Susan Yost
Cumberland, VA

Thank-you for providing this forum. I've been watching the TV in horror not only because of the events of yesterday but because of the responses of our gov't, financial analysts and journalists. I was becoming very alienated and depressed until something told me to check out commondreams.org. As I read these thoughts I know there are others, many, many, many others who take time to think intelligently and feel deeply, who are not racists bent on protecting their power and money. I feel the events of yesterday are the tragic consequences of cause and effect. Not only have we caused these events with our monstrous foreign policies but also with out complete disregard of our environment causing mortal damage to Earth (Earth is a living being) and other species that co-exist with us. Everytime I drive to a nearby city I see bulldozers destroying hundreds of acres of woodlands to make way for yet another freeway so that we can get to our offices faster to make more money. I know the trees, rabbits, deer, birds, squirrels, etc, etc, etc, etc feel the terrorist attack that has been perpetrated on them. Thanks again to commondreams for providing this forum and all the people who are providing their thoughts----I feel more hopeful.

Matthew A. Peckham
Eugene, OR

At 7:00 PDT i was awoken by the phone and my partner telling me that the WTC and the pentagon had been hit. I fell back asleep in disbelief. At 7:30 PDT my mother called from New Hampshire to say the same. Sleep rolled off of me slowly until I turned on the tv to CNN. . . and there it was. My jaw dropped and my heart went out to all the people there as i sat watching, waiting. . . and then sadness filled me, sadness that the foreign policy of this country has come back to haunt us; sadness that our government has been so arrogant that a lesson like this occurred; sadness that what should be learned from this by those in power is being overlooked. Retribution, retaliation... have we learned nothing? It is US policies of terror in other countries that have brought this down upon us. It is time for everyone who can to organize, to yell in one voice that things must change for the entire world. And we must make sure to remember the internment camps during world war two and not repeat that in any form towards any people that the US propaganda machine says is responsible. The time to stand is now, but not to fight, not to kill, to change US ways of interacting with the world. Yesterday was a sad day and must be remembered and learned from. My thoughts are with all who have suffered here, as they have been with others who have suffered and continue to suffer worldwide.

Jeff Hyde
Columbia, MO

No matter who you voted for, which party you align with, or what religion you believe in, you must rally together. The comments I read on this site criticizing President Bush and other members of our leadership makes me so angry. There will be a time for placing blame. But that time has not yet come. We must live up to the name of our nation by being United in every way. Save your harsh words for those in the Capitol you despise, and focus on healing and uniting us.

Jennifer Hampton

Paul Benoit
New York City

Mike Kostich
Milwaukee, WI

The talking heads on the TeeVee sure have been spouting drivel, "...the intelligence services are certainly *not* clueless on this... they're already *90%* sure [not 89, not 91.7, but *90%* sure] who to blame on this one... we have confidence in this country's ability to deal with problems..."

What is America supposed to do, take out another aspirin factory? Blow up some more tents and goats in a remote valley? It's not a 'war' between people inside one sovereign border, and those inside another. ...That issue starts to look a little bit circular and even cruelly symmetrical, the more you look at it. When the US can bomb marketplaces, bridges and schools in Serbia, without a ripple of conscience or a formal declaration of just cause; when the Foreign Policy apparatus tosses around suitcases full of cash, to export quasi-official Virginia-based para-military contractors (like MPRI), and can still t! urn its back on half a million dead Iraqi children, because an imaginary line in the sand needs to be drawn against dictators with 'sophisticated weapons', who began to blur which lines, when? Everybody's got a right to a minimum, basic security, behind some kind of buffer or barrier of justice, or do they?

Joe Morris

You may not like my point of view and I disagree with some of yours. Yet here we are discussing all of this in open forum, free to call the US terrorist, and free to decry the "terrorist" actions of our country. Try that in Iraq, or Libya or Iran, or Syria. We'd be all facing firing squads or prison at least. (By the way you could do this freely in Israel.) It's so easy to blame the American government for all of this... and point to our policies in the Middle East as a driving factor. But the reality is that what we have in the Middle East is a case of hatred and fear. The world felt guilty after World War II about the Holocaust, about how America and the rest of the world stood by and watched six million people be exterminated merely because they belonged to a religion. And no we have 500,000 displaced Palestinians who have been written off for fifty years.

