Never Forget September 11

Thomas E. Ryan, Jr., President of the Chicago Firefighters Union Local 2, has written an eloquent letter to the editor, making many of the same points I have raised over the past 8 years:

"Last year while I was driving my youngest son to a fall baseball practice, I asked him what his grade school had done to remember Sept. 11, 2001. He told me that no one in his school stood for a moment of silence to commemorate the events of that infamous day. In fact, he went on to say it was never even mentioned until the following day when a classmate brought in a newspaper article for their current events class. I find that his school was not alone in its neglect and it seems that most of our nation has now just gone on about their busy lives. The fact is that the national tragedy that was Sept. 11, 2001 has become an afterthought in most cases.
The first mention of what was then the seventh anniversary of the World Trade Center attacks came in the Sun-Times in Richard Roeper's column on page 11 with the only other item even related to this horrific day settled way back on page 26. Can it be that we have already forgotten the sick feeling that overcame us all as a collective nation when we witnessed that second hijacked plane smash into the south tower on live television? How about the desperation of those who were caught above the fire floor and were left with only two terrible choices; perish in the raging inferno or leap to their deaths? I can't even fathom the terror they must have felt. Or have we relegated to a distant memory of the bravery of those firefighters and police officers that raced into those crumbling buildings, knowing deep down they might never come out. How can we forget the unwarranted murder of thousands of our citizens on our own soil just eight short years ago?
The survivors of the Holocaust have justifiably and rightfully spent the last 50 plus years reminding the world of the atrocities that were perpetrated upon them by the Nazi regime as they attempted to conquer Europe and Russia. I recall being told repeatedly as a youth to 'remember Pearl Harbor' and even to 'remember the Alamo,' yet the footage of these terrorist attacks on innocent civilians in our own country is not being shown today because doing so may be considered too disturbing for some or may be perceived as prejudicial to others.
We, as a nation, owe it to the memory of those who perished at the hands of these terrorists as well as to the devastated and broken families they left behind, to never forget what happened on September 11, 2001. Our entire way of life was changed forever because of what happened on that dreadful day eight years ago. The lessons learned then should be shared with generations to come and we can never allow the world to forget 9/11."