Happy Thanksgiving

As I enter into the early portion of my Thanksgiving routine - namely sharing the sofa with my family and taking in the smells wafting in from the kitchen, yams and peach cobblers we will be bringing to two of the three gatherings scheduled for the day - the carnage still unfolding in Bombay is preventing me from embracing the spirit of the day.

It appears that Al Qaeda has followed through on threats to stage a major attack on Westerners.  Thousands of innocent travelers are experiencing their second day of unimaginable terror.  For many, life ended yesterday, brutally and cruelly.

I must give thanks that there are millions of people across the world praying for the souls of those cut down in the wave of violence that descended on Bombay.  May they rest in peace.

We will all give thanks for many things today, things that have happened in the past year, and things that we hope will always endure.  In addition to expressing thanks for my wonderful family and good health, I will be adding a prayer that next year I will be giving thanks for the reduction of terror in the world.  Nothing is so important to our survival, both individually and as a nation, than allowing our fists to clench and our blood to boil.  We must react to survive.

Remember

It really did happen.  Nineteen evil men, acting upon the orders of dozens of organizers, who in turn reflected the sentiments of millions of radical fundamentalist Muslims, set about seven years ago to take the lives of as many innocent Americans as possible and succeeded.

  2,974 Americans dead.  24 still missing and presumed dead.

  The nation survived in the following days by correctly recognizing that we were living in a state of war, even if it had not been declared upon us.  The wave of radical Islamic violence directed at U.S. targets around the world leading up to the 9/11 attack was not a chance series of events.  We were correct to identify the threat but the resolve to act has been weakened by a softer element in our society.

  For all the comfort and trappings of our civilized society, we still exist - in global terms - in a state of nature because the terms of resolving conflict can only be set by mutual consent.  When our enemy establishes violence as their medium of political communication and the currency of their power, it is not our choice to opt against meeting them with violence.  To choose non-violence is to choose death.

  We must remember that the choice was made for us on September 11th, 2001.  I didn't know anyone who died in the attacks.  Most of us didn't.  But those people who died unprepared, in a state of fear and terror, were someone's friend or family.  We can only imagine the sharpest sliver of pain that must have been felt when the bonds were broken in such a painful, sudden and senseless way. 

  Hold on to that moment, when the pain of those thousands becomes conceivable to those of us who didn't experience it personally.  It is what gives this war against terror purpose and gives us the will to proceed when the cause is difficult and forces seeks to dissuade us from the path that is just.