an eerie calm today

[antipos...@127.0.0.1]

I was just outside and there was kind of an eerie still in the air. The schools,
courthouse and other facilities were closed. There is still a lot of smoke
coming from the Towers site. There's been some road closure here and so there
was very limited vehicle traffic. I wanted to get the newspapers and wound
up walking to the newsstand at the enterance to the Path subway trains, which
connect Manhattan, Hoboken, Newark and Jersey City, which actually are running
today and there seemed to be some extra security. But the main feeling I
had, along with the deep feelings of sorrow at seeking the smoke, was just
how unsettling all this unusual calm is when you are used to the normally
hectic feel of city life. It's a very weird feeling.

Tom

[David Ballarotto]

The big mistake here, is the people behind this probably thought they'd
scare us into some sort of inaction. Whether that has something to do with
our political allies abroad, capitalism, or whatever. But the big mistake
here is the same mistake Adolf Hitler made when he attacked London in 1940.
Rather than pushing people quietly into the corner, stepping back for fear
of more, instead Britain became united. Indeed, it was their finest hour.
Rest assured, we Americans will show that same spirit of resilience. Even
as the bodies of people are pulled from rubble in New York and Washington,
America will not feel intimidated and silenced. Indeed, even as hijackers
were aiming to fly apparently towards Washington, the passengers on that
ill-fated plane, knowing they were going to die, heroically stopped that
plane from hitting the Capitol, the White House, or wherever it was aimed,
giving their own lives to protect our freedoms and the symbols of our
heritage. They fought the hijackers, and took that plane off its intended
path of destruction, into an abandoned strip mine in Somerset County,
Pennsylvania, ending their lives, and the mission of those who stormed the
plane. It's these acts of heroism that inspire us and give us a beacon of
light in such otherwise dark days. It's these acts that make us proud to
be Americans.
Perhaps the best example of that spirit of American resiliency is shown
in the words of our national anthem. Try, if you can, to read the words
without the melody.
"Oh, say, can you see by the dawn's early light, what so proudly we hailed
at the twilight's last gleaming. Whose broad stripes and bright stars
through the perilous night o'er the ramparts we watched, were so gallantly
streaming. And the rockets red glare, the bombs bursting in air, gave proof
through the night, that our flag was still there. Oh, say does that star
spangled banner yet wave, o'er the land of the free and the home of the
brave." And that's what America is all about, even as the World Trade
Center is destroyed, even as the Pentagon is attacked. Our flag, our
America is still here.