WIX Archives
An Article from London's Daily Mirror........
Posted by Karen on Tue Mar 04, 2003 06:14:04 PM
In reply top null posted by null on null
Hi all,
I just received this article in an email. I thought it was quite good. Forgive me if this has been printed or discussed already. I'm quite behind on reading the posts. I am happy to report my Dad came home today, and he will begin chemo, and radiation in four weeks. The Dr.s are quite optimistic because the tumor was caught so early! My thanks to all of you for your prayers, and good wishes! Anyway, on to the article......
This is well worth reading. Draw your own conclusions.
Article from London's Daily Mirror
Surprise! Surprise! When one of the world's most liberal left wing
newspapers writes a great article like this, there is hope for everyone. A
thoughtfully written piece in one of the most left wing newspapers in the UK.
Just a word of background for those of you who aren't familiar with the UK's Daily Mirror.
This is one of the most notorious Left wing, anti-American dailies in the UK. Hard to believe
that the Daily Mirror actually published it, but it did.
Begin article:
ONE year ago, the world witnessed a unique kind of broadcasting -- the mass
murder of thousands, live on television. As a lesson in the pitiless cruelty
of the human race, September 11 was up there with Pol Pot's Mountain of
skulls in Cambodia, or the skeletal bodies stacked like garbage in the Nazi
concentration camps. An unspeakable act so cruel, so calculated and so
utterly merciless that surely the world could agree on one thing -- nobody
deserves this fate.
Surely there could be consensus: the victims were truly innocent, the
perpetrators truly evil. But to the world's eternal shame, 9/11 is
increasingly seen as America's comeuppance [deserved reprimand or punishment].
Incredibly, anti-Americanism has increased over the last year. There has
always been a simmering resentment to the USA in this country -- too loud,
too rich, too full of themselves and so much happier than Europeans - but
it has become an epidemic. And it seems incredible to me. More than that,
it turns my stomach. America is this country's greatest friend and our
staunchest ally. We are bonded to the US by culture, language and blood.
A little over half a century ago, around half a million Americans died for
our freedoms, as well as their own. Have we forgotten so soon?
And exactly a year ago, thousands of ordinary men, women and children -- not
just Americans, but from dozens of countries -- were butchered by a small
group of religious fanatics. Are we so quick to betray them?
What touched the heart about those who died in the twin towers and on the
planes was that we recognized them. Young fathers and mothers, somebody's
son and somebody's daughter, husbands and wives. And children. Some unborn.
And these people brought it on themselves? And their nation is to blame for
their meticulously planned slaughter?
These days you don't have to be some dust-encrusted nut job in Kabul or
Karachi or Finsbury Park to see America as the Great Satan. The
anti-American alliance is made up of self-loathing liberals who blame the
Americans for every ill in the Third World, and conservatives suffering from
power-envy, bitter that the world's only superpower can do what it likes
without having to ask permission.
The truth is that America has behaved with enormous restraint since
September 11. Remember, remember! Remember the gut-wrenching tapes of weeping men phoning their wives to say, "I love you," before they were burned alive.
Remember those people leaping to their deaths from the top of burning skyscrapers.
Remember the hundreds of firemen buried alive. Remember the smiling face of
that beautiful little girl who was on one of the planes with her mum.
Remember, remember -- and realize that America has never retaliated for 9/11
in anything like the way it could have.
So, a few al-Qaeda tourists got locked up without a trial in Camp X-ray?
Pass the Kleenex. So, some Afghan wedding receptions were shot up after they
merrily fired their semiautomatics in a sky full of American planes? A
shame, but maybe next time they should stick to confetti.
AMERICA could have turned a large chunk of the world into a parking lot.
That it didn't is a sign of strength.
American voices are already being raised against attacking Iraq - that's
what a democracy is for. How many in the Islamic world will have a minute's
silence for the slaughtered innocents of 9/11? How many Islamic leaders will
have the guts to say that the mass murder of 9/11 was an abomination?
When the news of 9/11 broke on the West Bank, those freedom-loving
Palestinians were dancing in the street. America watched all of that -- and
didn't push the button. We should thank the stars that America is the most
powerful nation in the world. I still find it incredible that 9/11 did not
provoke all-out war. Not a "war on terrorism." A real war.
The fundamentalist dudes are talking about "opening the gates of hell" if
America attacks Iraq. Well, America could have opened the gates of hell like
you wouldn't believe. The US is the most militarily powerful nation that
ever strode the face of the earth. The campaign in Afghanistan may have been
less than perfect and the planned war on Iraq may be misconceived.
But don't blame America for not bringing peace and light to these wretched
countries. How many democracies are there in the Middle East, or in the
Muslim world? You can count them on the fingers of one hand -- assuming you
haven't had any chopped off for minor shoplifting.
I love America, yet America is hated. I guess that makes me Bush's poodle.
But I would rather be a dog in New York City than a Prince in Riyadh. Above
all, America is hated because it is what every country wants to be -- rich,
free, strong, open, optimistic. Not ground down by the past, or religion, or
some caste system. America is the best friend this country ever had and we
should start remembering that.
Or do you really think the USA is the root of all evil? Tell it to the loved
ones of the men and women who leaped to their death from the burning towers.
Tell it to the nursing mothers whose husbands died on one of the hijacked
planes, or were ripped apart in a collapsing skyscraper. And tell it to the
hundreds of young widows whose husbands worked for the New York Fire
Department. To our shame, George Bush gets a worse press than Saddam Hussein.
Once we were told that Saddam gassed the Kurds, tortured his own people and
set up rape-camps in Kuwait. Now we are told he likes Quality Street. Save
me the orange center, oh mighty one!
Remember, remember, September 11. One of the greatest atrocities in human
history was committed against America. No, do more than remember. Never,
never forget!