9/11: A Personal Reflection

I remember the day vividly.

As I walked up the staircase from the Astor Place subway station and looked down Cooper Square, I saw a black cloud of smoke blowing from the west. One of those giant oil tanks in Jersey, I surmised; not unusual that one would have a problem now and then.

When I made it to our office at 20 Cooper Square, the doorman told me that a plane had crashed into the World Trade Center. Immediately I asked if it was a small plane. He told me he thought so.

I had a window looking south, everyone crowded into my office to watch the burning tower. Someone said, it had to be a small plane; if it was a jetliner, the pilot would’ve ditched it into the ocean if he had trouble.

Then we gasped: what if the pilot wasn’t actually flying the plane?

When the second one hit, we knew something had gone terribly, terribly wrong. Then we heard about the Pentagon, and then Pennsylvania and suddenly realized the hundred or so of us were stuck together in an office in the East Village with no communications except email and no clue how to get home.

The most macabre experience in my life occurred a few minutes later. There was a TV in my office, positioned right next to the window looking out towards the towers. When the first tower started to wobble, lowering itself down, billowing black dust against a sparkling blue sky, we saw the same image side by side: television and window, electronic and live.

We were about three miles from the Towers. When they slowly collapsed upon themselves – like a giant rocket taking off from Cape Kennedy, except in the wrong direction – we couldn’t see the bodies of those jumping out windows, but somehow knew they were there.

Soon, Martin Sorrell sent me an email from London headquarters asking if all was OK. London? Jesus, it wasn’t just us watching this tragic event from an office overlooking a parking lot at 20 Cooper Square, it was the whole world..

I don’t remember how and when we decided to leave, but it was mid-afternoon. We walked all the way from Cooper Sq and E. Fourth to Grand Central Terminal. On the way up, we saw little kids in front of newspaper stands selling postcards of the World Trade Center, standing magestically over lower Manhattan, for ten dollars.

Just a few hours ago, they were real. Now they were being hawked as a souvenir, never to be real again.

I can’t tell you how scared we were to walk into Grand Central Terminal – a building we had known for years, a safe haven, now the next possible target for a terrorist strike. All trains went north, all stops along the way. I remember getting off in Stamford and members of the clergy – all denominations – were there to greet and console.

At home we were glued to the TV, 24/7. We watched as the NY City Police and Fire Departments and Iron Workers pulled bodies and debris from the morass. For years, we had taken these public servants and laborers for granted, maybe even complained about them at times, but on that day they rose to the ultimate occasion, teaching us lessons in bravery, duty and unselfish service.

Ten years later, something bothers me. It bothers me that we’ve forgotten about the heroism of these dedicated public servants, even villianized them in the last several months.

They make too much, they retire too early, they have cushy jobs, they create budget deficits.

Did any of the police officers, firefighters, or clean-up crews ask for a salary increase that day? Doubt it.

Did they think about their own lives each time they came out of the burning buildings alive, another victim in their arms or over their shoulders? No, most went right back up, many themselves succumbing to the flames and smoke.

Did any of them get a bonus for a job well done? Their only reward for a job well done was a job well done.

In a world increasingly judged by the yardstick of dollars and cents, let us not forget the time, a short ten years ago, when our public and union employees gave Wall Street – and all of us – the ultimate bailout.

And let us never again measure their contribution in mere dollars and cents.

A Few Words of Wisdom From Michael Moore

A friend of mine forwarded this to me recently. A very interesting perspective which makes a lot of sense

30 Years Ago Today: The Day the Middle Class Died

By Michael Moore

From time to time, someone under 30 will ask me, "When did this all begin, America's downward slide?" They say they've heard of a time when working people could raise a family and send the kids to college on just one parent's income (and that college in states like California and New York was almost free). That anyone who wanted a decent paying job could get one. That people only worked five days a week, eight hours a day, got the whole weekend off and had a paid vacation every summer. That many jobs were union jobs, from baggers at the grocery store to the guy painting your house, and this meant that no matter how "lowly" your job was you had guarantees of a pension, occasional raises, health insurance and someone to stick up for you if you were unfairly treated.

Young people have heard of this mythical time -- but it was no myth, it was real. And when they ask, "When did this all end?", I say, "It ended on this day: August 5th, 1981."

Beginning on this date, 30 years ago, Big Business and the Right Wing decided to "go for it" -- to see if they could actually destroy the middle class so that they could become richer themselves.

And they've succeeded.

On August 5, 1981, President Ronald Reagan fired every member of the air traffic controllers union (PATCO) who'd defied his order to return to work and declared their union illegal. They had been on strike for just two days.

It was a bold and brash move. No one had ever tried it. What made it even bolder was that PATCO was one of only three unions that had endorsed Reagan for president! It sent a shock wave through workers across the country. If he would do this to the people who were with him, what would he do to us?

