baby Boomer/Cold War world of opposing nations rattling nuclear sabres at one another was over. We progressed beyond that, but still face an enemy -- one coming from within our midst, without allegiance to any nation, without respect for any borders.

In such a world, self-centered patriotic jingoism has no place. All nations must work together to battle this common enemy. This effort, the most important our world has ever faced, requires communication, partnership, mutual respect, humility, honesty, intelligence, enlightened perserverance, and the ability to adjust strategies and tactics at a moment's notice.

Sadly, our leaders have not even remotely been up to the task. They've exhibited the worst side of America to the world, one of blind and unyielding arrogance. The world can't afford four more years of this disastrous approach. We may not have much time left.

[Minstrel Boy]

7. It made me hate the word "freedom."

That's a Bush legacy that will take years to undo.

[Union Thug]

60. Yeah, I guess so..

I get repulsed whenever that word is bandied about that way it has been by this administration and its minions.

[LiberalEsto]

8. It destroyed the NJ/NJ job market

and left my brother and many others unable to find decent jobs. My husband's best friend is still out of work; he dug victims out of the rubble for days after the WTC collapse, and he's neder been the same.

It left me terrified for the future of our democracy, fearful that it would be used to take away many of our cherished freedoms.

[TomClash]

9. Changed me?

For over three years, there has been a big hole in the ground next to my office.

I did my patriotic duty as a "Good American" after 9/11 and I now think it was a complete waste. I try to fight back the cynicism because that's what the financial and political powers that be in this country want.

I know the whole truth about 9/11 has yet to be revealed.

[Lorien]

10. Well, I'm underemployed

I honestly wasn't shocked that 9/11 happened; after all, Gore had mentioned terrorism as a threat during his rallies in 2000. In the Gore scenario, all of Manhattan was leveled by a small nuclear device. That image was etched in my mind when the attacks occurred, so I just kept thinking "well, could have been worse!" (I know; that sounds rather cold, but the attacks DID fall far short of what was already in my mind).

I've lost a lot of respect for my fellow Americans since then. What a huge group of whimpering, self important bed wetters! Instead of asking WHY BushCo had failed to protect NYC and DC that day, everyone started biting their nails, wondering if their tiny towns of Marysville, OH, Quitman, GA, and Overbrook, IN would be attacked by Al Qaeda. And their strong daddy figure, * ,kept telling them "yer safe, now be afraid"! I'm disgusted by how easily manipulated Americans are. The intellectual laziness is stunning!

And my salary has been cut, again and again, because people no longer feel safe to travel and relax and theme parks, and because so many of my fellow artist are unemployed that employers know we'll take about anything.

Pray for a Kerry landslide!

[drthais]

11. It changed the stupid people

they now had a reason to back Bush
and annoint him king of the world

it sucks, this result

[Vickers]

12. I can no longer carry my Leatherman Micra on airplanes

:(

[sweetheart]

38. Indeed, no pocket knives

I used to carry a nail clipper in my briefcase, and a 3" lock blade
knife, as i so often wound up needing it to cut food with when
travelling round. Buying a hunk of good french cheeze without a
knife to serve it with, is a bummer.

One time, i was returning to new york from a week in scotland and
the xray machine found that chinese army knife i though i lost,
with a 7inch blade. OOPs!! I had taken it through JFK, heathrow
and edinburgh before they found it in Glasgow. Post 9/11,
its downright ridiculous.

So now i've got a box at home of pocket knives i can no longer
take travelling. Its all so pathetic, that some wankers with
box cutters have curtailed the peaceful civilians who have never
and will never committ crimes from their own liberties.

It really annoys me that i can no longer lock my bags at checkin
either... still don't trust baggage handlers.

[ProfessorGAC]

62. Me, Too! But, I Just Check Luggage Now

I pack VERY light when i travel, so taking everything carry-on was never a problem. One small shoulder bag and my computer and i could travel for a week.

But now, i have to check luggage, because i always carry a Swiss Army knife and nail clippers. Rather than change that habit, i just choose to check luggage and put that stuff in there. When i get to either end, i can reach into the luggage and pull my trusty hardware back out.


Admittedly, a very small impact on my life.
The Professor

[Cleita]

13. Since I'm on the other coast, it didn't affect me directly,

but since it gave Bush such a big boost as a so-called leader it affected the election of 2000 giving control of Congress to the fascist Republicans. This makes legislation coming from Congress that affects everyone across the board, from those who have lost their jobs to senior citizens, who can no longer afford their drugs thanks to the prescription drug benefit.

[sweetheart]

14. It ended a chapter in my life

My guru had his business offices for over a decade on the 79th floor
of world trade 1, suite 7967, 10048... still remember the address
by heart. The first airplane hit right about where those offices
were, and i felt in my heart, as if someone had struck at a physical
basis of my religion... as a christian might feel if someone attacked
a christian holy place, or a muslim might feel if mecca was attacked.

I was in a board meeting in london, when i was interrupted by
someone: "Your country is being attacked, the world trade center has
collapsed." It was early afternoon, and i was totally cynical, and
said "Bollocks, those buildings are made to withstand direct impact
with airplanes, just like the one that hit the empire state building."

The guy, who reported to me, was insistant that i leave the board
meeting, so i came out and tried to use the internet. The whole
thing was dead, and it was then i realized that something was wrong,
ran downstairs to a london pub, and saw the buildings collapsing on
TV.

On returning to the office, i was informed by the marketing director
that i was lucky i was not in the world trade center, as we had
planned to attend a financial conference that was transpiring at
windows of the world that day, and as it turned out, all our
competitors and customers lost people in that collapse. I knew some
of them professionally, and one chap rather well... a guy who
started a financial software company called "Mint" that was later
acquired by Sungard.... well. So i felt like a cat who just spent
one of nine lives, lucky to not be dead with my collegues.

Unfortuntately, the business did not survive the market paranoia
of subsequent months. We made no sales for months after, as the
WTC collapse so shocked our customers as to cause them to suspend
all buying decisions.... so what was a company that was just in its
growth curve, we got clobbered, and our investors shut us down
6 months later. I lost everything i had worked for, and got
collectively blamed for the company failure, as the technology
product designer... I got stiffed for my investment and given a
less than joyful retirement by britains largest venture capitalist.

I threw all my things in the car, and drove to the house in scotland,
where my next chapter has been unfolding. I liked London and
cosmopolitian britain, living in tower bridge and taking black
cabs around, with all the executive priviledge of a business director
running a european company.... BANG. The terrorists changed
my career in a blink, but better that than lose my life... so in
retrospect, i'm grateful to be alive at any cost.

This current chapter, i would call "Yankee in the scottish highlands"
and it is still being written.

I miss wearing fancy clothes, and being treated like business elite,
fancy clubs, drinks, airline clubs and rubbing shoulders with the
doodoo of financial mecca. It was gratifying in its way, but
also extremely draining.

I used to go jogging around those towers, more specifically, i used
to run up water street to the brooklyn bridge, then over to city
hall, and down vesey street by borders and WTC7 across the west side
highway to the water of battery park city, down round batterry
park in a circle... early in the morning like 6'ish... and watch
the sunrise on the towers most of the run... for years... and it
was so private and personal, the towers sorta were atlantean
symbols of the human spirit, and i liked running round them.
(frankly i hated the inside, and really loathed doing jobs and
visiting customers, due to the tiresome security pass system and
the stuffy elevators full of smokers who took the long trip down to
have a fag.)

So its all erased, and the suitcase i packed in london to go up to
scotland was purchased in the world trade center shopping center...
9/11 was personal. Even i worked for about a year or so between
WTC 7 and 1, and the entire thing is gone, as if it never happened.

