9/11: 25 Years Later Part 2...

We felt that this blog is too lengthy to include it in our regular blog tomorrow, so we are sending it out today, standing on its own.

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As the horrific events of 9/11 unfolded, the television news media made a decision that, in ways no one could possibly have imagined at the time, reverberates to this day.

At some point during the day, they decided that they would stop showing the planes flying into the World Trade Center, nor would they show the over 100 people jumping from the 103rd floor to their death, choosing to die from the fall rather than burn to death.

The reasoning was understandable. The images were horrifying. Families were watching. Children were watching. There was a legitimate question of human dignity. But something else happened at the same time.

They felt they were protecting the public. But in reality, they were deciding what the public saw and heard. They decided that Americans were not emotionally able to handle those very graphic images.

(It is to be noted that when JFK was assassinated and then Lee Harvey Oswald was killed by Jack Ruby while being transferred from the city jail to the county jail, the news stations showed the videos of both shootings on a repeat loop. We vividly remembering waching those graphic images over and over again. Were we more emotionally stable in the 1960's? No.)

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We listened to a few podcasts about 9/11. One story resonated.

There was a film crew from France making a documentary about Tony Benetatos, a 21-year-old rookie firefighter. Tony was assigned to the firehouse at 100 Duane Street in Lower Manhattan, which housed: Engine Company 7, Ladder Company 1, Battalion 1. (Everyone in that firehouse survived 9/11).

On September 11, one of the filmmakers went out with Battalion Chief Joseph Pfeifer and several firefighters to investigate a reported gas leak at Church and Lispenard Streets. The other filmmaker remained back at the firehouse.

While filming the firefighters on the street, they suddenly heard the roar of a low-flying aircraft. The cameraman swung his camera upward and filmed American Airlines Flight 11 hitting the North Tower at 8:46 a.m. His footage became one of the extraordinarily rare recordings of the first impact.

The filmmakers kept filming. If one watched their work, the unmistakable thumps of bodies hitting the ground could be heard. These were the men and women who jumped from the upper floors.

So while the news media felt that Americans were too weak to witness what was really happening, it was happening anyway. And instead of seeing it, Americans were hearing it.

This small, unknown detail of that day opened the door to something much larger that affects us to this day: politicians, media executives and people in positions of power decide what we should and should not see and hear. They decide what news is presented according to their own personal agendas.

In the aftermath of 9/11, perhaps they believed they were protecting the public. But there is a very fine line between protecting people from horrific images and protecting them from reality.

Once someone else decides that line for you, they are no longer simply reporting the news. They are deciding how much of the truth you are permitted to see. And that is a very different thing.

Which brings us to what is happening in our lives today.

Almost all the news we read or listen to is filtered, edited, packaged and presented through someone with an agenda. They decide which stories lead, which ones are buried, which facts are emphasized, which are quietly omitted and, increasingly, which words we are supposed to use to describe what we are seeing.

In other words, they are skewing the truth for the agenda they believe in and represent. And as we all know, if you say a lie enough times it becomes its own version of reality.

Twenty-five years after 9/11, perhaps the question is no longer simply whether we can believe what we see on the news.

The big question is who is making these decisions that affect how we live and are governed.

Which brings us to this day and how our world is being governed, specifically in Canada.

Mark Carney is the master of filtered, edited and packaged information using slick presentations. He tells people nothing, urges them to believe that he is taking care of them and, the icing on the cake: tells you it's going to be hard times coming but we can weather the storm together.

And that is the essence of the issue at the moment.

He is weathering no storm whatsoever. His life will not change one iota with all the tariffs. And, to add insult to injury, he will not reveal what the 'deal' with Trump was nor what Canada's response was. We are supposed to blindly believe him.

Which brings us back to the beginning of this piece and the conscious decision of networks not to show people what was really happening on 9/11 because they knew better. We do not believe that Mr. Carney knows better for anyone but himself.

Mark Carney's career has been built around the conviction that highly credentialed people in powerful institutions are best equipped to understand complicated problems and tell the little people what needs to be done.

If his government wants Canadians to accept that rejecting an American proposal was the right decision, Canadians should be able to see enough of what was proposed to judge that decision for themselves.

The time has come to lead as a politician who cares more about the small peeps than his own personal agenda.

The time has come to stop pontificating and giving us word salads and start giving us real answers.

We'll talk...