This is Paul Krugman’s op-ed for the tenth anniversary of 9/11.
The Years of Shame
Is it just me, or are the 9/11 commemorations oddly subdued?
Actually, I don’t think it’s me, and it’s not really that odd.
What happened after 9/11 — and I think even people on the right know this, whether they admit it or not — was deeply shameful. Te atrocity should have been a unifying event, but instead it became a wedge issue. Fake heroes like Bernie Kerik, Rudy Giuliani, and, yes, George W. Bush raced to cash in on the horror. And then the attack was used to justify an unrelated war the neocons wanted to fight, for all the wrong reasons.
A lot of other people behaved badly. How many of our professional pundits — people who should have understood very well what was happening — took the easy way out, turning a blind eye to the corruption and lending their support to the hijacking of the atrocity?
The memory of 9/11 has been irrevocably poisoned; it has become an occasion for shame. And in its heart, the nation knows it.
I’m not going to allow comments on this post, for obvious reasons.
“I’m not going to allow comments on this post, for obvious reasons.” Of course not. What a miserable, stinking coward. He was too busy pounding out this sick little screed to even spell-check it.
As of this writing, the link to Krugman’s post is still working. The New York Times will be strongly tempted to pull it down. The editors should resist that temptation. We have screen captures, folks. You can’t make this disappear, or pretend Krugman didn’t say it. You must respond to this, not attempt to erase it.
Paul Krugman should have been summarily dismissed after he blamed the Tucson shootings on his political enemies. The Times didn’t apologize to the American people for their horrific editorial judgment in allowing him to write those pieces, and fire him when they should have. This is the result.
You are now at a decision point, editors of the New York Times. If Paul Krugman still works for you on Monday morning, you endorse every damned word he said in this piece. You will be endorsing the cowardice of this drive-by slander artist, whose failure as a human being exceeds even his miserable failure as an “economist.”
Your choice, New York Times. Your move. Your honor, decency, and integrity. Your consequences.
