Bush has been a divider, not a unifier

Bush has been a divider, not a unifier
BY CINDY RICHARDS
September 13, 2006
Copyright by The Chicago Sun Times



It was early summer when I made my plane reservations to head to Sun Valley, Idaho, for a weekend journalism conference. I booked the return trip for Sept. 11. Without its more emotionally laden name, 9/11, it felt as though I was simply flying on any old Monday.

It wasn't until a week ago that I realized I would be heading home on the fifth anniversary of the terrorist attacks. It was, to say the least, unnerving.

Even as I took off my shoes and jacket to make my way through the security checkpoints, I was reminded how little has changed in America in these last five years.

Sure, some things are different, flying, for instance. Chugging the last of the bottled water, tossing the toothpaste and waiting to see whether you'll be unlucky enough to be subject to the wand scanner at security certainly drives home the point that we aren't who we used to be.

Outside of airports, too, we have changed. We're more suspicious, less trusting, a little jumpier.

Even a clap of thunder, especially when it sounds on 9/11, can leave us shaken. Or so it was for my family. When I called home on Monday to let them know my plane would be delayed, they told me about a clap of thunder that hit that morning. It was, they all agreed, the loudest boom they had ever heard.

Their first thought: a bomb.

Of course, it was just a message from Mother Nature, not one delivered by some Islamic militant.

Likewise, my flights were delayed by Mother Nature, not a suicide bomber. Not that I expected a flight from Sun Valley, Idaho, to Salt Lake City, Utah, or one from Salt Lake to Chicago would be likely terrorist targets but, well, you just never know these days, do you?

And that, it seems, is the biggest change of the last five years. We no longer can go through life feeling smug that we are immune from the woes of the world.

But we have not changed in the way many had predicted while searchers still combed through the rubble. We have not united against a common enemy.

In his prime-time address to the nation -- delivered five years to the minute after he addressed the nation in the wake of the attacks -- President Bush put the terrorist attacks in the context of our war in Iraq. Noting that he is often asked why we're in Iraq when Osama bin Laden is somewhere else, he said that Saddam Hussein was still a threat to America and needed to be rousted.

Seems a bit like punishing one kid for the sins of another with the excuse that "If he didn't do this, he probably did something else."

But then, this is politics. We have a midterm election looming and some Republicans are worried about how a few Democratic victories could change the political landscape.

So it wasn't surprising that Democratic leaders were quick to criticize the president for "politicizing" a national tragedy. As though they haven't done it themselves and won't continue to do so into the foreseeable future.

In his speech, the president called for national unity, the thing he is least likely to get anytime soon. Sure, we all shared in a moment of silence, or wiped a tear as we remembered that horrible day, but that's as far as it goes. Once the day ended without incident, we all returned to our political corners.

At the risk of sounding partisan, the blame for that has to fall on the president. On Sept. 12, 2001, he had that national unity, handed to him by some Muslim extremists who thought they could take on the world's superpower. But he let it slip away when he chose to fight the wrong target.

If we were in a fight against our real enemy, Osama bin Laden, we would be united.