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The fifth year anniversary of September 9/11 passed yesterday. Like most Americans my thoughts have gravitated towards that day over the past week and left me feeling empty and angry.
Just as people from other countries have marveled at our lack of work to improve the conditions in New Orleans a year after Katrina and the levee failures that flooded parts of the city, the reaction to the 16-acre hole in the ground where the World Trade Center once stood is equally unfathomable. In the five years (five years) since the towers came down there is no rebuilding, there is no memorial. There is only a hole in the ground, surrounded by wooden barricades and a Plexiglas viewing area.
Why? Because there's big money to be made from whatever goe$ up on that $ite and by whoever build$ what goes up there.
But why should this be any different than what's going on in our government? My disdain for the ruling party has only grown deeper with the passing years. True, I was no fan of Dubbya from the beginning, nor of Cheney, Rove, Rummy or any of the rest of them. Right after the towers fell I wanted to be proven wrong about Dubbya, I wanted to see this puppet of a frat boy become the leader the nation needed.
("So, how'd that work out?")
("Eh, not so much.")
In the past months the ruling party has started stepping up their talking points, dismissing any opposition to their policies as being unpatriotic, unAmerican and foolhardy. What's worse is that most of the nation's media has fallen in step with that line of thinking, fearful that to say anything contrary will reduce their 'access' to the White House and get them branded as being traitorous.
I've mentioned Keith Olbermann several times in this blog and for the sake of those either not in the country or those who without cable/satellite or simply those who fear there is no dissenting voice in the media, I'll do so again.
Olbermann has taken time out from several of his newscasts lately for "Special Comments." These comments are, thankfully, all online and can be viewed from the MSNBC website.
His commentaries on Rummy and Fascism, on Dubbya, re-asking the famous "Have you no sense of decency" question and last night's amazing commentary on 9/11 and the legacy it leaves behind are all highly recommended viewing. (All are in QuickTime format. WMV files are also available if you scroll down this page)
Olbermann signs off his show with the words Edward R. Murrow signed off his newscasts with: "Goodnight and good luck." Murrow earned a top slot on my Heroes list after I read a long, thorough biography of him, detailing his work in England during the blitzkreig and, more to the point, in his efforts to stand up to the political tyrany of Joseph McCarthy that held much of the country in fear for years.
That same sense of fear mongering is going on in the US today and it will take people like Olbermann standing up and shining light into that darkness for us to regain the country and try to re-earn the world's (and our) respect again.
Lest you think we are all cowering in the darkness, let these clips show you differently.
Goodnight and Good Luck.
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