Fear and hatred, not the American government is to blame. But there is hope. Look at what's happening in Northern Ireland (partly brokered by the American government). If they can do that there then it can happen in the Middle East. But we must recognize that Israel is going to go away and neither are the Palestinians. We must find ways of getting past the hate and fear on both sides.

Finger pointing and name calling ain't gonna make that happen. Only love and tolerance will.

Marjie Colson
Madison, WI

Now that we¹re heading into a "monumental struggle of good vs. evil" [Geo. Bush, 9/12/01 9:55am], I'm finally beginning to focus on the 9/11 horrors.

First, the statements of our cowboy president force us to avert our gaze and look elsewhere for leadership. Focus where? The only Bush administration official who did himself proud was Donald Rumsfeld, the Elder, who actually went to the scene of death and destruction in Virginia and helped with rescue efforts. The rest of our leaders, including the president, disappeared. All that could be seen of Bush was jet trails, crisscrossing the continent.

We can look at the nearly 300 police and fire department personnel who died at the trade center, died trying to help others. We can look at the lines of good neighborhood people from the Boroughs who are standing in line to give blood to help other people. Faceless crowds of good Americans willing to go wherever they are needed to help other people.

This is real heroism. Wall Street has closed down, but the people came through. We are finally reading about great value that is not for sale. The market is nowhere to be seen; only love and generosity shown by ordinary people.

Maybe we should be grateful that George Bush got out of the way so we could see clearly what we are and who we are. Those faceless crowds make us proud.

Rich Cianflone
Colorado

The acts yes they were despicable and unspeakable and I mourn and cry for those lost and injured. NYC is my hometown, one that will likely never be the same again. But we need to look no further than our actions within our country, the way we lead our lives to begin to get an idea of why we can be so hated by a surpressed people.

Our corporate entities not only run this country but have decimated many other small countries in ways we cannot even fathom. Not only in terms of loss of innocent lives but in loss of economic and socioeconomic vitality.

Just take a look at us ever-consuming money hungry people. One vehicle is not enough, two is often not enough, bigger better homes, TVs and an assortment of useless junk and technology that we have to have to survive. All this at a cost to the world's environment and social structure. It is no wonder we are hated by so many.

This is a wake up call America. It is time to change our ways. It is time to take care of each other and put humans first well ahead of corporate profits and possessions. Maybe that will be some of the good that will come out of this. I hope for this country's sake that is true and for the sake of humanity around the world.

God be with the victims and their families.

Murray Young

Ben Lanier-Nabors
Baton Rouge, Louisiana

Dear All:

I do hope that people can from now on help and support fellow human beings during times of peace as well as in times of . . . horror. I cannot help but think that the growth of indifference in U.S. culture feeds terrifying acts such as those that occurred on 11 September. As many others have stated, perhaps the U.S. people can now focus on joining others for and in peace and for the improvement of all people's human condition--not for profits and the increase of inhumane imperialism.

All my deepest and sincerest thoughts go to the people of New York and Arlington.

Shane Hanson
Pocatello Idaho

Don Pelton
Palo Alto, CA

Palo Alto. 5 am. Day Two. Ground Zero.

Everywhere in America is Ground Zero now.

After fearful dreams, I wake up afraid. The border guards of consciousness have all been killed, and the crossing out of dream country is shrouded in clouds of rolling black dust. We no longer have fear in the old personal way. It has us. It settles over the landscape slowly, black dust falling over everything, turning everything to monochrome.

I realize ... it could have been nuclear. Maybe today, when the airplanes begin to fly again? I want to run.

...

I remember, "Oh yes, this is still happening." Just like when dad died, and I couldn't wake up from the grief.

The Day One Images linger:

Waking up watching the report of the one plane crashing into the first World Trade Center tower. An accident? Then, in "real time," the second one. Immediately, no doubt: a terrorist attack.

At work, Charles says, "I'm going to take my girls out of school. I want them near me." I chuckle, pat him on the shoulder, and say, "Wow, you *are* feeling insecure, aren't you?!" Imagining that I wasn't.

