On September 11th, 2001, on what was a perfect morning -- right up until the very moment a Boeing 767-223-ER slammed into the North Tower of the World Trade Center -- I stood on the corner of Delancey and Ridge Streets in downtown Manhattan.

I was working on an election campaign – it was primary day in New York – and little did I realize that politics, culture and our entire trajectory as a nation was about to change forever. I had been alerted to the first crash by a friend calling my cell phone, but it was as I was staring at the gaping hole in this New York City landmark, in horror, shock set in as I saw a second plane approaching.

I can see it all in slow motion these days – the airplane seemed to glide in almost effortlessly, and as I and others around stood unable to move, a loud explosion echoed through the canyons of lower Manhattan as a fireball erupted that almost seemed to reach where I was standing. It was, for lack of a better term, surreal.

For me, the journey forward from that day would be a difficult one. I was born and raised in Manhattan and was young enough that I couldn’t remember the city without those two awe-inspiring landmarks. It is what I would use to figure out where I was going whenever I came up from the subway system.

I had to process the knowledge that I had been in the North Tower only 16 hours before the attack. Because I had been delivering campaign literature to a volunteer who lived in the neighborhood and thought to myself, “I haven’t been in the Twin Towers for a while.”

What sticks with me most, though, is that after seeing the second plane hit, a lanky, salt-and-pepper-bearded man standing next to me who was holding his bike at his side, saying, “this is terrible; we’re going to be at war tomorrow.”

He wasn’t far off the mark. He only underestimated the wars.

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Via Susie Bright:

I've been so worn down by 9/11 profiteering/jingoism that I didn't think I'd post anything on this month's ten-year anniversary.

But then I discovered this:

September 11, 2001: De-Edited, Reconstructed and Synchronization

"A multi-view compilation of raw footage cross referenced with live news coverage. The closest thing to going back in a time machine."

Above is Part 1 - 8:45am to 8:53am

Part 2 - 8:54am to 9:03am

Part 3 -  9:04am to 9:13am

Part 4 - 9:14am to 9:23am

Part 5 - 9:24am to 9:33am

Part 6 -  9:34am to 9:43am

Part 7 - 9:44am to 9:53am

Part 8 - 9:54am to 10:02am

Part 9 - 10:03am to 10:12am

Part 10 - 10:13am to 10:22am

Part 11 - 10:23am to 10:35am

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[h/t Heather]

Sometimes there are simply no words to describe the behaviour of Mitch McConnell’s band of merry misanthropes - also known as much of the US Senate Republican Caucus. The level of pathological callousness, a nihilistic streak that would make Friedrich Nietzsche blush, the willingness to put an AR-15 to the head of the nearest vulnerable group if they don’t get every last dime of the mud-bath tax credit for the likes of Kim Kardashian.

You’ve seen these clowns in action. You know what I’m talking about.

They diagnose patients via Youtube. They block votes on everything that doesn’t involve water boarding someone or gutting mine safety standards. They turn bathroom stalls in Minnesota airports into tourist destinations.

Yet, this latest stunt, well, this one even shocked me. Senator McConnell’s boisterous brood decided that it was too expensive to fund healthcare for 9/11 first responders. That’s right, the guys and gals who ran into cascading buildings, brick bonfires and smoldering ash, many of whom - the ones lucky enough to get out alive - developed respiratory illness and cancer for their troubles.

Sicknesses no doubt brought about by their sloth, atheism and at least occasional voting for Democrats.

So "offsets" had to be found to pay for $6 to $7 bn in life-saving funds. Yes, we just added $858 bn in red ink to our budget because somewhere a campaign contributor needed pocket change for the latest yacht shoe, but those in need of less than 1 per cent of that amount for the deleterious results of heroism?

Get in bloody line, guys!

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Imagine that. There was a Muslim prayer room, right in the World Trade Center, even after the first bombing. I guess people didn't have Fox News and Glenn Beck to tell them they should be outraged yet:

Given the vitriolic opposition now to the proposal to build a Muslim community center two blocks from ground zero, one might say something else has been destroyed: the realization that Muslim people and the Muslim religion were part of the life of the World Trade Center.

