Whiskey Tango Foxtrot, Over?

[lagilman]

I came home tonight to the news that the GOP Convention apparently used as part of their convention wrap-up Grand presentation footage of 9/11. Including people jumping to their deaths from the Towers. Footage is here if you feel you need proof.

I haven't watched it. I will not watch it. Readers of this Journal and my web site know that I was in the city that day -- that I saw it all unfold not via the distance of a television screen, but out my office window. I knew rescue workers who raced to the scene hoping to find survivors. I knew people who died. For weeks, the sound of sirens made me wake in a cold sweat, crying. I was treated, years after, for PTSD from that day, and still have rather specific triggery reactions to sirens or sudden loud noises, or the visual of planes crashing.

To use footage of this event, to make use of the murder of thousands of innocents for political gain and call it a "tribute"?

No. A thousand and a thousand more times fuck no.

Comments

[debg.livejournal.com]

Jesus WEPT.

I wish I was surprised. I wish I still had the capacity to be surprised.

Evil bastards.

[smoemeth.livejournal.com]

To quote PNH:

"No more mercy. These people need to be more than defeated. They need to be driven from our public life."

Just watched this before reading your post...how oddly synchronistic...

[neutronjockey.livejournal.com]

Re: Just watched this before reading your post...how oddly synchronistic...

[lagilman]

Sorry, right now I'm far too full of rage to watch anything with any Repugnican (my first time ever using that phrase, but they've earned it) in it.

[kateelliott.livejournal.com]

Hugs to you.

They are beneath contempt. I've made two donations to the Obama campaign in the last week.

Re: Just watched this before reading your post...how oddly synchronistic...

[neutronjockey.livejournal.com]

FYI it would have pissed you off further. Best not to watch.

[handlebar605.livejournal.com]

but, but, 9/11 is the whole purpose for our being in Iraq (nope, that's the purpose for our being in Afghanistan)

So what's the purpose for our being in Iraq (because daddy didn't take care of Sadaam Husein)

I agree with you.

Re: Just watched this before reading your post...how oddly synchronistic...

[lagilman]

When posting things that will/may upset people, it's generally considered good manners to indicate what it is you're posting. For everyone reading this: please do so in this forum in the future.

I've only managed to gag down a few hours of the RNC

[bjcooper.livejournal.com]

Since it's all been awful. But I'm really sorry they chose to use 9/11. Horrid judgement.

[joycemocha.livejournal.com]

I cannot watch it. I will not watch it.

I was still a stay-at-home parent and 4-H Leader when 9/11 happened. Our Extension agent was in Manhattan when it happened, with a direct view of the World Trade Center. He sent us agonized e-mails, with pictures because it was too much for him to bear. He saw the people jumping.

No. This use of that memory is an abomination.

No.

Re: I've only managed to gag down a few hours of the RNC

[downtime-mayhem.livejournal.com]

You're stronger than I am. I admire those watching it so we can repudiate the lies and misrepresentations--but I couldn't do it. Just keeping an eye on the news around the web was making me ill.

(here by way of La Gringa)

[svilleficrecs.livejournal.com]

Just when I think they can't top themselves, they do. *grrrr*

That's it. My mission, in the next nine weeks, is to convince my mom to switch to Obama.

[arouraleona.livejournal.com]

I wish you luck with that. If I make a comment about it I'm told that I'm not showing the proper respect.

[mizkit.livejournal.com]

Oh my God. I haven't watched it either, and won't, and hadn't even heard of them doing this until I read it here in your LJ, and just the *idea* makes me cry. How unspeakably horrible.

[lagilman]

And that video showed "respect," proper or otherwise?

[neadods.livejournal.com]

It's the world's most unsubtle hint that because the Clintons were against a lot of security, all Democrats must be, and therefore only the Republicans can protect us from something that happened on their watch, with warning.

Remember, Bush's second campaign had ads of people removing bodies wrapped in flags. You'd think that the furious, horrified backlash against that would have learned 'em, but some folks are beyond learning.

Re: Just watched this before reading your post...how oddly synchronistic...

[stephen-dedman.livejournal.com]

As a Doonesbury strip once had the White House Press Secretary say, "It's 9/11 24/7".

[bigferret.livejournal.com]

I can't imagine how hard 9/11 was for those who were in Manhattan that day and how stinging the memories must be. My heart weeps for all of the tragedy you watched and the friends you lost.

I watched the video link you put up since I was curious and I don't have the emotional ties to the events that you do. OMFG! What a complete travesty! They could have showed a video of people dumping shit on bodies wrapped in American flags and it would have been less offensive to me.

It just breaks my heart that there are people who think this video is okay.

I want to marry Keith Olbermann for what he said about the video.

[jperceval.livejournal.com]

OMFG. Just when you think Repugnicans couldn't sink any lower.

[nick-kaufmann.livejournal.com]

There's no video at that URL.

