United in our common interests

In the days and weeks after September 11, 2001, in the midst of our shock and grief, there were things that nobody in America wanted to see or hear about on the radio or in the movies. That's why, the rationale went, there were certain songs that couldn't be played and certain films that couldn't be shown. The World Trade Center was digitally removed from TV shows and movies. The climax of Spider-Man was scripted to take place between Tower One and Tower Two, but the ending of the movie was rewritten.

Of course, censorship is not a lasting response to mourning. Eventually those shots of the World Trade Center were re-inserted and it was okay to listen to John Lennon's "Imagine" again. (Yep, it appeared on Clear Channel's list of "questionable songs" that radio stations were encouraged to refrain from playing just after September 11.)

Independence Day is, I'm sure, one of those movies that was unofficially "banned" from TV in late 2001. I happened to turn it on today just as the gigantic spaceship was looming over lower Manhattan, hovering above the World Trade Center. In the streets, panicking New Yorkers screamed and fled in terror.

For a moment, I was uncomfortable. As long as I live I will never forget those images: crowds of New Yorkers gathered on street corners, first bewildered, then horrified, wailing as the towers collapsed above them.

Then I realized that, as is often the case, real life rarely resembles the movies. And on September 11, 2001, New Yorkers screamed, and fled in terror, but we did not panic. Our firefighters ran into the burning buildings.

Independence Day ends right where action movies should: The heroes save the day. But what happens to them then? Newsweek's cover story this week, "Failing Our Wounded," is about the disgraceful way wounded American soldiers are (mis)treated when they arrive home. A 25-year-old Marine with severe symptoms of Post Traumatic Stress Disorder hanged himself after the VA consistently failed to provide him a spot in their mental health clinic. The mother of a 22-year-old soldier who had an artery severed by shrapnel took a second job at McDonald's to help support him when his military disability benefits failed to kick in for over a year. As Mike Luckovich's political cartoon puts it: "Support our troops* " (this in the traditional yellow ribbon image)..." *offer void if injured mentally or physically, requiring quality care, therapy, recuperation and/or disability income."

In the days just after September 11, 2001, Nancy Gibbs wrote what I still think are some of the wisest words on the subject:

"Do we now panic, or will we be brave? Once the dump trucks and bulldozers have cleared away the rubble and a thousand funeral Masses have been said, once the streets are swept clean of ash and glass and the stores and monuments and airports reopen, once we have begun to explain this to our children and to ourselves, what will we do?"

What will we do? We need to do better.