Later, I wish I'd said, "Charles, maybe you shouldn't? Maybe that will just make them *more* afraid?" I imagine myself very wise and centered as I think this.

TVs everywhere. No one is working. The usual distance between head and heart. It's all happening to someone else, somewhere else. But I'm walking around feeling weepy. What is that?

Jane and I go to a candlelight vigil at noontime in Stanford's Memorial Church, along with hundreds of others. Waiting for it to begin, listening to the music, more weeping. It's always the innocents who die. It's always the innocents who pay. A prayer goes up for restraint. A good prayer. People come forward and light candles. Finally, a man comes forward, takes the mike, and rambles incoherently forever about god and George Bush. I expect him to suggest nuclear retaliation. Jane whispers, "Wanna go?" I say, "Yes."

Cantor Museum, where we usually get our favorite lunch, is closed. We see a sign on the door in the distance. The Tressider store is closed, It has a sign, "Due to the current situation ... ", etc. The bookstore is closed. Hennessy sends out email suggesting that employees who need to can go home.

Later, out of curiosity I ride my bike over to the Stanford Shopping Center. It looks like a ghost town, all the shops dark. A few people wander about, some tugging on doorhandles in disbelief.

Some of my coworkers go home, fearing gridlock when the bridges close down.

We hear that the Transamerica Building in San Francisco has been evacuated. We hear that people are fleeing San Francisco.

...

Lying in bed in the dark this morning at 4:30, I realize that for all of my fifty-nine years I felt safe. I felt safe during the Korean War. I felt safe through the Cuban Missile Crisis. I felt safe during the Vietnam War (despite the domino theory), once I realized I wasn't going there myself. When Kissinger did his grisly work, I felt safe. Even when I went to the Watts riots with the National Guard in the late Sixties, I felt safe enough to empty the bullets from my M16 and my bandoleer, resolving not to spend my time on earth killing anyone. I felt safe during all the years of American support for dictators in South America. When ordinary Guatemalans were being dropped from helicopters into the mouths of roiling volcanos, I felt safe. What did it have to do with me? When Timorese were being slaughtered, I felt safe. When children were dying in Rwanda, I felt safe.

I felt safe.

Today, I'm no longer safe. I'm sick with fear.

And I shudder to imagine the profound change in our politics which is about to take place. The day may grow darker.

I shudder to think how George Bush, the forever lightweight reader of other people's speeches, whom I have so diligently despised, will retaliate.

I'm depressed with the realization that *I* want him to do something.

While we pray for the dead and grieving, let's pray for all of us at Ground Zero.

Let's pray that we do the right thing with this fear.

Femtas
Gaithersburg, MD

Edmund Zimmerman
San Francisco, CA

It’s 2:00 a.m. in San Francisco and nothing is flying but I hear nothing but the noise of high-flying warplanes. On wings of desire the innocents fly also…sad spirals. Fallen workers, each one a hero for doing the necessary, marching through this life to perpetuate a dream of love, to perpetuate a struggle. Every moment spent working is a moment spent nobly, not only in self-edification but most often for the love of others…for those left behind.

Danger in the workplace varies wildly according to occupation with taxi drivers regularly occupying first place and police officers and fire fighters close behind. To be struck down during selfless endeavor at our moment of innocence and altruism is the most extreme brutality, a crime against the solidarity of humanity. No religion can ever carry souls to this level of purity and no religion dare try. If a creator has given us truly free will then no deed this evil can ever be done in God’s name. In whose name are these things done?

In these days our planet’s various vengeful deities have unleashed such horrors one wishes merely for the formula, the incantation that would return these cruel genies to their bottles. Christians are throwing bottles at the little girls of rival Christian sects in Northern Ireland. Semitic Jews refuse the most basic human rights for Semitic Palestinians, like voting and property rights, and even international monitors who could stop the bloodshed in the Middle East (and much of the world?) immediately. India’s saffron fascists are dealing internationally to downgrade their brutal caste system into something less than racism (tradition…the untouchables actually benefited). The Christian government of the US refuses to consider reparations or apologies for slavery (tradition…the slaves actually benefited).