Then i started writing vociferously on internet forums, starting
with the UKONLINE free speech forum and moved to DU when it shut
down (so tony could bullshit a war). I figured the least i could
do for the folks i knew who died in WTC, was to write politically
what they were standing for... and they were, the people i knew,
good hearted people who believed in a word "neoliberalism"... that
by free trade, we were doing a good thing.

I have come full circle in political learning since, and no longer
quite share the view of neo-liberalism i once did, largely by
discussing it with its detractors on this forum and elsewhere... as
i see it more clearly as economic imperialism, than perhaps i once
did.

Sorry for writing such a long one.

peace,
-s

[TeeYiYi]

21. Thanks sweetheart.

I enjoyed reading your story.

TYY

[Sterling]

75. Great story!

So are you LIHOP or MIHOP?

[sweetheart]

77. LIHOP - thanks

The failure to scramble andrews air force base is deeply suspicious.

As well, were i to have died there, my ghost would be deeply and
totally upset that my death was used to mass murder thousands of
innocent civilians elsewhere for some imperialist ambition. Rather
i would have hoped my death might be memorialized by wiping out
AIDS, and making sure the world had clean water supplies.

I am more than angry, that the bush junta has hyjakked the deaths of
good people to their evil political ends.

It is comforting to see that i was not alone in having my career
torpedoed by that attack (and more so, the bush response). It gives
me great inspiration to see how people are healing from it, that
they put their cynicism aside to join together here and make a
stand for justice.

You guys rock!

[Sterling]

87. It seems a lot of us who were here in NYC that day or had connections

to people involved were motivated to see through the lie.

[smirkymonkey]

15. Well, I lost my job as an indirect result of 9/11.

I live and work in Manhattan. I was laid off on 10/11/01 with a third of the firm and the reason stated was that 9/11 was the final blow to an already struggling business.

I didn't mind though, because even thought it was a financial strain, I realized that I hated my job and that life was too short to spending most of it in an office in the service of materialism. My layoff was one of the best things that happened to me, and even though I wouldn't find a job for another year and a half, it forced me to look at my priorities and reassess my goals in life.

I worked down in Greenwich Village at the time and stood out on 7th Avenue wathcing the horror unfold with the rest of the shocked, incredulous onlookers.

After we were sent home from work, I walked with huge crowds of New Yorkers uptown to where I live. Everyone was in a state of shock. Many were covered with debris from the fall of the towers - it was otherworldly. People looked each other in the eye that day, and for weeks afterward as if to reaffirm thier own humanity.

I told a few friends the next day my MIHOP theory because it was so apparent that it was just TOO convenient for the * Administration and a lot of things didn't add up for me even then. They thought I was insane, but I am beginning to think I will have the last laugh.

I had a few acquaintances who perished or were injured in the fall of the twin towers. That really brought it home for me. I wept for them and for the fear of what would happen next. For a long time, we didn't know if attacks would keep happening and the fear was palpable in the streets, the subway and in office buildings. Everytime the subway stopped in between stations, people searched each others faces for reactions as if to gauge their own. "Am I crazy?", "Am I overreacting?", "Will these be the people that I die with?",etc...

It changed how I saw the city I lived in. New York had always been a somewhat magical place to me. I would have what I called New York moments, instances where I would just stop and be overcome with joy and fascination that I actually LIVED here, that this was my city! I haven't had one of those moments since. I still love this city, but it's a different place, a lot of the magic has gone and in it's place there is anxiety, fear and apprehension.

Mostly, it took away my innocence and the belief that benevolent forces were predominant in the world. I became cynical, mistrustful of human nature, and downright digusted with those in power. For a while, I despaired. But the event also galvanized my resolve to become a part of the solution and to break out of my insular little world to become part of the world community. Eventually, it brought me to DU, as I began to feel like I was alone in the belief that our government had not only failed us, but was actively against us.

But, like you, I don't live in fear of Middle-Eastern terrorists. I do, however, live in fear of the current administration and will no longer believe that our government exists to ensure the security and well-being of the citizens of this country. I now know for certain that it doesn't.

[TeeYiYi]

23. Your story resonates . . .

Thanks smirkymonkey. I enjoyed reading your story. New York has lost its magical aura, hasn't it? I used to love to visit New York. I haven't been there since 9/11 and haven't gone out of my way to get there.

I've changed. Like you, I'm more cynical now. Where I disliked this administration before, I loathe it now. And, like you, I don't fear Middle-Eastern terrorists. I fear the terrorists in my own government. I fear the hopelessness that is taking hold in this country. There are people living at poverty level and taking any and all low paying jobs they can find just to keep food on the table. I worry about a society that doesn't have the same prospects for a good future that it once had. A society where kids can't afford college so they end up flipping burgers for minimum wage. I see more crime in my community than ever before. That and drug abuse. I'm not talking about firing up a spliff on a Saturday night. I'm talking about daily hard core seperation from reality to escape the desperation, which probably explains the rise in crime.

I worry more now. I seem to worry about everything. Iraq. The soldiers. The sensless slaughter of Iraqi civilians. The untenable situation in Israel and Palestine. The future of the United States. You name it. Things I have no control over, yet I carry them with me like unwanted baggage in the pit of my stomach. The warm and fuzzy feeling of the 90's has been replaced with pessimism and fear of the unknown.

I have an overwhelming desire to give away my possessions. I don't want a life of excess when so many are suffering.

TYY

[smirkymonkey]

51. Thanks! I know exactly what you are talking about.

It feels as though you have no ground under your feet anymore. I just had dinner w/ a friend here in NY and we were talking about how we felt our lives were on hold because the future is so uncertain.

What makes me most angry about this administration is that they have taken that which America has always had in abundance - optimism - and replaced it with a dread of the future. It's all so sad when you think about it.

[TahitiNut]

16. Not a damned thing. I expected it.

I continue to be appalled by a nation that somehow expects to be spared the kind of atrocities and predations that it itself inflicts on the rest of the world. I'm appalled by people who think they can escape such realities by depending on a 'volunteer' military. In my opinion, we probably need a few dozen more 9/11's, especially in the 'heartland,' to wake people up to what we've helped create in this world.

Just who the hell thinks they can remain safe and at peace if they don't actively support the peace and safety of their global neighbors? The idea that we're somehow superior because we don't have a Beirut or Belfast or Gaza or Darfur or Fallujah or Port au Prince is an idiocy that deserves the worst of all of them. It's the morally bankrupt attitude of an inbred monarch hiding behind moats and parapets while famine and pestilence ravage the people who supply his food.

[Bhaisahab]

17. An International Perspective

I remember 911. It was 5 pm in Bangalore, and I was stoned at a friend's place when I got this message on my cellphone- "WTC explodes- watch CNN." I thought it was a hoax, so I ignored it.
I got home just in time to catch the tower collapse live on TV. I did not sleep that night. Just switched channels. One thing was clear to me- like a majority of Indians- when shrub declared that all states harboring terrorists were gonna get jacked.
I called up a friend and said- "The Pakis are screwed. Oh, how they are screwed." For us Indians, so used to Pakistan sponsored terrorism, it seemed that they had let the snakes crawl in their house too long. And now the wrath of an enraged America would smash the whole terror breeding system across the border. Good riddance to bad nuisance.
So I was considerably surprised when Musharaf became an ALLY, and not the number 1 target for America. Surprise led to curiosity. I started trawling the web, read a lot of bartcop.com, and through that site I discovered DU, as well as other American websites which goaded me into exploring America and its history. All I knew about America before 911 came from Cobain, Stephen King, and Hollywood.
Now I know a whole lot of shit that is never broadcast by the American media machine, thanks to websites such as this and blokes like Mikey Moore and Mike Ruppert.
911 made me bond with America. In ways I never would have.
The dead did not affect me too much. I've been numbed by terrorist deaths here in India. They don't bother me anymore.

