SO HOW TO NOTE THE TENTH ANNIVERSARY OF 9/11? In the past Ive given shooting lessons to a Marine, Ive taken the day off from blogging, and Ive even gone to a Tea Party.
This year, as in most past years, Ill just keep on blogging as usual. And heres a link to my original 9/11 coverage just scroll on up.
Heres a picture by my cousin-in-law Brad Rubenstein, from his apartment that day. You might also want to read this piece by James Lileks.
And heres a passage from Lee Harriss Civilization And Its Enemies.
Forgetfulness occurs when those who have been long inured to civilized order can no longer remember a time in which they had to wonder whether their crops would grow to maturity without being stolen or their children sold into slavery by a victorious foe.
They forget that in time of danger, in the face of the Enemy, they must trust and confide in each other, or perish.
They forget, in short, that there has ever been a category of human experience called the Enemy. And that, before 9/11, was what had happened to us. The very concept of the Enemy had been banished from our moral and political vocabulary. An enemy was just a friend we hadnt done enough for yet. Or perhaps there had been a misunderstanding, or an oversight on our part something that we could correct. And this means that that our first task is that we must try to grasp what the concept of the Enemy really means.
The Enemy is someone who is willing to die in order to kill you. And while it is true that the Enemy always hates us for a reason it is his reason, and not ours.
Ive mentioned it before, but it bears repeating today.
You should also watch this memorial, made shortly after the attacks. Its still quite powerful.