Shortly after the attacks on the Pentagon and the World Trade Center, George W. Bush told a Joint Session of Congress that “they” did it because “they hate our freedom.” Everybody knew who “they” were.
Even so, in those halcyon days, when it was still not acceptable for an American president to level ethnic or religious slurs against Muslims except by indirection, that morsel of idiocy drew justifiable derision.
There were, of course, many outraged citizens who took Bush’s words seriously. Before long, though, the level of hysteria diminished and their numbers declined.
From Day One, everybody whose head was screwed on right knew that blowback from Western, especially American, machinations in the historically Muslim world better explained why “they” did it. As time went on, ever larger numbers of people came the same realization.
Even so, the hysteria never quite went away. Thanks to the uses our political class and our media made of it, 9/11 marked a turning point.
Since then, “our freedom” has fared poorly. For that, “they” don’t deserve all the blame; not by any means. Most of the damage has been self-inflicted.
Whatever there is in patriotism that is admirable or even tolerable also took a hit after 9/11. When Bush spoke his drivel and for some time thereafter, displays of the stars and stripes were ubiquitous from sea to shining sea. The flag-waving had a chauvinistic component, but there were also whiffs of rational…