Honoring September 11th: The Rage Ratchet
by Bill WhittleWell, it’s been eight years since that terrible morning – George Bush was as deep into his first term of office as Barack Obama is today when those awful events unfolded.
The anniversary in the mainstream media will be muted, as always – and we’ll come back to that. And even though three thousand people died that day, I want to concentrate on two – not to exclude the others, but simply to show you that they were not some abstract number but individual lives.
![GetAttachment[4]](http://bighollywood.breitbart.com/files/2009/09/GetAttachment41.jpg "GetAttachment[4]")
Kevin Cosgrove
One of the people who died that day, eight years ago, was a businessman working in the World Trade Center. His name was Kevin Cosgrove. Kevin Cosgrove stands out from the other three thousand because he was on the phone to 9/11 when the tower he was in collapsed around him. (Fast forward to about 4:00 if you are pressed for time) And I’m warning you, this is not for the faint hearted.
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The most telling and poignant thing I felt when I hear the sound of a man, as the floors of his office fell away around him, is simply that this voice – recorded on tape – was only one of thousands of identical screams of terror that went unrecorded in the floors above and below, and in the other tower. I try to imagine what that must have been like, and how repugnant to their memory the entire idea of 9/11 “trutherism” is.
There’s somebody else I would like to remember today. In the years since that beautiful clear morning, many people have tried to identify the people who leapt to their deaths to escape the flames. The most famous of these doomed people has been called “The Falling Man.”
A newspaper article, followed by an exceptional documentary called The Falling Man, attempted to identify him and many of the others who took control of their final moments and plunged to their deaths that day.
Jonathan Briley
The Falling Man was named Jonathan Briley, and I’d like to remember him today as well. To get the essence of who Jonathan was and the consequences of the decision he made, watch from about 3:15 to from about 3:15 to about 5:15 in this clip from the truly remarkable doc, The Falling Man…
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The media won’t show these images. They say they don’t want to rile up the population. I say we should be riled up. There was talk that the current administration plans to “re-brand” 9/11 into a National Day of Service in order to chill out this nation of children they are trying to create. But I’m not going to calm down and “get over all the anger” of 9/11. I promised myself that morning that I would never forget what I saw that day, and I never will.
Just a few days ago, British Intelligence interrupted a plan that was days away from fruition, and convicted these three Muslim terrorists on charges of attempting to blow up seven airliners in mid-Atlantic. I said Muslim Terrorists because that’s what they are. Throughout the past eight years they have been foiled time and time again by British and American intelligence agencies – the same nameless heroes the Obama administration now wants to prosecute. I’m sure that will end well.
We’re not allowed to be enraged, you see?
Actually, you know what? That’s not true. We are allowed to be enraged, but only about certain things. You can’t be outraged when America is in the right, but you can be outraged when she is in the wrong: about Abu Graib, for example. Likewise, you are encouraged by the media to be outraged at corporate transgressors like AIG, but outrage at the politicians who caused this mess is given a “dangerously un-American howling mob rabid pack of animals” dismissal.
It’s a RAGE RATCHET, and it goes one way only: to the left. Well, I refuse to be controlled by these sons of bitches. If what happened to Kevin Cosgrove and Jonathan Briley doesn’t fill you with outrage and anger, not only are you not my moral superior… but your inability to see right and wrong is an indication of deep-seated, delusional psychosis.
Never forget what happened that day.
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72 Comments
Brilliant as usual, Bill.
We won't forget.
The Left is not going to be allowed by me to decide what is suitable to be enraged over and offended by. They are not morally equipped to make those decisions.
Refreshing to hear a good man with an apt and passionate curse on his lips.
"Sons of bitches" indeed.
I think our national mood is sharpened by the recent attempts to usurp our sovereignty with corruption and power-grabbing from within, juxtaposed with the still-burning memory of that day when we were attacked from without.
Sons of bitches and ACORN bitches. We don't need Soros' money to organize our outrage and underwrite the blubberous film makers. Hell, we've got 20 year-old beautiful women who spend their last dime to expose government corruption. Heh.
Maybe we'll be okay, after all.
Thank you. Takes me right back.
