Written by Craig Hardegree....
Dirty diapers were still in the bedroom, food sitting out on the
kitchen counter, unopened mail on the table. Two recently-registered
cars were in the driveway, a brand new PT Cruiser in the garage. The
residents of 4224 Escondito Circle in a posh gated-community in
Sarasota, Florida, abandoned everything and hurriedly fled in a white
van. Two weeks later, Saudi terrorists flew hijacked planes into the
World Trade Center.
The home on Escondito Circle was owned by
Esam Ghazzawi, a Saudi national and longtime advisor to a high-level
Saudi prince. Ghazzawi’s daughter, Anoud, and her husband, Abdulazzi
al-Hiijii, and their small children were the residents. License plates
automatically photographed by the gatehouse show that Mohamed Atta and
Ziad Jarrah were visitors to the home. Subpoenaed phone records connect
Walid al-Shehhri to the home. He was on the plane with Mohamed Atta –
the first plane to fly into the World Trade Center. The FBI tied 10
other terrorists to the home.
Venice, Florida is 10 miles away
from the home on Escondito. Mohamed Atta, Marwan al-Shehhi, and Ziad
Jarrah, all lived in Venice for most of 2001, leading up to 9/11. Atta
and al-Shehhi took flying lessons at Huffman Aviation, at the Venice
city airport. Jarrah got his pilot’s license from Florida Flight
Training, a block away from the Venice airport. He was at the controls
of Flight 93 when it crashed in Shanksville.
Emma E. Booker
Elementary School located at 2350 Dr. Martin Luther King Way is 10.2
miles away from 4224 Escondito Circle. Bush was reading a fairy tale to
children at Booker on the morning of September 11, 2001 when the first
plane hit the building.
Thirty-six days earlier the CIA had
delivered a memo to the vacationing Bush in Crawford warning him that
Osama bin-Laden was determined to strike inside the US and that he
wanted to use hijacked planes. The unreleased daily briefings (leading
up to that one released memo) have been seen in portions by journalists
who say the earlier warnings were more dire and imminent and had been
consistently given to Bush since the Spring of 2001.
I remember
where I was. I remember what I felt. I remember a heart-broken county. I
remember a unified country. I remember a swell of pride watching
President Bush standing on the rubble with a megaphone. I remember the
solidarity as we all tuned in to watch the prayer service, three days
later at the National Cathedral. I remember the dean of the cathedral, a
black minister, praying, and no one caring about the color of his skin.
I remember a black pastor of a Methodist church in Houston reading
scripture and no one saying that he wasn’t “one of us.” I remember a
Jewish rabbi reading the Hebrew lesson from Lamentations and no one
saying he “killed Jesus.” I remember Iman Muzammil Siddiqi of the
Islamic Society of North America, praying, and no one saying that he was
a terrorist or that his Koran advocates the killing of Christians. I
remember the Catholic archbishop of Washington reading scripture with no
one worrying that the church was trying to take over the state.
I
remember the physical frailties of Billy Graham and the humbleness and
sincerity of his prayer. I don’t remember him questioning the sincerity
of the president’s faith, as his son would later do with President
Obama.
I don’t remember liberals blaming Bush for the attack, as
conservatives would do with President Obama exactly 11 years later when a
diplomatic outpost would be attacked by terrorists. I don’t remember
liberals accusing Bush of giving a “stand down” order to those
protecting our country so the attack could proceed unimpeded. I don’t
remember liberals accusing Bush of secretly wanting the enemy to
succeed, even though he was very near the probable planning-house on the
morning of the attacks; allowed a plane-load of Saudis to flee the
country when all other fights were grounded; held hands and
kissed-on-the-mouth with the Saudi crown prince at the Crawford ranch.
Liberals stood with Bush in spite of their disappointment over the
Supreme Court stepping in, with no precedent, and shutting down a
state’s recount, essentially appointing Bush to be president. Liberals
stood with Bush from the time he looked up from reading the fairy tale
in Sarasota, through the time he stood on the rubble, hosted the prayer
service, and invaded Afghanistan. We only lost step with him in 2003
when he abandoned the mission and invaded an unrelated country which had
no connections whatsoever to 9/11.
What I will never understand,
and what has never been articulated by any conservative, is why they
hate President Obama...why they hate him so much that they will give aid
and comfort to ISIL by attacking President Obama in front of the world
and accusing him of being in cahoots with ISIL...why they hate him so
much that they would embolden Putin by attacking President Obama in
front of the world and saying that he looks “weak” compared to Putin.
I’m still waiting on a reason for their hatred. And at least for the
ones in the Teavangelical wing of the conservatives, they really need to
come up with a reason. Because according to their interpretation of the
Bible, one day they will have to give an account to God for their
hatred.
