Have They No Shame?
I saw no mention of it during our commemoration yesterday of the horror of 9/11 and the grim loss of lives that day that touched nearly all of us living in the vicinity of NYC. But apparently an organization called the FreedomWorks Foundation, Chaired by a former Republican House Majority leader, plans to exploit our loss by running a protest today (more people can travel on Saturday than Friday) in the Nation's Capital attacking our nation with the slew of lying slanders that the right wing Republicans have been circulating this past few months:
http://912dc.org/
http://www.freedomworks.org/about/board-of-directors
I can think of nothing more obscene than using our human tragedies as a stage to attack our nation's best values and most humane leaders -- political and others.
Lest people forget, 9/11 _was_ a nightmare. That morning my wife had headed off to a meeting near the World Trade Center. Only hours later was she able to reach me and report that she had escaped unharmed -- she had been leaving the subway with a friend when one of the buildings was hit and they were able to walk north to safety. A few days later when our Brooklyn College classes had resumed, I stupidly asked my first class whether any had lost a relative or friend. Six hands went up.
For months thereafter many of us cringed whenever we heard a plane passing overhead. We all gave our support to the Bush administration to respond to the terrorists. In this instance only 20 -- mainly Saudis carrying box cutters -- had done enormous damage to so many -- those killed horribly and their friends and loved ones.
We had no assurance that some similar small group could not do something comparable. A bipartisan commission had warned Bush when he came into office that a major attack was imminent. Stopping such things plotted by small groups is a near impossibility -- say another Timothy McVeigh. Our primary protection against Muslim attacks of this kind is, of course, American Muslims who migrated to this country as have so many others to share its decency and real freedom.
I have had it personally with these "tea party" types who look to be racists under the skin with a hate message that cannot even respect the many Americans who have lost their lives both through horrors such as 9/11 and wars where they gave their lives.
Were FreedomWorks marching to praise our heroes rather than to slander the government which does its best to protect us from the haters, they would be engaged in a worthy event. But apparently this group is obsessed with cutting the taxes of the well off and thereby putting our country in even greater jeopardy.
What do you think?
--
"A war is just if there is no alternative, and the resort to arms is legitimate if they represent your last hope." (Livy cited by Machiavelli)
--
Ed Kent 212-665-8535 (voice mail only) [blind copies]
http://912dc.org/
http://www.freedomworks.org/about/board-of-directors
I can think of nothing more obscene than using our human tragedies as a stage to attack our nation's best values and most humane leaders -- political and others.
Lest people forget, 9/11 _was_ a nightmare. That morning my wife had headed off to a meeting near the World Trade Center. Only hours later was she able to reach me and report that she had escaped unharmed -- she had been leaving the subway with a friend when one of the buildings was hit and they were able to walk north to safety. A few days later when our Brooklyn College classes had resumed, I stupidly asked my first class whether any had lost a relative or friend. Six hands went up.
For months thereafter many of us cringed whenever we heard a plane passing overhead. We all gave our support to the Bush administration to respond to the terrorists. In this instance only 20 -- mainly Saudis carrying box cutters -- had done enormous damage to so many -- those killed horribly and their friends and loved ones.
We had no assurance that some similar small group could not do something comparable. A bipartisan commission had warned Bush when he came into office that a major attack was imminent. Stopping such things plotted by small groups is a near impossibility -- say another Timothy McVeigh. Our primary protection against Muslim attacks of this kind is, of course, American Muslims who migrated to this country as have so many others to share its decency and real freedom.
I have had it personally with these "tea party" types who look to be racists under the skin with a hate message that cannot even respect the many Americans who have lost their lives both through horrors such as 9/11 and wars where they gave their lives.
Were FreedomWorks marching to praise our heroes rather than to slander the government which does its best to protect us from the haters, they would be engaged in a worthy event. But apparently this group is obsessed with cutting the taxes of the well off and thereby putting our country in even greater jeopardy.
What do you think?
--
"A war is just if there is no alternative, and the resort to arms is legitimate if they represent your last hope." (Livy cited by Machiavelli)
--
Ed Kent 212-665-8535 (voice mail only) [blind copies]
posted by Ed Kent at 8:46 AM
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