I watched the Kevin Cosgrove video after seeing a snippet of it on Afterburner.
I think today is the first time in eight years I have ever cried over what happened on 9/11.
Amen.
Let us never forget.
http://www.onebigdog.net/9-11-2001-a-day-to-remem...
Thanks Bill for a brilliant reminder of why we must remain always vigiliant.
I agree–let's get the public riled up. Let's show ALL these disturbing images and sounds, especially the ones of Arabs dancing in the streets in Paterson and Staten Island as the WTC burns in the background…
Spot on, Bill.
Another 9/11 anniversary, another stupifying dose of media anesthesia. Remembrances (such as they are) must be sappy and maudlin, and never dwell on what happened. Weepy candlelight vigils about some vague unfortunate "tragedy," or "disaster," as if it were about Princess Di or the Johnstown flood. God forbid the media ever show actual footage of the genocide, lest the blackhearted beast that lurks inside the Flyover Lumpenproles be stirred to anger. Let's all have a good cry over whatever it was that happened. Then let's invite the local Imam for Ramadan dinner, to apologize for the dirty look some brute gave him on 9/12.
These need replaying again and again and again. The short memory that's imposed by the MSM can be combatted by the rest of us who refuse to forget.
Oh, my.
I will never forget that day. On 9/11/01 I lived in suburban NJ. I received two phone calls, one from the middle school and one from the elem school, explaining that they weren't releasing any students unless a parent was home. Good thing, as so many in our community were murdered that day.
As 6th and 4th graders, it was also the end of the innocence for my children. Having to explain the events of that day to them was harder than any other conversation we've had. Many of their classmates were now fatherless. The skies above, instead of sounding like planes on approach to Newark Airport, now were eerily silent, except for the occasional military jets guarding the area.
No, I will never forget. Nor will I ever let anyone I know forget, for as long as I live.
Amazing Bill, and brings back the grief of that terrible day, wow.
Since that day, I’ve always had a fire in my belly to stick bin laden’s head on a pike over looking the harbor at battery park and his skin nailed to the side of the pentagon along with the hides of the other poster children of the ACLU for abused mass murderers and mistreated terrorist.
I don’t understand; Nazi Germany and Imperial Japan defeated in 4 years. We went for the throat and ripped out their wind pipe. A brutal world war, resulting in victory and no further world wide conflicts until 9-11.
Now, eight years after the mass murder. We’ve a president who apologies for who and what America was. A limited war designed to win “hearts and minds”, not destroy our enemy, who we don’t call the enemy anymore. For God sakes, did we forget that’s how the Vietnam war was lost?
I still can taste the dust and smell death in the winds across long Island sound but I just don’t understand…
For all I care you can kill every Muslim male between the ages of two and fifty as repayment for this episode. I would literally bomb pakistan, egypt,afghanistan, syria and iraq back into the stone age. If i decided there were more people that threatened us in this fashion i would kill them also. Survival is a moral imperative and i can assure you the Chinese don't give a shit how many muslims we kill and neither does russia.
I can't bring myself to listen to Kevin's call again, and even though it's been years I can still remember his choking voice push out anger and worry about his peril, yet he was polite to the operator. His life was gone in an agonizing instant and I will NEVER forget how that sounded…
That 911 call was horrific. Those poor men.
One of the things I remember most clearly from that day was a reporter on the scene, grabbing a young fireman as he ran past into one of the towers. She was screaming at him, saying things like, "What are you doing?! It's dangerous, you're going to die!" And he shook her hand off and said, "Lady, it's my job, this is what I do," and turned and ran into the tower. It wasn't even five minutes later that it collapsed. I don't know if he made it out or not, but I'm almost positive that young man died that day, trying to save others. He knew what was going to happen, he knew what the dangers were, and he ran into that building anyway, and there were hundreds of others just like him, willing to do whatever was necessary.
They don't deserve to be forgotten.
9/11 was not a disaster. It was not a tragedy. It was an *atrocity.* And unlike disasters and tragedies, atrocities require more than remembrance.
They require vengeance.
