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Memo Pad

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How To Honor The True Spirit Of 9/11 (First, Ignore Limbaugh)

September 1st, 2011 4:00 am Joe Conason

To Rush Limbaugh and assorted lesser cogs in the right-wing noise machine, that was a deeply controversial statement and an attempt to “politicize” the event — as if the White House had ordered everybody to put on blue caps, join a local Obama for America chapter, and then build a solar house for the poor.

Yes, according to the furious wingers, Obama’s attempt to inspire volunteerism was in fact a barely disguised appeal to “serve the state,” as well as an un-American distraction from what should be, in their minds, a more militaristic commemoration. But leaving aside their usual bizarre theories about the president and his motives, this pseudo-controversy shows how little these so-called conservatives understand what really happened on 9/11, in New York City and then across the country. On that day and the days that followed we saw a demonstration of the highest American values, which are apparently no longer comprehensible to the denizens of the right-wing swamp.

Our traditions of volunteerism and community have distinguished this republic ever since its earliest years — as Alexis de Tocqueville explained back in the 1830s, when he wrote the two volumes known as Democracy in America. In that classic work, he described the uniquely American style of voluntary association and how it made a free society possible. He was no radical, by the way, and would have ridiculed the stupid notion that a presidential call to voluntary service equals socialism.

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  • EvlynSkurow

    Rush believes anything that doesn’t include the ultra conservative side of the GOP is socialism. When will he realize his 15 minutes of fame is over?

  • dld542004

    YOUR 15 minutes of fame is over. Rush is right, again, and he’s been around a long time!
    Get over it.

  • kurt.lorentzen

    This just goes to show you it’s all in the presentation. That’s why it’s so important to consider the story from multiple angles. In this version, “Republicans” (lead byRush Limbaugh) are demeaning Obama because he’s made a call for Americans to honor 9/11 victims by re-affirming service to others. Pretty damning, eh? But from the opposite side, the basis for the criticism is that the real 9/11 victims and heroes are being marginalized by making the memorial about things other than the sacrifice and heroism of responders, and the loss of innocent life 10 years ago. Both sides have a good point – We can use what was learned to honor all who have sacrificed. But a memorial for responders and victims should be about their tragedy. You don’t have a memorial service for Grandpa who served in WWII, and turn it into a VFW event.

  • Jane

    Actually we often do honor the memory of someone by giving to help someone else. After a death families frequently request donations to a favorite charity in lieu of flowers. A friend whose small son was accidentally killed used the money from the settlement for his death to build a playground for other children. People participate in charity events such as the Susan B Koman Race for the Cure to honor the memory of a loved one. Furthermore, one principle often stressed in grief counseling is that one can sublimate that grief by reaching out to help someone else. I can’t think of a better memorial to the many firefighters and other public employees as well as workers in the WTC who ignored their own safety in order to help others than to spend the day helping someone else. I understand that the request to serve others for one day does not fit the agenda of someone whose main principle of living is hatred, but I think it is an excellent idea. Most of our holidays that are supposed to be spent in patriotic events such as Veterans Day, Memorial Day, and the Fourth of July often turn into major shopping days. I see this as a much more patriotic use of one’s time and energy.

  • FranklinWheeler

    Joe today on Hardball you stated that the Arab Spring is the opposite of the actions taken by Bush in Iraq. I contend that your completely wrong. The Arab Spring is a direct result of the war in Iraq.

    Prior to the war in Iraq the citizens of the Arab nations had to live under oppressed governments with little or no reprieve in sight. When our military captured Saddam they didn’t jet him back to Gitmo to try him, they turned the torture-in-chief over to those he had oppressed for decades and allowed the people to try him and ultimately execute him. Prior to this action the only way to overturn a despotic tyrant in the Middle East was by a coup or social uprising.

    When we first went into Iraq the administration with the overwhelming support of the congress and the press and the citizens of this country listed a plethoria of reasons to go into Iraq. Igniting democracy in the middle east was one of the reasons. What better way to begin a democracy than to rid your nation of a tyrant leader through a legal system? For the first time in generations citizens throughout the Arab alley saw that their plight for liberty laid within their own hands.

    your premise that the war was simply a lust for war based on faulty information regarding WMDs is not only simplistic by lacking consideration of all the other reasons to go to war, it is also misleading.