Terrorists (9/11, 25 Years Later, Two.)

My black face fades,
hiding inside the black granite.
I said I wouldn't
dammit: No tears.
I'm stone. I'm flesh.
My clouded reflection eyes me
like a bird of prey, the profile of night slanted against morning. 

I turn this way—the stone lets me go.
I turn that way—I'm inside
the Vietnam Veterans Memorial
again, depending on the light
to make a difference.
I go down the 58,022 names,
half-expecting to find
my own in letters like smoke. 

I touch the name Andrew Johnson; 

I see the booby trap's white flash.
Names shimmer on a woman's blouse
but when she walks away
the names stay on the wall.
Brushstrokes flash, a red bird's
wings cutting across my stare.
The sky. A plane in the sky.
A white vet's image floats
closer to me, then his pale eyes
look through mine. I'm a window.
He's lost his right arm
inside the stone. In the black mirror
a woman’s trying to erase names:
No, she's brushing a boy's hair.

~Facing It, by Yusef Komunyakaa, US Army Veteran

...

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

GEORGE BUSH, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: As we mourn the loss of thousands of our citizens...

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: President Bush, we can't hear you!

BUSH: I can hear you!

(APPLAUSE)

I can hear you, the rest of the world hears you. And the people...

(APPLAUSE)

And the people who knocked these buildings down will hear all of us soon.

(APPLAUSE)

CROWD: USA! USA! USA! USA! USA! USA!

BUSH: The nation -- the nation sends its love and compassion. And everybody that is here, thank you for your hard work. Thank you for making the nation proud, and may God bless America!

(APPLAUSE)

(END VIDEO CLIP) ~Via CNN Transcripts.

It's 9/11.

I remember, oh yes, I do.

I remember everything about that day, especially that morning.

Some images are seared into the mind over time whether you want them to be or not.

I remember, as a United States Air Force security forces veteran, the cold grim certainty that someone was going to pay for this, the feeling that once we knew who, it was on like Donkey Kong.

Classes were canceled, I went about my day as best I could, went to work, came home, chatted with the girlfriend. I remember the spicy pics she sent me because I somehow managed to make her feel better.

Oh yes, I remember and I've written perhaps too much about over the years.

I remember the feeling, so brief it turned out, of common purpose, of national unity, of people going about their days and refusing to be terrorized, the certain refusal on the part of even many conservatives, Republicans, to blame all of Islam for the actions of at most a few dozen men in total.

America counts millions of Muslims amongst our citizens, and Muslims make an incredibly valuable contribution to our country. Muslims are doctors, lawyers, law professors, members of the military, entrepreneurs, shopkeepers, moms, and dads, and they need to be treated with respect. In our anger and emotion, our fellow Americans must treat each other with respect. ~George W. Bush, remarks at the Islamic Center of Washington DC, September 2001.

Oh yes, I remember.

And, If you would have told me a generation ago that in the year 2026, that Republicans would angrily be trying to finish the work Osama Bin Laden started, and doing in the name of Donald Trump...and his angry, declining personality cult...I'd probably have punched you right in the mouth.

I'm tired.

Fuck this stupid bullshit.

But I can't give up.

Fuck that even harder.

I have a partner and a kid to think about and if you don't think that crosses my mind every minute of every damn day with all this crazy shit going on, you're wrong.

Everybody that I know is struggling, everybody that I know is tired.

But we can't quit.

Because they won't.

We've got to take the neighborhood back. We've got to go in there. Just forget telling your child to go to the Peace Corps. It's right around the corner. It's standing on the corner. It can't speak English. It doesn't want to speak English. I can't even talk the way these people talk. "Why you ain't where you is go." I don't know who these people are. And I blamed the kid until I heard the mother talk. Then I heard the father talk. This is all in the house. You used to talk a certain way on the corner and you got into the house and switched to English. Everybody knows it's important to speak English except these knuckleheads. You can't land a plane with "why you ain't…". You can't be a doctor with that kind of crap coming out of your mouth. There is no Bible that has that kind of language. Where did these people get the idea that they're moving ahead on this? Well, they know they're not, they're just hanging out in the same place, five or six generations sitting in the projects when you're just supposed to stay there long enough to get a job and move out. ~Bill Cosby, the "Pound Cake" speech.

