I noticed that ATA is now charging a "September 11th Security Fee" on top of their fares. Now, fuhgettabout the issue of capitalizing on tragedy- that discussion's been flipped. What I'm Pissed About And Blogging(tm) is the insinuation that before we paid this fee, it was an extra-chance-of-death flight. But you cannot object to this fee, right? It's your September 11th Security Fee!

Hey, it wasn't ME whose cheap wage and shitty job conditions caused airline security workers to leave their jobs most often for a job at McDonald's. Listen, I don't mind paying top dollar for an increased chance of survival when flying. Just don't try to pass it off as something I have to accept "In The Wake Of September 11th(tm)". Brooklyn's theory is that any rate hike would compromise market share, so they tack it on on the back end. Makes sense, still sucks.

Thinking about nine-eleven and its effect on the Israel-Palestine sticky wicket has me stumbling over one of the conceptual leaps that belief in a Higher Plan demands. I guess you could call it the "God Has A Plan" rule. If anything horrible happens, you must trust your faith in the fact that God Has A Plan.

Here's what I don't understand: Nine-eleven was the most horrible thing that I've ever seen, right? But who can know what its eventual results will be? Now the U.S. is sorta obliged to crack down on Northern Irish terrorism, because of Dubya's "If You're Not With Us, You're Agin' Us(tm)" speech. And now Israel is actin like the sycophant little guy hanging out with the schoolyard bully, and attacking a nation-state for the actions of its neither-condemned-nor-condoned (officially) fanatics. Does Dubya stand by his demand that Israel take a chill pill? Could the hawkish national attitude rebound to a more peaceful one when conscience prevails in world relations? My roundabout point is that 9/11, the deaths of a few thousand people, could prevent the deaths of many more by the lesson it teaches.

Same with the most extreme example, the Holocaust. Here we have the most expansive act of genocide in history, yet it would be nothing compared to what would happen if WWII never happened and we hadn't learned our lesson about agressive & nationalistic movements from good ol' Adolf by the time the bomb came around. Who are we, as humans, to judge the overall good of any one act or happenstance? How can we possibly obey the bible to not kill when we ourselves will be killed in return? What if Linda Hamilton commits a crime and destroys the Terminator's hand so that it won't be used to build the AI that sets out to kill all humans? What if I was nasty to my sweetie one time, it caused a 30-second delay, and an hour later it caused us to be missed by a fugitive car chased by the cops through a red light and into a pole? How can my conscience/bible/torah/koran/etc tell me not to be a butthole to the woman who brightens my life? If I hadn't, I'd be dead.

So you get my point. I'll accept 'faith' as answer, I understand entrusting your life to faith, but if you're trying to make rational decisions about the best course of action, how can you anticipate the results of any event? Again, I bring up questions that I myself have no answer for. Perhaps my fortune of having a much wiser readership than I will help me towards an understanding.