During last night's second nationally televised debate between Sens. Barack Obama and John McCain, Obama brought up a point he has mentioned previously regarding President Bush's response to the 9/11 tragedy. In the weeks and months following our nation's deadliest terrorist attack, Obama says, Bush failed to respond in a serious and appropriate manner, telling people instead to (paraphrasing) "just to go shopping".
The senator's implication here is that the President was trying to get people to ignore the problem. In this case, Obama is wrong. I remember when Bush said it and why.
Two major industries were in danger of collapsing as a direct result of the events of September 11, 2001. Retail sales were approaching record lows. Our economy was in the early stages of implosion. And our level of confidence in our security as American citizens had never been thinner. In short, we were a country teeming with paranoia. What we could never have imagined had just occurred. If the twin towers of the World Trade Center could be brought down with $40,000 and a dozen carpet knives, anything can happen. We were all vulnerable.
I spent the 2001 Thanksgiving holiday with my brother in Minneapolis. I remember shopping in the Mall of America that Friday when a horrific vision occurred to me: I was in the nation's largest shopping mall during the biggest shopping day of the year. I looked around the central atrium and thought to myself, what system do we have in here to prevent someone from walking in with a suitcase full of explosives, setting it in the central plaza and calmly walking away, seconds before the devastating explosion that would effectively change retail shopping in our nation forever?
Our economy depended on our ability to continue living, eating and shopping as we had done before 9/11. We needed to be told not only that we needed to trust our national security and go about our day-to-day lives, but that it was our patriotic duty to do so. This was precisely the context of George Bush's message to the nation.
So, on this topic--this lone, single point--Bush did the right thing. Now if you'll excuse me, there's a beautiful sunset I'd like to watch. And yes, my sky is the same color as yours.
