No 9/11 exploitation here

Yes, today is the sixth anniversary of the shocking series of airliner hijackings and subsequent explosions that was 9/11. For Americans -- especially those on the East Coast between New York and Virginia -- September 11, 2001, was a sucker-punch from hell ... what more needs to be said?

Yet both the predictable mainstream media and the copycat blogosphere are brimming over with stories/posts which state the obvious and offer recollections/observations as commentary, as if we need more of it.

However, with all due respect for anyone who lost someone dear on that tragic day, is there really anything new to say after six solid years of saying way too much? It seems to me that since that dark day’s fires were put out and the smoke cleared, the subject has been milked for whatever it’s worth -- by so many agendas, dubious and otherwise -- the best thing most of us could do today is to observe a moment of silence and then go back to whatever we we were doing.

Meanwhile, the silliest thing on 9/11 I’ve seen so far today was the Brookings cartoon on the Richmond Times-Dispatch’s editorial page. The gist of it was that America has forgotten about 9/11.

Phooey!

The crass exploitation of the 9/11 disaster and its victims for political gain, for business profiteering, for whatever reasons, has been a shameful chapter of America’s history. So, I’ll have no part of today’s nostalgic outpouring of purple prose. And, for today, at SLANTblog, I’ll even skip wagging sarcastic fingers of blame at the worst of the exploiters.