Another 9/11 has come and gone - 22 years and counting beyond the biggest terrorist attack on American soil and by far the biggest loss of civilian life our nation has endured at the hands of a foreign enemy.
As usual, I changed my facebook cover and profile pictures to the appropriate images, see below, and pondered posting a passive aggressive statement about the evils of radicals but never got around to it.
I find myself, as each one of these anniversaries pass, feeling less and less angry about external enemies and more and more anxious (and yes, also angry) about internal ones.
Increasingly, I'm oddly nostalgic for a time when it was clear who the bad guys were, even though there were still plenty of Americans who waffled on this plain truth. A solid majoirty of us knew absolutely that the USA is the beacon of freedom to the world and stands in stark contrast to zealots who would eagerly cut our throats if given half a chance.
Yes, those were the good old days. Bad was bad, and we were good. Criminals could be dastardly, but criminals went to jail. The odd weirdo at work might grumble at George W. Bush, but it was comforting to know that he could do that because he knew he was safe and protected by the greatest forces for good on the planet.
In hindsight, I myself was wrong in supporting the Gulf War and the invasion of Iraq, not because those missions were incorrect but because we faltered in our plan and in our execution and ended up spending an obscene amount of blood and treasure for no reason.
But I, and hundreds of millions of Americans and westerners were correct and righteous in our opposition to al-qaeda, hamas, isis, take your pick of the barbaric savages. A twisted religion that extols the subjugation of women and children is as in your face evil as it gets.
Today - isis is in ruins, the Islamic jihads still linger, but the regimes are in tatters and it's been over two decades without any attacks remotely resembling what we endured on that Tuesday morning barely a year into the new millenium.
Knowing this, I confess, "The War on Terror" is now far from my mind. I do get reminded on 9/11 that it still exists and we should be vigilant of course - but far greater concerns weigh on my mind about another enemy that now is growing in our midst.
Exhibit A -
Reading this just makes my stomach hurt.
It was posted on Facebook by the Burbank Police Department. It has to do with how the prosecutorial offices of LA County are going to enforce the law. Long story short, they are basically not going to, at all, in any meaningful manner.
It's this kind of document that makes me long for days like September 12, 2001 - when we were united as a country and could see plainly what evil looked like.
Today the water is muddy and people talk in doublespeak.
Law and Order has been replaced with "fairness and equity" - meaning depending on where you are in the intersectional hierarchy of race, sexual preference or gender spectrum, you will be treated differently under the law. If you rank high, you likely won't serve any jail time for anything up to and beyond gun crimes, sexual assault, crimes against children and the elderly.
If you rank low, you are expected to fall in line and comply with any and all capricious mandates handed down. From masks, to jabs, to surrendering your appliances and gas powered vehicles.
You will also obey language mandates and compelled speech. You will be censored if you get out of line, you will be civilly and criminally charged if you "misgender" or commit "hate speech" - a double standard that is murkily defined and used only against American citizens who don't fall into step with the woke mind virus.
It is truly an upsetting time, I never in my wildest dreams thought that I would be facing enemies in my own country.
I couldn't have conceived that my beloved FBI, an organization I wanted to join all through my teenage and college years, would become as corrupt and infested with marxism as any leftist college organization.
I would never thought it possible that the Department of Justice would be weaponized at the behest of the president against political opponents.
And most of all, my younger self would've been completely heartbroken that the greatest heroes of all, the US Military, would also fall victim to a bizarre cult of racialist nonsense and radical gender ideology.
All branches of the military today are falling drastically short of their recruitment goals. Three, four and even five generation military families are telling their youngest members to not follow in their ancestors footsteps. These God fearing brave men and women wouldn't be caught dead joining todays service. It's full of mentally ill sycophants who are more concerned with pronouns than they are with keeping their country safe and free.
So yes, the memories I have of 9/11 and what followed are indeed melancholy. But not at the thought of the attack itself and our response.
A great evil arose, and though our response was imperfect (and in the end deeply flawed) - it was unified. We all stepped up to the challenge and faced down our enemies. We were joined together, heart and soul, as Americans - first and foremost.
Today, we have not just lost September 12 and all that it meant - we have lost our grasp on reality.
We have professors shaming white students and humiliating black students.
We have employees being fired for not apologizing or accepting their victimhood.
We have schools who want to keep secrets with kids away from the parents.
We have government officials in California who want to pay reparations to random black people in a state that was never under slavery.
We have women's prisons full of men who are convicted rapists.
We have porn in elementary school libraries, and people opposed to this are called nazi book banners.
And now, in LA County we have decided to return to cashless bail - because that has worked out so well for New York City, San Francisco, Portland and Seattle.
It's a bleak situation.
But I still hold out hope. Already, things have been turning with a lot of my liberal friends. Not all of them, but many of them, are slowly waking up to the truth that they have been duped.
It may not be enough in the end, but I am grateful for those of my friends who - even if they won't admit it out loud, understand that they were wrong about a lot.
Look, I've been wrong about stuff too. I supported W. Bush and his awful war. I wore my mask outside when the pandemic first hit. I was excited to get the covid vaccine. I thought Disney was a great company for a long time after they had already been putting out woke garbage.
But I admit I was wrong on all of that, and probably more.
Will I ever hear from my friends that the covid lockdowns were incredibly damaging and a total scam and that the highest inflation in half a century along with a record setting surge in crime around this country is a direct result of democrat policies? Probably not.
But I don't need an apology, or even contrition. I just need to hold on to faith that things are going to get better. And I need to pray every day, as I have been for a long time now, that my fellow Americans will extricate themselves from this poisonous ideology that has them enabling and allowing all of these catastrophes.
I would ask that you pray with me in this as well.
Pray for a return to seeing a color-blind society as an ideal to aim for.
Pray for the return of a true meritocracy to our land, where the best and the brightest are rewarded and the lazy and selfish are incentivized against these impulses.
Pray for our military, that they will find leaders with the courage to stand against intersectional pablum and be worthy of leading the next generation.
Pray for sanity in our local leaders and a return to anti-crime policies that worked. Stop and frisk, broken window enforcement and mandatory long sentences for criminal behavior.
Pray for the courage of our local leaders to have zero tolerance for camping on the street, the garbage that results as well as open air drug use, defacation/urination and fornication.
Pray for all of that and more - and a return to the mentality of September 12, 2001.
Bring moral clarity to the confused and bring God into the lives of the people who need Him most.
In His name I pray. God bless all of us in our struggle.
Amen.
