Ten years ago, we learned that the fastest way to pass a bad law is to call it the ‘Patriot Act’ and force Congress to vote on it in the immediate wake of a horrible attack on the United States. The irony is that there is really very little about the Patriot Act that is patriotic. Instead, it has turned out to be yet another tool the government is using to erode privacy, individual freedom and the Constitution itself. Only Ron Paul has had the courage to point out the way the patriot act is eroding our liberties. Mitt Romney, Newt Gingrich and Rick Santorum support this serious violation of our rights.

Benjamin Franklin had it right:

‘Those who would give up essential liberty to purchase a little temporary safety, deserve neither liberty nor safety’.

Absolutely, protecting the American people from those who would do us harm is the federal government’s most basic duty. Everyone gets that. But when harm is done, as on 9-11, it is the nature of government to ask for more power and more authority in order to protect us. That’s how we get laws like the Patriot Act.

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A Big Government reader, Andrew Kaczynski, noted that demonstrators squatting in Zuccotti Park have defaced a 9/11 memorial statue.

The sculpture, J. Seward Johnson’s “Double Check,” once sat at the feet of the World Trade Center and became a shrine of sorts after it withstood the destruction of the 9/11 attacks (photo at Pundit Press):

Activists at the Occupy Wall Street protests, either ignorant about the statue’s history or indifferent to it (the Occupy instigators, after all, mourned the death of Osama bin Laden), have mocked the sculpture as a supposed symbol of capitalism.

Kaczynski provided several photographs, including one he snapped himself in Zuccotti Park this morning:

Photo credit: Andrew Kaczynski, October 17, 2011

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One week after the 10th anniversary of the September 11th World Trade Center attacks, carried out by Islamist terrorists, the American Islamic College and the Organization for Islamic Cooperation convened students, academics, and “intellectuals” in Chicago, Illinois, for its 2nd annual conference on “Islam and Muslims in America.” Rather than accepting the underlying facts that lead reasonable Americans to express concern about the spread of Islam in America, the conference chose to focus on Americans’ “racism and bigotry,” negativity, and the so-called “Islamophobia,” inherent in their opinions about the Muslim faith.

This perverse twisting of the post-9/11 environment in America, as well as the institution’s shady past associations with noted Islamist agitators, provides the context for an event of which all Americans should be aware.

The stated purpose of the conference was to promote awareness of the school, discuss the current affairs of Islam and Muslims in America, and confront ”Islamophobia.” However, events that unfolded reveal that the narrative put forth throughout the conference veered sharply from these goals, the careful review of which invites legitimate concern and even alarm*.

(*Notably, it was within this context that U.S. Congressman Mike Quigley found it appropriate in his official capacity, to apologize on behalf of America, seen here in our previously released footage from the event.)

The following video shows an opening statement from the event emcee, a Muslim/pro-Palestinian activist and host of the Rise Up Radio Show Rashid Darwish. While Darwishundoubtably came across as one of the more measured speakers at the event, and gave no reason for observers to conclude that he was of an unpeaceful character, he makes an alarming claim in his opening remarks:

“…This last week, we look back at 10 years of the 9/11 tragedy….I will tell you this, it gave us all a wonderful opportunity to now educate people about Islam….and really help define what Islam is all about.”

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First, let me say that I respect Ron Paul a great deal. More often than not, he’s fundamentally right on the pressing issues of today and I believe that the modern political landscape is a better place because of him. Over the current president, I’d vote for him in a heartbeat.

That being said, regarding his online clan of “libertarian” followers… eeesh. Here’s a recent tweet that I received from one of his followers after I so much as barely criticized Dr. Paul’s foreign policy ideas;

“Hey neocon, how the h*** can you justify our costly empire overseas? Only Ron Paul will stop this!!”

Come again, dummy?

