Monte Mater (11:30)
Back in Washington, Vice President Cheney, deep in the White House bunker authorized fighter jets to shoot down any hijacked aircraft still in the sky. President Bush had left Florida aboard Air force one at 9:55am under heavy escort. His plane zigzag across the country to secure bases. At 11:45am Bush landed at Barksdale Air Force Base in Louisiana, giving a short statement. Freedom itself was attacked this morning by a faceless coward. By 2:50pm Bush was at Outfit Air Force Base in Nebraska conferring with the National Security Council via secure video. Finally, by evening, he returned to Washington. At 8:30pm President Bush addressed the nation from the Oval Office. His voice was steady but grim. Today, our fellow citizens, our way of life, our very freedom came under attack in a series of deliberate and deadly terrorist acts to. Terrorist attacks can shake the foundation of our biggest building, but they cannot touch the foundation of America. By the end of that Fateful Tuesday, nearly 3,000 people were dead. 2,753 in New York, 184 at the Pentagon, 40 in Pennsylvania. Among the dead were 343 firefighters, 60 police officers and people from more than 90 countries. The attacks became the deadliest terrorist attack in the world. And I have, because I lived in New York prior to moving to Nashville. I have several friends, several clients who were there that day, some who were in the buildings or supposed to be in the buildings. And what I will say about living in New York is you don't understand the gravity of it until you're standing on those streets and understand that when the electricity went down to lower Manhattan, people were trapped in the subway systems and couldn't get out. People had to walk to New Jersey, took their work shoes off and walked to New Jersey to get home. One of my Clients who's a lawyer had to leave her attorney's office, take off her heels, walk in a cloud of smoke for 70 blocks to get out. One of my clients carries a large amount of cash at all times because of the inability of people to get cabs, because if you didn't have cash, the ATMs were down, there was no way to get out. People were trapped. People were desperate. Nobody knew what was going on. And I'm also going to tell you the story of one of my friends who lived near the towers. Her name is Christina Stanton. She wrote this piece in the Dispatch, and we're going to share it in portions here with her permission. On September 11, 2001, my husband and I raced down 24 flights of stairs after watching a passenger jet plow into the South Tower of the World Trade center six blocks from our apartment. We ran to what we hoped would be safety in Battery park in the southern tip of Manhattan, only to be engulfed in dust and debris as the Twin Towers fell. For hours we wandered in that choking cloud until we were saved by one of the boats that spent all day ferrying people to safety. Five days later, Christine Todd Whitman, the leader of the Environmental Protection Agency, assured us lower Manhattan was safe and the air was clear. Ten days later, our landlord and officials from the city, state and federal governments told us it was safe to return to our apartment. We moved back on September 23rd. From our terrace, we could see crews digging 24 hours a day through the pile of twisted metal and charred steel. Fires smoldered on the site for months, and the sulfuric stench permeated the air. Every day, I wiped away dust from every surface in the apartment. But every morning, a fresh layer of dust appeared, no matter how many washcloths we shoved under doors or around windows to keep it out. When we moved in 2005, I was horrified to discover just how much dust had settled beneath and behind furniture and in every hidden corner and crevice. America was shaken to its core. And as the Twin Towers fell, as the Pentagon burned, and as a field in Pennsylvania smoldered, nearly 3,000 lives were lost. But the attacks did not just take lives, set the United States on a path that would lead less than two years into another war. And if you have the opportunity to go to New York and go to Freedom Tower and the Memorial and go to Ground Zero, I highly, highly recommend it. It's one of those memorials that is very difficult to get through. You know, we listen just now to some of the voicemails that are hard to hear, but it's so I think it's important that we hear them. They're real people, real lives. And that the decisions that our government makes has consequences and decisions other governments make have consequences, decisions that groups make. What fundamentalism and extremism can do. I think it's really important that we sit and we listen. And there's a portion of the memorial specifically dedicated to those that are lost. And there's a lot of voicemails like what we played earlier and photos of people jumping, just heart rending to make that choice, you know, to burn or to fall. And I highly, highly recommend that if you get the opportunity to go visit one New York City, because it is my favorite city in the world and it's the people there and just the energy is incredible, but also to go remember, because memory sometimes takes action. It's not just something that we do passively. That night, after President George W. Bush addressed the nation, the focus was clear. It was Al Qaeda and Afghanistan, the Taliban. But behind the scenes, the seeds of Iraq were already being planted. Nine days later, on September 20, 2008, 2001, a joint session of Congress, Bush gave a speech that framed the new age of American foreign policy. Every nation in every region has a decision to make. Either you are with us or you are with the terrorists. Thunderous applause was met with this. The country was united. I remember everybody was on board. Congress quickly passed the authorization of use of military force, giving the President sweeping powers to go after terrorists worldwide. And In October of 2001, US troops entered Afghanistan, toppling the Taliban and scattering Al Qaeda. But even then, some in Bush's circle, Vice President Dick Cheney, Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld and Deputy Secretary Paul Wolfowitz were already looking