It’s a sad day. A solemn day. A day to meditate on the magnitude of what we lost eight years ago. Although I never met Rudy Mastrocinque (like Ed Morrissey’s 9/11 tribute, a Marsh & McLennan employee in the impact zone of Flight 11), I grieved as I wrote his story in 2006. Aside from sorrow for a wife losing a beloved partner, a girl whose Daddy will never walk her down the aisle, a boy who will have to learn to be a man without his father’s example, I wept because
so many of my countrymen do not seem to understand that the loss of nearly 3,000 of our countrymen is not the cost of doing business, not excused by any “root causes,” not a cause for manipulation and blameshifting on the part of ANY political party, and in short not acceptable for any reason whatsoever. Some people have openly stated that they’d like to see another successful terror attack because it would further their political goals. Others have said it doesn’t matter, because more people have been killed in other places and circumstances, and that it’s wrong to focus on these “few.” Just on this one day, I hope that those people will remember that the people who will be killed in the next big terror attack – and there’s bound to be a successful one eventually – are real people, like Rudy Mastrocinque. Not pawns on a political chessboard who may be sacrificed for expediency’s sake. Not just nameless, faceless victims who happened to die, as we all will die someday.
It’s personal. Every loss is personal, every attack and every threat is personal. The point of the 2996 project was to remind of us that. Not out of fear, because “next time it could be you” but out of respect and remembrance of the magnitude of our loss as a nation. In order to read each tribute over the next year, you would have to read 8.2 tributes a day, or 249 a month or 57.6 a week. To read them in a week, you’d have to read 428 a day. To complete them all on 9/11, you’d have to read 124.83 tributes an hour, for all 24 hours. That’s how many people we lost. They deserve to be remembered, and it speaks well of us and of them if we suffer some pain in the remembering.
Project 2,996 has more stories, but luckily MSNBC has stepped up to the plate to help us remember the victims of 9/11.
Muslims, who live in ever-growing fear of the inevitable backlash. These brave people struggle to make the tough decisions – not “Do I burn alive in this fire, or do I leap to my death out of a 95 story window?” but “Should I wear my hijab in public today, or stay home?”
Also, if you’re in New York and you’d like to mark the day with a special event, MSNBC recommends a play opening tonight: The Domestic Crusaders, a play about Muslim life in New York.
I’m surprised that MSNBC didn’t join Mr. Barbara Streisand (Truther James Brolin) in wishing us a “Happy 9/11 Day.”
Cross posted here.
On this day of all days, I’m amazed, shocked, not surprised. The media is a collective entity whose conscience is permanently seared, incapable of seeing the impact of their actions. Nevermind the 3000 who died, nevermind the suffering of their families, friends, loved ones.
Obama gave a speech pimping his National Day of Service, built upon the bones of 3k+ dead Americans.
Thank you, Laura. Your post brings into perspective how a monumental tragedy, such as this, is almost beyond our comprehension.”Every loss is personal” – and we cannot allow Obama to desecrate our memories of this day by replacing them with his thinly veiled, highly regimented Day of Service. We Will Never Forget.
Miradena´s last blog ..
I feel so sad, and pray for all american people regarding 9/11. I will never forget that awful day. your our cousins and brothers and sisters I pray for world peace you awill never be forgotten. what those people must have gone through in those towers the fear, i cannot imagine. God bless you all.