Opponents of the Park51 project say the presence of a Muslim center dishonors the victims of the Islamic extremists who flew two jets into the towers. Yet not only were Muslims peacefully worshiping in the twin towers long before the attacks, but even after the 1993 bombing of one tower by a Muslim radical, Ramzi Yousef, their religious observance generated no opposition.

“We weren’t aliens,” Mr. Abdus-Salaam, 60, said in a telephone interview from Florida, where he moved in retirement. “We had a foothold there. You’d walk into the elevator in the morning and say, ‘Salaam aleikum,’ to one construction worker and five more guys in suits would answer, ‘Aleikum salaam.’ ”

One of those men in suits could have been Zafar Sareshwala, a financial executive for the Parsoli Corporation, who went to the prayer room while on business trips from his London office. He was introduced to it, he recently recalled, by a Manhattan investment banker who happened to be Jewish.

“It was so freeing and so calm,” Mr. Sareshwala, 47, said in a phone conversation from Mumbai, where he is now based. “It had the feel of a real mosque. And the best part is that you are in the epicenter of capitalism — New York City, the World Trade Center — and you had this island of spiritualism. I don’t think you could have that combination anywhere in the world.”

How, when and by whom the prayer room was begun remains unclear. Interviews this week with historians and building executives of the trade center came up empty. Many of the Port Authority’s leasing records were destroyed in the towers’ collapse. The imams of several Manhattan mosques whose members sometimes went to the prayer room knew nothing of its origins.

History Eraser Button: A few photos of stuff the same distance from the World Trade Center as the "Ground Zero Mosque. Hallowed Ground? How can I tell?

The Reality-Based Community: Prisons Without Walls

Whiskey Fire: I am aware of his work

slacktivist: There is no basis in law, principle, doctrine or morality for opposition to the free exercise of religion by Islamic Americans. And their proximity to the Temple of Mammon on Wall Street doesn't change that.

Rising Hegemon: Never Speak Ill of the Dead

OFF THE BEATEN PATH: Youandmedoweagree's Blog, Great Big Lies, Reverend Manny and the Twilight Empire

Politicususa: 40 reiigious leaders denounce Sarah Palin, and Fox's hate speech - challenge Gingrich

David Rosen: Know Nothings of 2010

The Hill's Congress Blog: GOP vilifies workers who serve the public

Rumproast: Douchehat doubles down: Straight marriage is 'thick,' Gay marriage is 'thin'

The Atlantic: The Great Lie

The Root: S.C. mystery Dem, Alvin Greene, indicted

The segment of "Sicko" where we learned about the disabilities suffered by 9/11 volunteers haunts me to this day. If only we'd just offered to cover their medical care, instead of prosecuting Michael Moore for taking them to Cuba.

So many of the people whose respiratory systems were destroyed by the debris from the World Trade Center collapse are already dead. At least something's finally being done:

New York City and a group of contractors have agreed to pay up to $657 million to more than 10,000 workers who alleged that rescue and cleanup efforts around the World Trade Center made them sick.

The settlement, announced Thursday night, sets up a system to compensate thousands of firefighters, police officers, contractors and volunteers based on the severity of their medical problems. "This settlement is a fair and reasonable resolution to a complex set of circumstances," New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg said in a statement.

The awards would range from $3,250 to seven figure sums. By agreeing to the settlement, the plaintiffs release the city and its contractors from any future damage claims.

Mr. Bloomberg commissioned a task force in 2006 to develop a coordinated plan for responding to the massive health problems associated with the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks.

That panel projected roughly 43,000 people might ultimately seek treatment for exposure to the dust and smoke that permeated lower Manhattan after the towers toppled.

The settlement, coming just months before the first trials were to begin, comes after years of contentious arguing in court. Many of the sick workers have accused the city of failing to respond quickly and humanely to what were in many cases devastating health problems, a charge the Bloomberg administration has rejected.

In 2008, the city sparked outrage when it argued a third of the Ground Zero workers who sued the city had minor health problems, such as runny noses or trouble sleeping.