beyond Afghanistan to Iraq. By early 2002, the language started to shift. On January 29th of 2002, Bush delivered his State of the Union address. In it, he introduced a phrase that would define the road to war. States like these and the territories and terrorists alike constitute an axis of evil aiming to threaten the peace of the world. Iraq, Iran and North Korea. Suddenly, Iraq, long a thorn in America's side since the Gulf War, was linked directly to the war on terror, even though they were not linked to the attacks on the towers. Throughout 2002, the Bush administration made its case. Saddam Hussein, they argued, was secretly rebuilding weapons of mass destruction. Chemical, biological and even nuclear. He was hiding them from the world, defying the United nations resolutions. Cheney, on August 26th of 2002 said, There is no doubt that Saddam Hussein has weapons of mass destructions. There is no doubt amassing them to use against our friends, against our allies, and against us. The fear was powerful. And even being as young as I was, I remember these conversations and I remember how it quickly shifted from Afghanistan to Iraq. And what if the next 911 involved anthrax or a nuclear bomb in an American City? On September 12th of 2002, a year and a day after the attacks, Bush went before the United nations general Assembly. The history, the logic, the facts lead to one conclusion. He said Saddam Hussein's regime is a grave and gathering danger. He called on the world to enforce its will or America would act alone. Back home, the administration pressed Congress. In October of 2002, lawmakers passed the authorization for military use military force against Iraq, giving Bush the authority to use military power to enforce UN resolutions. The vote was bipartisan, but not unanimous. Not like going to Afghanistan was. Many Democrats, including senators Hillary Clinton and John Kerry, supported it. But other senators, like Ted Kennedy, warned it would be a disastrous mistake. And Ted Kennedy, unfortunately, would be proved right. In late 2002, Saddam Hussein allowed UN weapons inspectors back into Iraq, led by Haas, Blix and Mohammed ElBarade. And the inspectors searched factories, bunkers, palaces. They found nothing. No stockpiles, no proof of active programs. But the administration was utterly unmoved. Cheney insisted Saddam was hiding weapons. Rumsfeld said absence of evidence is not evidence of absence, which is kind of an insane thing to say when you're contemplating going to war and putting people in the line of fire. The turning point came came in February 2003 when the Secretary of state, Colin Powell, a man respected across party lines, due in fact to his intelligence and his cautions, stood before the United Nations Security Council holding up vials displaying satellite images, intercepts and testimony. He made the case that Iraq possessed mobile biological labs, chemical weapons, and was pursuing nuclear capability. He said, quote, my colleagues, every statement I make today is backed up by sources, solid sources. These are not assert, giving. You are the facts and conclusions based on solid intelligence. And it was convincing, especially coming from Colin Powell. To many Americans, it sealed the case for war. By March 2003, diplomacy was collapsing. France, Germany and Russia argued inspections should continue. The US and Britain insisted that time had run out. Powell later called his UN speech a blot on his record, saying intelligence was wrong, cherry picked and presented to him in a way that even misled him to. And former CIA officer Paul Pillar later wrote that the decision to invade came first. The intelligence was then scrounged up second. And political scientist Kim Kaufman Described how elite consensus stifled dissent and allowed weak claims to dominate. The CIA's credibility suffered deeply after this decision. The infamous yellow cake uranium claim alleging that Saddam tried to buy uranium from Niger was proven false. Curveball, a key defector who provided evidence of mobile labs, was later revealed to be unreliable. On March 17, 2003, President Bush appeared before the nation with a final ultimatum. Saddam Hussein and his son must leave Iraq within 48 hours. Their refusal to do so will result in military conflict commenced at the time of our choosing. The clock was ticking. March 20, 2003. Two days later, in the early morning hours in Baghdad, air raid sirens wailed. Explosions lit the sky. The United States and its coalition had had launched Operation Iraqi Freedom. That night, Bush addressed the nation once more. My fellow citizens, at this hour, American and coalition forces are in the early stages of military operations to disarm Iraq, to free its people and to defend the world from a grave danger. The war had begun. In less than 18 months, America had gone from the rubble of the Twin Towers to the bombing of Baghdad. From Bush's vow to hunt down terrorists wherever they are, to the sweeping claim that Iraq was an axis of evil. From inspections that found nothing to Colin Powell's fate speech and Bush's ultimatum, the world was told that Saddam Hussein had weapons of mass destruction. But soon it would become clear that those weapons never existed. But to fully understand the push not just to combat Those responsible for 9, 11, which we have every right to do, every right to respond in self defense, but to push that war into Iraq. We have to go back a little bit further to the Gulf War. In 1990, Saddam Hussein, the then dictator of Iraq, invaded Kuwait. The world responded very quickly. Under US leadership, a coalition of nations launched the Gulf War. In 1991, Operation Desert Storm expelled Iraqi forces from Kuwait but deliberately left Saddam in power. The rationale was that removing him outright might destabilize Iraq and the region, which has happened many times in the past, often with United States interference. However, the aftermath created an uneasy stalemate. Iraq was placed under crippling UN sanctions and subjected to weapons inspections to ensure Saddam abandoned his nuclear biolog chemical weapons programs. Throughout the 1990s, Saddam resisted, obstructed inspectors and played