9/11 coverage

We’ve heard an awful lot about the terrible events of September 11, 2001 during the past week.  And it really was a terrible thing. An unprovoked, unnecessary, and unjustified attack on innocent civilians resulting in nearly 3,000 deaths. And for what? An ideal? To make a point? Or was it revenge?  Whatever the reason, it wasn’t enough to justify taking the lives, in so cruel a fashion, of people who could have had no part in affecting the lives of the murderers.

And the legacy of that action?   An unprovoked, unnecessary, and unjustified attack on Iraq resulting in over 100,000 innocent civilian deaths. Civilians who could have had no part in affecting the lives of their murderers. And for what? An ideal? To make a point? Or was it revenge?

It makes me wonder if all the coverage of what happened in New York was misguided. Maybe a lot more tears should be shed over the 100,000.  Maybe the real terrorists are on this side of the ocean, because, after all, isn’t any unprovoked attack on innocent civilians a terrorist attack? And can’t we measure the magnitude of the atrocity by the number of dead? 

If someone who murders 3,000 is a terrorist, then what do you call one who murders a 100,000?