Bomb them with flowers
I remember clearly what I was doing on September 11, 2001 - who doesn't? An ordinary morning of a beautiful Chicago day was lazily unfolding when one of my roommates shouted upstairs to me, "Planes crashed into two buildings in New York." Then the part about suspected terrorism was added. My very first thought - "Wow, the Greens have gone too far this time." Seriously. Not even a hint of possible Middle Eastern retribution crossed my mind. Nor did it occur to me that the Bush administration was somehow at least indirectly involved in enabling these attacks which, by the way, I happen to believe.
In the uncertain weeks that followed, the nation was wondering what our President was going to do. It didn't take me as long to decide what I would have done had I been in Bush's shoes:
I would have loaded up a sizable fleet of our aircraft with a huge payload of flowers and humanitarian aid, and then dropped/parachuted these into Afghanistan - the hiding place of Osama bin Laden. That's right, I would have "bombed" them with flowers. And I had posted this plan on the now-defunct website Gaia, a plan that was met with universal derision at the time.
But think about it.
Had the United States responded in such an atypical and unexpected fashion, we wouldn't have invaded Afghanistan and Iraq. We wouldn't have created millions of terrorist sympathizers due to our overkill. There wouldn't have been the resulting scandals at Abu Ghraib and Guantanamo. And we would have been spared the infamous White House torture memos.
Not on my watch, had I been President.
The whole world expected President Bush to do something - the words "shock and awe" coming to mind. Politically, I suppose he had to strike the pose of one of the terrible horsemen of the Apocalypse - at least to get his base behind him. At most? To get us to spend a lot of money for "defense" and reduce our civil liberties. Nothing gets a nation behind you faster than a state of war. Duly noted - and the rest was history.
I dispute those who claim that our massive retaliation was worth it. We lost Iraq, though the final nails haven't been driven into that coffin quite yet. We will lose Afghanistan shortly after we pull out in 2014. That loss will happen more quickly than in Vietnam after we withdrew our combat forces there. It's funny, though, isn't it? Nobody talks about Vietnam much any more. We have a way of moving on, for better or worse.
My decision to bomb them with flowers didn't have anything to do with turning the other cheek. I am a Buddhist, not a Christian, so I would have apologized for our role in whatever motivated those who destroyed the World Trade Center buildings. A friend of mine responded to that with, "I don't want to hear anything about how any of this was our fault." The problem is - a large part of this was our fault. Our actions - for instance, the CIA-backed coup in Iran in 1953 - had consequences. Not to mention: our blind obedience to Israel surely didn't go unnoticed by the Muslim man in the street. And there were other transgressions - I know the litany.
It takes a certain bigness of spirit to apologize - and to show restraint. When the puny little guy feebly kicks a bully on the playground, for no reason apparent at the time, onlookers expect some kind of reaction. Usually, the other kids encircle these two, expecting (yea, encouraging) a fight. But those spectators would quickly sicken to watch the bully mercilessly pound the weakling into the ground in an unfettered, sustained flurry of fists, kicks, eye gouges, and groin kneeings. Not to mention when the bully pulls out an iron pipe and beats the now defenseless kid's head in.
Bombing them with flowers would have been my attempt to show the world another way. The Cold War was over, so the concept of overkill should have died with it. Would my approach have resulted in bin Laden being punished for his deeds? That's a trick question, since I believe he would have been punished - though perhaps only in a future incarnation due to the merciless machinations of karma - even if we never got our hands on him. But even if the US had managed to put him on trial and found him guilty, I would have issued a presidential order that he not be executed.
No! I do not believe in the death penalty under any circumstances.
In fact, I wouldn't have even cared if we didn't managed to kill or capture bin Laden. I know, I know. The blood of 3,000 Americans must be avenged, or so say the multitude. But even better? Making a holy gesture that could go a long way toward assuring that far more lives - including those of innocent civilians we would end up calling "collateral damage" - wouldn't be lost.
Anyway, it was a thought.
I don't favor such an Order that is corporate- or elitist- centric. Nor one that favors national sovereignties. I believe the path to an ideal NWO lies in the concept of Cross-Sectional Representation as a governance model (see Footnote One). And that would involve integration of the world's militaries under one command that doesn't owe allegiance to any particular nation state.