Listen, their heart is in the right place but here’s the concept that many of the younger, supposedly anti-establishment, self-professed “libertarians” can’t seem to grasp; by it’s very definition and historical precedent, an empire isn’t a costly endeavor. It’s a profitable one. Be it the Roman, Ottoman or English, all of these tyrannical government’s built their empire in order to expand their territory and reap the bountiful spoils of war.

The reason the United States supposed “empire” expanding abroad is so costly would be because it in fact is no empire at all. The United States boldly walks in through the front door of these countries, provides unprecedented aid and/or overthrows their evil governments in an attempt to rightfully give power back to its citizens, after which we ask for nothing more than the land needed to bury the bodies of those who died to provide them with that privilege.

Now is that a legitimate role of government? Should we really be playing “hero” to the world? Say! Now that’s a meaningful dialogue that deserves a spirited discussion!

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From AFP:

A small group of Islamist demonstrators staged a protest outside the US embassy in London Sunday during a ceremony to mark the 10th anniversary of the 9/11 attacks on the United States.

Around 50 people brandished anti-US banners, chanted slogans and burnt a small piece of paper with a picture of the US flag on it, an AFP journalist at the scene said.

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Big Journalism’s Larry O’Connor yesterday highlighted New York Times columnist Paul Krugman’s unhinged screed that marked the 10th anniversary of 9/11 — an attack on common decency for which Krugman (conveniently) refused to allow any comments. But in his mean-spirited and wholly inappropriate post, Krugman revealed more than he realized about the state of liberal/leftist thought in America today — and the frustration leftists foster about the current state of our politics.

To quickly recap, Krugman wrote:

What happened after 9/11 — and I think even people on the right know this, whether they admit it or not — was deeply shameful. Te [sic] atrocity should have been a unifying event, but instead it became a wedge issue. Fake heroes like Bernie Kerik, Rudy Giuliani, and, yes, George W. Bush raced to cash in on the horror. And then the attack was used to justify an unrelated war the neocons wanted to fight, for all the wrong reasons.

Such a passage makes me wonder if liberals of Krugman’s ilk even hear themselves? I know Krugman thinks Bush is a “fake hero,” because he hates him with a blinding passion. But he wedges W in there as almost an afterthought among his parade of “fake heroes” — ” … and even George W. Bush.” Before that, Krugman calls Rudy Giuliani a “fake hero.”

Now, Giuliani would be the first to reject the “hero” label, because he knows who the REAL heros are. He saw many of their dismembered bodies in the rubble of the WTC. He went to funerals for months on end. But what Giuliani did was of enormous value to the city of New York and the nation: He stayed calm in the face of enormous chaos and fear. And he acted as a leader — as did Bush.

Giuliani suffers in the measure of Krugman (as did Bush) for the same reasons. Both men were non-liberals (non-Democrats) who earned the admiration of the people. Krugman thought he’d be able to belittle Bush for the entirety of what he thought would be one quick term as a “pretender” who “stole” the election from Gore. Only now, of all days (but without comment), does Krugman feel the urge to scratch that long-neglected itch.

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Alert readers have reported that their flight, United Airlines 3681, from St. Louis to Washington Dulles had to make an emergency return to the gate as it prepared for take-off. According to local officials, it was found that two men who had boarded the plane as ‘federal air marshals’ didn’t have the proper credentials. Passengers were deplaned, all luggage was removed and re-scanned. All passengers were also re-screened. Passengers are now in the process of re-boarding. There is no word on the two ‘air marshals.’

BigGovernment has contacted security officials in St. Louis. We will report back what we hear. Interestingly, we understand that Oliver North is on the flight, as well.

An interview with one of the passengers is below:

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As Americans prepare to commemorate the 10th anniversary of the September 11th terrorists attacks, The Heritage Foundation has been busy reminding Congress and the public of the importance of staying the course in the War on Terror.

Since 9/11, at least 40 terrorist plots aimed at the US have been foiled. We have disrupted terrorist networks, captured or killed their leaders, and worked to keep them from rebuilding. But as Heritage’s James Carafano explains, our continued security is anything but certain:

The Administration now seeks to treat terrorism under a law enforcement paradigm that failed to protect Americans from terrorism when it was adopted by the Clinton Administration before 9/11. In addition, the White House intends to follow a “small footprint” strategy for overseas operations, relying primarily on Special Forces operations, covert action, and strikes with unmanned aerial vehicles.

