On the anniversary of the destruction of our collective notion that we are safe from the rest of the world, others are writing about it far more eloquently than I feel I can.
My little media crush is fading. Dahlia's latest article in Slate talks about civil liberties in a post-9/11 world, and how we as a society decide to alter them.
It's a serious article, and she makes her points well. Our civil liberties are being curbed not as a result of societal deliberation, but the knee-jerk power grab of a theocratic country lawyer.
She also shows moderation and compromise; she argues that some small, well-chosen reductions in freedom can result in a great increase in individual security and safety.
There's a part of me, the part triggered by my disgust that American citizens are being held as "unlawful combatants" without judicial review, that wants to take an absolutist stand on civil liberties. And I want my crush, who in the past has excelled at dishing out some highly entertaining analyses of the hypocrisy on our Supreme Court, to be similiarly entertaining in slamming the Justice Department.
But instead she holds back a little, shows some reason, probably makes the right call. But it's the brash Dahlia I have a crush on, not the sober one.
Katje took issue with my post about the child who died after being left in a car all day by a custodial grandparent.
Katje, I know that in the business of a hectic day, you can forget a kid for a few minutes. I know this doesn't make one a bad parent. (I've met you, and know you aren't a bad parent, so clearly good parents can do this.) It certainly doesn't make you a felon.
What boggled me was not that a parent could forget a kid for a few minutes, it was that a parent could forget for eight hours. So I looked for other explanations.
I think she made a conscious choice to leave him in the car all day. And I think that choice was motivated not by malice or negligence, but frustration with trying to earn enough money to support her and the kid while being unable to afford child care.
It's tragic that this child died. But the thing to take away is not "parents need mnemonics to remember where they left their kids", it's "working parents need affordable, safe child care."