Subj: 9/11 statement
Date: 9/25/2002 1:10:03 AM Eastern Daylight Time
SHAME ON YOU AMERICAN-HATING LIBERALS
Tony Parsons
A British opinion
ONE year ago, the world witnessed a unique
kind of broadcasting:
the mass murder of thousands,
live on television.
As a lesson in the pitiless cruelty of the
human race, September 11 was up there
with Pol Pot's mountain of skulls in Cambodia,
or the skeletal bodies stacked like
garbage in the Nazi concentration camps.
An unspeakable act so cruel, so calculated
and so utterly merciless that surely the
world could agree on one thing - nobody
deserves this fate.
Surely there could be consensus: the victims
were truly innocent, the perpetrators
truly evil.
But to the world's eternal shame,
9/11 is increasingly seen as
America's comeuppance.
Incredibly, anti-Americanism
has increased over the last year.
There has always been a simmering resentment
to the USA in this country - too
loud, too rich, too full of themselves and so
much happier than Europeans - but it
has become an epidemic.
And it seems incredible to me.
More than that, it turns my stomach.
America is this country's greatest friend and
our staunchest ally. We are bonded to
the US by culture, language and blood.
A little over half a century ago,
around half a million Americans died
for our freedoms, as well as their own.
Have we forgotten so soon?
And exactly a year ago, thousands of ordinary
men, women and children - not just
Americans, but from dozens of countries - were
butchered by a small group of
religious fanatics.
Are we so quick to betray them?
What touched the heart about those who died in
the twin towers and on the planes
was that we recognized them. Young fathers and
mothers, somebody's son and
somebody's daughter, husbands and wives. And
children. Some unborn.
And these people brought it on themselves?
And their nation is to blame for their
meticulously planned slaughter?
These days you don't have to be some
dust-encrusted nut job in Kabul or Karachi
or Finsbury Park to see America as the Great Satan.
The anti-American alliance is made up of
self-loathing liberals who blame the
Americans for every ill in the Third World,
and conservatives suffering from
power-envy, bitter that the world's only
superpower can do what it likes without
having to ask permission.
The truth is that America has behaved with
enormous restraint since September 11.
Remember, remember.
Remember the gut-wrenching tapes of weeping
men phoning their wives to say, "I love you,"
before they were burned alive.
Remember those people leaping to their
deaths from the top of burning skyscrapers.
Remember the hundreds of firemen buried alive.
Remember the smiling face of
that beautiful little girl who was on one of
the planes with her mum. Remember,
remember - and realize that America has never
retaliated for 9/11 in anything like
the way it could have.
So a few al-Qaeda tourists got locked without
a trial in Camp X-ray? Pass the Kleenex.
So some Afghan wedding receptions were shot up
after they merrily fired their
semi-automatics in a sky full of American
planes? A shame, but maybe next time
they should stick to confetti.
AMERICA could have turned a large chunk of the
world into a parking lot. That it
didn't is a sign of strength.
American voices are already being raised
against attacking Iraq - that's what a
democracy is for. How many in the Islamic
world will have a minute's silence for the
slaughtered innocents of 9/11?
How many Islamic leaders will have the guts
to say that the mass murder of 9/11 was an
abomination?
When the news of 9/11 broke on the West Bank,
those freedom-loving Palestinians
were dancing in the street. America watched
all of that - and didn't push the
button. We should thank the stars that America
is the most powerful nation in the
world. I still find it incredible that 9/11
did not provoke all-out war.
Not a "war on terrorism".
A real war.
The fundamentalist dudes are talking about
"opening the gates of hell", if America
attacks Iraq. Well, America could have opened
the gates of hell like you wouldn't believe.
The US is the most militarily powerful nation
that ever strode the face of the earth.
The campaign in Afghanistan may have been less
than perfect and the planned
war on Iraq may be misconceived.
But don't blame America for not bringing
peace and light to these wretched countries.
How many democracies are there in
the Middle East, or in the Muslim world?
You can count them on the fingers of one hand
- assuming you haven't had any chopped off
for minor shoplifting.
I love America, yet America is hated.
I guess that makes me Bush's poodle.
But I would rather be a dog in New York City
than a Prince in Riyadh.
Above all, America is hated because it is
what every country wants to be
- rich, free, strong, open, optimistic.
Not ground down by the past, or religion,
or some caste system. America is the best
friend this country ever had and we should
start remembering that.
Or do you really think the USA is the root of
all evil? Tell it to the loved ones of the
men and women who leaped to their death from
the burning towers.
Tell it to the nursing mothers whose husbands
died on one of the hijacked planes,
or were ripped apart in a collapsing skyscraper.
And tell it to the hundreds of young widows
whose husbands worked for the NYFDepartment.
To our shame, George Bush gets a worse press
than Saddam Hussein.
Once we were told that Saddam gassed the
Kurds, tortured his own people and set
up rape-camps in Kuwait. Now we are told he
likes Quality Street. Save me the
orange centre, oh mighty one!
Remember, remember, September 11.
One of the greatest atrocities in human
history was committed against America.
No, do more than remember. Never forget.
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