Friday, September 10, 2004

The anniversary

The impending anniversary of the September 11 terrorist attacks has been giving me reason to pause and think back to the events and emotions of that day. I was living and working in Baltimore at the time, a mere 40 miles from Washington DC. Additionally, I was employed at one of the largest military defense factories in America. I remember everyone leaving work in the fear that our facility would be a target. Indeed, in the days following the attacks, several employees had reported that a man speaking with an Arabic accent had questioned them in the parking lot during the preceding weeks about the nature of their job and the type of work that was done in our factory. Later, it was discovered that several of the hijackers had been living at a hotel less than 3 miles from where I lived. Despite this semi-personal connection to the horrible events of that day, one thought keeps occurring to me today: Why does the American public live in fear of terrorism? There are very few people in this country who have a legitimate reason to fear personal injury from terrorism. Most of them are in Iraq, courtesy of the Red, White, and Bush. But other than folks living in New York, Washington DC, and to a lesser extent Boston and Los Angeles, the rest of us home-landers don’t have a whole lot to fear.

Living here in Pittsburgh, I don’t give terrorism a second thought. Odds of an attack in my city are pretty small, and even if there was one, the odds say I wouldn’t be personally affected (good old safety in numbers.) Unless they live near a chemical or nuclear power plant, people in small town USA have even less to fear. The biggest impact any of us is likely to feel is an economic impact. Of course, the economic impact itself is largely a product of the fear and panic that an attack creates.

Don’t think that I’ve forgotten that 3000 people died on 9/11/01. Though I didn’t know anyone who died, I had a friend who lost his father in the WTC, and I recognize the pain that he and many others like him went through on that day and the days that followed. I also have friends who have lost loved ones to cancer, car accidents, heart disease, murder, and suicide. Their sorrow is just as deep, and there are many, many more of them.

Why do I bring this up? Because this irrational fear is destroying our country. It’s this fear that convinces us to look the other way when our government strangles our freedoms via legislation like the Patriot Act. It’s this fear that allows us to be misled into a war. We need to wake up and realize that this administration is playing our fears like a Stradivarius, pushing its agenda through a friendly Congress, while backed by an uncritical media.

This election should be about the things that impact EVERY American…jobs, health care, education. By all of these measures, Bush has been an utter failure. When Dick Cheney says, “…if we make the wrong choice then the danger is that we'll get hit again and we'll be hit in a way that will be devastating…” we need to call his bluff. Bush has done nothing to make America safer. How much safer would we be if we spent billions securing our ports and borders, putting air marshals on every domestic flight, and guarding our chemical and power plants, rather than spending billions settling a decade old family feud? We have become a country that is afraid of the rest of the world, ruled by a government that is afraid of its own people. What a dangerous combination.

As for myself, I’ll continue to fear the things that really threaten my life and limb, such as layoffs, driving to work, crime on my street, and fast food workers that don’t wash their hands. Kerry may not be my candidate of choice, but I’m tired of living in a nation of fear.

posted by bkopec @ 10:58 AM   1 comments