Pacific Views

Insult and Injury

Today should rightly be considered a national day of mourning, and a day where the survivors most directly affected by the terrorist attacks of five years ago are left to honor their memories as they see fit. I don't know what else to say about it on a personal level, words fail me.

Yet while I wasn't in one of the cities that was attacked and while I don't know anyone who was directly affected, it's as much my country that was attacked as anyone else's. I have as much right as anyone to be outraged and offended by the criminal levels of negligence and neglect with which the perpetrators were ignored both before and after they struck.

Fact: The Bush administration cut the operation monitoring Al Qaida suspects in the US before the attacks.

Fact: Bush pulled ground forces off bin Laden's trail in Afghanistan to prepare for a war of aggression against Iraq.

Fact: Republican partisans have been trying to rewrite history in an attempt to prevent the public from noticing that this administration values their pet grudges over our security, to prevent people from holding the Republican party accountable for accusing President Clinton of trying to 'wag the dog' when he tried to deal with the threat from Al Qaida during his time in office.

The people holding the reins of power in the US right now have failed in nearly every respect to protect and defend this country. They have failed to put our security ahead of their partisan interests. They have paid no respect to truth and have never had the fortitude to face their failures and apolgize, which would be a bare first step towards restitution. That they haven't been held accountable is an insult to every American who depends on them to defend this country and an injury to the memory of the many victims, both foreign and domestic, of their grievous incompetence.

Posted by natasha at September 11, 2006 10:30 AM | War on Terrorism | TrackBack(1) | Technorati links |