Post 9/11 Opportunity - Lost

I recently posted an article called "The Real 9/11" on Gather, a community site. My motivation was a series of discussions with conspiracy theorists insinuating the whole day was some grand shadow government operation. At one point I realized that attempting to intelligently debate the point with people incapable of seeing even the incongruence in their own arguments (not to mention lack of any evidence) was a waste of time. More importantly, I realized that these people were disrepecting the nearly 3000 people who died that day. So I gave an opportunity in my post for people to express their feelings for those who gave their lives, loved ones, jobs, security, etc. I also asked if people thought our actions since that day were helping or hurting the "war on terror." There were varied responses, however one struck me as so thoughtful and so insightful that I've quoted it here in its entirety. The commenter is Suzanne Ford, an actress (watch for her on the premier of Bones on Sept. 25th) and obviously a very keen observor of life (imho). The following is her comment:

"We had several opportunities as a nation after 9/11. We could have made a mighty effort to enlist the help of the nations of the world in tracking down and stopping Bin Laden. We could have initiated the creation of an international anti-terrorist effort that would have made great strides in dampening terrorist movements across the globe. We could have reached out, in the throes of worldwide sympathy and condemnation of that event, and developed a global alliance of unprecedented strength and effectiveness, which we could have led as the most powerful country on earth. Instead, we have squandered those opportunities and are now possibly the most reviled nation on the planet, having created a brand new and ever more frightening threat in a country that had nothing to do with 9/11, and yet are still trembling lest the terrorists come at us again. It almost doesn't matter why we did this - the reasons are myriad and largely wrongheaded if not completely opportunistic. The point is that we blew it. Figuring out what to do now, where to go now, and how to get out of this mess is, for me, at least, an exercise in futility and frustration."

I couldn't have said it as well.

See the entire post and comments here: http://www.gather.com/viewArticle.jsp?articleId=281474977097590