When reading the apologetics of the white Baptist church in the southern US, the biblical underpinnings of racism, one is reminded of Pakistani intellectual Irfan Husain writing recently in these pages of sexism among Afghanistan’s Taliban: “Their grasp of religion is based on a literal interpretation of poorly understood texts, and there is a tendency to ascribe ancient tribal customs to Islam. Thus, the traditional place accorded to women in a very backward tribal society has acquired all the weight and solemnity of religious dogma.”

My nine-year old son, shocked by the news rocking the East coast, asked me why this was happening. I wanted to tell him about religions and a horribly unequal and unjust world that our country seems to sit astride proudly but stopped myself. For this horror, for all these lives and promises, there can be no reason…or that the reason is a name so terrible it should not be spoken.

Paola de Santiago Haas
Rome, Italy

"We are one island in one ocean" (R. Buckminster Fuller)

As all of us stand horrified and shaken, our thoughts turn to the future: is the world safe anymore? is this the start of world war III? are these wounds ever going to heal?

On September 11 it was demonstrated without doubt how useless any Missile Defense System would be. How spending a nation's entire budget on warfare and intelligence is useless if it will not avoid the killing of thousands of civilians. Isn't it time to rethink policies and say: are we, the civilized world, doing everything we can to avoid violence, to ban it from the face of the earth?

Hopefully, with time, we will have more answers than questions to this tragedy. But only if we are capable of listening. More violence and destruction are not going to be the answer: there will not be one suitable response to this attack, there will only be one that harms our world and our future the least. Let's pray leaders will choose wisely.

Even if the horse has already bolted, maybe it is time to start closing the stable doors.

Andrew Kahn

Jeffrey W. Eisinger
Fresno, CA

However, as the Oklahoma bombing illustrates, it would be foolish to immediately conclude that this terrorism was committed by people outside our own country.

Finally, incidents like this make it plain that Star Wars offers no real protection to our country. We can feel safe when we start doing the right thing for a change.

Jerre Skog
Lingen, Germany

My deepest sympathy to all innocent people who were victims of yesterday´s attacks.

Hearing the cries for revenge and "hunting down and punish" on the TV-channels I cannot escape the thought that an attack like this was bound to happen, National Missile Defense or not, and such atrocities will never be able to completely avoid even if turning US and other western nations into high-security police states.

Every time a little Palestinian kid watches his father bleed to death after being hit by fire from an Apache helicopter gunship or sees his home being leveled to the ground by a Caterpillar, a potential future "terrorist" is created.

The greatest tragedy is that the wealthy and powerful whose politics are enforced by WTO and Pentagon for reasons of greed, are never the ones hit by the desperate tries to lash out against the injustices those organizations inflict on innocent people around the globe, including USA.

Michael D. Porter
Roswell, NM

At 5 a.m., Wednesday, the lead-off news of NPR includes a report on the effect of wholesale terrorism on U.S. stock markets and markets around the world.

Bush simply cites "unyielding anger" over "airplanes flying into buildings." But, those were not just any buildings, but rather, the World Trade Center towers, and the Pentagon--prominent symbols of an economic and military might increasingly used for unilateral gain at the expense of other nations and peoples.

Why is there need, in the midst of enormous human loss and suffering, to put market news at the forefront? Perhaps, that is a clue to the motive for the inhuman acts witnessed by the world Tuesday. Perhaps, those public priorities of markets and money are the measure of what we, as a nation, have become, rather than what has been done to us.

After the recriminations subside, perhaps, after the people responsible are brought to justice, as well should they be, Americans should take time for retrospection on what we have imagined ourselves to be, and for introspection of what we have become. There was a time in this country when the market was secondary to ordinary people's lives and concerns. Now, it seems, we must all hear of the plight of the markets before we hear of the immediate human needs of our fellows, and commiserate, first, with the markets and its corporate members in their suffering.

Mitch Lewis
Cambridge MA

The smoke has not yet cleared, and it will not for some time. I think we need to be extremely cautious and sensitive about people's feelings. The number of people worldwide who knew someone in the Pentagon, Twin Towers, rescue crews or airplanes who didn't make it may be in the millions. No amount of aspirin will heal this excruciating pain in a short time.

