Below is today’s brief essay in the Los Angeles Times that is part of a series called Reflections on 9/11. I was asked that day after the attacks to write a column for the newspaper, which ran on September 13, 2001. As I wrote the piece, I could still see smoke rising from the Pentagon. The plane in Washington hit just behind my car a minute or so after I passed the Pentagon on my way to work from Alexandria. On that day, my greatest concerns were two-fold: a change in the definition of war and the expanded use of assassination. Unfortunately, my worst predictions were exceeded by the Bush Administration and later the Obama Administration. It is shocking to think that this was ten years ago. The images and feelings remain so vivid. My car was forced into a curb by a careening car that morning and I had to replace my tire as the smoke bellowed from the Pentagon. The thought of all the innocent people lost in Washington, New York, and Pennsylvania remains an open wound for so many of us. The sheer savagery and inhumanity of the attacks shocked the conscience — a feeling only magnified later when Bin Laden was shown gloating over how he personally advised the terrorists on the best place to hit the buildings. The cautionary piece on September 13th was not meant to take away from the legitimate and collective anger that we felt — and still feel. However, it was already clear within two days of the attacks that Bush officials were going to seek the radical expansion of presidential powers and were already referencing our civil liberties as an impediment to our safety. My heartfelt sympathy to all who lost friends and family on that day.
In his September 13 Op Ed (“Cries of “war” stumble over the law”), Turley warned against the government seeking “greater flexibility” in responding to terrorists by treating criminal attacks “as a matter of war.” “Our system,” he wrote, “requires that legal means be used to achieve legal ends. We decide those means and ends within the general confines of the Constitution.” How has the founding document fared?
As the smoke was still rising from the Pentagon and World Trade Center, it became quickly evident that some of the greatest damage from the September 11th attacks would not come from without but from within our nation.
There was an almost immediate effort by Bush officials to change the definition of war. Rather than declare war on Afghanistan (where Bin Laden was sheltered), President George W. Bush wanted to declare war on terrorism. It was no rhetorical triviality. Bush decided to invoke the heightened constitutional powers of a wartime president by declaring war on what was a category of crime. Because there could never be a total, final defeat of terrorism, this “war” would become permanent – as would the heightened powers of the president.
Ten years later, the country remains “at war,” with President Barack Obama expanding many of the national security powers of his predecessor and, in the Libyan war, claiming his own re-definition of war: “a time-limited, scope-limited military action.”
Of course, the ominous signs in 2001 were realized in a myriad of other ways, from the establishment of the first American torture program to the widespread use of targeted assassinations, including operations killing American citizens. Ironically, I wrote then of the possibility of a new law that could govern the use of assassination, one that would deny a president unilateral authority to kill individuals and would reduce the need to invoke war powers. Instead, the Bush administration claimed full wartime authority as well as radically expanding the use of assassination as an unchecked presidential power. The claim of unilateral presidential authority to kill even United States citizens has been embraced by Obama.
What ultimately fell on that terrible day proved to be some of our most important constitutional structures. Tragically, it is a degree of damage that cannot be claimed by Al Qaeda alone.
Jonathan Turley is a law professor at George Washington University.
“So I won’t have to google it…what does that mean…I am studying Albert Ellis at present…Pretty hefty reading…if I think about it.”
AY,
Albert Ellis was a great man and I was in a group he led once. His Rational Emotive Behavioral Therapy was genius. Gestalt Therapy was
developed by Fritz Perls and I studied at the institute of one of his main disciples. They both fall under what is known as Existential Therapy, which turned from the emphasis on past history favored by Freud, into
trying to treat people by grounding them in the present. There are many similarities in approach in both methods, I preferred Gestalt because it favored “Drama Queens” like me. :=). Good stuff for you to read. The most accessible and quickest road to Fritz Perls and Gestalt Therapy is his autobiography “In and Out of The Garbage Pail”. Fun reading and gives an excellent overview of his approach without the ponderous portentousness so favored by those who write about psychology. In that sense, Ellis too eschewed a lot of the scholarly claptrap.
Nal1, September 11, 2011 at 10:28 am
The Years of Shame
What happened after 9/11 — and I think even people on the right know this, whether they admit it or not — was deeply shameful.
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I think that what happened after 9/11 was deeply human. Shock fear and grief are a damaging axis of emotions that allow people to be controlled. Ask any healthy amygdala. But if we are to remain humanist in our dealings, and Just, then we must retain our abiltiy to experience these emotions. That means we must have the strength to remain vulnerable. That very important moment when we could remain human without wildly acting out our grief as anger came and went when President Bush succumbed to whatever little voice told him to invade Iraq. The goons that use shock doctrine are not leaders….they are underminers. There is a healthy response to attacks of terrorism that do not necessarily contain ‘corporate initiatives’ or ‘transfers of wealth’. In acts of terrorism it is important that Law is our first response…so we can correct terrorists and not become them.
And it is not too late to correct our course and regain our terra firma for the people of this Country. And there is absolutely no shame in that.
Photograph from September 11
A Poem by Wisława Szymborska
Translated By Clare Cavanagh and Stanislaw Baranczak
http://www.poetryfoundation.org/poem/178603
Excerpt:
They jumped from the burning floors—
one, two, a few more,
higher, lower.
The photograph halted them in life,
and now keeps them
above the earth toward the earth.
