When I was growing up, I remember watching a 15 minute daily news program at school (when I would stay awake for it), called Channel 1. This was a brief look at current events around the world. One of the events that they covered was the Israel/Palestine situation. I remember back in those days, each week it seemed like there was new hope for peace between the two entities. There seemed to be constant talks involving the president (at the time, Bill Clinton) with new ideas about how to make peace work. I didn't understand much about the conflict, but I do remember taking away an idea about war and peace... at this point, neither side can remember who struck first, because each incremental strike only brings more death and destruction that ruins lives and families and creates more individuals hungry for death and destruction. I remember thinking this at the time and to get back to my original point, it was my first thought as I was watching the buildings coming down on live television 10 years ago.
On that day, as a freshman in my first semester away at college (3 weeks in, nonetheless), I was not very involved in politics. I did, however know enough to know that you can't depend on a politician to be even-handed and reasonable. I hoped against hope that our response to this disaster would be reasonable and well thought-out.
Of course, that's not how things worked out.
I can understand and excuse the mentality of the average US citizen crying for blood. However, it is the job of our elected representatives to hold the line and be the voice of reason, to make decisions that are good for the country, not good for our retribution. As a result of those attacks 10 years ago, we have endured a decade of politicians from both sides taking every opportunity to use them as an excuse for greed, spreading fear and paranoia upon the people that they are controllin... I mean representing, and justification for further bloody conflicts across the globe for a means of achieving their goals of imperialism, resource mining, or corporate interest (imagine the US fighting wars on behalf of a corporation!). Needless to say, the country (I almost typed company... quite the Freudian slip!) is only worse off as a result of almost every decision that has been made from 9/11/01 to 9/11/11.
It's time to take the country back from the elite and greedy. We have more millionaires in government than we have ever had before. Now, if I may ask, how is it possible that a millionaire is the best possible representation for people that on average, make $35,000 a year and are barely scraping by with the essentials to live in this country?
We are supposed to be a government of the people, for the people, by the people but we are quickly becoming a country of the people, for the wealthy, by the wealthy.
I guess what I'm trying to say is that for anything to change, we, the average joes need to rise up and run for public office. We cannot allow the system to be corrupted beyond help. You can already see all across the country, particularly at the local level, steps being taken to make it more difficult for the average person to run for office. If federal politics infects local policy, America as we know it truly is over.
I will remember today for what it has always represented for me; a squandering of an opportunity to take this country in a new, peaceful and enlightened direction, in lieu of the elite using it as an opportunity to make a shit load of money and pay back the US population in the blood of the foreigners.
On this day I am grateful that I was not one of those people in the buildings or planes, having global atrocities carried out in my name.
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