If progressives are to take a position on this matter, we must champion peace. We should state openly that we condemn terrorism and the killing of thousands of innocent people roundly - whether it is by hijackers of planes or Israel and the United States. From here it is less hard to see that the understandable angry motivation to a military strike really does not benefit us. Mass violence and terror on the part of the U.S. will only beget more mass violence and terror on the other side, and we will not stop terrorism by stooping to the level of the terrorists themselves.

Osama bin Laden, Saddam Hussein, Ariel Sharon and other terrorists and war criminals either are or have been bankrolled by the United States at one time (bin Laden was bankrolled in the Afghan war in the 1980s by the U.S.). The lesson to draw from this is that the United States government, in trying to construct a global empire and conquer the world, will always have some of its friends turn sour on it when U.S. imperial interests collide with those of our "friends". From this, one can see that a military strike will not stop terrorism, and war or martial law will only lead to the damaging of more lives everywhere. This is the progressive argument for peace that we should be making - that we will not stoop to the level of mass murderers in order to accomplish nothing. Besides, after the horrifying things that have happened, I'm sure there's a space in people's hearts next to their understandable feelings of anger and revenge for some peace in this truly awful hell.

In the wake of this tragedy, cooler heads may not always prevail. We will face a ravenous media and right wing which will hamper our efforts to get a progressive argument through sometimes. But give the dust time to clear, and in the coming months, when people will be more able to discuss this subject with equanimity, an argument for peace which firmly opposes terrorism as well may be able to win back the moral initiative to the progressive cause. Don't forget, we still have a president who walked out on the World Conference Against Racism, the Kyoto Protocol and the Anti-Ballistic Missile treaty. Though it will take time, this too shall pass. Let us be sober but not defeated.

John Serop Simonian
South Bend, Indiana

With the images of massive destruction of human life fresh in our minds, let us not forget that we must work together for an end to all violence from all sides. I pray for all those whose lives were shattered today; and I beseech all who read this to remember that our anger, while justified, can cause us to say and do things we would not normally do. Let us engage our friends, family, and other loved ones with compassion and understanding. We should work to defuse any anti-Muslim tensions we encounter.

We must also realize that our country has been lucky over its history in that it has remained relatively untouched by violence. Unfortunately, we have caused immense suffering in other countries. As we remember our injured and dead, let us also remember the innocent victims of Dresden, Hiroshima, Nagasaki, Seoul, Hanoi, Baghdad, and Belgrade. September 11 should serve as a wakeup call--not to the latent militarism within all of us but to the courageous nonviolence Gandhi and Martin Luther King, Jr., taught. We now know what it feels like to suffer undeserved violence. Let us remember this feeling when deciding how to go forward as a nation and as human beings.

Jim Gibson
Crestline, CA

I am an old Vietnam Vet anti-war warrior. Yet, when we are directly attacked I cannot stand aside. Let us find out who did this to us and then root them out and exterminate them as they deserve.

Michael Lopez-Calderon
Miami, FL

What occurred this morning, and what apparently is still unfolding ranks among the most despicable, monstrously wicked events of this or any Century. The evil attacks on the World Trade Center, the Pentagon, and plane crashes apparently near Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania and possibly even Camp David will forever change the way Americans view internal security.

There are too many events unfolding, so for now I will simply put forth some random thoughts to be commented upon at a later date:

1. There may be thousands dead and certainly thousands injured, making this a Pearl Harbor-scale attack. This is an utterly insane attack that will outrage this nation the way Pearl Harbor did. And remember that that attack nearly sixty years ago was avenged with two nuclear strikes on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, respectively. The Japanese learned a brutal lesson that you do not attack the US, and even though Hawaii was at the time a colony, not a state, several hundreds of thousands of Japanese citizens lost their lives and their government was smashed. America's fury has no rival.

