Date: Tue, 11 Sep 2001 20:33:35 -0400
To: Matthew Gaylor <freematt@coil.com>
From: Matthew Gaylor <freematt@coil.com>
Subject: Dan Gillmor On An Act of Barbarism, and America's Response
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http://web.siliconvalley.com/content/sv/2001/09/11/opinion/dgillmor/we 
blog/index.htm

News, Views and a Diary
Posted on Tuesday, September 11, 2001

An Act of Barbarism, and America's Response

By "Dan Gillmor" <dgillmor@sjmercury.com>

In our fury, grief and horror, will we allow the criminals of Sept. 
11 to wreck the American republic? They will have won if we do. They 
committed an act of war. There is no other way to look at these acts 
of barbarism. Now, as we hunt down their leaders and collaborators, 
and as we tend to the families of the dead and injured, we will be 
tempted beyond ourselves -- tempted to abandon our rule of law and 
our Constitution.

If we do that, the criminals will have won. These words feel hollow, 
somehow, in the wreckage of so many lives and America's buoyancy. 
But in the next days and weeks we will find ourselves at a frontier. 
We will be asking ourselves whether we want -- whether we can afford 
-- to live in an open and free society. We will ask if the risks are 
worth the blood. If we are wise, we will wait to ask those questions. 
We will wait until hot rage has eased into an abiding, icy anger.

[...]



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