a game of cat and mouse with the United Nations. Now that meant by the late 1990s the world knew that Iraq had once pursued weapons of mass destruction programs. But uncertainty remained about whether they existed. And before we dive further into the idea around weapons of mass destruction and Operation Iraqi Freedom, it's time for our mid show Sponsor Break if you turn on the TV or scroll your feed, you'll see it Accusations Polarization, Overt bias Nearly edvy every headline and whether it's coverage of the 2024 election, immigration debates, international conflicts like Ukraine or Gaza, the story often depends on who's holding the microphone. News has never been a pure area arena of debate. It's performance, and the reporter at bat often calls the shots. And the truth is that no single outlet can give you the full picture. And that's where Ground News comes in. Every day, Ground News processes over 30,000 news articles. Coverage of the same event from multiple outlets is merged onto one story so you can compare perspectives side by side. Each article is tagged with one of seven bias ratings Far left, Left leans left, center leans right, right and far right based on independent rating agencies like All Sides, Media Bias, Fact check and ad fonts Media Ground News doesn't rate the outlets itself. It uses outside trusted organizations to give you transparency because bias has always shaped the news. During the Gold Rush, newspapers openly backed or opposed political candidates. In the Vietnam War era, the Wall Street Journal warned the war effort was doomed, while the New York Times ran scathing critiques of the unjust war. Television turned anchors into celebrities, amplifying their opinions and dividing viewers. Fast forward to Benghazi in 2012, when coverage became so partisan it dominated congressional hearings and influenced the 2016 election. Each era has shown us the same lesson. Bias isn't new, it just evolves with new technology. And today the stakes are even higher. Social media algorithms amplify outrage. Global conflicts are filtered through national interests. Domestic debates, from abortion to healthcare to climate change, fracture along ideological lines. With the Ground News app, you can see how different outlets across the spectrum are covering the same story. You can track how the narratives shift as they unfold. You can identify blind spots, stories that may be your side of the spectrum and hasn't seen or reported on. You can even check your own personal bias. Bias Bias isn't something we can erase, but we can see it for what it is. And that's what Ground News empowers you to do. And you can go on to ground news.com tables to get 40% off their Vantage program, which comes down to about $5 a month, which is a latte. This helps me so much when I am navigating the news, navigating stories to find a really well balanced story and also check developments as they progress. This episode is also brought to you by Intravenous Solutions. It's Nashville's premier IV therapy and wellness center. IV therapy can help you recover quicker from heavy workouts or illness, treat the symptoms of dehydration and improve sleep or give you healthy glowing skin. Being on stage several times a week. Speaking for a living, I can say that IV treatments keep me on my feet and are a lifesaver. Dr. Allen and his staff are so kind and knowledgeable and they make sure that every appointment is welcoming and easy. They also offer vitamin shots, oxygen therapy, Botox filler, weight management and ozone therapy which has been transformative for me dealing with the symptoms of long Covid and chronic inflammation. With four locations in Nashville, Hendersonville, Franklin and their brand new location in second Avenue in the Bankers Alley Hotel by Hilton, it is so easy to get high quality care all week. So come party in Nashville, come see the band play and beat the hangover at Intravenous Solutions. Give the code Monty10 at checkout for a discount on your services. So post 911 caused a shift in American strategy. It changed the entire US Foreign policy landscape. The Bush administration, led by George W. Bush, Vice President Dick Cheney, Donald Rumsfeld and Paul Wolfowitz, adopted a new doctrine, the Bush doctrine of preemptive war. The administration argued that after 9 11, America could no longer wait to be attacked. It had to strike threats before they materialized. And while attackers were from Al Qaeda and based in Afghanistan, some officials quickly began pressing the idea that Iraq could be next and the greater danger. And they justified this war. We've seen that some of it was built integrally into the story around the Gulf War against around Desert Storm, the fact that Saddam had pursued weapons of mass destruction before. So when the Bush administration proposed a preemptive strike on Iraq, it was built on three main grounds. The first, and the biggest, was weapons of mass destruction. Officials claim Saddam Hussein possessed chemical and biological weapons and was reconstituting his nuclear program. And again, that fateful speech from the Secretary of State Colin Powell really mobilized the consensus to make this pursuit. He said that they had mobile biological labs and stockpiles of deadly agents like anthrax. Satellite images and intercepted conversations and defectors claims were presented as evidence. The second reason was terrorism links. The White House suggested ties between Saddam Hussein and Al Qaeda and throughout the nine later excuse me. Though the 911 Commission later found no operational collaboration, Speeches and briefings often blurred Saddam with Osama bin Laden in public imagination. But there was no proof at all of collaboration. And third, of course, was spreading democracy. Some in the administration, particularly Wolfowitz, argued that the war would liberate the Iraqi people from a brutal dictator and spark a democratic wave across the Middle East. This claim in particular is quite disingenuous because they intentionally left Saddam and in power before with no intention of freeing the people because of fear of destabilizing the region. And then later they're like, oh, now we're going to free the people