Attention: TDR Forum Junkies 
It was just a year ago that many stood in shock, fear, and anger, as a few men of varying origins took part in a coordinated attack, one that killed people, but who's target was the living.
America is hated by much of the world, partly because we are so prosperous, partly because we don't conform to thier standards, and partly because we are free. All tyrants fear the free. The free, in a world of absolute control, are the "loose cannons" of time. They fail to conform to the plans, to obediently follow the strictures laid out for them. They ruin the plans of those who seek thier own ends at the expense of others. They foil the efforts of those who think they can rule the world.
Today, we are still grappling the magnitude and pervasiveness of the hatred directed our way. We react with disbelief at the apparent desire to kill us. Our minds do not relate to the burning desire to kill that is so strong that it overcomes our own will to live.
But in spite of all this, they failed. They failed to demonstrate thier way is better. They failed to convince the world that good was done by killing us. But what they REALLY failed to do, was to break us. Oh, the naysayers are out there... The exploiters have attempted to take our liberty - or at least try to say that liberty must be sacraficed. They try to say our thinking is wrong - that our freedom, our non-conformity, our refusal to be the rest of the world - is the cause of all the ills that plague our world. But they are wrong. They are wrong because they are weak.
But we are not weak. We aren't even bothered by it all. I know we are strong, because I see we are strong. In the middle of it all, everyday men rushed into the buildings to save others. Ordinary people lined up to give blood. Countless anonymous people who gained nothing by it opened thier hearts and wallets. And we are still strong. In fact, I think we are even stronger. It's no longer out of fashion to fly the flag. It's no longer ridiculed to stand and face the flag with hand over heart and tears in your eyes from the swelling in your heart.
We may have seemed to forget, but then we remembered anew how each of us must determine to live as individuals. Not just exist, but LIVE. To exercise our freedom, our rights, and our obligations to care for each other on a personal level and reach out our own hand toward our neighbor.
And on this day of remembering, let us no longer mourn the dead or grieve for the hurt. Let us resolve that we never forget what it was that made it possible for those who attacked us to fail so miserably. It is a love of liberty. It is a unflinching belief in ourselves. It is our individualism, our freedom, our ability to face risk and loss and not resort to collective "safety" that made the attack on our institutions so utterly ineffective at breaking us. For so long as we stand as individuals, staring our fates down one to one, nothing can destroy America, unless they can destroy every one of us.
Let us renew our commitment to liberty, to individuality, to the belief that we are an entire nation of individuals who are "under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. " Because if "liberty, and justice for all" are not worth living for, then nothing else will ever really matter.
America is hated by much of the world, partly because we are so prosperous, partly because we don't conform to thier standards, and partly because we are free. All tyrants fear the free. The free, in a world of absolute control, are the "loose cannons" of time. They fail to conform to the plans, to obediently follow the strictures laid out for them. They ruin the plans of those who seek thier own ends at the expense of others. They foil the efforts of those who think they can rule the world.
Today, we are still grappling the magnitude and pervasiveness of the hatred directed our way. We react with disbelief at the apparent desire to kill us. Our minds do not relate to the burning desire to kill that is so strong that it overcomes our own will to live.
But in spite of all this, they failed. They failed to demonstrate thier way is better. They failed to convince the world that good was done by killing us. But what they REALLY failed to do, was to break us. Oh, the naysayers are out there... The exploiters have attempted to take our liberty - or at least try to say that liberty must be sacraficed. They try to say our thinking is wrong - that our freedom, our non-conformity, our refusal to be the rest of the world - is the cause of all the ills that plague our world. But they are wrong. They are wrong because they are weak.
But we are not weak. We aren't even bothered by it all. I know we are strong, because I see we are strong. In the middle of it all, everyday men rushed into the buildings to save others. Ordinary people lined up to give blood. Countless anonymous people who gained nothing by it opened thier hearts and wallets. And we are still strong. In fact, I think we are even stronger. It's no longer out of fashion to fly the flag. It's no longer ridiculed to stand and face the flag with hand over heart and tears in your eyes from the swelling in your heart.
We may have seemed to forget, but then we remembered anew how each of us must determine to live as individuals. Not just exist, but LIVE. To exercise our freedom, our rights, and our obligations to care for each other on a personal level and reach out our own hand toward our neighbor.
And on this day of remembering, let us no longer mourn the dead or grieve for the hurt. Let us resolve that we never forget what it was that made it possible for those who attacked us to fail so miserably. It is a love of liberty. It is a unflinching belief in ourselves. It is our individualism, our freedom, our ability to face risk and loss and not resort to collective "safety" that made the attack on our institutions so utterly ineffective at breaking us. For so long as we stand as individuals, staring our fates down one to one, nothing can destroy America, unless they can destroy every one of us.
Let us renew our commitment to liberty, to individuality, to the belief that we are an entire nation of individuals who are "under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. " Because if "liberty, and justice for all" are not worth living for, then nothing else will ever really matter.