The following quotes are all from:In the uncertain weeks that followed, the nation was wondering what our President was going to do. It didn't take me as long to decide what I would have done had I been in Bush's shoes:
I would have loaded up a sizable fleet of our aircraft with a huge payload of flowers and humanitarian aid, and then dropped/parachuted these into Afghanistan - the hiding place of Osama bin Laden. That's right, I would have "bombed" them with flowers. And I had posted this plan on the now-defunct website Gaia, a plan that was met with universal derision at the time.
But think about it.
Had the United States responded in such an atypical and unexpected fashion, we wouldn't have invaded Afghanistan and Iraq. We wouldn't have created millions of terrorist sympathizers due to our overkill. There wouldn't have been the resulting scandals at Abu Ghraib and Guantanamo. And we would have been spared the infamous White House torture memos.
Not on my watch, had I been President.
The whole world expected President Bush to do something - the words "shock and awe" coming to mind. Politically, I suppose he had to strike the pose of one of the terrible horsemen of the Apocalypse - at least to get his base behind him. At most? To get us to spend a lot of money for "defense" and reduce our civil liberties. Nothing gets a nation behind you faster than a state of war. Duly noted - and the rest was history.
I dispute those who claim that our massive retaliation was worth it. We lost Iraq, though the final nails haven't been driven into that coffin quite yet. We will lose Afghanistan shortly after we pull out in 2014. That loss will happen more quickly than in Vietnam after we withdrew our combat forces there. It's funny, though, isn't it? Nobody talks about Vietnam much any more. We have a way of moving on, for better or worse.
My decision to bomb them with flowers didn't have anything to do with turning the other cheek. I am a Buddhist, not a Christian, so I would have apologized for our role in whatever motivated those who destroyed the World Trade Center buildings. A friend of mine responded to that with, "I don't want to hear anything about how any of this was our fault." The problem is - a large part of this was our fault. Our actions - for instance, the CIA-backed coup in Iran in 1953 - had consequences. Not to mention: our blind obedience to Israel surely didn't go unnoticed by the Muslim man in the street. And there were other transgressions - I know the litany.
It takes a certain bigness of spirit to apologize - and to show restraint. When the puny little guy feebly kicks a bully on the playground, for no reason apparent at the time, onlookers expect some kind of reaction. Usually, the other kids encircle these two, expecting (yea, encouraging) a fight. But those spectators would quickly sicken to watch the bully mercilessly pound the weakling into the ground in an unfettered, sustained flurry of fists, kicks, eye gouges, and groin kneeings. Not to mention when the bully pulls out an iron pipe and beats the now defenseless kid's head in.
Bombing them with flowers would have been my attempt to show the world another way. The Cold War was over, so the concept of overkill should have died with it. Would my approach have resulted in bin Laden being punished for his deeds? That's a trick question, since I believe he would have been punished - though perhaps only in a future incarnation due to the merciless machinations of karma - even if we never got our hands on him. But even if the US had managed to put him on trial and found him guilty, I would have issued a presidential order that he not be executed.
No! I do not believe in the death penalty under any circumstances.
In fact, I wouldn't have even cared if we didn't managed to kill or capture bin Laden. I know, I know. The blood of 3,000 Americans must be avenged, or so say the multitude. But even better? Making a holy gesture that could go a long way toward assuring that far more lives - including those of innocent civilians we would end up calling "collateral damage" - wouldn't be lost.
Anyway, it was a thought.
One World, and the One World Trade Center
I was struck by the irony of naming that recently-completed structure "One World Trade Center" instead of, as informally called by many, the "Freedom Tower." We would have done better to move on from the original naming scheme in existence in 2001. Other buildings in the reconstructed WTC complex could be named Heroes' Tower, Free Enterprise Tower, Merciful Place, Hallowed Ground, etc. But, no, we opt to repeat past patterns.
The irony I mentioned lies in stripping away the "Freedom" designation and replacing it with a One World designation. It's the tallest building in the Western hemisphere - with a height of 1776 symbolic feet. But instead of dedicating it to freedom, we dedicated it to the concept of "One World." Many might claim, "Not so, it's only an address - as in 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue." I'm not so sure, especially since the alternative of "Freedom Tower" had been bandied about for so long. Anyway, I can't get over the hubris of having named that complex The World Trade Center over a decade ago.
There are a lot of USA citizens who fear the loss of sovereignty which the New World Order (that is, One World) could potentially bring about. But a lot of that concern has to do with "We don't like anyone telling us what to do." That is, they want us to be in a position to be able to resist any decision which might be good for the rest of the world but which might not be so good for the United States. That's what it really boils down to, although the One World concept is entrenching itself more and more surely as each day passes.