because it's convenient for us and we want to go in there together. These claims form the narrative that Iraq posed an imminent global threat. On March 20th of 2003, after months of failed diplomacy at the U.N. the U.S. and the coalition of the willing invaded Iraq. British Prime Minister Tony Blair was America's closest ally. France, Germany and Russia opposed the invasion, insisting inspection should continue. The initial phase was called Shock and Awe was a massive bombing campaign designed to cripple Iraq's leadership quickly. Within weeks, the US forces captured Baghdad. On April 9, 2003, Saddam Hussein's statue was toppled in Firdo Square, Broadcast worldwide as a symbol of his fall. By May, President Bush declared the deck from the deck of the USS Abraham Lincoln, mission accomplished. From April 23rd onward, US forces searched relentlessly for weapons of mass destruction. Suspected chemical plants were raided. Bunkers in the desert were drilled. Palaces were torn apart. Former weapons scientists were interrogated, but they found nothing. And I mean nothing. The Iraq survey group, a 1400 person task force spent more than a year combing the country. And In October of 2004, they delivered their final report. Saddam Hussein had entered ended his weapons program in 1991. He had no stockpiles, no active programs, no nuclear weapons. The entire premise of the invasion of Iraq was false. As Baghdad fell, U.S. forces scoured the country for these stockpiles, but nothing was found. Inspections of suspected facilities turned up abandoned factories, old records, decades of, you know, remnant programs from the 1980s and early 90s. Nothing active, nothing even close to active. No plans without WMDs. The narrative shifted. So America was now there to liberate Iraq. It's amazing how the government can just pivot and just be like just kidding, here's our real reason. And again, remember, they left him in power beforehand. But Iraq quickly descended into chaos. The De Ba' Athi vacation policy the US led Coalition Provisional Authority dissolved Saddam's ruling Ba'ath Party and disbanded the Iraqi army. Overnight, hundreds of thousands of armed unemployed men became hostile to the occupation was not well planned out. This led to insurgency. By late 2003, attacks on U.S. troops escalated groups loyal to Saddam, Sunni nationalists, foreign jihadists all joined in. Roadside bombs, ambushes and kidnappings surged the Faluha and the Nahaf. Fierce battles broke out in Sunni strongholds like Fallujah and the Shia areas, led by cleric Muqata al Sadir. The occupation became a grinding guerrilla war because when you go in and destabilize the region, that's what happens. And I apologize for my pronunciation of some of these names. I have little notes for pronunciation, but sometimes my tongue can't quite do what it needs to do. In 2004, shocking images emerged of US soldiers abusing Iraqi detainees at the Abu Ghraib prison. Hooded, beaten, humiliated prisoners became a global symbol of American hypocrisy. This America again, at this point, is making the claim, we're here to spread democracy, we're here to save the people. And then these images surface of them brutalizing prisoners. This severely undermined US Credibility, inflamed Iraqi anger, as it should, and strengthened the insurgency. As US Credibility began to crumble and doubts began to rise, there was also the death and the COVID up of Pat Tillman. Pat Tillman was born on November 6, 1976 in Fremont, California. By the late 1990s, he was a star safety for the Arizona Cardinals. Known for his grit, intelligence, and fearlessness, he was a player who broke records and expectations. After September 11th, Pat drew down a $3.6 million NFL contract. And instead, in May of 2002, he stunned the sports world and enlisted in the US Army Rangers with his brother Kevin. He said, quote, sports embodied many of the qualities I deem meaningful, but lately I've been feeling more of a need to give back. Tillman first served in Iraq in 2003 and then Afghanistan in 2004. On April 22nd of 2004, near Sparrow in the coast province, his platoon split into two. While maneuvering through steep canyons, One group came under fire and confusion erupted. In the chaos, US Soldiers opened fire on their own men. Pat Tillman was struck three times in the head. He was killed by friendly fire at the age of 27. And within hours, commanders knew the truth. They knew that this was friendly fire. They knew what had happened. But when the army announced his death, they told the world that he had died heroically in an enemy ambush. He was posthumously awarded the Silver Star and the Purple Heart. And at his funeral, top officials praised him as a symbol of patriotic practice. President Bush said Pat Tillman set aside a promising football career to serve his country. His memory will live on in the hearts of all who loved him. But the truth was already being buried. His uniform and his gear were destroyed on site, which violated regulations. Reports were written to emphasize heroism and download downplay the reality of fratricide. Why the date matters. This is April 2004. So this the same month those Abu Ghraib prison scandal exploded. Those images were produced. Photographs of tortured Iraqi prisoners were fueling outrage worldwide. America's hypocrisy and cruelty is crippling support for the war because we had no business being there. The Pentagon desperately needed a positive story. Tillman's death provided one. They spun it as propaganda. They spun it into a recruitment tool. Weeks later, the Tillman family learned the truth. Pat had not been killed by the enemy. He had been killed by his own men. And worse, the army had lied about it. His mother, Mary Tillman, became relentless. They purposely interfered with the investigation, destroyed evidence, and they lied. They used Pat's death as propaganda. She said. Public pressure really started to grow after this. By April 2007, Congress convened hearings to investigate. Pat's brother Kevin, who had served alongside him, testified, quote, the deception surrounding Pat's death was an insult to his family, but more importantly, to the soldiers who fought beside him. We