Reagan had been backed by Wall Street in his run for the White House and they, along with right-wing Christians, wanted to restructure America and turn back the tide that President Franklin D. Roosevelt started -- a tide that was intended to make life better for the average working person. The rich hated paying better wages and providing benefits. They hated paying taxes even more. And they despised unions. The right-wing Christians hated anything that sounded like socialism or holding out a helping hand to minorities or women.

Reagan promised to end all that. So when the air traffic controllers went on strike, he seized the moment. In getting rid of every single last one of them and outlawing their union, he sent a clear and strong message: The days of everyone having a comfortable middle class life were over. America, from now on, would be run this way:

• The super-rich will make more, much much more, and the rest of you will scramble for the crumbs that are left.
• Everyone must work! Mom, Dad, the teenagers in the house! Dad, you work a second job! Kids, here's your latch-key! Your parents might be home in time to put you to bed.
• 50 million of you must go without health insurance! And health insurance companies: you go ahead and decide who you want to help -- or not.
• Unions are evil! You will not belong to a union! You do not need an advocate! Shut up and get back to work! No, you can't leave now, we're not done. Your kids can make their own dinner.
• You want to go to college? No problem -- just sign here and be in hock to a bank for the next 20 years!
• What's "a raise"? Get back to work and shut up!

And so it went. But Reagan could not have pulled this off by himself in 1981. He had some big help:

The AFL-CIO.

The biggest organization of unions in America told its members to cross the picket lines of the air traffic controllers and go to work. And that's just what these union members did. Union pilots, flight attendants, delivery truck drivers, baggage handlers -- they all crossed the line and helped to break the strike. And union members of all stripes crossed the picket lines and continued to fly.

Reagan and Wall Street could not believe their eyes! Hundreds of thousands of working people and union members endorsing the firing of fellow union members. It was Christmas in August for Corporate America.

And that was the beginning of the end. Reagan and the Republicans knew they could get away with anything -- and they did. They slashed taxes on the rich. They made it harder for you to start a union at your workplace. They eliminated safety regulations on the job. They ignored the monopoly laws and allowed thousands of companies to merge or be bought out and closed down. Corporations froze wages and threatened to move overseas if the workers didn't accept lower pay and less benefits. And when the workers agreed to work for less, they moved the jobs overseas anyway.

And at every step along the way, the majority of Americans went along with this. There was little opposition or fight-back. The "masses" did not rise up and protect their jobs, their homes, their schools (which used to be the best in the world). They just accepted their fate and took the beating.

I have often wondered what would have happened had we all just stopped flying, period, back in 1981. What if all the unions had said to Reagan, "Give those controllers their jobs back or we're shutting the country down!"? You know what would have happened. The corporate elite and their boy Reagan would have buckled.

But we didn't do it. And so, bit by bit, piece by piece, in the ensuing 30 years, those in power have destroyed the middle class of our country and, in turn, have wrecked the future for our young people. Wages have remained stagnant for 30 years. Take a look at the statistics and you can see that every decline we're now suffering with had its beginning in 1981 (here's a little scene to illustrate that from my last movie).

It all began on this day, 30 years ago. One of the darkest days in American history. And we let it happen to us. Yes, they had the money, and the media and the cops. But we had 200 million of us. Ever wonder what it would look like if 200 million got truly upset and wanted their country, their life, their job, their weekend, their time with their kids back?

Have we all just given up? What are we waiting for? Forget about the 20% who support the Tea Party -- we are the other 80%! This decline will only end when we demand it. And not through an online petition or a tweet. We are going to have to turn the TV and the computer and the video games off and get out in the streets (like they've done in Wisconsin). Some of you need to run for local office next year. We need to demand that the Democrats either get a spine and stop taking corporate money -- or step aside.

When is enough, enough? The middle class dream will not just magically reappear. Wall Street's plan is clear: America is to be a nation of Haves and Have Nothings. Is that OK for you?

Why not use today to pause and think about the little steps you can take to turn this around in your neighborhood, at your workplace, in your school? Is there any better day to start than today?

P.S. Here are a few places you can connect with to get the ball rolling:

Main Street Contract for America

Showdown in America

Democracy Convention

Occupy Wall Street

October 2011

How to Join a Union by the AFL-CIO (they've learned their lesson and have a good president now) or

UE

Change to Win

MoveOn

High School Newspaper (Just because you're under 18 doesn't mean you can't do anything!)

This article was published at NationofChange at: http://www.nationofchange.org/30-years-ago-today-day-middle-class-died-1312662464. All rights are reserved.

A "Sane" Explanation and Approach to our Current Economic and Political Crises from Rep Jim Himes (D-CT)

I received this very interesting email from my Congressman today. It's worth a read. Finally, someone in Washington with a head on his shoulders:

For the first time since the late 1700s, the United States of America is at real risk of financial default. Other countries have defaulted before, but never as the result of deliberate foolishness. In 1939, in a fit of form over substance, the U.S. Congress created the "debt ceiling," a legal limit on our debt. Since then, that limit has been raised over 80 times. As a tool of fiscal discipline, it has underperformed, to say the least.