[Hosnon]

68. Nice

So what are some things you learned about us. For perspective I know close to nothing about India (besides pop, nukes and geo).

[thanks jon]

70. thanks for the international perspective

its good to know the leaf is enjoyed around the world.

I'm not sure if we were just being pragmatic by not going after pakistan, it actually being a nuclear power,the law of unintended consequesnces and all that. They for sure were complicit. Bush can't live up to his cowboy rhetoric, thats for show. His holy warrior crap scares the crap outta me. Don't forget, we didn't actually elect Bush .

As for 911 itself I am an American so maybe, I am biased, but the atrocity of it all really pissed me off no matter what the politics of the event. Unjustifiable. The perpertrators deserve death. Of course I feel the same way when I hear of the same type of events anywhere in the world. Its a chicken shit way to fight.

[EstimatedProphet]

18. Not much really changed for me

I was in DC on 9/11. They evacuated us and closed all the government offices after the Pentagon was hit. I went home for the day. Since I didn't have a TV, I didn't see any of the footage until much later at a bar, and I still believe that that is in part why I didn't become a bloodthirsty lunatic like so many of the rest of the nation-I don't think that the media did us a service by continually repeating all the footage over and over for weeks on end. Nor do I think that the news radio station I used to listen to-WTOP- helped any by spending the next 2 years beginning every story with "Since the tragedy of 9/11...". This stuff has done nothing but provoke irrationality in people.
So, what did change?
-Security at airports is now asinine
-Rationality is now gone in the average person
-I am often too afraid to speak my mind about things
I do feel sympathy for those people that were inpacted by 9/11, and lost loved ones. I do have to wonder why though, these people aren't usually the ones that are so vocal about attacking everyone.

[gulliver]

19. Suddenly I was surrounded by people who said everything changed.

That's about it. I always thought some big terrorist incident would happen. I now think Bush has raised the threat level through the roof. I guess that changed too. Thanks to Bush, we are a lot closer to nuclear terror.

[ElsewheresDaughter]

20. it made me worry more for my firefighter husbands life...

was possible, but it was :scared:

i moved to the mountians in upstate NY because everytime i heard the engines go out i couldn't sleep and found myself chasing fire trucks my nerves were a wreck and now i'm a basket case :crazy: as are my children

[democratreformed]

22. 9-11 caused me to become more aware and woke me up to the fact

that events all around the world can become important to a "country-girl" from rural Arkansas. By this, I am not talking about terrorism in particular. I am talking about becoming more aware that there are many many problems all over the world that can "come home" to affect our economy, our health, and our well-beings. I have become more aware of how our government's policies and reactions to events affect the rest of the world and how, in turn, that affects us as Americans.

I DO NOT believe that the world changed after 9-11. I believe that Americans reacted in a panic and acted like a bunch of babies that "WE" could be forced to endure what many other countries have endured for decades. I think, as a country, we have become indignant at being forced to admit that we are not "above" or "better than" the rest of the world. I believe that George Bush is trying to gain back that superiority through military power and is, instead, destroying what is great and good about the U.S.

It irritates me when I hear people saying that everything changed and that we, now, have to fight this stupid war that is a war in name only. In reality, to me, it is a complete joke. What kind of war can be waged against nameless, faceless beings and, especially, when we don't even know where they all are. It is ridiculous and we will be made to pay for it - both economically and otherwise in the years to come - UNLESS we make the right choice and get rid of that arrogant bastard currently running our country.

[Zorra]

24. It validated my belief that Bu$h was going to allow a terrorist attack on

the US.

[Seabiscuit]

25. Pre-9/11 I just thought Dubya was a dumbshit Dimson...

Post-9/11 he convinced me he was an evil moron from hell.

[number6]

29. can I barrow that Seabiscuit

"Pre-9/11 I just thought Dubya was a dumbshit Dimson...
Post-9/11 he convinced me he was an evil moron from hell."

sums up how I feel

[Seabiscuit]

30. I don't think you want to "barrow" it, but feel free to "borrow" it. :)

[number6]

32. oops, ok I'll borrow it then, thanx ....

;)

[thanks jon]

73. give Seabiscuit some oats for that one.

succint

[ilovenicepeople]

26. 911 The Day The Conspiracy Stopped Being A Theory!

:scared:

[amazona]

27. it caused me to lose 3/4 of my income

I've never been able to recover my previous levels of income and seem to have settled into an annual income in the high four figures with no prospects for improvement.

A good friend learned he had lost his entire life savings when the market opened again a few days later. (People who had margin accounts see forced sales at certain levels, so even if stock prices come back a little, it's too late for them -- they have lost the stock in forced sales at a low price.)

It might seem mean and tacky to speak of cash but as far as long-term personal impact, that's the main one for me personally.

I'm sure a lot of other people, especially in the airline industry, have similar stories. USA Today just carried a story about airline pilots who have second jobs -- excuse me, I don't want a pilot who must work two jobs, I want a pilot who is well rested!

[ghostsofgiants]

28. It's the reason I became interested in politics and history.

Hearing "they hate us for our freedom" just seemed oo simplistic to me, so I started reading up on things like American foreign policy and shit. Helped move me very far to the left in my politics as well I think.

[loyalsister]

31. Cynicism

At first, I was in the unique position of being slightly relieved the few moments after because my sister had quit a job at an office close by not long before. After breathing easy, I had the usual worries about our international situation.
My journalistic tendencies took hold, and I immediately began digging up history and following all of the news stories. That definitely made me cynical.
I agree with you, they want to see it continue so that we are living in a world where "everything has changed for the worse." Where people are convinced that a macho cowboy who exercises a lot, talks tough, therefore, probably tells off foreign leaders.
I am with you. I am ready for some hope. Where people believe that presidential policies are important to their lives, and events may have influence but certainly not DEFINING influence.

[Sabriel]

37. and I add "mistrust" on a wide scale

I am both cynical and mistrustful of almost everything my government tells me.

[yardwork]

33. Beautiful post.

I changed in two ways - one immediate and the other after some time.

My immediate reaction was one of great admiration for the people of New York City. It reaffirmed my love for my country, our greatest city, and our spirit.

Over time, the events leading up to 9/11 and those that came after revealed the truth of the Right-Wing Conspiracy to me. After years living in a quiet part of the country, raising children and being a soccer mom, I had become a fairly complacent moderate Democrat.

What I've learned has changed me forever into a left-wing liberal, who is willing to put my money, time, actions, and words to work for the cause.

[davekriss]

34. Still just below the surface

When my wife and I were at a screening of F911, when the screen blacked out and we hear again the sounds of the jet plowing into the WTC along with the bewildered and shocked screams, I was in tears. Kriss understands this (my wife), that it remains just below the surface for me. She was squeezing my hand hard in empathy, knowing how painful that scene was for me.

I worked in Manhattan then, in the Chrysler Building. I was on my way to the Westchester airport from my Connecticut home when Kriss called my cell and told me a plane had struck the WTC. A small plane, she said. Huh? On such a beautiful blue September day? While talking the second plane hit. We both said "terrorists!". We discussed what to do and I said I'd make a decision after I got to the airport. I got there just as they closed it down, so I turned around to drive home.

While driving home I heard reports of other cities being attacked (it turned out just to be the Pentagon, of course) and then the first tower collapsed. I'm thinking 10,000+ gone, at a minimum. I suddenly had the strongest urge to be home with my family and began racing home. Along the way I thought what madness! What SADNESS! This did not have to be! It was pure crazy! No one, no matter how strong the grievance, needs to do this to other human beings! While mulling this over I noticed what a perfect Autumn day it was. A perfect blue without a cloud in the sky. Rich greens with just a hint of color change. The next thing I noticed is that I was driving over 100 mph on the winding, hilly Meritt Parkway!