believe this cover up was intentional to protect the image of the military at a time of crisis. Retired General Richard Myers, former chairman of the Joint Chiefs, admitted mistakes but denied a deliberate cover up. He said in a congressional hearing, clearly, the way this was handled was wrong. But I do not believe there was an orchestrated effort at the highest levels to mislead lawmakers pressed Defense Secretary Ronald Dumsfeld, who claimed he did not know the truth until weeks after Tillman's death. Representative Henry Waxman asked him, Mr. Secretary, you wrote a letter to the Tillman family at that time. Did you know it was friendly fire? Rumsfeld said, no, sir. I had no idea. Had I known, I would not have written what I did. But many lawmakers and the Tillman family doubted his answers. The destruction of evidence and the carefully scripted public narrative suggested more than just confusion. No one was ever criminally charged. A few officers received reprimands, but accountability never reached the top. For the Tillman family, the betrayal was lasting. His mother again later wrote, they hijacked Pat's legacy. They tried to turn him into something he wasn't to suit their needs. And in doing so, they dishonored him. Today, the Pat Tillman foundation carries his name forward, supporting veterans, service members and military families. His own words, found in his journals before deployment, speak to the man he was. He wrote, somewhere inside, we hear a voice. It leads us in the direction of the person we wish to become. But it's up to us Whether or not to follow, Pat Tillman was a hero and it's despicable that his death was manipulated like that. And if you have not read Jon Krakauer's book Where Men Win Glory, it is a really beautiful account of Pat Tillman and his story and this kind of moment in history. And if you listen to my highway to Hell podcast, which is true crime and travel, when I talk about the Zach and Addie murders that happened in New Orleans. Zach also served in Operation Iraqi Freedom. And it's incredible how much that story impacted what would happen with him later on, including substance abuse. But he was also a veteran of this war and came back very disillusioned about why he was there, why people were suffering, watched one of his closest soldier friends die in front of him, and it really shaped, excuse me, what would happen when he came back. Now let's go back to our timeline. Remember at this point, Saddam has been captured since December of 2003, causing Iraq to fracture alongside secretarian lines. The Sunni versus Shia conflict erupted, fueled by Al Qaeda in Iraq, led by Abu Musab Zakawi. In 2006, the bombing of the Golden Mosque in Samar triggered waves of secretarian killings. Baghdad neighborhoods were divided by militias, with bodies turning up daily in the streets. By 2006, 2007, Iraq was in the grip of a full blown Civil War. In 2007, President Bush ordered a troop surge, sending an additional 30,000 soldiers under General David Petraeus. This strategy emphasized counterinsurgency, securing neighborhoods and working with local tribes. Violence began to decline by 2008, but political reconciliation remained elusive. And this, this is something that we did as well in Vietnam. At this point, when you've caused the destabilization, you've sent the military in to try to stabilize it, like help them get stable. Because just as things are starting to even out, violence has come down. Now, there's no political reconciliation yet, but as things are starting to stabilize, instead of helping them set up a new government, making sure institutions are in place, keeping them safe. In 2008, the Bush, Bush administration signed a Status of Forces agreement with the Iraqi government, setting a timeline for U.S. withdrawal, which we should again, we were never supposed, we never should have been there in the first place. But when you do that, when a situation like that is unstable, it leads to consequences later, which we'll get into. President Barack Obama, elected in 2008, partly on opposition to the war because people now realized that the weapons of mass destruction was a lie and we weren't establishing democracy. We were there for our own interests. He completed the withdrawal in December of 2011. And the cost of this operation was over 4400 US troops killed, tens of thousands wounded. Estimates of Iraqi civilian Deaths range from 150,000 to over half a million. Like no Wonder they hate US financial cost. It costs more than $2 trillion with long term costs. Veteran Care especially projected to exceed 6 trillion. And let me say something. War is a very powerful reelection tool. It truly, truly is. And then there was the regional fallout. The war destabilized Iraq as we knew it would weaken state institutions that we didn't bother to stay long enough to help re establish or send in social services or get the UN to come in and created fertile ground for the rise of, you guessed it, ISIS in the 2010s. ISIS is a direct result of our actions. Not just our actions going in under false pretenses, but our inability to stabilize the region before we left. And America has a pattern of doing this. And then we're shocked when certain regions are unstable or violent. So by 2005, 2006, the truth was undeniable. Iraq had no active WMD programs at the time of invasion. So why go to Iraq in the first place? Like what was the real reason? Because it wasn't weapons of mass destruction and it certainly wasn't democracy. Democracy was like a little byproduct they were able to spin favorably beyond weapons. Scholars point to ideology. In their book America Unbound, Ivo Daalder and James Lindsay described the Bush administration as believing America could remake the Middle east, remove Saddam, plant democracy in Baghdad and the rest of the region might follow. I would say that was very low on their list of priorities. Others, like Robert Gervais argue Iraq was meant to demonstrate US resolve to show Iran North Korea what would happen if they defied Washington or dared to attack. I feel like that's reasonable. Even realists like John Mercer Meier and Stephen Walt argued in Foreign Policy that Saddam was actually deterrable