"This agreement enables workers and volunteers claiming injury from the WTC site operations to obtain compensation commensurate with the nature of their injuries and the strength of their claims, while offering added protection against possible future illness," said Christine LaSala, president of the WTC Captive Insurance Company, formed in 2004 to insure the city and nearly 140 other parties against claims connected to 9/11.

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(h/t Heather)

Conservatives like Rudy Giuliani can change their views in a blink of an eye and act like WATB in the process. Anytime there's some Obama bashing to be done, conservatives happily join in even when they look like fools. Rudy, who was called as a witness in the trial of Moussaoui and applauded the America legal system now says that putting KSM on trial in New York is a really, really bad idea? Why? Well, because Rudy says so.

Here's what Rudy said after he testified in the 2006 trial.

"At the same time, I was in awe of our system," the former mayor continued. "It does demonstrate that we can give people a fair trial, that we are exactly what we say we are. We are a nation of law. . . . I think he's going to be a symbol of American justice."

I guess America doesn't need anymore shining examples of our justice system, right Rudy?

Chris Wallace puts up Giuliani's statements about the other WTC bombing trial which refute him, but Rudy dismissed his own views with nonsense.

Wallace:I want to take you back to what you said after the prosecution of the 1993 World Trade Center bombers. You said this, “I think it shows you put terrorism on one side, you put our legal system on the other, and our legal system comes out ahead.”

And after the 2006 trial of the so-called 20th hijacker, Zacarias Moussaoui, you said, “It shows that we can give people a fair trial, that we are exactly what we say we are. We are a nation of war (sic).” Respectfully, Mayor, you supported civilian trials for terrorists then.

GIULIANI: And if there’s no other alternative, I support civilian trials for terrorists. The reality is there is another alternative here. And this administration has created tribunals. At least five, possibly more, terrorists are going to be tried in those tribunals.

If there was no other choice, again, Chris, I support this. If there was no other choice and they had to be tried in New York, of course they should be tried in New York. But the reality is there is another choice. It is a better choice for the government. This choice of New York is a better choice for the terrorists. Why would you seek to give the terrorists a better choice than you’re giving the -- than you’re giving the public?

His decision to be against the KSM trial is because there were other alternatives? That is idiotic at best. Jack Reed came on the show right after Rudy and denounced Rudy's talking points in their entirety.

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REED: Well, as you pointed out, in 2006, Moussaoui, the 20th hijacker, under the Bush administration was tried in a federal court in Alexandria, Virginia. Mayor Giuliani was one who testified in the penalty phase and he, as you indicated, claimed this was a symbol of American justice, as he said in 1993.

But this was not 1993. This was 2006. The alternative existed for a military tribunal then. The Bush administration decided to make the case in federal court. They succeeded. A hundred and ninety or so terrorists have been convicted in federal courts, only a handful -- less than 10 -- in tribunals.

There are 200 individuals serving time in federal facilities now for their terrorist crimes. So what was a statesmanlike decision by the Bush administration can’t be a political decision by this administration.

If a conservative does it, then it's awesome!

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There really isn't more shameless a huckster working the snake-oil circuits of cable punditry these days than Glenn Beck. He embodies the worst of right-wing talking-head traits: obsessively wrong, compulsively stupid, reflexively mendacious, and always, always, shamelessly opportunistic.

He never misses a trick. Especially the 9/11 tragedy. He's managed to turn it into a big annual right-wing nutfest, particularly with this year's debut of the 9/12 teabaggers protest, a project Beck launched some six months ago.

On Friday, he devoted a long monologue to weeping, once again, before his national audience, and gnashing his teeth and doing that Glenn Beck schtick.

Not, mind you, in memory of the victims.

No, what ticks Glenn off is that we haven't built a new building to replace it yet.

Moreover, he manages to lay the blame for the delays -- which are in fact less than meets the eye* -- not on the usual kinds of delays that happen with massive construction projects, but on liberals in Congress and political correctness, or something like that.

Beck: I believe the only reason we haven't built it isn't because of Americans. It's because we are being held back. And who is holding us back? Politicians! Special interest groups! Political correctness! You name it. Everybody but you!

