by Lionel Bascom — July 22nd, 2008 — 1 comment
America was changed forever by September 11. John McEnroe, who wrote about the attacks for this newspaper a year ago, now hopes that his countrymen will learn that sometimes winning isn’t everything, the tennis player writes at www.telegraph.co.uk/education, a British website.
September 11 is close at hand, but for most New Yorkers it has never been far away. Every time you see a fireman or a policeman you cannot help but reflect upon the enormity of what happened to our city. And I, personally, am still mystified by the thought that somehow someone justified all of that.
The Civil War apart, we Americans have never felt the full horror of war so close to home; Pearl Harbour was too far away to have much impact upon the population. 9/11 was our reality check.
For many countries in the world and for thousands of people, war is something they have to live daily; we thought we didn’t have to. In a weird way while at first it may have distanced us from the rest of the world I think - or at least I hope - in time it will bring us closer.
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As a boy I grew up believing everything was black and white. It came as a shock to discover that most things in life were grey and the most horrific example of that was the attacks on New York and Washington. You think to yourself, “How could someone justify that?” But they did.
To read more, go to www.telegraph.co.uk/education/
8:40 PM in Uncategorized, World Trade Center, Ground Zero, Related Stories, Freedom Tower News, Politics
For the sake of our nation’s security, we need to begin using the term ‘tolerance’ in a way that will illustrate to the world that only through tolerance, will our nation succeed. If we act in this manner, the faith that so many people from all around the world have lost in the U.S. will once again become revived.
If we don’t, then who wins: those who believe that tolerance is a joke, those who think it’s perfectly all right to kick a wounded dog, those who think it’s perfectly all right to antagonize a city of people just because they can??
We, the people, of the United States of America need to take a stand against the kind of hostile consciousness that has no tolerance for any philosophy except its own.
We, the people of the United States need to insure that the world sees us as the steady, tolerant voice in the din of iniquity.
Jeanne · July 22nd, 2008 at 9:46 pm