United Flight 93...

September 11th, 2001

Took a ride over and saw the movie "Flight 93" today and once again I am amazed at how we choose not to keep this day of attacks and the war on terrorism on the front page. It has been interesting to hear that many feel it is to early for this type of movie and that the “Pain & Terror” are still to fresh in the minds of the American people… The majority of the media has been nice enough to keep images of the planes hitting the World Trade Center subdued for it may harm the society it strives to protect. Each anniversary of the attacks we see less and less coverage of these attacks on the people of the United States…

During the first year after the attacks on the American people I began to buy many of the documentaries made about the attacks and the news coverage of September 11th. I have even found several on the structural effects and damage of the planes hitting both towers and the Pentagon. Having some engineering background I found these very interesting on how they explain the eventual collapse of the towers and the Pentagon…

I find myself pulling these documentaries out from time to time when I find myself becoming too comfortable with the history of these attacks and how I felt that day. I know beforehand that viewing these documentaries will effect me and take me back to the day of the attacks and the days following. It is to a point where I know that I will not enjoy viewing the footage of the attacks and I never sit for the whole DVD without pausing it and walking away for a bit. I do return and view the whole program and each time it brings me back to perspective that our country was attacked and 3,000+ citizens died on that day of attack.

The movie “Flight 93” is of the same caliber and will be added to the “Library” when it comes out on DVD. It was interesting to see the events of the United Airlines Flight 93 that crashed in the field near Shanksville Pennsylvania after the passengers attempted to take back the plane from the terrorists. I have read the 911 Commission Report several times regarding the events on Flight 93 but the movie brings the emotion of the attacks out to be viewed directly… This movie is well worth the effort and I believe it was done correctly so not to push an “Agenda” one way or the other…

The photo above is of the World Trade Center towers after being hit by the planes flown by the terrorists. Flight 93 never made it to it’s intended target which we believe to have been the Capitol or the White House in Washington D.C.

There is one major newspaper that will publish photos from time to time to remind us of this very important event that is very young in our history. It is the Investor’s Business Daily ( IBD) which I have used many times for facts and issues when posting to this blog. A few weeks back on it’s “Issue & Insights” page there was a large photo of one of the towers collapsing in the middle of the page with nothing but the words “September 11th, 2001” attached to it. No stories. No opinion pieces. No “Spin” pieces. Nothing. Not the anniversary but months away from the actual anniversary of the attacks. In fact to the left of the photo was the daily column “From the Left” and to the right was the column “From the Right” and neither of the pieces mentioned the photo…

We need to be reminded of these attacks so as not to become comfortable with the history of this event…

The issue of "Spin"...

Numbers Game...

"The numbers can say anything you want them to say"....
That is one of the first things I was told when working as a Buyer\Operations manager for a Six Flags park Merchandise department during college years... I remember going into meetings each day before the park would open to go over prior days financial numbers. Each dept would have a print out with the "Percapita" spent in each dept as a guide to how well they did. Afetr a rain day the merch dept would have a very high percap number due to the bump in $5 rain ponchos sold that day. $5 retail at a cost of $0.35 did well for the profit margin also... Problem was the amount of people in the park would be less due to the rain and thus total revenue would be down... My retail Vice-President would lean over and say "The numbers can say anything you want them to say, it all depends on how much $$$ you put in the bank at the end of the week"...

Recently I linked to a story that appeared in the "Sun" newspaper about the violent death rate in Iraq as compared to cities in the United States. This resulted in numerous responses as to what numbers were used to obtain the rate and led to debate(s) on how numbers & info are spun by both sides to get the desired effect... I posted that story to highlight the problem we have with both the violent death rate in a war zone and here in the states. The amazing thing is that the debate went to proving or dis-proving the numbers used to get the rate instead of discussing the problem as I thought it would... Just this past week we had a guy go into work and kill two other workers before killing himself. No war zone here, it was in Harrisonburg Virginia just down the road from where I work...

This whole thing made me think about how numbers\info can be "Spun"...
Remember a few years back when Rosie O'Donnell would claim that hundreds(?) of children were being killed by guns each week? The spin here was that when she said "Children" she was also counting anybody under the age of 18 in her numbers. Many of the "Children" killed were gang members involved in drive-by's and drug wars....

"44 million un-insured Americans" is also another statement that can be looked at. How many of these people are covered under a parents insurance program not in their name? How many are 18 year olds that feel "Invincible" and choose to spend their money on I-pod's, CD's, toys, etc? There are many that can't afford insurance that they need but how many of the 44 million choose to spend their money in other places?

This past week Congress approved extending the Bush Tax-cuts to the year 2010 and somebody in the media did a spot on the street with the reporter waving a $20 bill and saying this was all the taxcut meant to the average person on the street. No data as to what the average person income or tax bill on the street was but a broad statement to back that reporters view. This reminds me of back in 2001 when then Senator Tom Daschle stood in front of a Lexus and said “If you’re a millionaire, under the Bush tax cut, you get a $46,000 tax cut, more then enough to pay for this Lexus. But if you are a typical working person, you get $227 and that’s enough to buy this muffler”. Now I was living in Key West at the time and some guy wrote into the local newspaper and stated that Daschle should have been standing in front of a $390,000 house to represent the amount of tax that millionaire pays in taxes for each million earned…

There have also been many polls out there recently and these numbers can be manipulated to get the desired result. There have been numerous polls that show that the majority of those polled want the U.S. out of Iraq. The % ratio changes a lot if you re-phrase the question by asking the question “Do you want the U.S. out of Iraq before the Iraqi government is secure and able to protect themselves?” With polls it’s all how you ask the question sometimes…

Also last week senate minority leader Harry Reid got up in front of the senate to pull out the race card again when they were voting to approve a amendment to make English the official language of the United States.
“This amendment is racist. I think it is directed basically to people who speak Spanish” The amendment was passed on a vote of 63-34 vote.

The issue here is that many media groups did not include the fact that the amendment proposed english being the official language of Government Operations in the United States.

84% of Americans say that English should be the official language of government operations and 77% of Hispanics agree…

As the photo below shows. Everybody can see something different when looking at the same thing...