[lagilman]

the link is via kradical's LJ -- I didn't check it myself but people seemed to be able to access it last night. Was it taken down?

(I'm not going to go look -- I don't stick my hand into working wood-chippers, either)

[nick-kaufmann.livejournal.com]

Thanks. The video is still available through a link in his blog. Though I saw no footage of anyone jumping, I was as disgusted as you are at the way the Republican party keeps trying to own this national tragedy. They are exploiting the dead.

[cedunkley.livejournal.com]

I've watched the video twice now and it does not contain any footage of people jumping. The narrator mentions this happened "...buildings burning, bodies falling..." but there is no footage in this piece showing it.

For those who haven't watched the video it starts off showing images of the Iranian hostage crisis then shows images of the embassy bombings in Africa in 1998, the USS Cole, Osama Bin Laden, and the attacks on September 11th in NY, the Pentagon and makes a reference to flight 93.

This is no different from many other videos shown about Sept 11th each anniversary and on cable programs about that day.

For the record, I was there and witnessed Sept 11th first hand as well. I too spent quite a while afterward on edge, reacting to sirens and other things, expecting the next attack to come. Looking back at that I guess I take a different view when it comes to this. I want to be reminded, I want others to be reminded. For people forget too easily.

Just my personal opinion.

[ex-fashioni.livejournal.com]

It was appalling. I watched it once-- all the way through so I could ascertain for myself what I was really seeing.

The difference between what happened last night and the tributes/reminders that occur on the anniversary of the attack is that on 9/11, we're going to know the video reminders are coming-- we can be prepared to watch or not, as we so choose.

Catching an entire convention and millions of viewers on television completely unawares could be considered every bit as much a hijacking.

Olbermann said it best, I think:

"If at this late date any television network had, of its own accord, showed that much videotape and that much graphic videotape of 9/11 and I speak as somebody who lost a few friends there— It—we—would be rightly eviscerated at all quarters, perhaps by the Republican Party itself, for exploiting the memories of the dead and perhaps even for trying to evoke that pain again."

[dianora2.livejournal.com]

It's still using the memory of the dead for fearmongering and political gain, and ambushing people with it. September 4th is not September 11th. I choose not to watch TV on that day, because I know it will upset me. I feel very sorry for people who were ambushed with that footage last night, especially Keith Olbermann, who had friends who died that day.

You're free to think it was okay, and I'm free to think it was utterly disgusting.

[lagilman]

*points to Olbermann's quote* Yes. That.

Back when Ground Zero as still being excavated, there was a very strong negative reaction from the entire political spectrum to the possibility that Bush was going to use that site as a political grandstand. Likewise when Rudy-the-asshole tried it. It has become an accepted convention that the visuals of 9/11 were not to be used for that sort of political gain, not without massive backlash. And to do it here and now, in such a manner, to -- as was said, to hijack without warning an entire audience, live and televised... reprehensible.


(and it's not just politics: a major writers conference used footage of 9/11 in a roundup of recent events -- at a formal event attended by a number of NY writers and editors. The backlash was immediate and scathing.)

[cedunkley.livejournal.com]

The website for the convention had the agenda listed for each day of the convention, listing speakers and videos that would be played and when.

I'm not the biggest fan of Sept 11th being used by a political party. Its obvious the Republican party has been doing this since just after that day.

As for Olberman's reaction, I respect it as someone else who lived that day in person. I don't agree with his claim that there was a lot of graphic Sept 11th footage. The most graphic footage in the video were victims of the Embassy bombings. That was far more graphic than anything shown about Sept 11th.

Personally, T think the Republicans use Sept 11th too much and the Democrats stay too far away from it. Being such an emotional issue for so many of us perhaps there is no middle ground.

I didn't have a problem with the content of the video shown, other than the implications that only the Republican party can protect us from it.

on this, I must strongly and respectfully disagree

[lagilman]

There's a difference between "forgetting" and being assaulted without warning by the images in an attempt to use those images for political gain.

If someone chooses to forget, shame on them. On September 11th there will be memorials, as is proper.

On September 4th, as the wrap-up to a political convention... they were not 'remembering.' They were fear-mongering.

[ex-fashioni.livejournal.com]

>(and it's not just politics: a major writers conference used footage of 9/11 in a roundup of recent events -- at a formal event attended by a number of NY writers and editors. The backlash was immediate and scathing.)

I was there-- the 9/11 footage wasn't actually used in the final cut, but only because La Nora, who was supposed to emcee the show and ultimately refused because the person responsible for the video wouldn't agree to not show it, insisted that the Tower footage be removed, as well as the Challenger explosion and the ruins of the Oklahoma City bombing. We were, unfortunately, still treated to the shot of the Challenger rising into the air, plus the ever heartening sight of tanks in Tieneman Square with "Don't Worry Be Happy" playing in the background.

It was not a Fun Night.

