9/11/2001 The Day America Changed?

We flew out of Boston after the last hijacked plane that day. Our flight, like theirs, was a flight to Los Angeles, but ours was supposed to land in Denver midway. Toronto welcomed us with open arms, but it was chaos everywhere. So many flights were suspected. Our flight crew was interrogated for hours in police cars on the tarmac. The air traffic controllers refused to tell the pilots what was going on. The first time we realized something was up was when my wife noticed the plane was flying in circles, the US would not let us reenter American airspace. So once we landed, the pilots asked us to get on our phones and find out what was going on. I called my dad who thought we had crash landed in Toronto. Days later we sat in the airport waiting to get permission to return, dozens of airplanes parked out there. It was a bizarre experience. Especially when we realized we had made last minute changes to our trip. We were supposed to meet up with a friend in Manhattan 9/11, but had canceled because we were exhausted.

Post 9/11, Iraq, Afghanistan, Patriot Act, TSA, do you think the clamp down and foreign wars protected us? Was it overkill? Was it the start of a erosion of freedom for Americans? Or would this have happened anyway?

I, like many others in fly over country, were doing our everyday jobs. Didn't know what had occurred until that evening. In my particular field there was no TV or radio access during procedures. Stunned is the best description of my reaction to what had happened.
Sidebar, two of my hunting partners had gone into the Idaho backcountry to scout for elk and find a campsite with pasture and water for our horses. They went in on Sept 6. Came out on Sept 14. Couldn't understand the flags at half-mast in the small Idaho town until after loading the horses they went into a local cafe and were told of 9/11.

Yes, one of my hunting buddies only figured out something was up when he noticed no jets flying that day.

Remember when NYPD hats and shirts were fashionable?

This country did change, for the better, but only for a very short time. I remember the respect for first responders that seemed to be universal, and yes Fred, I remember so many people wearing those NYPD hats. I don't remember everything being about race like today. I remember so many flags being flown and a feeling like we were all united in our grief and desire for justice. Now, Sept 11, 2021 that all seems to have evaporated. Everything seems to have changed for the worse, at least for a significant portion or our population. Race is now central to almost everything, police have been universally condemned as racists and not heroes, and now our country is more divided than ever. Our president is pitting American against American while he himself condemns Americans who are not willing to be bullied anymore.

After our tragic and idiotic Afghanistan departure, I have a strong feeling we will see another major attack to capitalize on our new weak leadership. If we do get hit with another big one or many smaller attacks, I don't see us coming together, at least not under the current leadership. We have a woman in congress who, when referring to the 9/11 attack, said "some people did something". No outrage by her party, no outrage by her constituents, and no outrage by the media.

I believe the best and most united days are far behind us now and unless we get a radical change in leadership, it's only going to get worse. This is just my opinion and I hope I'm wrong.