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Today, I’ll be thinking less about the World Trade Center and more about my father and the relentless – probably unique – ability of New York City to bury its dead and move on without a backward glance.

My father was born in Manhattan in 1923, in a tenement building off Columbus Circle. A few years later, he moved to Brooklyn, a borough that was considered the country back then, a place that had more horses than cars. By the time he left there for good in 1966, it wasn’t the country anymore, that’s for sure.

He worked for Sea-Land, a shipping company that was one of the World Trade Center’s original tenants, and one of my very earliest memories is of my older brother and me playing in the company’s unfinished offices in one of the towers before the complex opened to the public in 1973.

Like many, probably most, New Yorkers, my father hated the Twin Towers at first, preferring the Chrysler and Empire State buildings, which had gone up during his childhood.

He’d seen King Kong when it came out in 1933, he explained, and he just couldn’t see the big ape climbing the towers. By the late ‘70s – after Philippe Petit tightrope walked across them, George Willig scaled them, Owen Quinn parachuted from them, and King Kong himself had been shot off them in a 1976 remake – he’d come around.

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“…on a day when others tried to divide us, we can regain the sense of common purpose that stirred in our hearts 10 years ago. As a nation, we face difficult challenges, and as citizens in a democratic society we engage in vigorous debates about the future. But as we do, let’s never forget the lesson we learned anew 10 years ago — that our differences pale beside what unites us and that when we choose to move forward together, as one American family, the United States doesn’t just endure, we can emerge from our tests and trials stronger than before. That’s the America we were on 9/11 and in the days that followed. That’s the America we can and must always be.”
– Pres. Barack Obama, USA Today, Sept. 8, 2011

Ten year have passed since the Islamist attacks on the United States of America; attacks that killed 2,977 people in New York, Washington, DC and Shanksville, PA. Since that time we have routed the Taliban from their haven in Afghanistan, dispatched Osama bin Laden to the icy deep and lopped off many of the heads of the Islamist terror hydra. We have grown as a people to better understand the dysfunctional relationship that the Islamic theo-political dogma has with Western Culture. And we have done our best to attain closure, for ourselves, for our society and for our country.

But closure can be hard to attain when there are no bodies to bury and no pointed victory over a vanquished foe. And when closure alludes because of unresolved issues we must always re-examine the event; the moment; the realities.

At the ten year mark, an American president is foolishly stopping short of succeeding in a generational conflict with fundamentalist Islamists…or radical Islamists…or jihadists, you pick the politically correct term the Progressive-Left elitists are sanctioning as appropriate this week. To me, they are the enemy; bloodthirsty ideologues who are committed to ideological conquest by the sword in their quest to establish a global Caliphate existing under the exclusive stricture of Sharia Law. But then, that’s just me…educated on the subject and painfully realistic in my examination. You see, I dispensed with the self-imposed mental handicap of political correctness years ago…and I feel a lot better for having done so. I also see things a lot clearer without the fog of stupidity clouding every issue.

At the ten year mark, a secularist New York Mayor – along with the Progressive elites of his ilk – is advocating for the construction of a victory mosque within the footprint of the fallen World Trade Center. New York’s Mayor Bloomberg, about as self-righteous as they come, is so certain that a “kumbaya” inclusionist approach to fundamentalist Islam will heal the rift between cultures that he refuses to examine the Islamic traditions of conquest; traditions that include building great mosques over conquered lands and, in particular, conquered religious properties. One need only understand that mosques now stand over holy places meaningful to religions that existed long before Muhammad or the theo-political creed that is Islam, established in 610 A.D., to validate this reality.

