Fear Itself

I admit it, there is a rather large streak of liberal thought running through here. At the conclusion of those seemingly interminable telephone surveys, when the droid at the other end of the line asks which direction I lean, I will always say to the left. I once almost went so far as to joining the ACLU strictly for the purposes of identifying myself as being a "card-carrying" liberal. I find it highly ironic that, apropos of absolutely nothing, this blog bears the same title as the web page of a rather arch conservative. It is also the name of an album of electronic music by Douglas Leedy. It is also the name of a site that collects digital photos.
But I digress. All of these links can be established via a quick Google search, but the virtual real estate on which I squat is not really my concern. I was struck today at my rather knee-jerk reaction to the announcement that Osama bin Laden will release a new video in the coming days ahead of the sixth anniversary of the September 11 attacks. This is a guy who can still ring my jingoistic buzzer pretty good. I have no shame for the days that followed the collapse of the World Trade Center towers, as I felt my national pride and patriotism swelling. It was a gift, of sorts, to be given a real and true villain. After so many years of hating and fearing an enemy that we never fully identified, we finally had somebody to put on dartboards and toilet paper. The image of Colonel Kilgore's Air Cavalry screaming out of the morning sun to the strains of "The Ride of the Valkyries" somewhere in Afghanistan kept me going in those early days. I'm usually a pretty big proponent of turning the other cheek, but in this case I would have been quite happy to see both of his cheeks forcibly removed.
Six years later, we have spent four of them attempting to flower a democracy in another country, while the frontier justice promised by Pinhead has netted a few big fish, but mostly threats and taunts from Osama. It has become somewhat of a symbiotic relationship, with the last video featuring bin Laden coming in 2004, just before the election. Now, as the strains of a war that has no focus or end in sight wear on Americans and just before the report on the troop surge, we have a new message. Will he be defiant? Will he instill fear? Will he deny that he is gay? At this point, just having his face in the news again will certainly jog the memories of those horrible weeks in the fall of 2001. For a few days, at least, the terror level will burn a little brighter for all of us because that nut is still out there. And yes, this time I am talking about Osama bin Laden.