and that the war was unnecessary. Their critique highlights how divided scholars were and even as the White House pressed ahead. But here's the big one. In my opinion, what about oil? Energy wasn't the sole driver, but it certainly mattered. Doug Stokes and Ram Ram Sam Raphael and Global Energy Security and American Hegemony argued Iraq fit the broader US strategy of controlling the oil border in the Persian Gulf. I would say this was probably the biggest reason. And while the two towers gave us the in to have the conversation, I would say oil was probably the larger motivator. Author Greg Muddit later shows in how post invasion planning documents prioritized reshaping Iraq's oil industry for global markets. So within their war plans was this plan to reshape Iraq's oil industry for global markets. Whether or not blood for oil is too simplistic, Energy security was undeniably part of the calculation. By late 2003, when searches came up empty for WMDs, the Iraq Survey Group was able to confirm that this could not be the primary reason that the US was there, that it was false premises. And we also knew that the evidence that was given was cherry picked, manipulated and intentionally misleading to give the administration what it truly wanted. The weapons of mass destruction were the public rationale, but the deeper reasons were more complex. And the result was trillions of dollars in spending. Thousands of American lives, hundreds of thousands of Iraqi civilians, as well as an unstable region that was fodder for isis. Now, I'm not saying people like Saddam should not be brought down. Obviously they should, obviously. But in order to come in, to destabilize a region and make it so much more significantly worse and then act shocked and upset about it without taking any responsibility is also foolish. They launched this war on the promise of Saddam leaving behind weapons of mass destruction, but there were no stockpiles. There were plenty of lessons, though. In the words of historian Melvin Loeffler. He said the invasion of Iraq was not a war of necessity. It was a war of choice. The choice shaped by fear, ideology and ambition. Now that brings us today. Remember Christina from earlier, who lived six blocks from the two towers, who had to flee her apartment the day of the attacks and was welcomed back to the city only 10 days later to fight the dust and debris. Let's finish reading her story. We know now that the air in Lower Manhattan was far from clear. When we returned to our apartment, it was toxic, filled with jet fuel, asbestos, glass, fibers and particles from pulverized electronics, cement and other materials. Experts have compared breathing in the caustic dust to inhaling Drano. In the years since 9 11, the air has been linked to nearly 70 types of cancers and other illnesses that have since claimed twice as many lives as the attacks themselves. Whitman has apologized for falsely assuring the public that the air was safe. In 2010, after lengthy negotiations, established the World Trade Center Health Program to provide medical benefits for the first responders and others whose health had been affected by the September 11 attacks. The program was extended by Congress in 2015 and covers people who worked in the rescue, recovery or cleanup efforts after the World Trade Center. The Pentagon or the crash site of Flight 93 in Pennsylvania. It also provides benefits for people who lived, worked, went to school and attended daycare in a New York City disaster area. I have carefully kept track, and this is still Christina of the World Trade Center Health Program and the Victim Compensation Fund. Over the years, because of my proximity to the disaster and also because I'm a licensed New York City Tour guide. Since 2011, when the 911 memorial in New York officially opened, I have taken groups almost weekly to the memorial, pointing out the names of nearly 3000 people who died in the towers that day. I usually start my tours tours at the Memorial Glade, which was added in 2019 to commemorate the lives of those lost to 911 related illnesses. The site's plaque reads, in part, whose actions in our time of need led to their injury, sickness and death Responders and recovery workers, survivors and community members suffering long after September 11, 2001 from exposure to hazards and toxins. For a long time I didn't think those words applied to me, but now they probably do. At the beginning of this year, 2025, I began experiencing worrisome health symptoms. After a few tests, my doctors called to tell me I had uterine cancer, and I wasn't completely surprised because the Decenter for Disease Control and Prevention had added uterine cancer to the list of World Trade center related health conditions in 2023, based on extensive scientific review and research. Because of that status, since my husband and I were among the 25,000 residents who lived south of Canal street during the World Trade center cleanup, my cancer treatment should be covered by the health program. I have no idea if it will ever if I will ever be able to claim those funds or receive any further treatment I might need. Thanks to recent actions by our current administration, the program benefits are supposed to last until 2090, but the funding is shaky. A deal to include long term funding in a spending bill appeared to have been worked out by Congress in late 2024, but criticism from Donald Trump and then President Elect and his advisor Elon Musk Torpedoes torpedoed that bipartisan spending deal. The smaller bill, passed in December 2024 did not include funding for the 911 health fund, to the great disappointment of New York legislators, firefighters and other advocates for the program. Then in February, when I decided it was time to approach a doctor with my symptoms, I started seeing reports that the Trump administration had cut both funding and staff from the CDC that would directly impact the World Trade center health program. After strong bipartisan backlash, the funding cuts were reversed and some of the employees were rehired. I had to have a full hysterectomy on March 27, 2025. While recovering, I submitted my World Trade Center Health Program forms just as