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> >>
> >> From the Miami Herald
> >>Published Wednesday, September 12, 2001
> >>
> >>We'll go forward from this moment
> >>Leonard Pitts Jr.
> >>
> >>We'll go forward from this moment. It's my job to have something to
> >>say. They pay me to provide words that help make sense of that which
> >>troubles the American soul. But in this moment of airless shock when hot
> >>tears sting disbelieving eyes, the only
> >>thing I can find to say, the only words that seem to fit, must be
> >>addressed to the unknown author of this suffering.
> >>
> >>You monster. You beast. You unspeakable bastard.
> >>
> >>What lesson did you hope to teach us by your coward's attack on our
> >>World Trade Center, our Pentagon, us? What was it you hoped we would
> >>learn? Whatever it was, please know that you failed.
> >>
> >>Did you want us to respect your cause? You just damned your cause.
> >>
> >>Did you want to make us fear? You just steeled our resolve.
> >>
> >>Did you want to tear us apart? You just brought us together.
> >>
> >>Let me tell you about my people. We are a vast and quarrelsome family, a
> >>family bent by racial, social, political and class division, but a
> >>family nonetheless. We're frivolous, yes, capable of expending
> >>tremendous emotional energy on pop cultural
> >>minutiae -- a singer's revealing dress, a ball team's misfortune, a
> >>cartoon mouse. We're wealthy, too, spoiled
> >>by the ready availability of trinkets and material goods, and maybe
> >>because of that, we walk through life with a certain sense of blithe
> >>entitlement. We are fundamentally decent, though -- peace-loving and
> >>compassionate. We struggle to know the right
> >>thing and to do it. And we are, the overwhelming majority of us, people
> >>of faith, believers in a just and loving God.
> >>
> >>Some people -- you, perhaps -- think that any or all of this makes us
> >>weak. You're mistaken. We are not weak. Indeed, we are strong in ways
> >>that cannot be measured by arsenals.
> >>
> >>
> >>IN PAIN
> >>Yes, we're in pain now. We are in mourning and we are in shock. We're
> >>still grappling with the unreality of the awful thing you did, still
> >>working to make ourselves understand that this isn't a special effect
> >>from some Hollywood blockbuster, isn't the plot
> >>development from a Tom Clancy novel. Both in terms of the awful scope of
> >>their ambition and the probable final death toll, your attacks are
> >>likely to go down as the worst acts of terrorism in the history of the
> >>United States and, probably, the history
> >>of the world. You've bloodied us as we have never been bloodied before.
> >>
> >>But there's a gulf of difference between making us bloody and making us
> >>fall. This is the lesson Japan was taught to its bitter sorrow the last
> >>time anyone hit us this hard, the last time anyone brought us such
> >>abrupt and monumental pain. When roused, we
> >>are righteous in our outrage, terrible in our force. When provoked by
> >>this level of barbarism, we will bear any suffering, pay any cost, go to
> >>any length, in the pursuit of justice.
> >>
> >>I tell you this without fear of contradiction. I know my people, as you,
> >>I think, do not. What I know reassures me. It also causes me to tremble
> >>with dread of the future.
> >>
> >>In the days to come, there will be recrimination and accusation, fingers
> >>pointing to determine whose failure allowed this to happen and what can
> >>be done to prevent it from happening again. There will be heightened
> >>security, misguided talk of revoking basic freedoms. We'll go forward
> >>from this moment sobered, chastened, sad. But determined, too.
> >>Unimaginably determined.
> >>
> >>
> >>THE STEEL IN US
> >>You see, the steel in us is not always readily apparent. That aspect of
> >>our character is seldom understood by people who don't know us well. On
> >>this day, the family's bickering is put on hold.
> >>
> >>As Americans we will weep, as Americans we will mourn, and as Americans,
> >>we will rise in defense of all that we cherish.
> >>
> >>So I ask again: What was it you hoped to teach us? It occurs to me that
> >>maybe you just wanted us to know the depths of your hatred. If that's
> >>the case, consider the message received. And take this message in
> >>exchange: You don't know my people. You don't
> >>know what we're capable of. You don't know what you just started.
> >>
> >>BUT YOU'RE ABOUT TO LEARN.
> >
> >
>
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