Who will ever forget the destruction of the world trade center towers September 11, 2001. Often called 9/11, people who had never heard of Al-Qaida before, were exposed to the name in the worst sort of way and that “visible” attack created waves of panic, anger, and retaliation that would eventually take our focus off of other things and eventually lead up to where we are today. 9/11 was a very real and “visible” eye opener to all of us that there are people in the world that truly despise and hate the United States of America. What many still fail to realize though is that Al-Qaida didn’t form overnight. Those towers of smoke and flames we saw permeating from the television sets on that day was just a visible symbol of things that have been forming over many years.
Al-Qaida is not the only organization that hates the United States of America, but they certainly became the “visible” target of our aggression, because they “so visibly attacked us”. Consequently, our country has been completely ignoring other sorts of terrorism that are not so visible, or flamboyant , but still destroy people's lives in far larger degrees than a terrorist ever did.
According to some, there are over one hundred definitions for the word “terrorism”, and no universal definition of the word agreed upon worldwide. Terrorists are an “invisible”, and then “sometimes visible” influence in the world and one reason terrorism is so hard to fight against and illuminate, therefore hard to eliminate is because we are not at war with a country, which is a visible target, but we are at war against individuals, organizations and hundreds of other things that are set out to destroy our great and wonderful country.
So, what are these “invisible things” that at some point will become “visible” and cripple our country and our economy? After all, there is no agreed upon definition of terrorism, therefore no true and agreed upon definition of who the leaders of terrorism (also called terrorists) actually are? It is my belief that in order to answer the above question, we have to look at what the ultimate goals of a terrorist organizations are, particularly the ones that hate us. If we do this, we can make that which is working “unseen” under the radar become “visible” so that we can destroy it before it destroys us.
According to “thinkexist.com” Osama Bin Laden, the leader of Al-Qaida, has been quoted as saying “America is a great power possessed of tremendous military might and a wide-ranging economy, but all this is built on an unstable foundation which can be targeted, with special attention to its obvious weak spots. If America is hit in one hundredth of these weak spots, God willing, it will stumble, wither away and relinquish world leadership.”
So based on the above quote, we see that terrorists would see us stumble, and terrorists often use their horrendous acts to scare and promote their political agenda, and that political agenda supersedes the value of human liberty, safety and life. Therefore one easily could surmise that terrorism is “any act” where a group’s political agenda is more important and valuable than human liberty, safety and life.
It was so obvious after watching the twin towers burn and fall to the ground on television on that dreadful day of what the “visible symbol” of terrorism is. But it is so important to also be looking for terrorism that is not easy to see on the surface. There are people in the world that love the United States of America because we “buy things” and help their economies in doing so, but many of those same people hate the United States of America as a political power and would love to see us crippled in that respect. Also, there appears to be too many self-interest politicians, self-serving politicians, partisan politicians currently in government, and not nearly enough bi-partisan politicians and what I call patriot politicians.
“We can't accommodate terrorism. When someone uses the slaughter of innocent people to advance a so-called political cause, at that point the political cause becomes immoral and unjust and they should be eliminated from any serious discussion, any serious debate.”
~RUDOLPH GIULIANI, CNN interview, Sep. 11, 2002
Giuliani is quoted as saying this after the attacks. My point is that there are many ways “to slaughter innocent people to advance a so-called political cause”.
“Our enemies are fully aware that they can use oil as a weapon against America. And if we don't take this threat as seriously as the bombs they build or the guns they buy, we will be fighting the War on Terror with one hand tied behind our back.”
~BARACK OBAMA, speech, Feb. 28, 2006
I think back do the Bush Administration and the war when gas prices increased exponentially. Who controlled these price increases? With over 320,000,000 people living in the United States, and a good portion of these people pumping gas weekly, spending an extra $50 a tank doesn’t seem like much until you multiply it times how many cars are on the road. Some estimates say there are 240,000,000 vehicles on the road. If we assume there are 200,000,000 vehicles spending an extra $30 per week on gas, then approximately $6,000,000,000 (6 billion dollars) per week. Multiply that times 52 weeks and you get $312,000,000,000 (312 billion dollars). Where did this money go in a time when people were struggling and really needed money and small and large businesses and shops were really needing people to be using that money on products by putting money back into the economy?
We do not create terrorism by fighting the terrorists. We invite terrorism by ignoring them.
~GEORGE W. BUSH, speech, Dec. 18, 2005.
Reality tells us there has been a lot of partisan politics with our current President and even our previous President, but people do write some good quotes for them from time to time. And it’s true, we “do” invite more terrorism by ignoring it. It is not good to ignore or to not sweep bad things affecting our countries future under the rug, or try to “hide” those bad things with chemical dispersants. Once the problem is brought to the surface for its ugliness to be seen by all, attack the problem head on.