Re: on this, I must strongly and respectfully disagree

[cedunkley.livejournal.com]

There's a difference between "forgetting" and being assaulted without warning by the images in an attempt to use those images for political gain.

I generally agree. I guess I didn't feel blindsided by the video. I guess I was expecting it. The video was a War on Terror video with Sept 11th as part of it. Considering the Republican party's foreign policy platform, I wasn't surprised they would highlight it at the convention.

I don't like the we're the only party that can keep you safe stuff though. That's far more insulting to me than the video itself.

[wyld-dandelyon.livejournal.com]

The Republican party has been using images of and references to 911 to bolster their politics, and especially their President ever since it happened. In my opinion, this administration has committed many abuses of power, and used that tragic footage as a “get out of jail free” card, pulling at our fears of outside attack to get us to let them get away with violating the Constitutional values and laws that work to keep us safe from oppressors in our own country.

So, I can’t say it surprised me to see them doing the same thing for their presidential candidate. But I wasn’t ready for it. I guess I hoped for at least a little better from McCain. So, I was eating dinner with the convention on when the 911 clip came on, and it turned my stomach. I don’t want more years of an administration that wants people to make decisions based on fear, rather than honor, or kindness, or even logic.

Should we honor our dead? Of course. But I don’t think that was the intent of putting this footage in the Republican convention.

Let’s face it—since the nominations are now decided by popular election in the primaries, these conventions are a pageant designed for just one purpose--to win votes. Every word, every speech, every video, and every performer is there because the organizers think they will help win votes.

And I don’t think it is appropriate to use the deaths of so many, including Americans and visitors to our country, Democrats and Republicans, Christians, Muslims, Jews and people of other faiths, adults and children alike, to tug at our fears and our heartstrings in an attempt to win votes.

[otterdance.livejournal.com]

I missed that part. And agree with you 10000%. But are we surprised? How else to keep the Gospel of Fear going? If Obama does win, do you think they'll unbolt the Code Orange signs around the airports? Instead of a reading of the moment, it's become a creed.

[kynn.livejournal.com]

The thing that bothered me the most was the very start where they try to link Iran to 9/11.

If we've been at war with Iran since the hostage crisis, why the hell hasn't Oliver North and the rest of the Iran-Contra gang been executed yet for treason?

[wolfsilveroak.livejournal.com]

And yet... people still want to vote for him.

I just don't get it.

[lagilman]

I've learned the hard way that some people, having chosen a path, or a position, or a belief, just can't change it. I don't know if it's stubbornness, or an inability to bend that's DNA-coded or what, but not all the evidence in the world will make them admit they chose badly.

Also, there are a lot of people out there who are afraid, and fear often makes us cling to the thing that looks/sounds the most like a weapon.

[wolfsilveroak.livejournal.com]

I've learned the hard way that some people, having chosen a path, or a position, or a belief, just can't change it. I don't know if it's stubbornness, or an inability to bend that's DNA-coded or what, but not all the evidence in the world will make them admit they chose badly.

Yup.
Also, there are a lot of people out there who are afraid, and fear often makes us cling to the thing that looks/sounds the most like a weapon.

Sad, isn't it?

[kalligraphy.livejournal.com]

There is a certain aspect of politics that thrive on telling people who to fear, who to hate and who is to blame and that THEY are the only people who can protect your poor innocent self from it all. For 8 years the thugs on the right have been telling us what to fear, who to fear and who is to blame. Most of it is lies, damn lies and shameful abuse of a terrible event for their own political gain. It's abuse and exploitation. I grew sick of it long ago and Giulliani strutted it out shamelessly at the RNC. If they aren't talking about 9/11, they are shouting about the dangers of homosexuality, the threat of foreigners or the infidels that don't follow their judeo/Christian belief system. In fact anyone who deigns to think or act differently than they do, is a threat to world peace and the sanctity of all that is held holy. We know this to be true because the politicians and the talking heads have told us so. My own grasp of history and it's relevance tells me that we've seen this brand of politics before. And it has NEVER turned out well for anyone, but some people do get to bask in the glow of wealth and power before it all goes to hell. I suppose for them it's worth it. But not to me. I don't vote for Obama because he is the best person for the job, I vote for him because he is the best person available. The alternative is unthinkable.

[arouraleona.livejournal.com]

Hey, I agree with you, my parents on the other hand see that sort of thing as a memorial. It's a carry off of the "don't agree with the Iraq war? UnAmerican! Don't support your president? UnAmerican! Question your government? UnAmerican... unless you're questioning those liberals, then - WAY TO GO! Telling my parents that the constitution practically commands us to question our government, especially when it is taking liberals with our freedoms, etc, is 'not showing proper respect' not respecting the elders... blah blah blah.

[mmegaera.livejournal.com]

I didn't have any direct ties to New York on 9/11, and I'm still traumatized at pictures and/or footage. I cannot imagine what it must be like for those of you who do. I wish I could strangle those who decided this was a good idea for you. For all of us.