At the beginning of the week I posted both of these videos to my Facebook. I asked my friends to view them sometime this week, and Remember. I was surprised to find both here, and on PJTV, and on Michelle Malkin's site. The same two films being used to mark the day that I did in my little corner of the internet, behind my "potted palm". But it is interesting that these films capture that day, in all its horror, for me, and apparently for many others.
I miss My America. I miss it very badly. I think that many people do. I think that is why there is a rumbling in the distance…
Degenerate faces….(those Muslims)…
Here, Here! Very well written Mr. Whittle. I will never forget! May all the souls that were murdered muslim fanatics on 9/11 rest in the peace of Jesus Christ!
Never forget what happened.
Never forget who did it.
Never stop fighting for what’s right.
Never let them win.
Or, better yet, indirectly blame them for 9/11 because, after all, "Christians started the Crusades." The moral hypocrisy of some people never ceases to amaze me.
Damn right.
I second the nominations.
Obama IS a RACIST.
His administration IS attempting to impose fascism on us.
Van Jones IS a RACIST.
Rev. Wright IS a RACIST.
ACORN is an organization involved in and tied to FRAUDULENT ACTIVITIES.
THESE ARE FACTS, AND IF YOU DON'T LIKE THEM, DEAL WITH THEM ANYWAY.
What has this got to do with this article CgntvDssdnt? I would respectfully ask that you go on Beck's blog and complain. If you have a direct point about this article then state it.
CgntvDssdnt – quit defacating all over BH – nothing you write or quote will ever top what Whittle and all the other writers here at BH have said – you apparently are obsessed with Glen Beck…is it a man-crush or something? Do you get a tingle up your leg every time you push the button to spam the site? Your spamming the site with that stupid quote just reveals more about you than it does about the person your crushing over.
THIS so puts your defecations to shame:
"It’s a RAGE RATCHET, and it goes one way only: to the left. Well, I refuse to be controlled by these sons of bitches. If what happened to Kevin Cosgrove and Jonathan Briley doesn’t fill you with outrage and anger, not only are you not my moral superior… but your inability to see right and wrong is an indication of deep-seated, delusional psychosis." ~ Bill Whittle.
YOU, CgntvDssdnt – are in the throes of a deep-seated, delusional psychosis.
They're only half a step out of the stone age- it would not bother them very much.
It doesn't have anything to do with it, he's just so lost in his own little world of GOP-hating he has to spew it at any and every opportunity.
To accomplish what?
You don't understand, because you think that Islamic terrorists are analogous to Nazi Germany and Imperial Japan.
…and so hate begat hate.
Congratulations, you have sunk to the level of your enemy.
This isn't some fucking Hollywood action movie, pardner. This is real-god-damn life. When you invade a country, there are consequences. When you kill someone, you kill a human being. The people who loved them feel the same way you do now.
Paranoid opinions are not the same thing as facts. Simply stating your beliefs does not make it so, you're not some kind of deity, believe it or not.
I know that, idiot. You're an idiot, and THAT is a fact too. You proved it.
I am as upset as I have ever been about this horrible event.
Thank you Bill.
It is a sin to waste. You my friend are wasting bandwidth posting the same tired message, which has not a thing to do with what is being discussed. If you want to discuss Glen Beck there are plenty of sites, both conservative and liberal, where he the topic of discussion. If you have a comment that is relavant to the thread please feel free to contribute otherwise just leave.
Awesome piece. Thanks for channeling my anger for me.
Facts do not enter into their reasoning at any point.
Most trolls know this is an especially good time to stay out of the light.
Any trolls that show up now are the worst sort of trolls and not worth anyone's time.
DFTT
That being said I completely agree with your assessment of the facts. One doesn't have to be a deity to see and hear, IN THEIR OWN WORDS, how much they hate America.
As I stated on another thread, the storm of Obamapologies has emboldened them to leave their little spider-holes. And most of them are garden-variety cretins, anyway, as you can see for yourself.
Just "thumbs down" his comments whenever you see them. Eventually he'll get the point. Maybe.
Oh, and Liberals NEVER consider it a sin to waste OTHER PEOPLE'S STUFF.
Great piece Bill Whittle. I've got to admit I've let myself be brainwashed by MSM……Thats my past. There is a whole other world on the independent/conservative/republican side.