I recently read an article in the New York Times titled “Alabama Town’s Failed Pension Is a Warning” written by Michael Cooper and Mary Williams Walsh, December 22, 2010. The first thing I noticed about the title is that it left out exactly who Prichard’s scenario was a warning to. After reading further, we see it is clearly a warning for city government officials and the voters who elected them to office; to be good stewards of both their office and their votes. It seems it is also a warning for county government officials, state government officials, and even federal government officials and the voters that elected them to office to be good stewards as well.
In a nutshell, the City of Prichard, Alabama, has been attempting to file for Bankruptcy. They have already completely “defaulted” on their retiree’s pension plans. In other words, through lack of planning and foresight on city official’s parts, “the checks stopped coming in the mail”. Think about that for a moment, “The checks stopped coming in the mail.” Faithful people working for the city, basing their entire retirement around their retirement checks all of a sudden quit getting their check. Just because Prichard broke state laws in not mailing the checks didn’t stop them from not mailing them, after all, the money just wasn’t in the bank. Quoted from the article: “Far worse was the retired fire marshal who died in June. Like many of the others, he was too young to collect Social Security. “When they found him, he had no electricity and no running water in his house,” said David Anders, 58, a retired district fire chief. “He was a proud enough man that he wouldn’t accept help.” This is just one unfortunately city right? Wrong, as I type, there are many cities at the brink of bankruptcy. It could happen to a city, or a corporation, but this could never happen to a “country” right? Wrong, there have been multiple countries bankrupt over the years. Do a little research into Greece and Iceland and read about their struggles. Read up on other countries that has had to seek help through the International Monetary Fund (IMF). Don’t know what the International Monetary Fund (IMF), the World Bank, the Group of 20 or Bretton Woods are? Ever heard of the “Nixon shock”? Ignorance is bliss, start reading. It was a “shock” to me right after the financial collapse of the Bush administration to read that the biggest holder of our national debt, a communist country which is called “China” was encouraging Russia and the European Union to “drop the dollar” and re-establish Bretton Woods back to the gold standard. The dollar I am speaking of is the very same dollar that gives us a lot of “political clout” worldwide because the rest of the world uses it as a benchmark. When Nixon blew off Bretton Woods, and the rest of the world in 1971 by dropping the “gold standard” (called the “Nixon Shock), the world began to “float on the U.S. dollar” instead of something stable like “gold”. Now, there is a great push by some very influential countries to “drop the U.S. dollar, dropping the U.S. in the process” so that our problems won’t cause them problems. This is a very serious situation.
Considering that our national deficit has increased exponentially over the last ten years, and every recent president seems to be bound and determined to spend our grandkids inheritance, leaving them only debt in its place, spending could technically called terrorism, and the spenders, terrorists. I’m sure that thought will raise some eyebrows, but considering, like Prichard, the thought of our government “defaulting” and out of the blue, hundreds of millions of people losing Medicare, Medicaid, Social Security and welfare benefits, like Prichard, this could be a very real possibility. What I am talking about is millions of people starving to death or dieing from other causes. That makes the few thousand people killed on 9/11 look pale in comparison. It is very scary that out national debt has gone from 380 billion to 14 trillion since 1970. According to Wikipedia.com, the leading owner of our U.S. Treasuries (national debt) is communist China at almost 20.8 percent, Japan at 20.2 percent, the United Kingdom at 9.2 percent. The oil exporters are next in line at 5.5 percent. While it appears that oil exporters have far less faith in our treasury (at 5.5%) than does China (at 20.8), we find out that Russia has far less faith and support in our government treasuries, being next to last on the list at 3.2 percent. There are only a few more that own our national debt such as Carribean Banking Centers at 3.7 percent, Brazil at 4 percent, Hong Kong at 3.3 percent, and the Republic of China at 3.2 percent. Does history show that a country can “default” on a national debt? Yes, history shows us this very clearly. China and Russia seem to be the two largest powers pushing for Bretton Woods to be revised and dropping the U.S. Dollar in exchange for a new international currency based on gold. It’s interesting to me that our largest financial supporter, China, and our smallest financial supporter, Russia, are conspiring together on this issue. True, the United States economy plummeted for various reasons in 2008/2009, pulling the “world” down with it. According to George Soros there will be a second “bubble” or plummet. For a guy who was so adamant against Bush and supportive of Obama, he's now dropped support of Obama it seems, therefore where do his loyalties lie? Like many billionaires, himself. I agree, that the economy crash here in the States was embarrassing, and out of control, effected the world in a negative way and the leadership at the presidency, congress, the senate etal had their part in it, but the fact is, it is our 300,000,000 plus population of convenience hungry people buying other countries products that gave those countries a market for things they produced. Let’s face it, how many people live in France anyway? Approximately 60 million. The United States is five times larger.