When I got home, I was glued to the TV set (for days). I watched the jets hit and the towers fall over and over again. Then the sickening coverage ("they hate us for our freedoms" -- geeze!).

So what did it change for me? A slow disaster unfolded. My adopted early onset/rapid cycling bipolar disordered daughter ended up melting down weeks later, beginning a 19 month hospital stay. My business utterly collapsed. My savings eroded. My house -- paradise on a private Connecticut lake! -- was lost. My marriage severly tested (and the anger from that period was to surface again, recently, leading to a filing for divorce -- we've since reconciled and we are going to make it). 9-11 for us was a complete tragedy that literally almost cost me my life.

Though we lost clients on 9-11, the business limped along on reserves for another 6 months. Don't let any New Yorker kid you, we were all effected. All winter long our conferences would still, everyone would tense, and we'd each listen in silence until assured the roar of a low flight-path jet from LaGuardia was safely past (understand we were then high up in what had become the second tallest building in Manhattan).

Several of my colleagues moved away from the city before I did. One after, out of the blue, sharing his story with us. He lived a couple of blocks away from the WTC then and he was home that day. He told of what he witnessed when he and his neighbors rushed from their apartments that morning. Bodies and body parts landing everywhere. Like rain he said. And with a sound that will never leave him (nor us that heard him that day). He said life was too short to spend it slaving in our offices, and I have not seen him since.

I had a dream (coincidently) the night before the jet crashed in the backyards of Brooklyn. Anxious, I raced into the backyard of a surburban house (not my house). What I saw were jets crashing almost straight down -- and parachutes all around me. At first the fear increased, I thought they were terrorists. Then in extreme grief I realized they were the passengers from the crashing jets, each falling gently out of the sky. May they never hit the ground!!!

***

Like smirkeymonkey, above, NY just does not have the same attraction it once had for me. I grew up there. I used to go offshore fishing with my dad and recall many miles off shore the only landed thing I could see was the orange glow of the towers' facade in the morning light. After 9-11, when driving into Manhattan from Connecticut my heart would ache at the emptiness I felt when observing the palpable absence in the Manhattan skyline.

And like TeeYiYi, I worry more about everything, though I recognize this as something to get over. I still need to heal as the wounds, and the impacts, were for me very extreme.

[nostamj]

46. wow. powerful and eloquent post dave...

i've really been stunned by the personal stories posted to this thread. not sure WHAT made me write the OP but, hope there was *some* catharsis in writing your reply...

[anarchy1999]

56. Thank you for sharing so much. Nostamj started this thread, I can't

myself come to terms with the depth and the emotions that have been shared here.

Thank you once again, and welcome to DU, I hope you find many friends here.

[ComerPerro]

35. That was when I realized how Bush would claim legitimacy

I knew, on Sept 11, 2001, that we would be at "war" as long as Bush needed and wanted us to be, and I knew we would be hitting Iraq soon.

[bling bling]

36. It made me realize that ordinary Americans are BETTER

than those who represent us.

The only people to STEP UP on 9/11 were Ordinary Americans. While Bush cowardly flew around avoiding scary people, Ordinary Americans on Flight 93 took the terrorists down. While our Congressman, Senators, and Administration Officials scampered down in their bunny holes, the Ordinary American firefighters marched heroically into the burning buildings.

If only our government was truly representative of the Ordinary Americans the world would be a better place.

[nostamj]

58. while I think you're a bit harsh on the Congresspeople...

I would like to add that an extraordinary and diverse group of 'ordinary' americans rallied that day in NYC--beyond the professional 'first responders' whose work and sacrifice cannot be overstated. that outpouring of help included doctors and nurses, iron workers, heavy equipment operators, and thousands of NYCrs who just volunteered to donate blood, gather supplies, support the rescue effort by providing food...

it's a long list.

[bling bling]

90. Yes.

I used the firefighters in the specific example but I meant the post to include all of us average folks. Or, well, most of us. Maybe about half of us.

It goes beyond 9/11. Today I see that government and corporate (redundant) corruption is occurring at alarming rates and it is threatening. The most obvious system designed to counter this is the press. But they are failing miserably. In fact, they are so unreliable that I consciously sought out an alternative source which is how I found this website several months ago. And once again, I see it is the average citizen stepping up to do what's right. People here, for example, spend hours researching, investigating, and reporting the facts in their free time for no salary to provide the rest of us with the truth.

Just one more of hundreds of examples.

[bluedonkey]

39. In the days that followed 9/11

I wanted to move out of the country.The 'patriots' made me sick,the hate made me sick.Some friends and I took turns sitting in muslim eatery so the 'patriots' wouldn't hurt them.
The nazification of the country took me by surprise;I thought I knew my neighbors and co workers.I went from a well-liked person to a person of suspicion within days of the attack.One of my cats was murdered and left on my doorstep.
Some times I still want to leave,I have that option,I still have my german citizenship,but then I get furious.I will not let them run me out of the country!I lived here for 25 years!

I'm not as out going as I used to be.I avoid talking politics now.But I'm not afraid of Terrorists,I'm more afraid what it did to some of the people I thought I knew.

[fudge stripe cookays]

57. Oh mint, how horrible.

I'm so sorry.

For what you did for those Muslim friends, thank you. I'm sure they thank you more than you know.

The nazification took me by surprise as well. I was nauseated for days afterward. Wanted to pack up and leave right then. I WAS fearful. Now I'm just angry. Really really angry. When I think of all the support we had from people all over the world-- and how we could have done so much to bolster our standing in the world-- and then how that empathy was shredded and twisted, I get so mad my head hurts.

For those of you in New York-- Words cannot express my warm, tender feelings toward you. I was always used to seeing New York in that charming, glamorous, big city, "When Harry Met Sally" sort of way. That all changed that day.

I was terrified of flying in or out, and kicked myself for a long time for never visiting when I had the chance. I never got to tsee the Towers, or any of it. Now, I don't know if I ever will.

FSC

[bluedonkey]

63. thank you,fudge

nowadays I get angry when I think about that this administration had knowledge off the attack long before it happened(I can't bear to believe they actually planned the whole thing).
What kind of people are they?
I cannot descibe the disgust I have for this administration and their followers!

[nostamj]

64. 'mint' ? 'fudge' ? and now i'm thinking ice cream.....

;-) couldn't resist!

[baby_mouse]

82. It's awful.

When you think about all the people talking about how it would bring the country together...

[olebrowser]

40. my changes

Weekly Update 15 Oct 04

Ladies,

It is with the deepest sadness and most profound grief that I must report to you the loss of Daniel Wyatt, LCpl, Fox Co, 2nd Bn, 24th Marines, USMC. Daniel was killed in the line of duty, while conducting foot patrolling operations in Yusufiyah Iraq. Daniel was killed by a command detonated improvised explosive device. He died instantly, suffered no pain and was immediately recovered by his fellow Marines.

My command security element and I personally recovered Daniel's body and escorted him back to the forward operating base, and then onto the helicopter for the beginning of his final ride home. I cannot even begin to express to you the soul touching sight of combat hardened Marines, encrusted with weeks of sweat and dust, who have daily been engaged in combat, coming to complete and utter solemnity and respect in the handling of the body of one of their own. It puts on display a level of brotherly love you just cannot see anywhere else.

We conducted a memorial service for Daniel in the battle space owned by his fellow Marines, as well as one the following day at the battalion forward operating base. I have spoken with his fiancée and expressed the sorrow and sympathy of the entire Battalion.