a new threat of funds became clear. In late March and early April, the Trump administration announced plans to cut 10,000 jobs from the Department of Health and Human Services, including the cdc, which oversees the National Institute of Occupational Safety and Health, the branch that runs the World Trade center program. It was expected to lose about two thirds of its staff 873 positions, including doctors, nurses, researchers and administrative workers. Then, around 1 May, layoff notices were received by nearly all of the remaining staff, including the 16 workers left in the World Trade Center Health Program. With such drastic reductions to staff, applications to the World Trade Center Health Program likely can't be properly reviewed or processed and critical services and they are critical because cancer rates for the population have been reported to be much higher than average. We'll grind to a halt. Even before the recent funding and staffing cuts, the programming was struggled struggled to receive timely service for more than 130,000 people currently enrolled. I recently spoke to a boat captain, one of the boat this is one of the boat captains that helped rescue her from the bottom of the island who spent 13 hours ferrying people from to safety on 9 11, spending hours inside the toxic dust cloud that hung over Manhattan that day. After losing half of his jaw to cancer, he submitted forms asking for compensation from the health program more than a year ago and has heard nothing. Michael Barash of the of the law firm Barasha McGarry, which represents more than 40,000 responders and survivors who have been diagnosed with cancer and other 911 related illnesses, including myself, recently communicated his fears to me in an email. If the layoffs are not reversed, 911 responders and survivors will die needlessly, he said. Anyone trying to receive care through the program must have their illness certified as being related to 911 exposure to receive approval and begin treatment or file for compensation. Although the HHS asserts that the program is functioning properly, Barash and others affiliated with the program have said patients are not receiving the certifications they need to get treatment. Barrage said that three firefighters from New York employees with 911 related cancer have been denied treatment from the World Trader Health Program just two weeks ago. The program simply cannot function properly with these massive layoffs, he wrote. For the last two decades I have worked to keep alive the memory of those who died on 9 11. I tell tour groups how first responders rush in. I show them the battered sphere statue and discuss how it was buried under tons of debris. I've written a book and multiple articles about my experience on that day and the months that followed. And I've shared my 911 story in churches, libraries, schools and jails, not just across America, but in person in countries such as Japan, India and Madagascar. My husband is just as active, coordinating an annual event that raises funds for a scholarship at Clemson University in the name of his friend and fraternity brother who died in the North Tower. My goal for this has always been to honor my country's promise to never forget. To never forget those who died in the plains, in the towers, in the streets, to never forget the ones who rushed into the burning towers. I or spent months digging through the smoldering rubble or cleaned the buildings or the houses or taught school or sold groceries or rebuilt lives in the blocks around Ground Zero. Now I raise my voice for myself as well, for thousands like me. We need this fund. We need the healthcare providers and the researchers studying our diseases and the staff who read the forms and fill in the databases our country promised to remember. Can we still count on that promise? And again, that full article is in the Dispatch, written by Christina Stanton. And I hope that this demonstrates that the First Amendment is the most important thing that we have in this country. And the First Amendment guarantees our freedom of religion. And I have an episode coming out next week really discussing separation of church and state and the freedom of religion and why it is integral to the community, the freedoms that we have. But the First Amendment also protects our right to protest, to peacefully assemble, and it protects our freedom of speech. And as of this recording, yesterday, Donald Trump signed an executive order saying that burning the American flag would carry a mandatory prison sentence of a year without the option for early release, which is in direct violation to the supreme court decision in 1989 of Texas vs. Johnson. That that is protected free speech. You don't have to like it, but that symbolic free speech is so important because without the ability to speak up against our government, to criticize our government when they lie or they encroach on civil liberties or when they break their promises, we have nothing. If the first, if this executive order that Trump has just signed should go back to the Supreme Court, who will rule in his favor because they are under his thumb, if we lose the First Amendment, we lose every pathway we have to civil nonviolent resistance against an authoritarian regime. This also after Trump's announcement that he's going to send the Department of Justice against the California redistricting Which is only happening because of the redistricting he asked for in Texas, that he called Governor Abbott and said, I need you to get me more seats. And they did redistricting the middle of a decade in, like, between censuses, which is never done. And Gavin Newsom was very clear. And I've never been a huge fanboy of Gavin Newsom, but I think he did the right thing. He said, if you do this, we will balance what you do. We will not let you get away with it. So what I hope not just to remember with, you know, September 11th being tomorrow as of the day of this release, not just to remember the people who died and the unbelievable bravery of people who ran into those buildings without any regard for their safety. Yes, to remember that. To remember those who tried to take that plane back and