2. We must mourn the loss of so many innocent lives and at the same time realize that these monstrously wicked and vile attacks are the result of a foreign policy that for too long has ignored much of the world. The US government, and by implication, the American people can not continue to act as if the rest of the world does not matter. Our one-sided support for Israel, our walking out on the Kyoto Agreement, the Durban Conference on Racism, the ABM Treaty, and numerous other examples has not only isolated the US from the rest of the world, but has served as a clarion call that we simply insist on being an arrogant and intentionally ignorant society. Today, that ignorance came back at us in the form of massive hatred and violence.

3. The President's proposed National Missile Defense system (NMD) could not and would not have been able to thwart such an attack. We may soon spend hundreds of billions on a system that not only will create another destructively wasteful arms race with Russia and China, but that will also leave us with an illusion of safety. Those of us who oppose NMD do so from a motive of patriotic concern for the nation's genuine security. We are motivated also by the realization that such a useless, wasteful program will squander our resources and trigger a deadly arms race. Finally, since I am both a student and teacher of history, I am aware of previous unsuccessful attempts by other nations to defend their territories. France's Maginot Line and China's Great Wall come to mind, respectively. National Missile Defense will amount to another hare-brained scheme, a modern day whiz-bang, high-tech Maginot Line utterly incapable from halting attacks like the ones today.

4. This terror attack also marks a Titantic-sized failure on the part of the FAA to provide airline security. The idea of turning over airline security to private industry is sheer madness. The only thing being "turned over" under such a system are the airport security personnel whose turn-over rates range from 200 percent at Boston's Logan Airport, where two of the ill-fated planes were hijacked, to 90 percent at Dulles Airport, scene of another fateful hijacking today.

5. We may add to the failure list the FBI, NSA, CIA, and Department of Defense. Where were they?

6. The anti-Arab and anti-Islamic Witch Hunt will now reach a fever pitch. We can rest assure that there will be a wave of the most hateful, anti-Arab hysteria that will sweep this nation. While this is the darkest day for America since December 7, 1941, American Arabs will soon face a backlash not suffered by any American minority since the Nisei (Japanese Americans) were targeted and eventually interned in 1941-1942, and remained interned for the duration of the Second World War. It is dark day to be an American Arab.

7. CBS Network News earlier today showed film footage of Palestinians dancing and celebrating in the streets. While it is true that Arafat and seemingly all leading Palestinian figures have condemned the attacks, the scene of some Palestinians celebrating this deed is not only a horribly disgusting scene, but another example of how America has so badly alienated herself from Palestinians that such celebrations are made possible. The video tape footage no doubt will be used to strike another hard blow against Palestinians. Some Palestinians and Arabs' ignorance of Public Relations and of how to sway American hearts and minds absolutely boggles the mind. I have heard some say this before: "When Allah was handing out diplomas and degrees in Public Relations apparently not a single Arab was in line." This harmful little maxim gained momentum today.

The cause of Palestinian Justice may well have died today along with thousands of innocent lives and America's sense of security. Making the case of Palestine to the American people has now become a million times more difficult.

Matt Johnston
Portland, OR

As liberals who see how the unjust U.S. foreign policy have fueled such anti-American hatred, we must be careful to say that the people murdered in Tuesday's crashes are not at fault.

The attacks are inexcusable. Period.

But I can hardly say I am surprised at these attacks. We (as a country through our government) commit similar violence on so many other nations, Iraq, Palestine, Columbia, etc. with our political, military, and financial power. The people afflicted by our violence feel the same thing we do in Tuesday's crashes.

Shee-it doesn't just happen. It goes through the digestive system and goes through a complex process before it becomes shee-it. I'll be praying for the victims today, but also the future victims of whomever W picks as the enemy du jour.

Mike Cross

Instead of threats of vengeance, we, as a nation, should turn the other cheek. How can we be surprised to have our collective nose bloodied, after we have allowed our government to bloody so many others. Even the meekest slave may lash out against the cruel master. Without the military power to slug it out with the USA, they strike at us however they may.

I do not condone this terrible and stupid waste of life and resources. But, we must ask ourselves, how would we react, given the same circumstances? This nation was born of revolution. Now we don't even recognize our own mother when we see her.

We must wage peace as bravely and as fiercely as we have waged war.

