First, lets think about what it means to be a jumper. Being a jumper means that in the face of the worst uncertainty, with grave suffering and fear reaching your bones, the uncertainty and fear becomes so large that certain death seems like a better option. This is what the jumpers went through.

OK, so how is that a reason to ignore them?

Well, if you think about it, the entire US, on that day faced great fear and uncertainty and later, we collectively decided that the uncertainty and fear of great suffering was to great to deal with so we decided to "jump"

How did we jump?

Jumping is choosing certain death over possible/likely great suffering. We chose to jump because we couldn't deal with the possibility of another attack. We coudn't allow ourselves to feel pain again like we felt that day so we got the war machine going. We jumped.

How can you equate the "war machine" to suicide?

By taking to the offenses and establishing a "war on terror" and cultural war on islam, we could tell ourselves that it prevent future terror attacks/suffering on us soil. By giving up our freedom, values and dignity, we essentially guaranteed our death. We lowered ourselves to the barbaric nature of the terrorists themselves, we gave up our freedoms and values. We supported revenge, torture and murder of innocent lives. We became something different than what we had always been. We died at that moment. We chose it and it was certain. We "jumped" as a nation.

The lingering effects have been the destruction of our economy, government and lives of our soldiers. We can never go back to what we used to be. The terrorists won. They turned us into them. Now, we are the ones sending our young men to die in the process of killing the enemy with no regard for civilians. Our nation became a suicide bomber.

[Edited on September 11, 2011 at 10:57 AM. Reason : k]

9/11/2011 10:48:38 AM

I'm pretty sure the people that jumped were about to burn alive and animal instincts took over.

9/11/2011 11:26:32 AM

You are right, Ill round it up and say the terrorist spent 100k max, we spent 3-4 Trillion and bankrupted this country. We now have a militarized local police force and the feds watching citizens with unchecked power. Why does the greatest country in the world suffer from chronic shitty leadership? You have to think this was done on purpose, what did they think was gonna happen?

9/11/2011 12:03:43 PM

Well if the end goal of the gov't is to have absolute power over the people why waste a good chance for increasing control?

9/11/2011 12:12:17 PM

Jeah charge them windmills buddy; never consult reality.

9/11/2011 1:01:55 PM

None of it is permanent. As time passes the collective memory will fade and America's government will undo some of the worse excesses. Democracies do this crap, we just have the live with it. Thankfully, American cultural tradition eventually overcomes our democratic impulses to restore sanity.

9/12/2011 7:49:35 AM

I wonder what WWII vets would think of your short sightedness?

9/12/2011 8:37:09 AM

I wish you would step back from that ledge my friend
you could cut ties with all the lies that you've been living in

9/12/2011 9:02:16 AM

not cc

[Edited on September 12, 2011 at 3:02 PM. Reason : not cc]

9/12/2011 2:59:13 PM

What a worthless political diatribe.

[Edited on September 12, 2011 at 3:43 PM. Reason : .]

9/12/2011 3:39:28 PM

^^^^ There is no comparison between Iraq and WWII

9/12/2011 6:25:47 PM

There is no way to undo 10 years of war. We can't just go and get a refund and have the rest of the world forgive us for being shitty. These are permanent damages. The opportunity cost can never be undone. Even if we survive.

9/12/2011 7:09:40 PM

are you sure you understand what opportunity cost means?

9/12/2011 8:12:45 PM

Are you? When you spend your money on wars you can no longer spend that money on other things you could have been spending it on.

9/12/2011 8:26:32 PM

The dead soldiers are lost forever. However, the rest of it is just like all wasteful spending: the only long-term damage is from continuing the bad policy. As such, end the war, shrink the military and cut corporate and union handouts and within time it will be as if they never happened.

9/12/2011 8:43:41 PM

you are assuming those trillions of dollars would have all been wasted, had we not gone to war. no. they would have been invested in america and instead we have the reverse investment of debt with no benefit from that debt. the opportunity cost is what we could have spent that money on.

One random example is we could have built a bullet train network connecting the largest 35 population centers in the us with the fastest train system in the world for the price of the wars.

9/12/2011 8:50:41 PM

Now I really wish we had that train.

9/12/2011 8:56:33 PM

these are from 2008
http://warorcar.blogspot.com/
http://www.datepad.com/articles/10-things-we-could-have-purchased-with-the-iraq-war-fund/

9/12/2011 9:06:03 PM

Quote :

"Are you? When you spend your money on wars you can no longer spend that money on other things you could have been spending it on."

we didn't have the money to begin with.

9/12/2011 9:08:33 PM

credit/money, we still had it and will eventually pay for it.

9/12/2011 9:18:24 PM

We were warned by Third Eye Blind.

9/12/2011 9:22:20 PM

^^No way we pay this back, once there is an alternative to the dollar euro game, it's lights out uncle sam.

9/12/2011 10:25:04 PM

Quote :

"One random example is we could have built a bullet train network connecting the largest 35 population centers in the us with the fastest train system in the world for the price of the wars."

Exactly. The money would have been wasted, such as by building an inferior competitor for the airlines that takes four times longer and barely avoids bankruptcy thanks to massive government subsidies which we will all be paying for the rest of our lives. In comparison, we technically could leave Iraq this year. But we'd still be paying for the trains come the 22nd century.

9/12/2011 11:54:47 PM

heaven forbid we pay for infrastructure. that could never benefit us in any way. Plus, we can continue to move things on planes for free because planes run off of fuel that is plentiful.

9/12/2011 11:59:29 PM

I'm okay with paying for infrastructure. I'm not okay with paying for stupid infrastructure, such as the lunacy you just posited

9/13/2011 12:01:04 AM

Yeah, a chaplin given last rights to someone died when he got hit by a jumper....what rotten luck! When it is your time to go it is your time to go!

9/13/2011 12:51:38 AM

I'm pretty sure there were lots of stories about jumpers. When exactly did we hide them?

9/13/2011 2:12:07 AM

Stories like that should jump out at you

9/13/2011 7:23:38 AM

The E Man is dead on. Our future has been forever compromised by the decade of useless war. It isn't what it could have been and this is not the 21st century I signed up for. I would say we could have implemented maglev technology in terms of high speed transport.

As for the jumpers there was plenty of talk about them and the images have been shown time and time again. We don't need to see or hear them hitting the ground. I say let their families have their peace and privacy.





[Edited on September 13, 2011 at 8:40 AM. Reason : added to the post]

9/13/2011 8:35:15 AM

bunch of whiny ass hippies up in here.

9/13/2011 11:03:00 AM

I don't think it's considering whining when, as a matter of fact, our future prosperity was handed over to war profiteers and bankers. We are now faced with a historic burden, and when I look around at most of my peers, it's hard to be optimistic.

9/13/2011 11:19:58 AM

Quote :

"Yeah, a chaplin given last rights to someone died when he got hit by a jumper....what rotten luck! When it is your time to go it is your time to go!"

9/13/2011 1:42:59 PM

I always thought "the falling man" picture was really moving. They had a large print of in in the NY Times on 9/12/01. I still have that newspaper, and I didn't see how it was offensive to people - it's not gruesome, it's sad.

9/13/2011 1:50:22 PM

Quote :

"I would say we could have implemented maglev technology in terms of high speed transport. "

Monorail.

Monorail.

Monorail.

9/13/2011 2:17:42 PM