If I might for a moment, I hear and see some of the media coverage. I hear the accusations and charges. I hear what could almost be labeled as hysteria over the situation in Iraq. Let me tell you something from ground level. The town of Yusufiyah that Daniel and his fellow Marines seized, had not seen government structure or security forces for over 8 months. FOREIGN FIGHTERS, TERRORIST AND THUGS have had free reign and have routinely murdered people in the market for no reason other than one day they MIGHT support a democratic process and speak for themselves. For nothing more than they MIGHT choose a version of religion even slightly different than the terrorists and foreign fighters. They live in squalor and fear. The Marines of Daniel's unit have not had a shower since seizing the town. They have eaten MREs day in and day out. They live a Spartan existence that few can imagine. And, on all my trips to their position for planning, coordination and command visits, I ask them if they want to be relieved. To a man, they look me in the eye and tell me NO WAY. Why? Well, I am not going to soften it for anyone, the primary reason why is to kill terrorists. Please remember, that is what they are trained and paid to do. But, they also tell me, they want to help the people of Yusufiyah. They want to show all of Iraq that they can stand on their own feet, push back against extremism, and with our help live the life of freedom that all men yearn for. Yes, from the mouths of these young and hardened warriors, this is what they tell me. And then...and then...they ask me how I am doing! Un-freaking believable! They worry about everyone else but themselves.

So believe what you want. That is your right as Americans. But I am telling you, there are no heroes on any football fields, basketball courts or halls of government. There are honorable and decent people all over America. However, the heroes are on the battlefields of Iraq. Suffering, killing and DYING that others might live, and live in FREEDOM. Americans free from terror, Iraqis free from oppression and tyranny.

I am an under-educated gun toter from Indiana who is just lucky there is an organization like the USMC where a half-wit like myself with some rudimentary combat skills can succeed. But I do know heroes! I am surrounded by over a thousand of them. And I am not the least bit ashamed to tell you I have wept like a baby for Daniel Wyatt. Because when one of these heroes falls, it is if an Angel of God himself has fallen from heaven! I will not profess glory of battle or any other such hype. I will profess duty and sacrifice. Daniel showed us all true duty and ultimate sacrifice. I have no doubt that the instant he died, he was whisked to heaven on the wings of Angels and placed before the unapproachable light of Jesus, who himself said: "greater love hath no man, than a man lay down his life for his friends."

GOD BLESS AND KEEP DANIEL WYATT, HIS FAMILY AND FIANCEE AND GOD BLESS AND KEEP ALL THE FAMILIES OF 2/24.


Yours in profound sadness Mark A. Smith, LtCol TF 2/24 Cmdr Mahmudiyah, Iraq

[VOX]

42. Wish you would comment. This is being posted all over the Internet...

word-for-word.

For instance, try here:
http://66.102.7.104/search?q=cache:8xlHXSBcxSIJ:www.jrlago.com/+%22I+am+an+under-educated+gun+toter%22&hl=en
Are you in some way related to Lance Cpl. Daniel R. Wyatt?

Do you support those who were responsible for sending Daniel into a situation that hadn't been adequately thought through, or properly supported with adequate troop support and supplies?

[robbedvoter]

41. I used to hate W just for stealing the election, now it's also posturing

with the bullhorn over the dead bodies after running out of harm's way on 911.

[CBHagman]

43. For about a year afterwards...

...I thought of those images of people jumping from the World Trade Center each night before I went to sleep. There was a pastry chef named Norberto (I don't recall his last name) at Windows on the World, and I couldn't forget the image of him going through the air alongside the building.

To this day I never go to Capitol Hill without saying a prayer that the Capitol and the other buildings won't be destroyed. It's the same at my church and at the National Gallery. I realize how fragile and vulnerable we all are.

It gives me a particular longing for happy and even silly moments in life, and a painful sense of how quickly that happiness can be snatchedd away. I want people to go to football games and stupid movies and dance in the streets. I want there to be some sense of hope and healing for the human race.

It's going to take a lot of work and a lot of time. It can happen, but not if we continue as we have been.

[anarchy1999]

44. Thank you, nostamj. Beautifully written for many of us out here in the

heartland, wasteland. Thank you.

I don't know what else to say, except, thank you.

[nostamj]

45. oh, thanks....

there have been MANY beautiful, heartfelt posts to this thread. I've got a bunch to catch up with now. (just getting back from a friend's cabaret show in town)

and, there is no waste where there is heart.

[expatriate]

47. I woke at 3 am on September 12, 2001 - 9/11 for America -

and as was my habit when waking in the night, went to the computer to check to see if any email had come in from my family in America.

There was a short email from my mother, assuring me that everyone in my family in upstate New York was okay because "As you probably already know, terrorists have destroyed the World Trade Center".

I didn't know. I had gone to bed early, and was blissfully unaware of what had happened for a few more hours than most of the rest of the world had been. I'm thankful for that, because it was a few more hours of not knowing. Many times in the hundreds of days since then, I've been grateful for those few hours.

Seven people I knew and loved died that day in the WTC. Some were family, others were longtime friends. Several others, by dint of being late to work, or having called in sick, were spared, only to be emotionally scarred.

As I watched the newscasts over the next three days, I cried continually. I was far away, there was nothing I could do. There was a terrible feeling of impotence and helplessness. I finally stood up, and turned the TV off, and shed that helpless feeling.

I was sickened as George W. Bush used 9/11 again and again to further his career. Over time, as more and more has come to light, I have become enraged.

I am cynical, and believe I was born this way. I've always questioned, I've never just gone along with "how we're supposed to do things". I wasn't surprised the terrorists managed to bring about 9/11, and I wasn't surprised at the laxness and incompetence that made it possible. I'm not even surprised that it is very likely that there is even more to it than that, that 9/11 may very well have been allowed - even orchestrated - to further an ideology which is abhorrent to me and abhorrent to freedom.

I'm much more serious now. I've read and learned and campaigned and pushed and fought like crazy during this election campaign to see Bush out of office. I fear for my remaining family in America, should Bush be returned to office. I watch with amazement and sorrow as one right after another of the American people is pruned and whittled away, with little if any protest from the people being deprived.

I lost the very last lingering belief that I should try to believe in a benevolent, loving God. That was a relief, actually, it had been getting very hard to make the necessary rationalizations to believe.

I am not afraid. I found that the security in airports, the last time I was in the us in 2003, was a combination of absurd overkill and lack of attention. I couldn't bring myself to visit New York City. I don't want to see the altered skyline with my eyes, because it's forever burned into my heart. But I fly often, I go into major cities without fear. They have battered my life and taken a large chunk of it, but they will not make me cringe.

Sometimes, at 3 am, I hear the voices of the seven who are gone. Who were murdered. They will not pass this way again.

[nostamj]

49. wow. another amazing post!

thanks. very moving. as I say earlier, the replies have been so powerful and well written... i'm stunned. thought I would come home and find the thread long gone...

[anarchy1999]

50. Surprise!! We all love you more than you know!

And there are many that need an outlet. Thanks, sweetie, you did really good this time! Good luck with replying to all.

S.

[anarchy1999]

55. Thank you so much for so much heart.

I'm in awe. Thank you again.

[Bo]

48. Billions into Intel that doesnt deliver

[anarchy1999]

52. A kick back to the top!

n/t

[killbotfactory]

53. it shocked me that they got away with it...

I couldn't believe our security was so lax and our intel so bad that we let it happen.

Well, it turns out this administration just didn't take terrorism seriously. Instead they focused on renewing the cold war and all the military pork like missile defense that goes with it. "How is missile defense going to stop a terrorist with a backpack nuke?" I thought at the time.

All the dots were there, they were just too stupid/ignorant/shortsighted to connect them. The same assholes who yelled "wag the dog" whenever Clinton tried to do something about it.

