9/11

And There You Have It

According to a GlobeScan BBC poll the world wants Obama to be president:

 “US Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama may be struggling to nudge ahead of his Republican rival in polls at home, but people across the world want him in the White House, a BBC poll said.

 All 22 countries covered in the poll would prefer to see Senator Obama elected US president ahead of Republican John McCain.

 In 17 of the 22 nations, people expect relations between the US and the rest of the world to improve if Senator Obama wins.

 More than 22,000 people were questioned by pollster GlobeScan in countries ranging from Australia to India and across Africa, Europe and South America.

 The margin in favour of Senator Obama ranged from 9 per cent in India to 82 per cent in Kenya, while an average of 49 per cent across the 22 countries preferred Senator Obama compared with 12 per cent preferring Senator McCain. Some four in 10 did not take a view.”

 And in related news:

 “Seven years after the Sept. 11 attacks, there is no consensus outside the United States that Islamist militants from al Qaeda were responsible, according to an international poll published Wednesday.

 The survey of 16,063 people in 17 nations found majorities in only nine countries believe al Qaeda was behind the attacks on New York and Washington that killed about 3,000 people in 2001.

 U.S. officials squarely blame al Qaeda, whose leader Osama bin Laden has boasted of organizing the suicide attacks by his followers using hijacked commercial airliners.

 On average, 46 percent of those surveyed said al Qaeda was responsible, 15 percent said the U.S. government, 7 percent said Israel and 7 percent said some other perpetrator. One in four people said they did not know who was behind the attacks.”

 I simply can not come up with a better reason to stop paying attention to what the rest of the world thinks. This stuff just writes itself.

What a bunch of maroons.

Let's Row?

Mark Steyn provides an update on the efforts to build a pathetic memorial to the Flight 93 passengers:

"Five and a half years on, the only good news on the 9/11 memorials is that they're not (yet) Islamic Education Centers funded by Saudi princes. Nonetheless, Jonathan V Last's account of the Flight 93 memorial's "progress" makes very sobering reading. A combination of bureaucratic process and our contemporary culture's default mode of tasteful passivity has brought about something that's more or less the precise opposite of what Flight 93 embodies:

Part of the Bowl is designated "Wetlands": "The area will be its own kind of healing landscape, as it will be a habitat full of life. . . . Here visitors will be most aware of continuously connected living systems as the circular path literally bridges the hydrology of the Bowl."

The architects proclaimed that their plan was for a "living memorial" that "offers the visitor space for reflection, learning, social interaction, and healing."

All that plus wind chimes. A true Flight 93 memorial would honor courage, action and improvisation, but reflection, healing and wetlands are the best we can manage. Go to any Civil War memorial on any New England common, and marvel at how they managed to honor their dead without wetlands and wind chimes."

The Flight 93 passengers epitomized the national characteristics to which we used to aspire. When they recognized the dangerous situation they were in the passengers organized and attacked the hijackers in an attempt to save not only themselves but also their fellow countrymen.

Since we, as a nation, seem to be intent on removing anything resembling courage and self reliance from our national character, perhaps would should just raise a single flag pole on the memorial site and fly a white flag from it.