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Ten years ago at this exact time I was standing in my pajamas in my living room with tears streaming down my face, my hair a wreck. I was a 21-year-old newlywed and mother. My months-old infant sat in a bouncy seat, fascinated by his fists. My sobs startled him; he jolted in his seat, looked for my face, smiled and cooed, which made me cry harder.

The dichotomy of such innocence in my living room and the terror and evil unfolding on my television broke me in ways that I will never be able to explain. I wept for every single person as though they were cherished members of my own family. I wanted to reach through the television to make it stop, to catch the people jumping and falling with my hands.

As the second tower fell, the realization of what our country faced and what we would have to do as a nation hit me.

I had identified myself as a liberal my entire life, until this day. I had an early midlife crisis when I was around 19 years-old, when I began to think that I didn’t actually believe in the principles with which I was raised. I was raised by a very big southern Democrat union family. I was indoctrinated by years of pop-culture, educational bias, and family mantra. It was the only way. I did not vote for George W. Bush. I supported Gore. Even as I began to shed the beliefs of a Democrat, one thing remained: I still felt that America had a problem with the “military complex.” The only reason people were hostile to us, I surmised, was because they were intimidated by our military. I thought Bush was representative of this and it was the reason I didn’t support him.

That belief was blown to hell on 9/11.

“Thank God George Bush is president,” I blurted out in the middle of a furious sob. My husband, who was born wearing a Reagan shirt, looked at me with wide-eyed wonderment.

How foolish I had been.

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I chose to commemorate the tenth anniversary of 9/11 by running throughout Manhattan, on a 14-mile route that took me from the East Village down to Ground Zero, up to the Central Park Reservoir, and back down through Midtown.

The day started with a brilliant blue sky, almost like the sky of that Tuesday ten years ago. The flags on the Brooklyn Bridge were at half-mast in the early morning.

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My memories of September 11, 2001 are likely little different than those of so many others. Thankfully, no one I knew died in those attacks, but I mourned just the same; and in that way one can ever truly recover from such a thing, I still do and always will mourn.

Ten years on, my emotions have evolved, however. Because for ten years I’ve watched the Left, much of Hollywood and almost all of the news media turn against our country for mercenary, partisan political reasons. And none of this surprised me. In the aftermath of the atrocity as solemn celebrities hosted benefit concerts and Democrats sang “God Bless America” on the Capitol steps, I knew it wouldn’t last and that over time they would become America’s enemy within in the fight to protect herself. I never even took a moment to hope I was wrong. Why waste the energy.

If you recall, we had seen it all before. We saw it when after spending years undermining a war of liberation with the Killing Fields of Cambodia as a direct result, the Left never once stopped to second guess themselves.

With great pride I watched my cousin Kyle join the military when the war was at its ugliest and just last week my grandson Mikey left boot camp and started his hazmat training with National Guard. With horror I’ve watched the Left use every dishonest trick and tool at their disposal to make their jobs harder.

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On September 11, 2001, I was a left-wing freelance journalist spending a few days in the African ghetto of inner city Johannesburg as an escape from the previous week of antisemitic mayhem at the UN World Conference Against Racism in Durban, South Africa.

I walked into a Bollywood movie at a crowded shopping center at 3 p.m.–which was 9 a.m. in New York–and when I emerged three hours later, I was completely alone.

Two memories from the aftermath stand out for me. First, the way my Muslim landlady and neighbors in a working-class neighborhood in Cape Town made a special effort to tell me how appalled they were at what had happened to America.

The Malay Quarter, Cape Town

Second, the way elite journalists and intellectuals in the international press actually celebrated the 9/11 atrocity, while offering formal condemnations of terror “in all its forms.” (more…)

9/11…A tragic day when Islamic terrorists from Al Qaeda hijacked commercial jets and used them to destroy the WTC, hit the Pentagon and crashed another hijacked plane in Shanksville, PA. 3,000 innocent lives, Americans and foreigners of all sizes, colors, languages, religions, were killed that day. All Americans were shocked, mortified, caught completely off guard. Around the world, some mourned, others cheered.

