September 12th

I forgot about September 11th. I have to work. Plus, I try not to think about September 11th. It is not because of the people who died. It is because I want to thing of the USA as the great country which instigated the Berlin airlift, the country whose soldiers gave kids candy bars to kids in a country we had bombed to absolute rubble. The country who people really couldn't quite hate even though they tried, because they wanted to live here more than anything in the world.
It ain't the same place it once was...
I loaded hay on September 12, 2001.
I was struck at how quiet it was. I am somewhat used to the ever-present drone of an airplane and the faint hiss of tires on Highway 18 from some miles away.
I remember talking about the future with my brother. We were not very optimistic.
September 12th was the last day of the America of our forefathers.
What September 11th revealed was that our democracy had become a bureaucracy. Those who run this country, from the large to the small, rely on rules and procedure to govern.
Despite what the conspiracy people say, the attack on the WTO was a low tech effort. There was more than one plane because "they" never expected to be completely successful. Our leadership had no clue how to respond to an event with no landmass capital to bomb.
So they just made stuff up and they did it poorly. They kept the failed heads of departments who had missed the opportunities to capture the hijackers before they got on the airplanes and they developed a war like a Hollywood script. What "they" thought we wanted.
(unless my conspiracy theory is correct, that they hijackers were actually part of a sting operation which was supposed to be busted at the last moment and the government agent went on vacation or maternity leave on September 9th and lost them. Sort of like the first WTO bombing and selling guns to drug gangs in Mexico and our loan with FCS)
But, anyway...
I was listening to the spaceship guys last night while stacking.
Sure, the bureaucracy of government had plans in place to deal (or take advantage) of a huge and damaging event. But, it is more of an example of unchecked government growth and the paranoia of a huge bureaucracy that can't see out of its own fishbowl, than the master plan of the new world order.
A huge bureaucracy is like a virus, it expands and grows feeds off its host.
We have been making hay next to 99W by the local airport. We watched a traffic stop. Six cop cars and a K-9 unit and lots of running around while a guy stood handcuffed next to his car. It took hours to arrest one bozo for drugs. And with a really good lawyer the guy could still get off because some procedure wasn't followed. And a the same time, they could have dropped him face down on the pavement and got away with it, as long as it was following procedure and someone felt threatened.
So I suppose I have an even more depressing view of the post September 12th world than the conspiracy people. They have a defined source of evil. I see it as a blob taking over my country. (not very eloquent)
The after-effects of the terrible event have been much what I had feared. A long and undefined war that has done nothing but make people hate us. The loss of the essential freedoms that made us a unique society. We have torture as acceptable policy, "they" can hold you without charges, "they" can record your every move and conversation, "they" can bust down your door and shoot/and/or arrest you without a warrant (Recall Boston?) and we still have incompetent leadership.
And... There ain't a durn thing you can do about it!