1984
by Carol
Fondiller
I dozed off with the TV
on.
I was awakened from my doze not by the
garbage can tossing obscenity yowling clarion call of yet another lovely Venice
day, but by the phone ringing at 5:47
a.m.
My sister, the sane one, was
crying, “New York is being bombed! We’re being
attacked.”
I turned up the volume
and tried to focus. There’s something special about a New York September
day.
Autumn in New York is as crisp as
the snap of a Jonathan apple. The yellow sun radiates not so much warmth as
energy. Lamby clouds scamper across the clear infinity of blue
sky.
People running screaming into the
streets pursued by thick billows of smoke erupting out like the contents of a
slashed mattress.
I couldn’t tell
whether I was watching one of the I hate New York genre of sci fi flicks
(“Escape from New York” comes to mind) when a plane looking like the
toy plane in the classic “King Kong” movie slammed into the
remaining tower.
Yes, I was assured by
one of the media mavens, this was not a simulation, this was real time the real
deal Eastern Standard Time 8:50 a.m. And another plane had crashed into the
Pentagon and…one had crashed into a field in
Pennsylvania.
It was a deliberate
attack. Not by a country, so much as by a group of disenfranchised embittered
fanatics.
I make no rationale for what
they did on that beautiful September day last year 9/11/01. I didn’t like
it when we bombed villages in Vietnam to save them, or plotted to overthrow
legitimately elected governments of other countries, and I do not like the way
the Arab Emirates are exploiting the Palestinians, etc.,
etc.
Even now the Media Muses are
gearing up for a Sob Fest.
The Novaks,
Pauleys, Rathers, Wills, et al are revving up the gears of the media machines to
spew out tons of viscous sentimentality about the terrible events of that
September day. They will inundate us with their memories and great thoughts. So
I’ll add my drop of water to the media
sludge.
We will be drowned with stories
of the nearly 3,000 people who died so horribly, of how they called their loved
ones on their cell phones, or how in the close-ups of the towers one saw people
waving handkerchiefs to signal there were people in those towers, now calcified
and cremated together.
We will hear of
the bravery of the rescue workers, the New York Fire Department, and the New
York Police Department. We will hear stories of the goodness and kindness of
so-called ordinary people.
And how New
Yorkers were loved in those days following
9/11/01!
The media marveled at how plucky the
New Yorkers were! Who would have guessed that those lily livered
liberal/multi-ethnic sallow city dwelling slime could be…so
American?
Things are back to normal
again. The great white-bread heartland is upon us and according to the Media
Royalty, the Homeland must be protected and we must do our bit, as President
Shrub said in the immediate aftermath of 9/11/01, “Go about your business,
shop travel shop.” And leave the thinking to
us?
May I say before I am drowned by
the commemoration industry that I too feel ich bin ein New Yorker. Do I have to
buy a genuine Heritage Mint porcelain replica of our brave fire fighters to
prove it?
Do I have to agree with
Attorney General Ashcroft’s methods of preserving what is left of our
democracy in order to prove I am a true
American?
Shortly after the bombing we
were faced with the bioterrorism Anthrax
scare.
Now, I’m not talking about
racial or religious profiling here. This is the story of a protestant
college-educated white middle-aged male. In a way, it couldn’t have
happened to a more perfect person. Dr. Hatfill was working in something to do
with contagious diseases.
He was
questioned by the FBI. He answered their questions, allowed them to search his
home and as a result of his co-operation he was deemed a “Person of
Interest” by the Attorney General of the USA, one John
Ashcroft.
To my understanding, a Person
of Interest is neither suspect or innocent. He is a Person of Interest. He is
followed by the FBI, his girl friend is intimidated, her belongings are trashed,
and Dr. Hatfill loses his job. But he is not a suspect. He is a Person of
Interest.
Somehow I think the American
Civil Liberties Union might get a new
member.
As I said, Hatfill ain’t
no commie crazy Moslem held in the thrall of world Jewish
domination.
Now, if I speak out against
some of the policies of my beloved US of A (no SATIRE intended), or you march
for peace, or sympathize with the motives that drove the hijackers to such
desperate measures, does that make you or I a Person of Interest? Have the
spirits of Sam Adams, Tom Paine, and Thomas Jefferson left the building? We are
at war. We’re not at war. Our Congress is dainty in its hesitance to
aggressively question. Do we have a dialogue based on facts, or are we going to
be drowned out by the Tiny Tim sentimentality and a longing for black and white
good versus evil.
We are good. They are
evil. We’ve met the enemy, and we are becoming like
them.
I disagree with George Dubya and
John Ashcroft. We should go after the real People of Interest—those people
who renounce their citizenship so they don’t have to pay taxes—the
killers of American People who pour toxic wastes in our rivers, who deny women
the right to choose, who evict people from their neighborhoods in the name of
progress. The entities/people who coined the phrase Homeland Security when what
they really mean is “Your papers please.” When we travel “What
is your purpose for traveling?” Homeland Security. What a nice Norman
Rockwell resonance that has. The People of Interest like the reverend Jerry
Falwell who accused the feminists and the ACLU for the 9/11/01 attacks are of
interest to me.
I am a good American. I
wrap myself in the flag, not a
burka.
And the Falwells, Bushes,
Ashcrofts, Limbaughs, and their motives make them People of Interest to
me.
Goddess save this Great Republic.
Posted: Sun - September 1, 2002 at 06:56 PM