9/11…We all remember what it is and what happened, and we vowed to never forget it. But the true meaning of NEVER FORGET is not to forget what 9/11 means, to our nation and to free people around the world and to never forget our mission. I have never actually tried to put together “what it means” in its totality and scope because the far reaching impact it had on my life and where I was in my life at the time.  I liken it to being asked “What was BUDS like?” or “What’s it like to be a Navy SEAL?”

These questions are just unanswerable in a sitting.  They will usually elicit a response of “Really?” or “You will have to come up with some better questions than that.”  My quick and ready answer is the first line of a Dickens book “It was the best of times, it was the worst of times.”  Then I just walk away.

9/11…It ripped me to the core — being that I grew up not forty miles away in — Upstate New Jersey and had some people that I knew in there as most of us in the area did.  Plus, growing up in New Jersey, you were used to seeing New York City on the horizon when we would climb to the top of the Mountain behind my house.  I used to visit my grandparents and cousins that lived out on Remsen and we would see the towers as we would go by on the GWB past Yankee Stadium.  We would sometimes go into the city and go to the towers to ride in the elevators and jump when it got to the top and you would almost slam into the ceiling or to feel almost weightless as you would plummet so fast.  Those buildings were HUGE!!! You may have seen them on TV but until you have seen them up close and personal you don’t get the full scope of what happened there.

About 4 days before 9/11, in 2001, I was a young Navy SEAL and had just graduated from SQT, which is the last hurdle to get through before reporting to your assigned Team or Platoon.  I was happy and excited to be a Frogman and there wasn’t a care in the world for me. Like firemen, you don’t wish for people to get into accidents or for their houses to get burnt down but you want to get out there and play in the big game being that you are finally in the Big Leagues.  I wanted to test my skills somewhere in the world and there really wasn’t much going on in the world.  I wanted something to happen in the world so the SEALs can go save somebody or kill some bad guys….. I remember thinking that my generation had nothing to show other than for the advent of the computer and video games, and this was about two before 9/11.  Little did I know the Horror that awaited a nation……. MY NATION!

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On this 10th Anniversary of the September 11th attack on America we’ll hear politicians and pundits wringing their hands over the “tragic events” of that morning. They’ll wonder aloud whether we’ve “learned anything” in these past ten years and whether we’ve achieved the correct level of “tolerance” and “understanding” that is so desperately needed to solve our worlds problems.

From our president we will hear a call to community service and a plea to find volunteer opportunities in our neighborhoods, because, you know… the real message behind 9/11 is to plant a garden at the local welfare office.

What we won’t hear enough of this momentous day is the truth about 9/11. The truth about what happened that day. The truth about why it happened.

The truth is that on September 11, 2001 war was declared on the United States of America. Our ideological opponents on the left (as well as some of the more troubling supporters of Rep. Ron Paul) will tell you that it 9/11 wasn’t an act of war because the perpetrators were not acting on behalf of any nation. As if in some way the fact that our attackers didn’t have a flag on their sleeves while demolishing our financial and military headquarters some how re-defines the act as merely a “crime”.

The liberals and libertarians mired in their denial of the reality of the world we live in are dangerous and must be answered with vigor. 9/11 was not a “criminal act”. And, despite what President Obama might say, we are not in a war against Al Qaeda. By narrowing our focus and pretending that we must only respond against those whose fingerprints can be found on the 9/11 attack is an invitation to our enemies around the world to wage war on us through proxies like Al Qaeda.  A Commander-in-Chief Ron Paul, with his pathetic call for Letters of Marque and Reprisal, would allow enemies like North Korea, Iran and Venezuela to send hundreds of organizations like Al Qaeda toward our skyscrapers all under the protective banner of “rogue criminal act”.

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Looking back over the last 10 years and thinking about where many of us were and how we felt when the towers fell is surreal. These are sad thoughts. But what I find even more saddening is the fact that we have allowed our country to become more and more of a police state over the last 10 years. And apparently, the end is not in site…and will likely only become worse.