Beck doesn't bother to explain what the hell he means because, with his audience, it doesn't matter. They could care less about facts, it's the gut reaction that counts on Planet Beck. Besides, he's quickly off paranoiding out over the "1 World Trade Center" name ("One ... World. Ohhh. Isn't that great?") anyway.

Likewise, Beck's attempt to make 9/12 into a day of right-wing protest is just so much right-wing agitprop. Remember the mission statement at the project's website:

The 912 project is designed to bring us all back to the place we were on Sept. 12, 2001. The day after America was attacked we were not obsessed with red states, blue states or political parties. We were united as Americans, standing together to protect the values and principles of the greatest nation ever created.

Yep. Because cheap symbolism and fake sentimentalism are the real glue that binds hucksters like Glenn Beck to our national hindquarters.

This isn't the first time Beck has abducted 9/11 and its aftermath for his own personal use. Remember the time he tearily praised one of the 9/11 widows who had passed away in a plane crash.

Of course, all this is in stark contrast to what he said abut these same families in 2005:

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Beck: You know, it took me about a year to start hating the 9/11 victims' families. It took me about a year. Um, and I had such compassion for them and I really, you know, I wanted to help them, and I was behind -- let's give them money, let's get them started, and all of this stuff. And I really didn't -- all the 3,000 victims' families, I don't hate all of them, I hate about, probably about ten of them. But when I see 9/11 victim family, you know, on television, or whatever, I'm just like, 'Oh, shut up.' I'm so sick of them. Because they're always complaining. And we did our best for them. And again, it's only about ten.

In fact, Beck likes using 9/11 as his own political prop so well, he'd apparently love to have another one.

At least, that's what we had to conclude from the time Beck had on Michael Scheuer, who announced that our only hope was to suffer another big terrorist attack:

Scheuer: The only chance we have as a country right now is for Osama bin Laden to deploy and detonate a major weapon in the United States. Because it's going to take a grass-roots, bottom-up pressure. Because these politicians prize their office, prize the praise of the media and the Europeans. It's an absurd situation again. Only Osama can execute an attack which will force Americans to demand that their government protect them effectively, consistently, and with as much violence as necessary.

Did Beck respond as any decent human being would: "What??!!! Are you out of your mind??!! How could you hope for that??!!"

Er, no. Here's what Beck actually said:

Beck: Which is why, I was thinking this weekend, if I were him, that would be the last thing I would do right now.

Oooh, that's a heavy thinker there. Not to mention disgusting manipulator.

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I was in my then-doctor's office in Yardley, Pennsylvania, home to several of the pilots and crew members who died in the attacks. None of us knew that at the time, of course. We were just there to see the doctor.

When I walked in for my 9 a.m. appointment, they had the radio on. "A plane crashed into the World Trade Center," the receptionist told me. Weird - that's an awfully big building to miss. I assumed it was a small plane, sat down and picked up a magazine. (I think I was there for a sinus infection.)

And as we sat there half-listening, a few minutes later the weirdness replayed itself: Another plane crashed into the other building.

At this point, dread set in and we knew something really, really bad was happening.

I remember the drive home, heading south on I-95. It was completely empty, except for one state trooper I'd passed. I'd never seen that. I remember thinking it looked like the end of the world.

On the ride home, I kept trying to call the people I cared about - not to see that they were physically safe, but as an emotional touchstone. The phone lines were busy everywhere and it was hard to get through. (I remember my then-boyfriend was not all that interested in hearing from me, so something else died that day.)

My grown son was staying with me while he looked for a job and was sleeping on the couch when I came home. I flipped on the TV and it woke him up. We watched as they showed the planes crashing into the building, again and again and again.

"Turn it off," he said after an hour or so. "This is pornography, war pornography. Turn it off."

So I did.

When we have our limbic brain punched over and over again by horrific images, and those images are then used to justify more horror, there is only one solution: Turn off your TV.

My son was right: The 9/11 images were war pornography, something watched over and over as we stroked ourselves into wargasm.

In honor of the victims of the 9/11 attacks, comments are closed to this post. We offer this opportunity for our readers to take a moment of silence in deep respect to those whose lives were lost, both here and in Iraq.