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An open letter to a terrorist:

Well, you hit the World Trade Center, but you missed America. You hit
the Pentagon, but you missed America. You used helpless American bodies,
to take out other American bodies, but like a poor marksman, you STILL
missed America.

Why? Because of something you guys will never understand. America isn't
about a building or two, not about financial centers, not about
military centers, America isn't about a place, America isn't even about
a bunch of bodies. America is about an IDEA. An idea, that you can go
someplace where you can earn as much as you can figure out how to,
live for the most part, like you envisioned living, and pursue
Happiness. (No guarantees that you'll reach it, but you can sure try!)

Go ahead and whine your terrorist whine, and chant your terrorist
litany:
"If you can not see my point, then feel my pain." This concept is alien
to Americans. We live in a country where we don't have to see your point.
But you're free to have one. We don't have to listen to your speech. But
you're free to say one. Don't know where you got the strange idea that
everyone has to agree with you. We don't agree with each other in this
country, almost as a matter of pride. We're a collection of guys that
don't agree, called States. We united our individual states to protect
ourselves from tyranny in the world. Another idea, we made up on the
spot.  You CAN make it up as you go, when it's your country.

If you're free enough.

Yeah, we're fat, sloppy, easy-going goofs most of the time. That's an
unfortunate image to project to the world, but it comes of feeling free
and easy about the world you live in.  It's unfortunate too, because
people start to forget that when you attack Americans, they tend to
fight like a cornered badger. The first we knew of the War of 1812,
was when England burned Washington D.C. to the ground. Didn't turn out
like England thought it was going to, and it's not going to turn out
like you think, either. Sorry, but you're not the first bully on our
shores, just the most recent.

No Marquis of Queensbury rules for Americans, either. We were the FIRST
and so far, only country in the world to use nuclear weapons in anger.
Horrific idea, nowadays? News for you bucko, it was back then too, but
we used it anyway. Only had two of them in the whole world and we used
'em both. Grandpa Jones worked on the Manhattan Project. Told me once,
that right up until they threw the switch, the physicists were still
arguing over whether the Uranium alone would fission, or whether it
would start a fissioning chain reaction that would eat everything.
But they threw the switch anyway, because we had a War to win. Does
that tell you something about American Resolve?

So who just declared War on us? It would be nice to point to some real
estate, like the good old days. Unfortunately, we're probably at war
with random camps, in far-flung places. Who think they're safe. Just
like the Barbary Pirates did, IIRC. Better start sleeping with one
eye open.

There's a spirit that tends to take over people who come to this
country, looking for opportunity, looking for liberty, looking for
freedom. Even if they misuse it. The Marielistas that Castro emptied
out of his prisons, were overjoyed to find out how much freedom there
was. First thing they did when they hit our shores, was run out and
buy guns. The ones that didn't end up dead, ended up in prisons.
It was a big PITA then (especially in south Florida), but you're only
the newest PITA, not the first.

You guys seem to be incapable of understanding that we don't live in
America, America lives in US! American Spirit is what it's called. And
killing a few thousand of us, or a few million of us, won't change it.
Most of the time, it's a pretty happy-go-lucky kind of Spirit. Until
we're crossed in a cowardly manner, then it becomes an entirely
different kind of Spirit.

Wait until you see what we do with that Spirit, this time.

Sleep tight, if you can. We're coming.