As a tool for highlighting political hypocrisy, the debt limit is unimpeachable. Members of Congress routinely vote to cut taxes or raise spending, both of which require borrowing that they then vote against. That's like running to the store, buying a flat screen TV, and then making a big show of not paying your credit card bill because of your mounting debt.

But this time, the sham has become deadly. Should the debt ceiling not be raised, the government will be unable to pay bills such as Social Security checks, Medicare payments, and salaries for our soldiers, judges, and air traffic controllers. Equally worrying, the U.S. would almost certainly lose its AAA credit rating, a national asset we have guarded for two centuries. Once again, middle-class families who can afford it least will suffer most—through increased interest on mortgages, small business loans, and credit cards, and through damage to retirement accounts and other savings.

While debates over the debt ceiling have reached fever pitch, it's been months since Congress seriously considered the problem most Americans see every day: a weak recovery and unacceptable levels of unemployment.

If there's one redeeming feature of the debt ceiling chicanery, it's the discussion it has prompted on how to address the unsustainable path of our nation's finances.

Warren Buffet famously said that "only when the tide goes out do you discover who's been swimming naked." Since 2000, when the Congressional Budget Office projected year after year of government surpluses, we've been swimming naked. We've spent without discipline on two wars, a drug benefit for Medicare, and a stimulus bill to jumpstart the economy. And we've taxed less and less, to the point where the federal tax burden we feel is now at its lowest level since 1958. So when the economic tide went out three years ago, there we stood, our trillions of dollars of debt for all to see.

As usual, the fevered rhetoric surrounding our finances is not helpful. Those interested in allocating blame for the debt find that it must be shared between Presidents and Congresses of both parties and notably, on the Great Recession.

The misinformation and demagoguery have been even worse. No, we are not three months away from becoming Greece. Yes, the magnitude and timing of spending cuts really matters; cut too much too soon, and our hesitant recovery might fall back into recession. And yes, the long term problems in Medicare and Social Security are real and should be equitably addressed sooner rather than later.

Anyone familiar with the details of these challenges knows that success will look something like the proposals made by the Simpson-Bowles Commission or more recently by the Senate's Gang of Six. Both proposals included significant cuts, additional revenue achieved mainly by eliminating tax loopholes and deductions, and proposed reforms to Medicare, Social Security, and Medicaid. Both proposals received bipartisan support from strange bedfellows like Senators Dick Durbin and Tom Coburn. Both proposals were also condemned by both ends of the political spectrum and by many interest groups.

Those (like most of the Republicans in the House) who insist that no additional revenue should be on the table must acknowledge that a "cuts alone" strategy would devastate our nation's investment in the highways, airports, and other infrastructure critical to our nation's prosperity. They must acknowledge that spending cuts will reduce or end the availability of education and health care to many of our least advantaged citizens. This is particularly true if we hesitate to make the huge defense and security budgets share in the effort. And they must explain why taxing the very wealthiest among us at the rates they paid in the 1990s would prohibit the stunning economic growth we experienced in precisely those years.

On the spending and entitlements side, we must acknowledge that because of our aging population and the continuing climb in health care costs, Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid, if unreformed, will eventually squeeze out all other spending.

Social Security is the lesser and least urgent of these challenges. It is capable of paying promised benefits until around 2037. But ominously, for the first time last year, Social Security paid out more than it took in. That is a clarion call for us to do what Ronald Reagan and Tip O'Neill did in 1983 and reform the program to assure its availability for generations to come.

Reforming Medicare is a larger, more urgent, and more politically challenging issue. Medicare has unfunded liabilities (promises it has made to the Americans alive today) totaling almost $40 trillion. Working Americans pay into the system, but the average American family will receive more than $200,000 more in benefits over a lifetime than he or she pays in.

We all worry about our health care, particularly as we age. As we saw in the health care debates of 2009 and in the response to Congressman Ryan's Republican plan to "voucherize" Medicare, the topic can be used as a powerful political weapon, often at the expense of reform. Fortunately, in a delivery system as wildly inefficient as ours, there is much we can do to cut costs without affecting the availability or quality of care or without simply shifting costs as proposed by Chairman Ryan. Just ask citizens in other industrialized countries who have better health care indicators at roughly half our per capita cost. The federal budget, our economic health, and our capacity to keep the promise of health care for our seniors may depend on another look at how our nation conducts the business of health.

Time is short. As I have said for months, we should never have let the sham of our debt ceiling imperil our credit and our hesitant economic recovery. But if we seize the moment to achieve a comprehensive plan for financial stability, perhaps it will have been worth it. If not, we'll have this discussion again soon, not because of the debt ceiling, but because our creditors will force it.