saved whatever that target was, but also to have an honest reckoning of America's presence in Iraq. How we lied. We lied to get in there, to manipulate it for our own benefit. And then we left the people in a volatile situation that led to ISIS control. As Americans, we have to start getting honest about our history. I lived in London very briefly, and I love the city of London. And my favorite place in London is the Tower of London, which is. You're like. Wait, like the dungeon, the torture? Yes. Yes, it is. And when you go there, the Beefeaters is what they're called, which is part of the Queen's royal guard, or not the queen anymore. The king, the monarch's royal guard, take you on a tour of the Tower of London, and they tell you these stories, and they show you the hill where they used to behead people, and people would come out with pistols, picnic baskets, and watch. And this was the place that they would hang, you know, people's heads on the walls as a warning. And one of the things I love about the Tower of London is the brutal honesty with which they approach their history, because so many people were murdered there that shouldn't have been. So many people were mistreated, so many things happened. And they're so honest about it. And those soldiers will look at you and say, it was such a dark time in history. Our leaders were corrupt. Our leaders were broken. And America has to get to that point with our history. You know, we also have. Donald Trump is going through the Smithsonian saying that these exhibits shouldn't talk about how bad slavery was. Slavery was horrific. And if you are not convinced of that, I want you to read, like, really find some good material on the transatlantic crossing and how people. Human beings were packed into those boats and how many of them died before ever getting across the water? We have got to be willing, especially as white Americans, to sit in the discomfort of truth. Because if we do not do that and we continue to lie to ourselves, we will continue to make the same mistakes. We will continue to perpetuate the same evils over and over and over again. We see that happening now. The same group of people that, you know, a few years ago were talking about, you know, this Democratic leader is going to impose martial law, and they're going to violate civil liberties, and we have the national guard in D.C. for no reason. And they are silent because when we do not tell the truth, we repeat the same mistakes. And I hope that with this lesson, we get a moment to remember the two towers. We get a moment to sit in the uncomfortable truth that America has not always been the hero. America has done some great things. American people have done some great things. And Americans across the civil rights movement, the Civil War, the Revolutionary War, have done things of immeasurable courage. I'm working on an episode right now about the abolitionist John Brown, who is one of my heroes and becomes more of a hero of mine every single day. Yes, we've done great things, but this idea of make America great again not only refers to the Gilded Age, where child labor and unfair workers compensation was rampant and they would murder you if you defied the company, but also that we need to understand that America has never reached a place where it was great for everyone. We have never followed our promise of liberty and justice for all. We have never stayed true to the ideals of democracy as much as we have stayed true to the ideals of wealth. And I have no issue with people being wealthy, but when wealth grows to such a level that it impacts democracy, strips people of their rights, now we've got something to talk about. And so my challenge for this episode is to keep learning your history. Read it and sit in its discomfort. Go to the Holocaust Museum, learn about slavery. Like, I mean, sit down and read it. Read the Humanity Archive by Jermaine Fowler about the history of what has happened to African Americans in this country. Read Malcolm X's autobiography, sit in the discomfort and challenge yourself to sit in the truth, no matter how painful it is. That is the only way that we stop this cycle that we've found ourselves in these. These periods of history in America where we've gone through global interference or global neglect, where we refuse to act like periods of fascism, fighting against civil rights, all of this Christian evangelical rhetoric about abortion and LGBTQ rights is a result of their anger that they had to desegregate Christian schools or lose their tax exemption. We have to be grounded in the truth or we lose everything. And I still, regardless of the administration's misleading and lying to get us into Iraq, I do want to say a very special thanks to everyone who served in Iraq and Afghanistan, because I know that your hearts were in the right place and I know that you were motivated by protecting people from what happened at the towers. And to those who are survivors of the towers or survivors in New York City, thank you for your strength and your courage. And please, like, let's write into our representatives to make sure that the World Trade Center Health Fund stays funded. We said we would never forget. Let's keep that promise. And to everyone else, that's our job, is to actively remember, honor what happened. And thank you so much to people who now work, whether you worked at the World Trade center or not, but act as first responders in dangerous situations. Thank you for trying to save people's lives. Challenge yourself to sit in a little bit of discomfort and a little bit more truth every single day. Next week we have an interview with Dr. Richard Ballmer, who just wrote America's Best the Separation of Church and State, where we talk about the history of the First Amendment, specifically freedom of religion and the separation of church and state, because that is under threat right now. I want America to be as great as I was told it was when I was a kid, and I hope you do, too. And I hope we'll make steps towards that. And I will see you next week to talk about the freedom of religion, the Separation of church and State with Dr. Richard Ballmer right here on Flipping Tables.