We will have a New World Order one way or another - either directly obvious or indirectly controlling. The real question is, what kind of New World Order do we want?
We will have a New World Order one way or another - either directly obvious or indirectly controlling. The real question is, what kind of New World Order do we want?
I don't favor such an Order that is corporate- or elitist- centric. Nor one that favors national sovereignties. I believe the path to an ideal NWO lies in the concept of Cross-Sectional Representation as a governance model (see Footnote One). And that would involve integration of the world's militaries under one command that doesn't owe allegiance to any particular nation state.
From Wikipedia
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/One_World_Trade_Center .
I intersperse my comments with these quotes.
QUOTE: In 2009, the Port Authority changed the official title of the building from "Freedom Tower" to "One World Trade Center," stating that this name was the "easiest for people to identify with." :UNQUOTE.
COMMENT:
I don't understand how anyone would identify more easily with WTC 1 than Freedom Tower. As far as I'm concerned, the Port Authority symbolically took away our freedom in order to foist upon us their version of One World. The stated reason is a lie; there are reasons behind names - and not always good ones.
QUOTE: After the changes in the design of One World Trade Center's spire were revealed in May 2012, questions have been raised as to whether the 408-foot (124 m) structure will still qualify as a spire and thus be included in the building's official architectural height. As the building's spire is not enclosed in a radome as originally planned, it may instead be classified as a simple antenna which, according to the CTBUH, is not included in a building's official height. :UNQUOTE.
COMMENT:
I don't understand how anyone would identify more easily with WTC 1 than Freedom Tower. As far as I'm concerned, the Port Authority symbolically took away our freedom in order to foist upon us their version of One World. The stated reason is a lie; there are reasons behind names - and not always good ones.
QUOTE: After the changes in the design of One World Trade Center's spire were revealed in May 2012, questions have been raised as to whether the 408-foot (124 m) structure will still qualify as a spire and thus be included in the building's official architectural height. As the building's spire is not enclosed in a radome as originally planned, it may instead be classified as a simple antenna which, according to the CTBUH, is not included in a building's official height. :UNQUOTE.
COMMENT:
RE: The yellowed highlight above.
The Port Authority saved $20 million by not constructing this radome. Which is a paltry savings indeed, given the reported $3.8 billion cost for this new WTC 1. The point? By saving $20 million, the PA ran the very real (and perhaps intended) risk of losing bragging rights that this building is 1776 feet in height - 1776 being the year, of course, when the USA's Declaration of Independence was signed.
QUOTE: Without the inclusion of the antenna mast, One World Trade Center's official height would be its roof height of 1,368 feet (417 m), making it the third-tallest building in the United States, behind the Willis Tower and Trump International Hotel & Tower, both located in Chicago. ... One World Trade Center's developers have disputed the claim that the spire should be reclassified as an antenna following the redesign, with Port Authority spokesman Steve Coleman reiterating that "One World Trade Center will be the tallest building in the Western Hemisphere." The CTBUH announced that it would wait to make its final decision as to whether or not the redesigned spire would count towards the building's official height. :UNQUOTE.
COMMENT:
RE: The yellowed highlight above.
What's to wait for? If the CTBUH decides that the antenna should count, then any reference to 1776 as WTC 1's height becomes a lie. Is that what we want?
That would be about as bad as the lie propagated about Neil Armstrong's first words uttered when he became the first man to stand on the moon. What he actually said - and what the whole world heard - was, "That's one small step for man, one giant leap for mankind." However, instead of admitting his mistake (heaven forbid), he decided to lie, claiming he'd meant to say, "That's one small step for a man...." His "a" allegedly got lost in static. However, anyone listening to this would realize there was no time (static or not) for the "a" to have really been there.
But you know how it goes: If a lie is repeated often enough, it becomes gospel. We've simply got to change our religion in this regard.
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Steven Searle, former candidate for US President (in 2008 and 2012)
Founder of The Independent Contractors' Party
"Why is it that we are so often tempted to lie when, almost invariably, no good comes of it?"
Contact me at bpa_cinc@yahoo.com
Footnote One: Go to this link and scroll down to the heading "The way out: CSR (Cross-Sectional Representation) for a description of CSR, which is also featured on other posts on this blog: http://ind4prez2012.blogspot.com/2011/01/ultimate-peace-candidate.html
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