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September
13, 2002 12:40 p.m. |
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September 12, 2002, George W. Bush ushered in a new morning following
the end of America's Longest Day. The 9/11 anniversary was a lengthy day
of sorrow and memory, but in fact, the previous 365 days had been part
of an extended continuous moment dating toward 8:46 A.M. September 11,
2001.
The anniversary really began Tuesday. Around the nation, the date of September 11 will always be associated with unspeakable acts of horror. But for those of us living in New York at the time, it's not just a date, but a specific day that stays fixed in the mind.
It had been Primary Day 2001. A contentious Democratic mayoral nomination contest had wound down to the final day. Public Advocate Mark Green and Bronx Borough President Fernando Ferrer led a field of five mayoral wannabes. A runoff was expected and various political reporters and editorial writers expected to be up late sifting through the returns. Republicans also had a choice to make, but hardly anyone gave Herman Badillo much of a shot against billionaire Michael Bloomberg.
It had been a beautiful September day — sunny, warm, not a cloud in the sky. It was clearly still summer, though with that slight hint of autumn coming around the corner. Then, horror struck around 8:46 A.M. A year later, those first few minutes were studies in innocence slowly trickling away. The early TV images of a single burning building with smoke coming out of its side were accompanied by local and national reporters followed 17 minutes later by the full realization that our country had changed forever.
Within minutes, elections were cancelled for the day. By striking on that particular day and in New York, the terrorists had managed to attack not just buildings, or the nation's financial center, but also at the heart of the democratic process.
In the days to come, the images would be replayed over and over again — multiply on the TV screens and then ingrained permanently in memory. There was the one-month mourning moment, two months, 100 days, six months. Sorrowful as it was 9/11/02 must have been for some almost anticlimactic. We are, almost, but not quite all cried out.
The date "9/11" became the most referenced in more than a 100 years. Regardless of what the calendar said, we knew that 9/11 was the guiding principle for the day. It was the foundation for most of political debate — despite occasional deviations into falling stock markets and corporate corruption. Just as the Cold War provided a sociopolitical umbrella for most of the politics from the 1950s through the 1980s, so too did everything rippling away from 9/11.
This year, the elections went off without a hitch — though gubernatorial candidate Andrew Cuomo's surprising withdrawal a week beforehand also made the day somewhat uneventful. Not surprisingly, there was very little mention of the primary in Wednesday's papers. H. Carl McCall, the state comptroller, is the official Democratic candidate to take on incumbent Republican George Pataki. McCall may even have a chance considering billionaire Tom Golisano won the Independence-party nomination (over Pataki) and has threatened to spend $100 million on the contest. He spent more than $20 million on the primary. On 9/11 though, hardly anyone cares what happened on 9/10.
But, thematically, as the 9/11/02 comes to an end, there is a subtle shift in the president's approach. Speeches in the immediate weeks following the attack noted the actions of the "evildoers." The struggle was clearly, in Bush's eyes, a Manichean battle of Good vs. Evil. That may still be part of the equation, but it was interesting to see in the president's Ellis Island speech Tuesday that the word, "evil" was not mentioned. "Freedom" was mentioned several times. There were references to tyrants and terrorists, but not specifically to "evil."
It is clear, that the Wednesday speech fully anticipates Thursday morning's address to the United Nations. Alas, the world body does not necessarily ascribe to the moral clarity George W. Bush tries to bring to issues. And so, the challenge in making the case of forcible regime change in Iraq is no less important than the war on terror, but the language is both direct and subtle for the world of nations. The black/white language of 9/11/01 may give way to a determined, yet, in its own way, quite nuanced, call to action in the post 9/11/02 universe.
Bush warned the United Nations that the United States clearly reserves the right to launch a unilateral invasion of Iraq, however, he throws the U.N.'s own language back in the organization's face. The rhetorical sleight of hand — including a full list of all of Iraq's violations of U.N. resolutions — puts the onus on the U.N. Bush reminds the world exactly why the United Nations was created:
…born in the hope that survived a world war — the hope of a world moving toward justice, escaping old patterns of conflict and fear. The founding members resolved that the peace of the world must never again be destroyed by the will and wickedness of any man. We created the United Nations Security Council, so that, unlike the League of Nations, our deliberations would be more than talk, our resolutions would be more than wishes. After generations of deceitful dictators and broken treaties and squandered lives, we dedicated ourselves to standards of human dignity shared by all, and to a system of security defended by all.
In this context, it is hard for the administration's critics to say that going after Saddam Hussein is just the enactment of Bush family "revenge." It also removes the argument that this is simply a U.S.-Iraq issue. Beyond 9/11, which had come to be seen as an American tragedy, Bush has fully raised the stakes into forcing the United Nations to realize that Iraq is the type of problem for which the body is obligated to control. Bush has given the world organization a full indictment of Hussein's crimes and dares the organization to allow them to go unpunished.
Ultimately, Bush is declaring that the choice for U.S. unilateral action ultimately rests with the United Nations response. The U.N. must embrace U.S. resolve for the days ahead — or risk being exposed as totally obsolescent.
This is a very different time; the mourning period is over. 9/11/01 has given way — not to the crawling from the wreckage that typified 9/12/01 — but to 9/11/02. The longest day is over. A new one — ushering in the long-term Day of Resolve — has just started.
— Mr. George is an editorial writer for the New York Post.