Live from New York...

it's MEEEEE!!!

Actually, I'm not live, this is a review of my 4-day trip to New York City and the cities in New England with colleges famous enough to be included in Korean tours.

Randi Rhodes of Air America Radio.

The only thing that beat THIS (a bus stop, I think) was the anti-Bush posters and slogans on the walls at MIT. Made me kinda like those really freakishly smart, predominantly male, and unusually geeky student body. Actually, MIT's gorgeous, and soooooooo nice. A huge pool, all-night outdoor tennis court, and- get this- an ICE SKATING rink. Why do the smart people get everything? So unfair.

But that's not the point. I kept a journal on the trip. Some of it recapped the daily activities and bashed Harvard. But I did two reflective, bloggish pieces. I'm putting the first of the two, with edits and additions.:

GROUND ZERO

Before the trip, my apolitical mom commented that I may turn Republican if I visited and witnessed Ground Zero. She, of cousre, was taken by the sadly popular notion that Democrats are weak on national security against terrorism. Continuing with this train of thought, I would supposedly switch my political orientation after I had seen the real effects of terrorism.

It's not true. The last few hellish years (gosh, it felt like a decade) have been distinguished by almost un-democratic power of one party in the government. Jon Stewart was right:

"Three and a half years ago, Congress passed the Patriot Act, a sweeping counter-terrorism measure carefully crafted to be just restrictive enough to impinge on civil liberties without actually being effective."

But despite all the assumptions that only the GOP knows how to make America safe, I don't feel any safer. In fact, I feel more uncomfortable and terrified on flights. My brief survey of the 86th floor observatory at the Empire State Building only compounded my initial uncertain ties. From that high in NYC, I could see the city's skyline from all sides of the building. Towards the ocean, there is a severing gap, where the nation lost thousands of lives, confidence, and its sense of justice and liberty.

So if we're supposed to earn something from every loss, what did we learn? That, despite the political rhetoric, this country was shamefully unprepared for global dangers. That we've been self-centered for too long...

I don't care who's doing the "securing" as long as they're doing it right. The Republicans ain't. They instead sent our troops to topple a random dictator leader. They f*cked up international relations during a time when we MOST need the global support. They rejected the international sympathies after 9-11 by saying to them that they were our terrorist enemies unless they joined in our "cause" and then saying that they can go screw themselves, cuz we don't give a damn about any of them.

America is a proud nation. Sometimes that's good. It's what got this country through events that have devastated other nations in the world. But even with the courageous rebuilding of the country, manifested by the plans for a new trade center, Ground Zero is a searing scar in our minds.

It's almost surreal that we're living through this period in history. I can almost imagine the future historians linking this decade with the Cold War- the pervasive sense of threat and danger in a perilous indifferent and distant society.

The bottom line... Ground Zero tells us that there is a world out there. It's like two different worlds competing for the attention of one population: the dangers of war and the affluence of the modern society. God bless America.

Because we need all the help that we can get.