Its been 4 years now. Out of respect I think we should just for one day forget about foolish politics and remember the ones who died and the ones who still suffer.
I agree Ed, today is a very somber day. I can only imagine the pain the families have felt since. 9-11 has changed us all in countless ways. As somebody who runs international transportation and imports for a major American corporation I can tell you my world has changed. Before 9-11 security was all about anti-theft measures. Today we all live in fear of the known plans to place a WMD in a sea container. Many of us have spent months each year working on the security layer that is meant to thwart this but I can tell you the system is still very vunerable. This vunerability is not as bad as it was it was 4 years ago but we are still open to some sort of attack.
On 9/11/01 I was on my way to look over the operations at a railhead in MA. We stopped at a Dunkin Donuts on the way that had a tv mounted over the counter. The picture showed smoke coming from a hole in the WTC but the caption said "fire at the Pentagon." Not knowing what was happening yet, I thought that maybe there was an office file and CNN had messed up the copy. Two days later I spoke with an exhausted firefighter on 75 M late in the evening (not AM). He had spent every waking moment for two days digging and was emotionally spent and exhausted. I asked him the chances for survivors and he said that it appeared that all of the concrete had turned to dust on impact.
Its too bad that so many people in this world spend their time on plots fueled by hatred. The sooner we can hunt these bastards down the better. I sure hope things don't get worse before they get better. It has been a real challenge to not drop to the level of Al Quada in rooting them out. They have to be stamped out.
73, de W1XAW