Kirsten Engstrom
Minnesota

A Gaelic blessing: Deep peace of the quiet earth to you, deep peace of the shining stars to you. Deep peace of the gentle night to you; moon and stars pour their healing light on you. Deep peace to you, deep peace to you.

Troy Juzeler
Bentonville, AR

Because enough people have commented on the main event, I’d like to just look outside the main circle and look at the ripple effects flowing throughout our nation. Although there were plenty of comments about how this brought out the best in Americans, I saw plenty of the worst brought out, too.

Gasoline prices got jacked-up in order to gouge consumers after prices had already skyrocketed this year. Cars lined up outside of stations in my small town, creating traffic jams and danger on the roads. I heard second-hand of fistfights at the gas pumps. Nearly all of the stations were out of gas by the end of the day—a few had premium left. We Americans love a good panic.

Living in the Bible Belt, I wasn’t surprised to hear a lot of talk about how we had to retaliate. (Most people around here pretty much ignore that part about turning the other cheek and go straight to the “eye for an eye” section of the Bible.) Various people want to bomb Iraq, China and the Palestinians. Who are we going to bomb if this turns out to be the work of people pissed-off over losing their jobs due to NAFTA?

Did the national television media show the gas lines on their “special reports”? No. Did they even mention oil refineries closing down? No. I don’t know if they did or didn’t. If it was just a rumor, it was certainly enough to send prices up for the oil companies. Did you see anything about corporations putting up barricades at their headquarters and increasing security? I didn’t. I can’t help but wonder if the media silence is complicity in masking the first steps towards martial law being declared. Everything will be in place before we bother to ask what it’s even doing there.

Robert Crumley
Eugene OR.

Today was the worst day in U.S. history. No one who died today deserved this. They killed our mothers, fathers , brothers and sisters. But they will not kill the American sprit. They have lit a fire in all of us. The people of the world will not stand for this. I pray for all the people lost. I pray for all the families hurt. God bless

Chris Muir
Reston, VA

First and foremost: the events of today no matter what their motive are never and will never be justified. Slaughter for any reason is never justified.

But as we recover, Americans will clamor for revenge, even though it is revenge that we have seen today. It is revenge for the oppression and violence we have shown the world. America can only push the world so hard before it pushes back. To quote Bruce Cockburn:

"If I had a rocket launcher...someone would pay.
If I had a rocket launcher...I would not hesitate.
If I had a rocket launcher...I would retaliate.
If I had a rocket launcher...some son of a bitch would die."

Someone found a rocket launcher today.

But the saddest thing about today is the innocent victims who died. No doubt, those who perpetrated the acts were aiming at those who they believed had killed and undermined them or those they support. But it's the men in the shadows who make the decisions of this sort, who order the deaths, who accept collateral damage, who initiate violence..."they are never the ones to fight or to die" -Jackson Browne. And suppose we retaliate against Afghanistan or whomever, the members of the Taliban or the small sect of violent extremists who perpetrate the violent actions will not die either. It will once again be the faceless civilians who are forced into war by a dictatorship. If America really stands for freedom, we will not send our innocent into war to kill other innocent people, but rather expose those in our own government and other governments who condone terrorism and accept the deaths of millions. Why are they never the ones to lose their lives?

To leave with one last quote from the best diplomat ever:

"Non-violence is the first article of my faith. It is the last article of my faith. "

-Gandhi

Adrian Wolf
Orange County, CA

The news stories were harrowing, the images unbelievable.

While listening to National Public Radio most of the day, many people interview mentioned the notion of retaliation and retribution, always in the form of swift violent responses. What does this achieve?

The casualties will be accounted for once the rubble is searched. I am not minimizing their deaths, in no sense at all, however, those who really hurt at this moment are the survivors - those who lost parents, friends, childrens, wives, husbands, companions, etc.

If the US retaliates with violence, will the result not be the same - in that families and friendships will be displaced and destroyed in another place. We need to internalize this prior to professing violent retaliation.

Surely, two wrongs do not make a right. Retaliation should come forth in the form of restraint first, national reflection, foreign policy review, peaceful negotiation, and consideration of viable alternatives for preserving freedom and peace.