9/11 didn't change anything. It was a wakeup call to republicans who refused to take terrorism and Al Qaeda seriously. Instead of realizing/admitting they had their heads up their asses, they assumed they gained some huge insight on the dangerous world of terrorism and that the world was forever changed.

Bush decided it was his calling from God to transform the middle east into a democracy through bombing and force, and Cheney and friends decided it was his chance to make obscene amounts of profit exploiting a national tragedy, most likely justifying it in his mind as "hey, we're taking out a dictator, might as well make some money, too!" or some other self serving bullshit.

And then they proceeded to fuck us. Embarking on the biggest strategic mistake since... I don't know... Waterloo? Custer's last stand? It's way up there in the big fucking stupid mistake category. Totally predictable. Totally preventable. But these stupid assholes couldn't see it. Just like they couldn't see the threat from OBL.

[timtom]

54. Having been a Berkeley resident in the 60's

I was, at that time, more into the sex and psychedelics than I was into the very serious issues that were being "discussed". I was in total agreement that we mustn't have been in Vietnam, that something was rotten in Washington, DC, and that Eisenhower was probably right about the military-industrial complex.

But I wasn't really a player. I was more interested in hedonism.

9/11 changed all that. I won't rest until we have restored dignity and some measure of truth to our government. And, while there may be some "good" Republicans, I will never be able to trust them again -- at least, for a very long time. Their critical thinking skills will always be suspect. Their integrity will always be suspect. I will always think, "Tsk!"

[Union Thug]

59. It didn't change me.. .but it sure did change the country.

In spite of the ridiculous "everthything has changed" crap you get from the talking heads, my life hasn't changed one iota...unless you count the 10 fold increase in my disgust with conservatives.

[auburngrad82]

61. It made me realize that America needs to become part of the world

Our Isolationism and "cockiness" has led to America being the most hated country in the world. We could easily solve this if we started acting as if we are part of the world community. Bush's administration has done just the opposite, using military force and threats to coerce the world to see it our way. All this has done is anger people around the world and acted as a recruiting tool for terrorist organizations.

[Dastard Stepchild]

65. Well, I never used to roll my eyes when I saw an American flag...

but now I seem to do so. I think because I was so inundated by stars and stripes that I have become not only immune, but irritated, by the presence of a flag.

[thanks jon]

71. I know what you mean

but i actually fly it now, because if I don't fly it the fascist will own it, and I do not want that to happen either. I remember it felf kinda freaky the bicentennial year, because of so many flags. Too many flays and I think "swastika". directly after 911 it seemed kinda amusing to my jaded mind but I could kinda get behind the feeling of the moment.

[Dastard Stepchild]

72. yeah - my father has a flag up for the same reason

I can respect it, but it seemed like such a gimmick for a while. Not so bad nowadays, but those months following 9/11 were really awash in red, white and blue. Almost pathologically so.

[thanks jon]

74. I do nuance

:kick:

[babylonsister]

66. We were in Bali, Indonesia

Had been there only 2 days. A friend called us up at 10:30 pm to tell us to turn on the TV. We thought he was kidding until we did. Stayed up for hours watching CNBC, the only channel we could get. Next day we went to the local sports bar. They had CNN and BBC on 24/7 for the entire next week. We obviously couldn't get home as no flights were flying. The outpouring of grief and sympathy from the Balinese and travelers from all over the world was overwhelming; everyone was extremely upset and fixated on the images. We eventually made our way home after 12 days; sadly, the flight was empty as so many people had cancelled their travel plans. I'm originally from NY so just wanted to get home. I spent the next several weeks just trying to catch up on the madness. To this day whenever I see images from that day, I do cry. It's changed something for me as well. The horror of it; perhaps we were long overdue for something like this, but that doesn't prepare anyone for it. As for traveling, people no longer sympathize with our country, I've found many are curious or suspicious of one's political leanings, as pretty much across the board I've found everyone hates Bush*. And now I'm really angry, for as a direct result of 9/11, our government has deceived us all totally. I am no longer an innocent, and believe it's cost us all that.

[nostamj]

76. another gem for this thread

i think a lot of us are tired of being angry. angry ABOUT being angry. so much, too much of this did NOT have to happen.

thanks for a thoughtful post.

[Hosnon]

67. My Error

I realized that I need to watch myself in highly emotional times. I was very much a big supporter of Bush around that time. I should not have let my emotions cloud my judgment. It won't happen again, regardless of who is President.

[deadparrot]

69. It got me really, truly interested in politics.

I was fourteen at the time, so I was a little upset about what happened in 2000, but was okay with it, seeing as * and his minions seemed harmless during their first nine months in office.

Then all hell broke loose. Invading Iraq was about the last straw for me. I was in world history class the day after we invaded and everyone was fawning on and on about how * was doing with this "war on terra." I finally had enough, and said, "Give me a break. The moron invaded the WRONG COUNTRY."

They all had plenty to say then....they're quiet now.

[marlakay]

78. Made me realize I can't take life for granted

and I need to make it count, personally, politically and in other ways.

[vetwife]

80. Not as much as it did for Bush and Cheney for sure...I actually

cared that people lost life but killing people in Iraq would not bring them back and it was like they said, Attacking Mexico because of Pearle Harbor showed the world just how stupid Bush is ! We lost most of our constitution that day and Freedoms that went with it. No ones fault for that But the present regime. The terroists won when our people took away civil liberties and became fearmongers. It made me mad but it made me madder at Bush for being such a Bunnpanty chickenhawk and flying around in a plane we pay for and Cheney in a bunker we are paying for not counting all of their enteurage of protection.

I would wager more have died from their fear mongering either suicide or heartattacks, strokes than those who actually died in the Trade Center and Pa. and Washington. IT was something that did not have to happen. How much courage and morality does it take to stand on dead people underneath a pile of rubble and stand with a Bullhorn and then politicize it.

[Lostnote03]

79. 911 changed me.....

....I used to be anxious Now I'm manic....

[Tom_Foolery]

81. It destroyed my small business...

so I went bankrupt. I am now under-employed with no health insurance.

[camero]

83. Made me realize the people in charge are Nazis n/t

[Dob Bole]

84. It drove me leftward...

It may not have had this effect on most people, but it did on me. I got a flyer from some people who were gathering to pray for peace...and it just so happens that they had been attacked by terrorists before. It was these people:

www.koinoniapartners.org

Being from the Deep South, it was pretty much my first experience with the "religious left."

[baby_mouse]

85. This will make some people very angry, but it's true...

...my flatmate and I were watching it and put on "Where is my Mind?" The Pixies track at the end of Fight Club.

Keep reading.

We were tremendously clued-up lefto politicos, you see, able to perceive the true motivations behind any politician's bullshit. And we hated America, oh, yes, we did, we were entitled to, because of our superior brains and experience of prejudice as bisexuals. Smash the Capitalist Bastards! We were awfully smart, back then.

So for a few minutes, while it was still television, we played, as if it were an episode of South Park.

Then the music stopped. A few minutes later the first tower actually collapsed, live. We sat in silence, our superior brains studying the debris. I don't think either of us knew quite what to say.

I felt as if cold water had started running down my spine slowly, as if God had heard us play the track. It got colder and colder.

"Oh, CRAP," the thought came, like falling into an icy lake. "What the FUCK are the Yanks going to try to pull off on the back of this?"

I remember a BBC commentator remarking spikily that "Oh, of course, you're not USED to this, are you?" while interviewing a completely confused New York Official of some sort as he nearly burst into tears. "They won't forgive that," I thought. Strangely, over the next few days, the comment was buried. Also, a young man was pulled in front of some studio cameras to give the New York reaction. He smiled, eyeroll. "Well, you know, New Yorkers are terribly blase about this kind of thing-" he started and was cut of. The ice got colder, obviously he was off-message.