We will never forget… we need the others to remember. How can they forget? What is wrong with them?
Sheer terror, blood curdling horror, heart stopping fear. What has happened in this country?
Thank you for showing the "truth", in image, words and emotion.
What struck my heart was the phrase you used, "accept the witness of these images". Maybe that is why I feel such anger about the the way the media has tried to silent the voices of these witnesses. As all the images, words and emotion of that day are "received", literally, in to our minds, hearts, and souls we can learn something from them, both about the people who died that day and about ourselves as individuals and our nation.
To reflect now with the luxury of time, is invaluable and we should all aspire to do so.
Tell me, pardner:
Why is Khalid Sheikh Mohammed still alive? And what does his long-overdue execution have to do with invasion? And who gives a fuck whether his mommy loves him?
Oh, that's rich. A liberal complaining about divisiveness, partisanship, and hate?
I'll never forget that day and all the people who died. We must never forget. We must never allow the government to take away our voices. We must never be silent. We must continue to stand up and fight for our great country and our freedom.
Brother, I am with you. Figuratively, literally, spiritually… I am that guy right next to you running up that hill, firing into that machine gun nest of America-hating vipers. Their philosophies are bankrupt, their souls are dead… and my quest is to do what i can to render them and their ilk back to the heap of worthless dung from which they crawled.
I can think of two others who deserve a special remembered today. Fire dept. Chaplin Father Mychal Judge was killed when one of the buildings fell on him, while he was giving last rites to a dead fireman. He knew the dangers, it was all going on around him, yet he decided that his duty was more important.
Abe Zelmanowitz chose to stay in the WTC despite certain death. He refused to leave a quadriplegic co-worker and friend to die alone. That devotion to his friend is beyond belief.
In my opinion, they both deserve to be awarded America's highest civilian honor.
Great column. I can't say anything but how much I agree. I find it intolerably sad to see my country turn into one where it's considered hatespeech to rail against the Islamic extremists who commit almost all of the terrorism in the world today, but it's perfectly fine to rail against Christians (especially Mormons and Catholics) for every bad act committed (real or perceived).
Beautiful. Right there with you. We need outrage and anger, they are powerful, natural parts of the human healing process – parts that certain factions don't want us to access, and tried to stifle immediately after the attacks. Don't let them.
Would you like me to list the endless 'unity' quotes of Obama and the endless 'divisive' quotes of Obama?
You and your ilk have been destroying America for decades. We're swinging back to save it. The racist and nefarious Obama states he's going to fundamentally transform America.
No. He's. Not.
Oh, feh, for the site admin bot! I was only repeating what Whittle said!!
)
To repeat it, since the site bot is on vacay, let me just express admiration for a good man of character employing a well-placed and apt bit of cursing. It's refreshing to see cursing used for proper emphasis, and to pull all nonsense about "decorum in the public debate" a tiny bit off-center.
I Will NEVER FORGET…..
"On the Transmigration of Souls"
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S6nrJ3ByzzE
I thought cons like Whittle are supposed to be so cool and logical, not some pumped up low brow full of rage. Sounds like the media doesn't do a good job of controlling anyone's rage.
Today was very different for me than it was these past 7 years. It's as if it's September 10, 2001 again, but somehow I know we are doomed. I certainly don't hold that sense of cavalier okay-ness that I had 8 years ago, in fact I am sure we are in harms way every day since Nov. 4. But, I have this distinct sense that there are many who have regressed back to their September 10 selves, or maybe there are many who never really "got" what happened on 9/11. Cont.:
I have a sister who was completely clueless as to why I was so upset when I called her, asking her how she was doing on 9/12/2001. She said "that she didn't know anyone personally who was killed, so it didn't affect her at all." She repeated this a year later at Ground Zero when asked by a local how Californians reacted…apparently "it didn't really affect California, very little was mentioned about it." Wha tha??? Is it just me that is cursed to share DNA with the likes of a person who could actually verbalize those words? Have any of you met up with anyone who wasn't affected by 9/11? So I'm all those things Bill mentioned plus really confused. But most of all I'm still really mad.
"Con"??? "low brow full of rage"??? Only a Liberal would call such names. Move along…nobody's interested in your childish ways. Do Liberals EVER actually grow up? Geez.
