It’s a couple days old, but I’ve missed it until now: Christopher Hitchens has a superb piece in Slate explaining why we should commemorate tomorrow’s second anniversary of the 9/11 attacks by not commemorating it.
A couple of representative snippets and then you’re on your own:
I tried to anticipate this two years ago. I didn’t at all mind what some critics loftily dismissed as “flag-waving.” Indeed I was surprised that there wasn’t more of it than there was. But I never displayed a flag myself and argued quietly against putting one up over the entrance to the building where I live. This was for a simple reason: How will it look when the effort tapers off?
and
What is required is a steady, unostentatious stoicism, made up out of absolute, cold hatred and contempt for the aggressors, and complete determination that their defeat will be utter and shameful. This doesn’t require drum rolls or bagpipes or banners. The French had a saying during the period when the provinces of Alsace and Lorraine were lost to them: “Always think of it. Never speak of it.” (Yes, Virginia, we can learn things from the French, even if not from Monsieur Chirac.)
Indeed. Go read the rest.
