Toward Justice

Toward Justice

By Missy Comley Beattie
Counterpunch.org

Our experiences and what we do with them shape and determine our trajectory. Often, they change us gradually; sometimes, they are immediately life altering. So much so that months, even years later, a thought, a song, even an aroma can transport us, abruptly, into the past. Some events are wonderful. Others are brutal.

The phone call from my sister, telling me that Chase was killed in Iraq, is among the brutal.

My nephew, Chase Comley, died a little over five years ago. He enlisted in the military because he believed our freedoms were in jeopardy, a message George Bush gaveled into the American psyche after 19 hijackers used planes as weapons to attack US symbols of power on 9/11.

This week, we mark the ninth anniversary of that turning point, the day that invokes images of death and destruction, and the date that heralded our post-9/11 world with its increased militarism/imperialism resulting in more death and destruction, mainstream media failure, the Patriot Act, a surveillance state, torture, indefinite detention, military tribunals, corporatism, economic collapse, and Islamophobia.

I have just watched 9/11 Press for Truth at the urging of Jon Gold, a friend and fellow member of Peace of the Action. Gold has worked diligently to bring justice for 9/11 families.

Less than two minutes into the film, George Bush says: “Today our fellow citizens, our way of life, our very freedom, came under attack.”

Members of the Bush Administration tell us there were no warnings. Condi Rice states: “No one could have imagined them taking a plane, slamming it into the Pentagon … into the World Trade Center, using planes as a missile."

We learn, however, that 14 nations alerted our intelligence agencies to the threats, and that on the eve of the event, Bush stayed at a resort whose roof was mounted with ground-to-air missiles, a safeguard never before taken.

Continued. . .