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recent terrorist assault on this country has really rocked me.
In fact, I am astonished at how deeply and profoundly it has hit me.
For inexplicable reasons, I feel that I have been personally violated,
even though I did not know any of the people killed.
And, while I have walked by the World Trade Center in NYC a few times,
and visited The Pentagon, I really have no identification with either place. I guess it really boils down to the fact that faceless
assassins have sullied this great country of ours.
This horrible attack leaves me, and most
Americans, with a profound sense of sadness and an abundance of undirected
anger, and that is the worst, the most frustrating kind.
In
the weeks and months ahead we will heal. And
during that process we must continually remind ourselves that we must stay in
control of our anger and frustration, and not lower ourselves to the level of
the terrorists. Remaining in
control is going to be hard to do. There
are now many voices in America, some powerful and influential voices, that are
crying for revenge, or better put, for vengeance.
We must resist the immediate temptation to return a couple of mid-eastern
countries, likely actively or passively involved in this, to the Stone Age.
Rather, we must now, with all deliberate speed, and with absolute
certainty identify those responsible. When
we have identified them, those people must be destroyed.
Regrettably, it is possible that when the guilty are destroyed, innocent people will die in
what the military euphemistically calls "collateral damage." We must have the courage to accept that, but also the
humanity to abhor it. We cannot let
ourselves become like they are, we must never take pleasure in the deaths of
innocent people.
Certainly,
it is hard to see where there is anything encouraging in all of this horror.
But, clearly this has delivered a wakeup call to our Nation, and it has
united The Country in heart and mind in a manner reminiscent of the last day
“that shall go down in infamy.” What
these terrorists can never understand is that this nation is not great because
it is rich; it is rich because its people are great.
The people who did this are not poor because they have been exploited, they are poor because they are poor in spirit, and they seem ever destined to remain so. They believe that they are guided by a god that they have created to be as reprehensible and vengeful as they are.
John
C. Marshall
Hurricane, UT
September 14, 2001
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