Once it actually sunk in I phoned my friend Andrew to see if he'd seen it, he works from home and could have been watching the TV. It turned out he was. He was horrified. "New York is one of my cities," he said.

We exchanged reactions and then I went back to the living room to see Paul staring at the TV as if he had realised it was a scorpion in his living room and had been all along.

"How bad is this?" he asked.

"It's the worst terrorist strike ever," I answered.

"It is?"

"Oh, yes, by far. At least an order of magnitude."

We looked at each other, the cold running down our backs. He'd had the same thought.

And then the second tower collapsed. I actually can't remember the rest of the day, it's like a dream. I vaguely remember calling my parents.

I remember some part of me thinking all the time: "Why am I reacting like this? What's the total going to be, 10,000? It's nothing, in the Third World they're used to 100 times that number dying of starvation in 10 year cycles or worse." But the feeling wouldn't go away, and the fear built. "What are they going to do, what are they going to do...."

I had been buying into the death "currency exchange", brown poor people were supposed to die and rich white people weren't. My hind-brain couldn't take that much death in one place in a civilised country. Despite my self-deluding suppositions about my politics, on one level at least I was as racist as the fascist KKK people in the States I had allowed myself to hate, all the white trash on Springer, the Southern gentleman openly expounding racist rubbish in front of crowds of apoplectic black people suddenly seemed different. My hatred of them was a luxury.

"The Black Death," my brain said, unhelpfully, "The Great Fire of London", more and more catastrophes on soil outside the States jumped up and down in my head as I tried to balance it all out somehow, but it didn't balance out, and it still doesn't. "It's so unfair! All the billions of sacrifices made in Europe during the wars, all the torture and maiming and sacrifice, and none of it will matter, they will use this paltry 10,000 to make Americans the most important people in the world. Their suffering will eclipse all of history through a simple conjuring trick, the contrast of before and after. Their inexperience, their good fortune, will be the end of our history. Everyone will have died for NOTHING. Why? Because this time the people throwing themselves out of the burning buildings were ON TV."

And another part of me was whispering "nukes, nukes, nukes,"

Yes, I thought all these things. "Paltry." I'm not as nice as I always thought I was.

At NO POINT did I even consider the possibility that what these people had done was a bad thing. I have since learned to think carefully about who is responsible for what in all political acts. Who creates the conditions, how choices are in a sense the intellectual property of the chooser and therefore their responsibility for reasons other than the reasonably predictableconsequences that follow from them. I was SO fucking naive. I used to think there was only one kind of responsibility, that of the powerful for the conditions of the weak, and now I can see that that position, like its opposite, is impossible to maintain.

Over the next few days: Discussion!

Everywhere, at work, in the pub, at home... more and more people, more and more views. Not usual for me, who was always trying to engage people in political discussion, to be bowled over by the sudden interest. I found out a lot about the people I thought I knew. Several folk recommended nuking Jerusalem, sparking instant rage from me that I didn't know I had in me. Everyone cast the event in the light of opinions held more deeply than the casual remarks they would pass off as political in ordinary conversation. I discovered that Andrew is basically a Republican, although he labels himself a left-leaning anarchist and genuinely believes it. I discovered that Paul isn't nearly as committed to change as he says he is. I discovered I'm able to change people's views if I know the facts and present them properly, a personal victory, as I used to go in either so "all guns blazing" or so "softly, softly" that I never made any difference. Nobody at my work knew anything about the Palestinians, I had to tell them. They didn't know the WHY of anything.

For years, my approach had been Laugh Hard at the Absurdly Evil (except when you're quivering under the sheets in fear), and then suddenly the Great Satan had a gaping wound and neither it nor I had any idea what to do or say.

But now I think we do.

The inevitable drum-bashing started straight away, as Paul and I had feared. BUT... Not Enough People Were Fooled.

America is not Invincible, and therefore, Not Evil. Good Thinking, Batman. What planet were you on? My brain is that simple. How can I justify my existence to Americans? Why should I expect them to tolerate my existence?

America is not Stupid, and therefore, not Impossible to Reason With. Applause! Ever thought of TRYING, asshole? Hits Self with Stick.

One of my favourite comic writers said on his website that there was an occult association between the symbolism of the Moon Card in the Tarot deck and 9/11. The Moon card has two towers on it and is the symbol of dreams and illusions, and so the destruction of the Twin Towers was the end of the American Century, the end of the Land of Dreams. America was going to lose a lot of it's illusions about itself.

This is, of course, rank mysticism.

But it's coming true.

And there was a flipside to that mysticism. "What if the gate swings both ways?" I thought. "What if I have to lose some of my illusions about America? What if America has to lose it's illusions about the outer world? What if the outer world has to lose it's illusions about it's relation to America?"

I have learned that I have never met an American I didn't like, all the Yanks I met Before were somehow different in my head, now I wonder if they are, really, from their fellow countrymen.

I have learned that cynicism is corrosive, not constructive, that ignorance is by no means an American speciality, that a relationship of implicit trust is far more fragile than I suspected, and that I want the old America back, and that I loved it, and what's more, I loved it as a spiritual guide. Not the Bible bashing rubbish or the silly politics, the movies that said "Follow Your Dreams." That was liberalism to me, following your dreams, and I thought it was my idea, then remembered that pretty much every film I'd ever seen that carried that message (and, horrors! I'm a capitalist media-junkie! I got from films and nothing else) came from the States.

And now there are no more dreams. Only plans and strategies and tactics and conspiracies and theories and other intricate nonsense that feeds no-one's soul. Sometimes I feel isolated.

But never, NEVER as much as I did Before. Why? Because of what I've learned.

I have learned that I love MY country. Bizarre! Scotland, a COUNTRY. Before, it was just a place. I thought patriotism was about dreams and ideas, it isn't, it's about HISTORY and LAND.

I've learned that I've never hated America, I don't even know anything about it. I hated some strange model of America in my head that was more about me that that big continent across the pond.

I have learned that there are a lot of extremely nasty American people. Yet, for some strange reason, I am no longer afraid of them.

Maybe it's because there are SO MANY EXCELLENT PEOPLE living in your country, like the posters on this board, who, if they pull this off, will finally get me to believe that America really is as great as it's always said it is. :-) Because, you see, the forces at work in it now have happened over here on the other Western Continent, and we failed terribly, hundreds of thousands were rounded up and killed in alphabetical order. We crushed these forces in the end, with a little help :-) but they spring up everywhere. Probably never again, here... probably. Never again is a VERY long time.

But I don't think Pure Evil is going to work in America, the godless Great Satan. I don't think the American Flag can be hammered into a swastika, there's something about it that's just too goddamn stubborn. How could Satan flourish openly in a country that generates the men and women I have met, of near infinite patience and courtesy? Yes, America, you are patient and courteous as well as arrogant and impatient, just as Britain is yobbish and humourless as well as diplomatic and witty, in fact, I think if one tendency rides high in a country, it's opposite usually does also. What defines the national character are the axes along which its citizens place themselves, not one arbitrarily defined position along one of the axes that fits one ill-met tourist. How could Satan flourish openly in a country that worships a cartoon featuring him in bed with Saddam Hussein? ;-) Me, the big atheist.

I think America is about to prove the old me wrong.

That being said there's one more thing that changed, the way I thought about the American Right.

"They're jealous of our freedoms."

Uh?

Now, I've been told by family members that often people criticise in others what they don't like about themselves. And there's another nasty thing floating around my unhelpful head that I don't want there.

