Courtesy of the Red, White and Blue

Think back to how you felt on September 11, 2001 as you watched the twin towers collapse, killing thousands of Americans. What emotions did you feel? Anger, fear, sadness, vulnerability, disbelief? If you are like the majority of Americans, you felt that innocent civilians had been murdered by extremists and that they had to be punished, and prevented from commiting future attacks.

My friend Mike sent me a song, written on September 12, 2001, that captures how many of us felt that day:

Courtesy of the Red, White and Blue (click here for other formats).

As the song suggests, we have indeed gone out and lit up their world like the 4th of July.

Since that happened, though, for many the memory of 9/11 seems to have grown hazy. In some ways, that's a good thing. It's important that we, as a country, get back to our lives. After all, the terrorists very goal is to disrupt our lives to the point where we are willing to give them whatever they want just to be left alone. In other ways, though, that is very, very bad. There are many people around the world who live in poverty and are led to believe that the best way out is to attack and kill innocents. They have not gone back to their ball games, malls and "reality" TV shows. For them, the only reality they know is minimal living conditions and radical preachings to the effect that the United States and Israel are the root of all of their problems (this may seem a familiar historical pattern to some).

We also forget that some of us are not surfing, shopping and going to the movies. Many Americans are overseas, away from their families, and in harm's way to protect the liberty and freedom that we all enjoy.

Don't forget.

• Don't forget the thousands who have lost their lives to terrorist attacks.


• Don't forget the hundreds of thousands of Americans deployed abroad to protect those at home.


• Don't forget - speaking of the American withdrawl from Somalia, Osama Bin Laden said "Clinton appeared in front of the whole world promising revenge, but these threats were merely a preparation for withdrawal…The extent of your impotence and weakness became very clear." Don't forget - To extremists like bin Laden, to withdraw from conflict is to show a weakness that is to be exploited.

Some people may see "Courtesy of the Red, White and Blue" as a reactionist position to the events of 9/11. While couched in patriotism, which can be used to motivate both noble and vile acts, the message is nevertheless dead-on: As a free society, we cannot tolerate people or groups who kill innocent Americans to obtain their political goals. We cannot tolerate regimes that support such groups. We cannot leave countries like Afghanistan and Iraq who would become breeding grounds for extremists until the people there are able to provide for their own security.

Just before leaving for Basic Training, Mike sent me this song to wrap up this blog post...

Have you forgotten?

Remember.