My name is Sean Haller and I give my word, my pledge, my oath, my solomn promise on my honor as an American and as a believer in Jesus Christ I will NEVER FORGET, and I will NOT let the "SONS OF BITCHES" keep me from it.
As always, you are saying what I want to say Bill. Great post brother.
I remember I was rooming with a gay couple at the time of the attack. One was a pretty moderate Democrat, and that was my friend I'd known for several years. His lover was a very radical hardcore leftist. I woke up first, woke the lover guy up (I honestly forget his name), and we sat and ate breakfast and watched the news about the attacks. And I could feel the differing reactions as we sat there on that couch, left and right. That was the beginning of the end of our friendship actually as it turns out. I could accept them being gay but they couldn't accept me being Republican, after that attack, it all fell apart and they got more and more resentful and angry at anything even vaguely right wing.
A few years later I was working in a pretty uniformily left wing business, I learned pretty fast to not discuss politics. But on the first 9/11 that I worked there, I brought in some of my 9/11 books and things that I'd bought and set them out in the kitchen/common room for people to browse through if they wanted. I didn't even think anything of it, I didn't imagine this was controversial. I never mentioned the day, i just set them out. Well it was like I'd taken a dump in there, the reaction was along the lines of 'Who put THAT here?' No one wanted to talk about it, no one wanted to even see anything about it. Its like they resented even being reminded of it. So I sighed and took the books back to my desk and put them away.
Oddly those are my two strongest personal 911 memories. A strange and dark day, but one that I think focuses us on what needs to be done in the future. Who we need to be as a people. With or without the Left.
Your mom must be real proud of you man. What a guy! Now run along I'm sure there's some dogs you need to kick and some productive citizens you need to protest.
Exactly what leftists are afraid of…a unified movement against evil.
Wrong. We just want to kill them and be done with it. They want to torture us and cripple us to impotency. And that's worse than death.
Obama is unifying the unifyable. He's dividing out the devisive. To unify any group, there will always be some left out. Its may sound counter intuitive, but I think its true anyway. To unify some, typically you have to unify AGAINST others. And if those others are clearly against you no matter what anyway? Well, then why waist anyone's type trying to include them? We're Obama to waste effort doing that then he'd truly be a wimp! That is the definition of ceding power.
Obama is unifying the unifyable. He's dividing out the devisive. To unify any group, there will always be some left out. Its may sound counter intuitive, but I think its true anyway. To unify some, typically you have to unify AGAINST others. And if those others are clearly against you no matter what anyway? Well, then why waist anyone's type trying to include them? Were Obama to waste effort doing that then he'd truly be a wimp! That is the definition of ceding power.
Why does a troll choose one bridge or another to live under? If I know… I'm not saying.
Amen, and thank you.
This morning I had to deal with a person who actually compared the monsters who committed these atrocities with freedom fighters. (Not directly, but through an icon on a post about the topic.) I could not believe what I was hearing.
I am DONE being polite and civil about this. We NEED to be angry. And we need to be angry at those who dare to spit on the memories of those who died that day, whether they do so by being a Truther, by denying that Islam was the cause, by saying America deserved it – whatever the lie is, we need to be angry and stay angry. It's the only thing that will motivate us to continue to speak out about this ideology and the ugliness that it continues to spawn.
It's the only thing that is going to help us win back our country from enemies without and within.
Another Glenn Beck hater?
Jump on the bandwagon!
Beck never called the president a racist, but did call the president out on his anti-Americanism. I haven't enjoyed a G.O.M.P. in a long time – why don't you call Beck next week during his radio broadcast and fulfill my wish.
They are analogous in the fact of; they are the enemy that has vowed to destroy us and we are currently engaged in a death struggle for survival.
Nothing angers me more than what happend to our country on 9/11. Something has to be done to make the people responsible pay for their attack on my country.
Another thing that angers me is when the right wing idiots always want to blame everything on what they call the Left wing.
It infuriates me when the idiot right wing morons attempt to make the adjective conservative appear to mean (holier than thou) and the adjective liberal mean (demonic). And what's worse is the liberal bafoons let them get away with it.
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