"Are THEY jealous? of US? Not of our Enlightenment, not the Renaissance, the Industrial Revolution, Magna Carta, the Blitz, the art, the culture, the sophistication, but that darkness at the heart of European history? Is that why they accuse us of jealousy, because jealousy is a handy model (buried and unknown for what it is, of course) for some of THEIR feelings?

The rack. The boot. The concentration camp. The sheer blaze of hatred ringing out from Nazi Germany, the appalling abuses of children under Victoria. The Dark Ages, the Inquisition, the Crusades. Again and again, Europe has poisoned the world around itself.

Is there some demon in the background there, hidden at the top of the PNAC pyramid in some poor, weak-brained Republican's head, masquerading as a belief-system, that's JEALOUS? A middle management willful sprite aching to joint the ranks of Hitler, Torquemada, Robespierre and Napoleon as a hot, young demon at the cutting edge of hell?

Do these asshats want to prove that they can be as big and manly a bastard as EUROPE?

Oh, I hope not.

If so, they're in for some nasty surprises..."

-------------------

Head dump. Move along. Nothing to see here. Certainly nothing "political".

[murdoch]

86. I live in New York City

I live in New York City. I guess it's probably correct to say that this had more of a psychological, and actual effect on people in New York City than say, people who lived in Fresno, or Juneau, or Oahu.

When I woke up that morning I turned on my TV and saw static. I figured my TV had broken or something. Then I went on the Internet to check my e-mail or something and saw something about the airplanes, and then I realized what had happened. I was actually in the direction of prevailing winds, so that night the toxic ashes of the WTC flew into my Brooklyn apartment.

I was actually planning to go to Windows on the World on Thursday of that week with my friend.

I had a friend who worked directly next to the towers. If they had fallen eastward, they would have fallen on his building. I tried calling him but the cell phone network was overloaded. Eventually I got through to him and found that he was OK.

Also, I had computer equipment nearby which went down for a few weeks.

I'll tell you what effect it had on me, although it might not be pleasant to hear what effect it had on my thinking.

Perhaps the biggest psychological effect is I had interviewed for a job on the 103rd floor of the WTC at the end of 2000. Or to better express my views of work, bosses and corporations better, I went in and begged for their corporation to hire me as a wage slave. My begging came to nothing - they turned me down, and some other "lucky" worker took my position. I later found that the person who interviewed me was killed on 9/11. Probably everyone I passed in the office, if they were there that day, were killed as well.

Then it occurred to me that the Saudi nationalists were not bombing shopping malls in Omaha, Nebraska - they were attacking perhaps a better symbol of Wall Street than the New York Stock Exchange, as well as the Pentagon. Inside these places, white collar workers, like myself work, and I suppose in some way contribute to things such as the American army's presence in the Saudi dictatorship for the decade previously.

It's a very jarring thing. One the one hand I am a wage slave at the mercy of these Wall Street corporations. On the other hand I am a white collar professional worker, fixing computers so that the Wall Street robber barons can rob the world. I, like so many, throw my hands up and say "What can I do about it?" But the Saudi nationals care little for my professed lack of control over things and see me and the Pentagon bureaucrats as the white collar professional class brains acting in service for the rich, the capitalists, the bourgeoisie, whatever you want to call them. They wanted to send a message, and on 9/11 thousands of Pentagon bureaucrats, people on business flights and financial workers in the WTC were killed.

I could very easily have been one of them. And *WHAT* the hell would I have been dying for? For being a wage slave to a boss who gives me BS? For having a beeper and being oncall 24/7? For working with no job security, no pension but what I put in a 401K? For having "competitive" bonuses so everyone in the office is at each others throats instead of being cooperative? For in some small part helping these Wall Street bastards rob the world?

Then again, I have to make a living, right? I have to eat. How unfortunate that I have to do so in this imperialistic, capitalistic world.

9/11 had a radicalizing effect on me. I guess I've had a left wing view before that but was never active or involved or anything. On February of 2002 I went to my first demonstration though. It was in New York City, against the World Economic Forum.

It's sometimes talked about how world poverty is the swamp where terrorism is created, but I want to actually DO something about that, instead of to talk about it. And I don't think anything will happen by mealymouthed DLC planks. In Nepal, the peasants got fed up with their landlords and began taking over their country. The workers were treated like garbage and did something about it. Maybe it's not in an ideal fashion, but nobody gave a hoot in hell about their misery until they got up and did something about it. And what does the US government under Bush do? It's sending millions to Nepal to put down the peasant uprising. The Nepal rebels, who control most of the country because the peasants hate their oppressors, shot two guards at the American embassy. Nepali guards guarding the American embassy. They haven't killed any Americans - yet. But who knows what they'll do now that the US government is trying to ruin their lives and kill them? Why the hell is the US trying to screw over the poor peasants of Nepal? It's sickening. More sickening than any excesses to their revolution in my opinion. I learned about this at a local volunteer bookstore in New York City. I don't follow their whole philosophy and so forth, but I'm always glad to see workers empowering themselves, and the Nepali peasants have had it awful until now.

Maybe I can peacefully in a political fashion stop the US from killing and oppressing these people in the middle of nowhere, things can get done without some Nepali (or Colombian, or Iraqi, or Haitian) commandos coming up here and blowing stuff up. As Martin Luther King Jr. said "Those who make peaceful revolution impossible will make violent revolution inevitable." People talk about the angry white men in this country and perhaps I can get into that frame of mind sometimes. But I try to not be angry, or at least to channel that anger into positive things like organizing, because if enough people are organized and doing the right thing, *that* prevents violence. I didn't live through the 1960s so I've never seen the US make a change for the better, whether organized working people can push the idle class in this country back somewhat in their heinous deeds, and so that working class people can empower themselves. But for now I'm keeping positive, organizing and seeing where that gets things.

[sweetheart]

88. Cantor Fitzgerald and nepal

A coupla years back, while standing in pokhara nepal, i was accosted
by 2 drunken nepali men. They wanted to shake my hand, which is,
frankly against hindu custom, and i offered the hindu standard bow
and hands pressed together. Then they started getting hostile and
saying things like "What, you think we're not good enough? White
mother fucker. Fuck you you rich tourists, you don't own us." This
i managed to get out of, by apologizing and smiling like an asshole,
so i would not get beaten up.

On the way back to the hotel, i could recall standing in mexico
city to find the mexican peso collapsing in 1994, and in korea
while its economy was crushed similarly years later... and back in
a bunker on the home front, Cantor fitz, was there firing the guns.
The financial voodoo wizards have been sending curses out from those
towers around the world destroying the econmic lives of 10's and
hundreds of millions of people.

And there i was, a white american representative of the white collar
elite, travelling in disguise in nepal, recognized by the angry poor
brown people who we've collectively fucked over. I'm lucky they
did not break my arms and throw me in the lake. They may not hate
us for our freedoms, or their poverty, but something is up, and
the karmic bill is coming due. Who's gonna pay it?

You are lucky not to have died that day, by some odd coincidence of
god, as am I... and some wankers who have never set foot in the WTC,
have hyjakked the event for some other wholly more insideous purpose.
Whilst people who actually remember the 70's syle interior of those
towers, changing elevators at the 75th, those people are the living
dead, and our voice must become stronger to shout down the hyjakkers
before they mass murder someone else.

Godspeed to you and your family. Thank you for telling your truth.

[autorank]

89. I live in Northern Virginia.

Two changes: (1) I developed immense respect for my fellow DC area citizens. People here were great. Nobody laid down, everybody kept working and supported each other. (2) I realized GWB is a chicken-shit when he flew all over the US, coming back to the capitol only when he was sure it was safe. He also showed his cowardice when he broke down and cried in his first attempt to give a speech in the WH. What a pussy!