What better way to tell the world that America will not be intimidated by imbecilic acts of suicidal maniacs? The moment the rubble is removed, excavation for the foundation of the new World Trade Center should begin. Build it 10 floors higher. To protect its new occupants, put a radar-controlled missile-defense system on the top. Put a similar system on top of Sears Tower in Chicago, and on all our vulnerable landmarks.
Sure, it will cost a bundle. Fox news reported that in 1973, construction costs for the World Trade Center exceeded $800 million. Today, four billion dollars might not cover the reconstruction costs. Where will it come from?
Here’s a thought: Each year, we give more than $2 billion to the various United Nations organizations, making it possible for the Human Rights Commission to kick us off the Commission, and then hold a world conference to condemn Israel – and by association, the United States – as a “racist” nation. Some of this money pays for conferences where Castro and Saddam are praised, and the United States ridiculed.
Surely, they will understand that we have something better to do with our money for the next few years.
Rebuilding the Pentagon goes without saying, as does the rebuilding of our national defense. These are jobs for the government. The people, too, have a rebuilding job to do.
We need to rebuild the spirit of America, the spirit that says to the world – we mean you no harm, but we will not tolerate threats to our people, or to our nation. And we need to reorder our priorities to make certain we can protect our people and our nation.
We must – absolutely must – develop energy self-sufficiency. This means energy from oil, coal, and nuclear sources – within our borders. We have allowed unfounded, idealistic arguments about the “pristine” tundra of Alaska’s frozen north shore to delay oil exploration for more than a decade. Get over it, Sierra Club – sink the oil wells!
We have allowed environmental zealots to convince us to abandon the use of coal, when we have a 200-year supply of relatively cheap energy in our own country.
President Bush: Rescind Bill Clinton’s designation of the Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument; free that massive reserve of low-sulphur coal.
Get those nuclear-power plants under construction. The fact that 56 percent of our energy is imported, mostly from nations that are sympathetic to the people who invaded the United States on September 11, is sufficient justification for launching an immediate top-priority campaign to regain energy self-sufficiency.
We can’t stop there. We need food self-sufficiency as well. We can grow what we need, if we can get regulatory obstacles removed. More than 1,400 farm families were nearly driven off their land in the Klamath basin, to insure that a sucker fish had plenty of water. The coho salmon, for which the water was also reserved, never was endangered, according to a September 10 ruling by Judge Michael R. Hogan. Environmental extremists filed law suits forcing the listing, with which federal agencies, staffed by executives from environmental-extremist organizations, were happy to comply.
America’s security is far more important than the sucker fish, or the coho salmon for that matter. Our security requires adequate food supplies, produced in America. Our food supply can no longer be jeopardized to appease the utopian vision of those who use the environment as an excuse to stop resource production.
Nor can we let our zeal for global trade dilute our common sense. American farmers and producers should not be forced to compete on an uneven playing field. Countries that export products into this country should be required to meet the same production standards American producers have to meet. America should set the rules of trade – not the World Trade Organization.
This “America first” attitude is called “jingoistic” in the international community. This attitude is precisely what the United Nations is trying to outlaw. In fact, most of this article borders on “hate speech,” in the view of proponents of the global village.
I wonder how these same folks would label the “speech” made by the hijacker-invaders on September 11.
These invaders were welcomed into this country. They were granted driving privileges. They were extended all the freedoms that Americans enjoy – and they thanked us by killing thousands of innocent people.
People who are not citizens of the United States may be in this country only on the conditions set by our government. To live in America as a non-citizen is a privilege, not a right. This privilege is being abused – badly – and we must rethink the conditions that govern non-citizen entry into this country.
Some of the invaders who attacked our country were here illegally. If we need more people to monitor visas, and deport illegals, then so be it. There is a procedure by which any person may apply to become an American citizen. Those who wish to become citizens are welcome. Those who wish to visit for a specified time, for a specified purpose, are welcome – so long as they obey our laws. Those who harbor hate and plan destruction are not welcome, and must be excluded from our society.
These views will not be popular among environmental extremists, or proponents of world government. Tough. This is war.
Make no mistake: It is not a war against Osama bin Laden, or his network of terrorists, or any other group. It is a war against the underlying philosophy which spawned them. Those poor, misguided souls who believe they are going to heaven for killing innocent civilians, are the victims of a philosophy that has many followers in many countries – including the United States. Most of these people operate within the law, but what separates them from the hijackers is only a matter of degree. They don’t hate America quite as much as those who blow themselves (and others) to kingdom come.
Gar Smith, editor of the Earth Island Journal, the official publication of the Earth Island Institute, that great beacon of American environmental extremism, says that the solution to the problem of terrorism “… would require the United States to give up its position as the world’s reigning Superpower,” He also says that it is time to “move to a world beyond oil, beyond repression, and beyond superpowers.”
He and his organization are welcome to move on to Afghanistan, or anywhere else, besides America. His attitude reflects much of the same philosophy that inspired the terrorists’ attacks on America.
It’s up to others to rebuild the World Trade Center, and the Pentagon, and our national defense. It is up to us ordinary people to rebuild the spirit of America, through our neighborhoods, our churches, our schools, our workplaces, and in our own minds and hearts.
Yes, we will protect the environment, but we will not be enslaved by it, nor by those extremists who use it as an excuse to destroy productivity and property rights.
We now have to decide: Do we want to remain free, independent, strong, self-reliant? Or do we want to acquiesce to the politically correct global village nonsense that allows the leaders of the nations who harbor terrorists to have more say in our domestic policy than we do?
Let not history record this generation as the one which gave away America’s freedom.
