Appropriate and Moral ReactionsMost of the people I know have had their lives return to normal fairly quickly following Tuesday's attacks. Of course, the people in that group mostly live in California, and don't know anyone directly affected by the attacks. The biggest exception in my circle is Lucy, who is a travel agent and therefore has spent much of the past week refunding tickets and helping people get rebooked or advising them of alternate ways to get where they need to go. The other exceptions have largely been people stranded due to the airline shutdown. Two of my cow-orkers have had girlfriends stranded elsewhere because of this, and Debbi's sister Janine was unable to leave Wednesday as well. I pointed Debbi to Lucy for some help with finding the Amtrack stations in the area, but I guess Janine will rent a car and drive home next week.
Work has been straightforward. Plugging away with my coding, learning some new stuff. Apple has added some extra security, just in case - as I'm sure have many other companies - but beyond that the campus doesn't seem to have been affected beyond all the extra time spent talking about the attacks, and a number of people taking off Tuesday or Wednesday. And now I'm gearing up to go look at some more townhouses this weekend, probably Sunday. That's not so bad, is it?
 A lot of U.S. flags have been purchased nationwide in the last few days. I already have one hanging in my apartment, as I've written before, and don't plan to buy another one. I do find the volume of flag purchases to be a bit strange. After all, it seems a clear-cut case of preaching to the choir. But, of course, people are buying the flags for themselves, and to make themselves and their neighbors feel better, and to promote a sense of solidarity, even if no one outside the United States sees this display. Which is fine, of course. I do kind of wonder how many of those flags will still be up one year - or ten years - from now, though. At the other end of the spectrum, there have been threats and even some violence against Arabs and Muslims in the United States, which is completely unacceptable. Speaking as an outsider of both religions, Christianity and Islam seem to me to have a lot in common, not least that both of them promote the cause of peace, but both have been used as the basis for some of history's most horrible violence. (Catholicism promoted this violence officially, in the form of the Crusades. I don't know whether Islam has a similar parallel.) It's distressing - but not surprising - that some people view Islam, Muslims, and Arabs as some sort of monolithic group who are collectively responsible for the attacks. If nothing else, it's not surprising because there are a lot of uneducated and/or unbalanced people in the world. I hope that our law enforcement agencies will pursue such incidents of bigotry, hatred and violence to the fullest extent of the law. Arabs and Muslims number among the citizenry of this country, and they deserve to have their rights defended like any other citizen. Maybe more so, in these difficult times.
Subrata and I have been having an e-mail debate about what could be or ought to be done by the United States in response to the attacks. Plenty of other journallers have written about this subject, too, and it seems like many such entries have begun with variations on the phrase, "I'm a pacifist, but...". I haven't really considered myself a pacifist for many years, at least not since the Gulf War, when I realized that I didn't genuinely meet the criteria to be a Conscientious Objector, but that I didn't want to get drafted, either. (The Gulf War erupted on my 22nd birthday, making me of prime drafting age.) I think that going to war is a morally appropriate response in some cases, and I think this is one of those cases. I also have an outlook towards the possible violence which I think is ethically unusual among liberals: I'm not really concerned about what sort of civilian casualties there might be if, say, the U.S. decides to carpet-bomb a major city (Kabul, Afghanistan being the one obviously bandied about lately). That's because I don't believe that, in war, there's a meaningful distinction between military and civilian targets. If we're at war with another nation, I think that the citizens of that nation should be afraid for their lives. If we're not willing to take whatever steps are necessary and expedient to achieve our goals, then I don't believe we're really in a war; we're just playing some macabre game. There's an important distinction here, though: I'm only talking about what I think is morally acceptable, not about what our best strategy is. Clearly our priority should not be to exact revenge on those responsible or their allies, but to prevent this sort of attack from ever happening again. Doing so, however, is very difficult. Terrorists are, by their very nature, madmen, and the only ways to stop them are to make it impossible for them to act, or to kill them. The former is very expensive and very difficult to accomplish. The latter is easier - if you can find them, and if killing them doesn't inspire more people to become terrorists in their stead. (Actually, the brand of terrorist who is using terrorism to accomplish a specific goal because there's no other avenue left open to them could arguably be reasoned with. Yassir Arafat is the obvious example here. But I think such terrorists are the exception rather than the rule, and those behind this attack obviously don't fall into this category.) So what should we do? Beats the heck outta me. Though I think in general we should step up our willingness to carry out "black ops" operations to destroy known terrorist nests pre-emptively.
It's going to take a while for things to truly feel "normal" again, especially for anyone who has to fly in the coming months. Until and unless we go to war, that's going to be the most enduring reminder we'll experience. Well, that and the airline bankruptcies (Midway Airlines apparently closed up shop last week, and Continental announced a 20% workforce reduction). Although I don't have a lot of sympathy for the airlines, who have for years chosen to emphasize profits over customer comfort. I wonder how Midwest Express is doing? They're the only airline I've flown in the last ten years who seem to care a whit about their customers. Indeed, their whole business plan seems based on it. Anyway, I'll be back with more stuff later. Monday the stock market supposedly re-opens, and then we'll see whether the fecal matter really hits the fan...
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