Derangement

Notes on an anniversary.

Considering the latest, Digby recalls this statement—

All that we have to do is to send two Mujahedin to the farthest point East to raise a piece of cloth on which is written al-Qa'ida in order to make the generals race there to cause America to suffer human economic and political losses without their achieving for it anything of note other than some benefits to their private companies… So we are continuing this policy in bleeding America to the point of bankruptcy. --- Osama bin laden

Tengrain re-posts "Falling into History"—

...originally from the SF Chronicle from 2006, which seems like a lifetime ago; It was written by Neva Chonin, who has long since gone from The Chron. I still think this essay remains the best writing about September 11 that I have encountered. This essay has fallen into the void and is no longer on their servers. I want to ensure that it remains on the web...

Charles Pierce—

So it is the 13th anniversary of the day on which America was successfully encouraged by murderers to lose its mind and, last night, the president gave a speech entangling the United States in another combat situation in another place in that same part of the world against a different group of murderers who have taken it on themselves to encourage America to lose its mind....

The president, says Pierce, is

... groping, still, to find logic to the derangement that broke out on this day, 13 years ago. He is groping, still, for a way out of the profitable trauma.