They all suck up to us because we buy their products and help support their labor forces, but also because we still have a lot of potential growth, due to our vast land area, but many of them hate our political power and our wars. Fact remains that many of them would love to see our country still be dependent on their products, yet fail as a world political influence.
That being said, Wiki-leaks is a terrorist organization. I have no doubt. They use propaganda to influence us to believe that they are about stopping wars and peace, yet the truth of the matter is, they hate us. Also, they are bias. They don’t target ALL countries, or all industries, only those that they want to, or those that attack them back such as the financial institutions which are abandoning them because of the controversy. This organization has further set out to destroy our great country. They have put the lives of many in severe danger, and consciously doing so. The United States has recently sent out hundred of notifications to people whose names were identified in the Wiki cable leaks, alerting them to the fact that their life could be in danger. Is this just propaganda or is it true? Think about it, if a U.S. spy’s name was compromised, or an undercover cop in a big drug sting operation was identified, don’t you think their lives would be in danger? Is this not terrorism? Doesn’t the world all recognize that the tensions on the Korean peninsula are very high, with threats of war and even nuclear missiles talked about almost on a weekly basis? We are talking about millions of people that could be in danger if South Korea and North Korea go to war. So, assuming that Assange is a fairly intelligent man, and knows better, wouldn’t he recognize that those leaks could cause the two countries to go to war. Again, Wiki-leaks and Julian Paul Assange could be one of the largest and most dangerous terrorist organizations I’ve seen; putting the lives of millions of people on the Korean peninsula in danger, but also attempting to cripple the United States of America as a world leader and financially, thereby threatening the lives and safety of over 320 million people who live here. Now, that’s one pretty serious terrorist if you think about it. What makes it worse is both the verbal, moral and financial support this terrorist organization is receiving. Julian Assange and his terrorist supporters should be in jail. A reward should be on his head every bit as much as a reward on Osama Bin Laden’s head.
If we hate the terrorists so much, then why are we acting like them and supporting them? Please don’t be offended. I mean it in the nicest name-calling way possible. George W’s quote about inviting terrorism when we ignore it reminds me of a quote attributed to Edmund Burke, “All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing.” Edmund is also quoted as saying “When bad men combine, the good must associate; else they will fall one by one, an unpitied sacrifice in a contemptible struggle." I think in tri-partisan politics you’d call those people falling “one by one” as neither Republican or Democrats, but as Independents. What I believe he means is that when only a few stand to right the wrong, rocking the boat in the process, when the majority of those in the boat are corrupt and all the rest complacent and uncaring, the corrupt will destroy the last few of the good every time they stick their necks out for the complacent population. I hope and pray that we never get to that point.
Terrorism is terrorism. It doesn’t matter if it’s a visible bomb that kills thousands, or incompetence, corruption, greed, and complacency leading to mass layoffs, lawlessness and suicides. Also, terrorism is jeopardizing the future of social security pension checks, welfare checks, Medicare and Medicaid, which would lead to mass hysteria, starvation, theft, killings and revolution. Finally, terrorism is jeopardizing our countries political influence and economy and the lives of millions of people here and on the Korean peninsula by a “squealer” who is so obviously out to destroy our country through leaks of extremely sensitive data.
So many people seek to divide our country through partisan politics, bad policies, and playing on people’s emotions for their own political self interests and greed, defecating on our countries future as they smile and wave a magic wand, saying it will all be better tomorrow while at the same time continuing the poison of our countries future. The writing is on the wall, it’s written on the floor, and it’s written all over the ceiling. It is past time to trim the fat, cook the crooks, and bury the terrorists, obviously in the most diplomatic way possible, using your voice, your vote, letters, phone calls, influence and "do it" as "peaceful" as possible. I wanted to say that in case some off balance nut like Jared L. Loughner, the suspect in the recent shooting and killing in Arizona, reads this.
"I would like to assure the world that I did not plan the recent attacks, which seems to have been planned by people for personal reasons".
~OSAMA BIN LADEN
Bin Laden is quoted as saying that after the “very visible” 9/11 terrorist attacks, denying any responsibility. Sounds like “non-accountability” and “finger pointing” to me. Can’t you hear these very same words being said by every politician, every voter and non-voter, every single dissident and non-dissident, patriot and non-patriot, and every single illegal alien if complete chaos erupts in our country?
Winston Churchill said that “Politics is the ability to foretell what is going to happen tomorrow, next week, next month and next year and to have the ability afterwards to explain why it didn’t happen”. Right now there is so much writing on the wall, but without enough people actively searching for truth, then we won’t get to the “explain why it didn’t happen”, but only to the finger pointing.
For a patriot is not a title given at birth, or is it based on color, or is it self-inflicted; but patriotism is a title earned through a lot of heart and love of country, while actively seeking the absence of blindness, ignorance, incompetence and complacency.
Dewayne Allday
Selma, Alabama
