Remembering 9/11/2001

Then, or maybe a few days later, someone on a discussion list that I administer tried to point out that the United States is not revered as a paragon of virtue throughout the world. That wasn't the time or the place for that discussion and I remember firmly asking for an end to it. But maybe now is the time.

"Patriotism is overrated." Joan Baez said words to that effect in an interview with Bob Edwards this week and I think she may be right. We are born wherever it is that we're born. Taking pride in that seems silly. Is patriotism the extreme extension of property over people? Is it nothing more than the old "Hurrah for our side because we're better than you are!" nonsense?

And then today I heard Andrew J. Bacevich, a professor of history and international relations at Boston University and a retired Army colonel, on Fresh Air with Terry Gross. If you can find a recording of that program, it's well worth listening to. Bacevich opposed the war in Iraq from the start. His son died there, but note that I said he opposed it from the start.

He says that he is a conservative who cannot accept the actions of the Bush administration, that actions the United States has taken since the end of the Cold War (and particularly since 2000) have squandered our prestige and our power. As a professor of history, he also takes an honest look at this nation's policies and, in many cases, finds them severely wanting.

The question was and is "Why do they hate us so much?" It's not, as George W. Bush would suggest, because of our freedoms. It is because of what we have done, or not done, to alleviate suffering throughout the world.

It seems to me that we have a long way to go as a planet. As long as it's "us" versus "them", we're never going to get very far beyond the mud. When we ignore global warming, poverty, starvation, ethnic "cleansing", and such, we make enemies. When we support dictators, we make enemies. When we allow US corporations to run roughshod over emerging nations, we make enemies.

All that is not to say that the murderous bastards who planned and executed the attacks on 9/11/2001 were right or justified; but it might explain why some people around the world felt that we got exactly what we deserved on that ugly day.