Thursday, September 13, 2001

A Personal Reflection

On the fateful morning of September 11, 2001 America awoke to a nightmare beyond description. The unspeakable, the unthinkable had happened in our own backyard. The horrifying images of civilian aircrafts slamming into the twin towers of New York City’s World Trade Center in part of a massive terrorist attack will prove immortal in our national consciousness. We watched in disbelief as our largest symbols of wealth, capitalism and power collapsed into piles of dust.

My condolences and prayers go out to all the victims of this horrible tragedy, their families and friends, and all of the rescue workers and volunteers who donated their services in this time of tragedy. Although I was fortunate enough not to have any friends or relatives who were in Manhattan or Washington D.C. at the time of the attacks, the event still holds a personal significance for me.

A little over a month ago, I applied for a Financial Advisor position at Morgan Stanley. Morgan Stanley was one of the largest tenants of the World Trade Center, occupying approximately 50 floors of the first tower. The position I was interested in had a training program, part of which would take place at Morgan Stanley’s New York City National Sales Training Center. At the time, I was very interested in pursuing a career in finance and I was also very excited about working in the World Financial District in Lower Manhattan. Although my fate let me in another direction, I was horrified to hear that so much of the Morgan Stanley firm was affected.

As a human being and as an American, I was shocked, saddened and angered by the attacks on the Pentagon and the World Trade Center. It is too early to consider the impact on anything but the families and friends of the all the individuals who fell victim to these violent attacks. The full fallout of these unbelievably horrific events will surely take time to sink in. While my thoughts and prayers are with all of those who lost loved ones and gave their time (and in many cases their lives as well) in rescue efforts, this event gives me certain pause.

As I watched the towers collapse, besides feeling shocked I thought “What if......What if”...

Reason Wilken

Random thoughts...

• I have to imagine that Israel has been given the green light to deal with the Palestinians any way they see fit. If the terrorists' intentions were to get America out of the Middle East, it boomeranged on them.
• NATO invoked the mutual defense clause for the first time in its history. Article 5, the cornerstone of the alliance, says "an armed attack" against any of the allies in Europe or North America "shall be considered an attack against them all." From what I can understand, this is a show of solidarity and doesn't commit NATO member countries to military action. Nor does it require the United States to coordinate its military actions with the rest of NATO. High level view - the U.S. is definitely going to war and is using this as a basis for global support. Who are we going to war against? At this point, I think all terrorist organizations around the world are targets. It doesn't matter if they were involved with the attack on America or not. They were implicitly involved by using and advocating terrorism.
• Tomorrow, Friday, September 14, is Red, White, & Blue day. Wear the colors proud. You can also make a donation to the Red Cross at Amazon.
• Anybody who doubted American's patriotism was sorely mistaken. If you read our newspapers or watch our news telecasts, you would think that American's don't care about each other very much. If you looked at the percentage of the American population that votes, you would think we're apathetic. American's patriotism is always just beneath the surface. We don't need to go around beating our chests to prove it.

On a personal note, there is an icy cold anger burning inside of me. Everytime I hear a victim's story about losing someone close, it tears me up inside. I'm not one that gets swept up in feelings of hurt or loss - I get pissed off. Furious. And when I start thinking about the big picture, all of this combines to produce a cold burning fury. This is not about revenge. This is about defending any person in any country who is subject to these barbarians. Godspeed.

Josh Watts
Publius