this year its different

there's tension, despair. perhaps because two NYC firefighters were killed here just weeks ago.

perhaps because half of the children near the Trade Center on Sept. 11th developed breathing problems.

perhaps because most in this country now realize that thousands in uniform have died in vain, thousands more will for years to come, and scores of thousands in uniform will return missing limbs, or pieces of their skulls, or both.

perhaps because the evil, lying rat bastards in the white house will attempt to force-feed us all the same shit on a different anniversary, and that the opposition party is impotent, despite a mandate and a majority. perhaps because a critical mass of the U.S population now realizes that our nation is despised by much of the world, and the core principles of our former democracy are now not worth the parchment they are written on.

i can't write anymore, it hurts to care, and it is painful to be numb. i will instead quote a fine but depressing piece from a mainstream news site.

It took America 1366 days to win World War II. Yet in the 2192 days since the Twin Towers fell our political leaders not only have failed to resoundingly win the Battle of Baghdad, they haven't even been able to come up a constitutionally sound and comprehensive set of legal policies and practices to guide our systematic war on terrorism...
Good ideas, like establishing a wholly separate legal system to handle sensitive terror-related cases and causes, have been shot down without a fair hearing in the court of public opinion (never mind inside the White House). Terrible ideas, like allowing agents from the Federal Bureau of Investigation to determine when the private records of consumers can be poached from telecommunications companies, have rocketed through the corridors of power to become policy.
this from CBS News' Andrew Cohen: 'Opportunities Squandered Since 9/11'

as we remember the many innocent people who were killed on September 11th, and the countless more military casualties, the tens of thousands of innocent Iraqis and Afghanis dead, the millions of refugees streaming into Lebanon, also remember what this country was before George W. Bush made a shameful mockery of it.

then read 1984 again. we were warned.