When the Department of Homeland Security was launched after 9/11 and the Patriot Act was launched as a bill that would last only 4 years, many freedom loving Americans squabbled. Most turned to those rebels and told them to “shut up,” that it was necessary to protect America. Then we allowed the TSA to militarize our airports and treat us like cattle. Then came the unsecured and blatant violation of personal privacy when travelers data was being collected. And of course the full body pat downs of children and colonoscopies full-body scans.

Oh, but a little before the whole body scan debacle was of course the hush-hush hiring of Ex-Stasi Spy Markus Wolf by the DHS. Who better to know how to teach the government how to spy on its own citizens and invoke citizen to citizen tattle telling than an ex-East German communist?

Is it any surprise that in the years following Wolf’s tenure as a consultant to DHS prior to his death we have now seen programs develop out of DHS that include the government asking its citizens to report on their neighbors, and the institution of a secret police force called “Viper Team”. It’s rumored they great each other with a hearty, “Shield and sword!”

Don’t forget the vans with X-ray patrolling our streets as well…

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I’ll be covering the tenth anniversary of 9/11 from New York.

Thursday, the “Tribute of Light” was illuminated at Ground Zero.

Amidst the political chatter, its twin beams are a reminder of what matters most.

Last week, Barack Obama declared that September 11 is a day of service, and encouraged everyone to get in on it: “There are so many ways to get involved,” he said, “and every American can do something.” He added: “Even the smallest act of service, the simplest act of kindness, is a way to honor those we lost; a way to reclaim that spirit of unity that followed 9/11.”

True to his authoritarian leanings, Obama isn’t just hoping Americans get involved in this, either. Now schoolchildren are being indoctrinated, too.

Organizers of the 9/11 Day of Service and Remembrance and the educational organization Scholastic announced Monday that they were partnering in a new educational program that they said was “designed to help America’s children learn about 9/11 in a constructive, nonthreatening way and inspire them to participate in the 9/11 Day Observance through good deeds and charitable service.”

In a press release, the 9/11 Day of Service and Remembrance and Scholastic stated that “MyGoodDeed, a leading 9/11 nonprofit organization, and HandsOn Network, the volunteer activation division of Points of Light Institute, are co-leading the national effort to organize the single largest day of charitable service in U.S. history in observance of the 10-year anniversary of 9/11 in tribute to the victims and survivors, and the many who heroically rose in service in response to the tragedy.”

The calls for service on September 11 are inappropriate and sacrilegious. September 11 is a national day of mourning. It should not be a day of service, but of remembrance for those who died in a surprise military strike against the United States of America conducted by the military wing of the global jihad, resulting in the largest loss of life from domestic terrorism in American history.

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Talking points. Anyone standing in front of a group of people, representing an organization or focused message has ‘em, just in case the person speaking decides to veer off topic and start discussing the lunch that gave him heartburn.

Yeah, most of us see the need for ‘em.

But when our own government sends out a list of  9/11 talking points in order to curb and dilute the message of this terrible sacred day, it shows how far gone this administration really is when it comes to knowing the pulse and sentiments of its people.

According to a the New York Times report, the adminstration said its goal in issuing 9/11 talking points is to “present a positive, forward-looking narrative.”

“As we commemorate the citizens of over 90 countries who perished in the 9/11 attacks, we honor all victims of terrorism in every nation around the world. We honor and celebrate the resilience of individuals, families and communities on every continent, whether in New York or Nairobi, Bali or Belfast, Mumbai or Manila, or Lahore or London,” the guidelines state.

We all understand people of many different nationalities perished on 9/11. We also understand the global impact of 9/11 and how it changed the face of terrorism in the world. Suddenly, we were all acutely aware of the danger out there – the fact we, as Americans were being targeted and hated as a country for our beliefs in freedom, independence and liberty. So, to globalize the 10th anniversary into a memorial to victims of terrorism around the world seems to demean the significance and importance of this one, very real event in America’s history.

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