Monday, March 11, 2002

I know I could turn the t.v. off, and not get this constant feed of rememberances. Some is not well done, too often the new pat phrases like "the day everything changed" which, well, says nothing at all. Clearly, some things changed, and things are still changing, and they have affected us very very differently. The obvious - those in closest proximity, physically and emotionally are affected most. Last night's show, 9/11 was good, which I wouldn't have expected otherwise. I hadn't known the focus of the story beforehand, but once it was on, I remembered the whole coincidence of the French filmmakers who were following a young fireman from his first days on the job. The only real criticism I had of the show was the brief appearance at the onset of Tom Ridgeland, the "Homeland Security" guy - which I felt was really a creepy political move - "we're working on it, folks" which just made me extremely angry about them not working on "it" before 9-11.

But I do think people are returning to a healthy cynicism about their government, while retaining that feeling of awe, and appreciation, for the "regular joes", the underpaid cops, firemen, emt folks (is their a shorthand name for them?), etc. I still wonder what it was like to work for the FBI, as an agent, who was stuck several years ago looking into Clinton's sex habits, while so few were put on the case of following up on the WTC truck bombing back in '93, and tracking what those folks might be planning next. How disillusioning is that? Signing up to fight the "bad guys", screwing around with Linda Tripp and that whole crew, while this whole thing was being planned. I really wish one of those agents who were on that detail had the balls to come out in public and say "I can't fucking believe they made me do that bullshit, while I might've been able to help prevent this!"