So, here's my take.
Heroes? We seem to live in a time bereft of genuine, unsung heroes. This one, though known and admired at the time for a multitude of qualities and accomplishments, has become a lightning rod since a bunch of earnest, well-intentioned catholics decided to informally canonize him - for being a celibate gay man.
Fundamentalist Christian zealots are shrieeeking that they are being deprived of their media entitlements and an opportunity to spew their islamophobic screeds because the official NYC commemorative event will remain secular and focused on the families of people who died in the September 11 attacks.
And, according to this, the fall-out continues to kill more people.
More than 18,000 people are suffering from illnesses linked to the dust from the attacks on New York's World Trade Center on 11 September 2001.
The figure comes from the US government's monitoring and treatment programme for 9/11 emergency workers, volunteers and local residents. The most common afflictions are respiratory problems including asthma and sinusitis, but muscular and intestinal conditions are reported as well.
The senior US official managing the health legacy of the attacks warns that early deaths are possible among the survivors.
Note: I started drafting this post while listening to Radio-Canada's live coverage of Jack Layton's cross-partisan state funeral. The first photo was found here.
3 comments:
I can't help wondering how we would commemorate the deaths of the 500,000 Iraqi kids who died over a ten-year span, not all at once, due to US sanctions.
Add the "collateral damage" from bombing sorties in Iraq and Afghanistan to that list of 500,000, Dr. Dawg.
I heard a sound bite earlier today by some UK security expert - foreign policy dictates that the time is right to negotiate with AQ. The War on Terror was a misnomer according to this expert since the Sept 11 attacks were criminal in intent and not a military act.
It took a decade of continuous bloodshed and a complete distortion (and destruction) of international laws to arrive to THIS!!
Didn't international law experts insist from the beginning that the US should negotiate the surrender of Bin Laden for criminal prosecution?
True, how about the other countless victims of war. It is and was an act war that caused many casualties, but because it was on american soil we feel indignant. Let look around us all over the world...it's tragic.
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