Akkam's Razor TL;DR.

AND he should be fired for this nonsense :

America's fabric is pulling apart like a cheap sweater.

What would sew us back together?

Another 9/11 attack.

[...]

Is there any doubt they are planning to hit us again?

If it is to be, then let it be. It will take another attack on the homeland to quell the chattering of chipmunks and to restore America's righteous rage and singular purpose to prevail.

The unity brought by such an attack sadly won't last forever.

The first 9/11 proved that. *

E-mail stubyko@phillynews.com or call 215-854-5977. For recent columns:

http://go.philly.com/byko.

This last 6-years has been a slow-motion train wreck.  OBL is still on the loose.  The Anthrax attackers are still on the loose.  We're stuck in a quagmire in a war of choice in Iraq, losing a winnable war in Afghanistan, and then contemplating opening a third front of the Great War on Terror in Iran (and Pakistan).

I'm tired of staring into the abyss.  In addition to the 3000 lives lost on 9/11 and the near 5000 (3600 military deaths, and an estimated 1000 contractor deaths) in Iraq and Afghanistan, we can chalk up threats to free speech, habeas corpus, our own privacy, and any semblance for advocacy for the middle class in Washington.  We are distracted from true threats like class inequality, our aging infrastructure, precarious financial environment, and global warming with bright and shiny objects like Paris Hilton and Lindsay Lohan, and divisive social wedge issues like abortion, gay marriage, and evolution.

Although Bykofsky takes the easy way out and (correctly) states that another 9/11 would finally unite us, he's correct, but I hope he's thinking of the wrong outcome.  He thinks that another 9/11 would would cause us to put aside our partisan differences to get "it" done – I'm assuming by "it" he means the War on Islamofacism.  But there's danger in these thoughts.  With the right proudly proclaiming that we are safer BECAUSE there have been no new attacks, another 9/11 might have the complete opposite consequences – reinforces the disgust and despair many of us are feeling towards our media and political institutions.

The next-9/11 will preceed one of two outcomes – either the police state, or the beginning of the American Renaissance, where we cast of the dead weight and corrupt institutions of the past and become the America we thought, hoped, and dreamed we were.

Should Bykofsky get fired?  Should free speech have consequences?  Vote here.