Each is still complete,
with a particular face
and blood well hidden.
Mike S.,
So I won’t have to google it…what does that mean…I am studying Albert Ellis at present…Pretty hefty reading…if I think about it…
Mike Spindell 1, September 11, 2011 at 12:38 pm
Dredd,
I appreciate the articles on 9/11 you’ve been running on your blog.
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I had to overcome some fear of my own to do so.
But I tried to do it in a way that focuses in on evidence, not personalities, not hate, in an attempt to snap myself and others out of the trance that set in on us all to one degree or another this past decade.
Looking at the evidence is my intent … not whodunnit … that is for a grand jury and a petite jury.
I will accept their conclusions following a fair trial for all concerned.
What I like about Toronto is that it gives us a glance at what that presentation might look like, and can then perhaps open us up to such a thing without distortion.
I have been involved in very difficult cases where jurors were petrified, outraged, wanted to puke, and the like, just on the reading of the indictment.
I know they were that way because each juror was asked “what were your first thoughts on the hearing of the indictment” …
“He calls 9/11 a “deep event”
Dredd,
“Remember the Maine!”
“They say follow your gut instincts and it will take you to your truths…”
AY
As a trained Gestalt Psychotherapist, who personally practices it in his own life, following ones’ gut feelings is known as listening to the wisdom of ones
organism.
Mike Spindell 1, September 11, 2011 at 10:36 am
Forgive me but I can’t keep from my mind on this day the manifesto of the
Project For The New American Century from 1997, of which two signatories were Donald Rumsfeld and Dick Cheney.
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I was listening to the presentation of Peter Dale Scott this morning at the Toronto Hearings.
He calls 9/11 a “deep event” (a term of art I think) and says that they typically precede our wars and some other events, elections, etc. going back even to Vietnam.
He had an “Above Secret” clearance as a junior diplomat and is very concerned about SOCOM and the secret spy agencies.
He says they are very eager to shed blood.
He has written the book “The American War Machine”.
Mike,
They say follow your gut instincts and it will take you to your truths…I think your truths are the same as lots of other folks….
Dredd,
I appreciate the articles on 9/11 you’ve been running on your blog. Isn’t it curious how people forget the suspicious burning of The Reichstag and how through it Hitler and the NAZI’s took complete control of the German government. I have no certainty of a 9/11 internal conspiracy, but I certainly am suspicious, particularly in light of PNAC.
Your=You’re
Dredd,
Agreed….too bad they were only together for about 25months….but the was the 60’s the beginning of Love the One Your With…
Anonymously Yours 1, September 11, 2011 at 10:28 am
Dredd….For What Its Worth…
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Yes, an incredibly talented band.
eniobob 1, September 11, 2011 at 8:56 am
Toronto and Massachusetts
Kinda reminds me of this:
“Buffalo Springfield – Stop, hey what’s that sound”
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Me too.
I am further concerned that these very revealing hearings may generate another “deep event” such as “9/11 II” (nine eleven the Second).
These people are not human in the sense that we generally use that word, so they will not hesitate to do so.
I hope I am mistaken about that.
mespo,
My opinions on big foot are, he does not have to use water skis or snow skis…..I bet the people from Heelys’ are not paying Big Foot royalties ….
BVM:
I hear you ranting again. Saying it fifty times won’t make it so, but, just for the record, what are your opinions on Big Foot?
BWM,
We better have your status checked as well… How do we know you are here legally…Just because you say so does not make it so, right? We need proof….or you to Poof…..
Obama is not a “Natural Born Citizen.”
Mario Apuzzo, Esq. excerpt: … because Obama was not born to a father and mother who were both U.S. citizens when he was born (he was born to a father who was a British citizen), he is not and cannot be a “natural born Citizen.” He is therefore not eligible to be President and Commander in Chief.
Dr. Edwin Vieira excerpts: … If Obama is not “a natural born Citizen” or has renounced such citizenship, he is simply not eligible for “the Office of President” (Article II, Section 1, Clause 4). That being so, he cannot be “elected” by the voters, by the Electoral College, or by the House of Representatives (see Amendment XII). For neither the voters, nor the Electors, nor members of the House can change the constitutional requirement, even by unanimous vote inter sese (see Article V). If, nonetheless, the voters, the Electors, or the members of the House purport to “elect” Obama, he will be nothing but a usurper, because the Constitution defines him as such. And he can never become anything else, because a usurper cannot gain legitimacy if even all of the country aid, abets, accedes to, or acquiesces in his usurpation.
Congress cannot even impeach him because, not being the actual President, he cannot be “removed from Office on Impeachment for, and Conviction of, Treason, Bribery, or other high Crimes and Misdemeanors” (see Article II, Section 4).
http://www.wnd.com/?pageId=321969
Obama has been using a stolen Social Security number for 25 years.
Obama committed fraud and forgery in his Selective Service registration.
Obama is an illegal alien. It was criminal for him to hold office in Illinois and criminal for him to take that salary and other compensation.
The US wars are illegal just like Hitler’s Wars of Aggression. To vote funding for a War of Aggression is a war crime. Obama voted for funding Wars of Aggression many times as a US senator. Each vote is a war crime.. a felony. Obama is guilty of many war crimes before and after the election. Obama is a major War Criminal.
Obama’s criminality before and after his illegal election is massive. He is one of the biggest criminals in world history.