As a journalist, it can be difficult to remain levelheaded when a huge story breaks.
It takes consciousness and courage to resist being swept up in the frenzy of the media pack. There was far too little of both qualities on display in the aftermath of Osama bin Laden’s death during a U.S. forces raid.
Television commentators cheered reports that U.S. forces had killed the principal target in the global war on terror. Only the pompoms were missing.
Taking their cues, young people showed up at midnight outside the White House to celebrate the al-Qaida leader’s death. There were other similar spontaneous gatherings around the country in a disturbing, misguided surge of patriotism.
The week that President Barack Obama announced the news, I was traveling in the Washington, D.C.-Virginia area, New York City and Boston — three of the four Sept. 11 crime scenes. It was an emotional time to be returning to New York City. I lived there when bin Laden’s foot soldiers flew two planes into the World Trade Center. My neighbor, a sweet and generous man named Lawrence Virgilio, was one of the firefighters killed when the towers collapsed. Friends and colleagues lost loved ones.
I am relieved that bin Laden, who had bragged about masterminding the deaths of so many people, will never be able to harm anyone else. I also applaud the courageous U.S. forces who risked their lives in the daring raid on bin Laden’s hiding place in Pakistan. But I don’t rejoice in the violent death of another human being — regardless of what he has done.
I didn’t find anyone in New York popping open the champagne, either. The mood was somber rather than celebratory.
An acquaintance whose mother perished in one of the towers said she felt a sense of “balance.”
Yet the unexpected news also reopened a flood of painful memories on the eve of the 10th anniversary of Sept. 11. She now wonders how she will explain the events to her young son who was just a toddler back in 2001.
This is not a simple story of good guys and bad guys that can be wrapped up at the end in a nice, neat little bow by tossing around pat words like “closure” and “justice.”
The main target of the global war on terror may be dead. Yet his legacy is very much alive.
The question is, how can we as a nation begin to undo some of the damage resulting from that terrible day?
In so many ways, our lives have been changed by a global war on terror inspired by bin Laden.
We must practically strip nowadays to get on an airplane thanks to terrorists with bombs in their tennis shoes and underpants.
The Patriot Act, the controversial anti-terrorism law which was supposed to be a temporary tool to help intelligence gathering agencies, has been in place for a decade now.
Since bin Laden’s killing, some members of Congress have called for a re-examination of certain Patriot Act provisions — arguing that the invasive surveillance techniques have trampled individual civil liberties.
A whole new giant government bureaucracy called the Department of Homeland Security was created. Education, transportation and social programs may be getting the ax. But Homeland Security will see an increase in its budget to $44 billion.
The fight against bin Laden’s global terror network led us into wars in Afghanistan and Iraq that have claimed the lives of thousands of American soldiers and Iraqis. These wars have further sapped hundreds of billions of dollars from our national treasury and are a major contributor to our current economic crisis.
The United States invaded Afghanistan in search of bin Laden.
We can only pray that his death helps to hasten the withdrawal of U.S. troops, that our brave men and women soldiers will finally be able to come home.
That would be cause for celebration.
Contact Tammerlin Drummond at tdrummond@bayareanewsgroup.com.