Yeah, that's right, there's a small minority of activist fascistic Republicans who seem energized by all this constant crazy shit, who did about everything but engage in ecstatic, orgiastic worship of Trump these last few days, in a "Convention" the vast majority of people looked at and saw nothing but a massive soup sandwich, the kind of shit that would make Ronald Reagan rise from the grave and go change his party registration back to Democratic.

I Have Spoken.

No arguing.

No debate.

Enough is enough with this ridiculous horseshit.

Republicans don't give a good goddamn about America, they don't give a good goddamn about conservatism, Christianity, any of the things they've claimed as excuses and rationalizations and anybody who actually believed in any of that stuff is being given the old heave-ho right out the door as quickly as they can be discovered, and it doesn't even matter how hard-right you were before. I mean for fuck's sake I used to be a Republican!

These motherfuckers just wanna shoot people.

Like they're fuckin' Russians or something.

"The fight is here; I need ammunition, not a ride."

~Volodymyr Zelenskyy, allegedly 25 February 2022, Associated Press

You want to stop this mess? Eventually, it's going to come down to a fight.

And I'm here to tell you, had These Fucking People been These Fucking Peopled this bad in 2001, the motherfuckers would have all gone and signed up with Radical Islam back then, too. They just didn't have the guts, or Trump enabling them to be the worst version of their worst possible selves at the time.

Trump gives them that, and while many have gotten tired, found the whole mess unsustainable, or just plain couldn't afford it...there are still those, maybe up to 20% of this whole damn country, that are addicted to that shit.

"I will not trash talk. I will not be a divider in chief or an agitator in chief. I won't be out there blowharding, talking a big game without backing it up. I think the next president needs to be a lot quieter but send a signal that we're prepared to act in the national security interests of this country — to get back in the business of creating a more peaceful world."

[Silence, A Tumbleweed rolls by, a Coyote howls mournfully in the distance.]
"Please clap."

~Jeb! Bush, February 2nd, 2016

And as other people have tapped out, "Establishment" Republicans and all those tight-ass conservative types have gone more whole-hog on this shit than the most Reddest of Red-Hat-wearing MAGA's did in 2017.

Now, we're going to have to stop this fucking bullshit.

Republicans spent the decade after 9/11 being so afraid of the Terrorists that they went out and became the fucking terrorists, just because a man uses political power instead of AK-47's and improvised explosives does not make the effect any fucking different.

And time and time again since then, they have been offered the chance to go back to making the world better, by Democrats, by other Republicans, by Barack Obama, by their own fuckin' presidential candidate...and they have refused it.

Because a Black man said "Yes We Can" the only thing Republicans wanna say is "No We Can't."

And it doesn't even matter what it's about.

They don't want freedom, light, peace, any of that. They'd rather walk in the darkness like it's some kind of awesome flex. Anything but "Love Thy Neighbor" I guess.

Then spoke Jesus again unto them, saying, I am the light of the world: he that follows me shall not walk in darkness, but shall have the light of life. ~John 8:12

You either believe in freedom or you don't.

And either you're willing to fight for it, or you're not.

I can't put it any more simply than that.

I have spoken.

Слава Україна!

And so tomorrow, as we take the campaign South and West, as we learn that the struggles of the textile workers in Spartanburg are not so different than the plight of the dishwasher in Las Vegas; that the hopes of the little girl who goes to a crumbling school in Dillon are the same as the dreams of the boy who learns on the streets of L.A.; we will remember that there is something happening in America; that we are not as divided as our politics suggests; that we are one people, we are one nation. And, together, we will begin the next great chapter in the American story, with three words that will ring from coast to coast, from sea to shining sea: Yes, we can. ~Barack Obama

One

[Cassian plays Nemik's audio diary]

Karis Nemik: There will be times when the struggle seems impossible. I know this already. Alone, unsure, dwarfed by the scale of the enemy. Remember this. Freedom is a pure idea. It occurs spontaneously and without instruction. Random acts of insurrection are occurring constantly throughout the galaxy. There are whole armies, battalions that have no idea that they've already enlisted in the cause. Remember that the frontier of the Rebellion is everywhere. And even the smallest act of insurrection pushes our lines forward. And then remember this. The Imperial need for control is so desperate because it is so unnatural. Tyranny requires constant effort. It breaks, it leaks. Authority is brittle. Oppression is the mask of fear. Remember that. And know this, the day will come when all these skirmishes and battles, these moments of defiance will have flooded the banks of the Empire's authority and then there will be one too many. One single thing will break the siege. Remember this. Try. 

~From the Star Wars series Andor, S1.E12 "Rix Road."