The day before 9/11 happened

By Gary Maydew

The workers who came streaming into the World Trade Center in Manhattan, N.Y., on Monday, Sept. 10, 2001 were doubtless like most Americans not thinking about terrorism. The thought that more than 2,000 of them would die the next day in a terrorist attack would have been beyond belief.

Indeed, terrorism appeared to many to be waning as a concern. An op-ed in the New York Times on June 10, 2001, by a former State Department counterterrorism specialist stated that “... terrorism is not the biggest security challenge confronting the United States, and it should not be portrayed that way.”

The economy was on the minds of New Yorkers and the rest of the country on Sept. 11, 2001. In Washington, politicians began considering a tax cut in response to a government report that unemployment had risen from 4.5 percent in July to 4.9 percent in August. The S&P 500 had fallen more than 30 percent since its high in March of 2000. The market finished up nearly 1 percent that Monday, Sept. 10. It would not open again until the next Monday.

Iowans were focused on the big football game week between Iowa and Iowa State coming up Saturday. The Hawks had opened with two very impressive victories and ISU in its opening game had pummeled UNI 44-0. The game, a 17-14 win by ISU, proved to be as exciting as forecast. However, it would not be played until Nov. 24.

The point of this historical vignette? The thoughts and concerns that occupied Americans on Sept. 10, 2001, were almost totally forgotten a day later as we hovered anxiously in front of our TVs and watched endless reruns of the horrible events of Sept. 11. Eight years have passed. And the entire nation seems to have lost its collective memory of that date. Consider:

l Recent polls show that fewer than 50 percent of the people support the war in Afghanistan. Many columnists recommend that we withdraw our troops and leave the country to the Taliban, the government that harbored and encouraged the terrorists.

l The CIA, regarded in the months after 2001 as indispensable in gathering intelligence from our captives and others, is now being subjected to possible prosecution for its interrogation techniques.

A cynic once said that Americans have the staying power of a grasshopper and the memory of a fruit fly. Let's prove the cynic wrong.

Let us vow to not only remember 9/11, but to continue to take steps to minimize the likelihood of that terrible event ever happening again.

Gary L. Maydew of Ames is a retired professor of accounting at Iowa State University.