““For those heading to an airport,” the 9/11 Commission report stated, “weather conditions could not have been better for a safe and pleasant journey.” The 8:51 a.m. temperature reading was 68°F at Central Park, 72°F at La Guardia, and 73°F at both JFK and Newark Airports.”
A good day to fly or die as any.
Twenty years on. 6 Trillion dollars later. And 21 million dollars more for 8000 Afghan visas.
At least this time, Congress did not hesitate (it did back in 1975).
First the plot, then the plunge. Buildings collapsed, stock brokers jumped.
All hell broke loose.
Our Commander-in-Chief was doing his mom’s job (help children read) turned to his war-footing (flying and landing on a air-craft carrier to declare “Mission accomplished”).
Yet, today, in his most recent interviews, George W. Bush said we haven’t finished the job.
In a sense, he is right. The world is still very unstable, no mater whose hands are that the helm.
Just a little less unsettling than years previous. But the poor and the variants are still with us.
At least, we get to roll up our sleeves to focus on infrastructure (as we should have, albeit two decades late, distracted and all with far-away lands and far-flung conflicts).
A generation has grown up, digitally.
Games, games and games.
Comics, comics and comics (counterparts in France).
War stops and game stop.
Kids in the West worry not about not having foods in their fridges.
They only worry about not having wi-fi signals.
Life online is more important and relevant than life off-line.
Tik tok profile, and instagram photos.
Digital natives vs Afghan non-natives (new arrivals).
All those who wear turbans and masks are arriving at our doorsteps.
What we fear happened is happening. (Replacement Theory?)
The invasion of the body snatchers. Fiction turns non-fiction.
America gets to be multi-colored. A large percentile of Republican said they would take up arms to defend the old ways of life. Whatever that means…Against the British Empire? Against dead OBL? Against China and the origin of virus?
Against those young Russian hackers? or our own home-grown terrorists who refuse to wear a mask and get a jab?
First choose one’s battle.
And one chapter at a time.
We need to eat and sleep. Life makes basic demands on us: its flow and its perpetual cycle of growth.
Nice weather for travel on that crisp Fall day.
Perfect for flying. Also perfect for destroying.
It would have taken 2 years of willful distmantling of the structure.
But in a few hours, both towers were no longer there.
When the smoke clears out, we see Sept 11 – 2021 approaching.
6 Trillion dollars all spent.
Lives and limps lost.
We’re all baseless ( I did not know al Qaeda means “the Base” per Peter Bergen).
Ask the Saigonese who are migrating back to the country side.
De- urbanization. Baseless. Rootlessness.
Gypsies and reality re-constructs.
People do travel. Crisp and clear day or not.
While a few (19) purposefully killed themselves and brought others down with them.
In the name of Allah. In the name of zeal and of vengeance (against infidelity and heathenism).
This makes my blood boil. This makes me want to rebel against hypocrisy and hyper-fervor.
In the name of this and that. End justifies the means. Ideology over individuals – aka collateral damages.
Somehow nature patiently puts up with man’s folly…Suit yourselves.
I am still here. Albeit a few degrees hotter…but still a crisp Fall day…good to travel as any other day.
Friendly sky, hostile terrorists. Got on all of our nerves, unsettled and upended our lives.
At the tune of 6 Trillion dollars and counting. Yet it’s still not quite dealt with. The root of evil lies at the heart of man. Can’t get it out without getting rid of man himself.
The human condition. Sometimes it makes me ill. To think of the hypocrisy vs transparency, of Evil vs Goodness.
We move the needle in between those extremes, or settle in the middle for a compromise called daily life. Pretending that it’s someone else’s business. The outsourcing war, the contractors and the drones.
All mix-up life comprises of Artificial Intelligence, man’s poor judgement and a virtual world that grows in size.
Twenty years ago, we lost two towers and many lives. Today, we lost our causes (Jan 6) and the ones who defended the building (Capitol) spoke of hatred and humiliation at the hands of fellow American. Don’t see any al-Qaeda here!
Thang Nguyen 555 