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by John F. Butterfield The noise, smoke, and screams were beyond belief; and the destruction was unimaginable. Over 6,600,000 dead in just the United States. In the United States alone, over 375,000 killed by disease, over 275,000 killed by toxic agents, over 215,000 died in the twisted metal coffins that had been their cars or were run over, over 86,000 were gunned down or knifed by their enemies, over 50,000 were killed by friendly fire and still the Bush administration shows no conviction or determination. It is weak on health care, weak on the environment, weak on law enforcement, and weak on gun control. Nor does it seem that we can get tough on tobacco even though over 2,175,000 people died from tobacco in the last 5 years. 425,000 died from alcohol and 85,000 from illicit drugs. Over 1,000,000 died as a result of their own sexual behavior and over 2,000,000 died from bad diet and inactivity. Over 12,000,000 people died in the United States in the last 5 years. About 6,600,000 of these deaths were preventable and our country should have been determined to prevent them. It should have been willing to have some conviction, make a commitment, and stay the course. Last week, I didn't hear or read anything about these 6,600,000 preventable deaths that have happened since 9/11. I didn't hear any speeches about how being determined to enforce environmental protection would have saved 275,000 lives in the last five years. If President Bush exceeded his constitutional authority or asked for truly tougher laws to protect us from non-terrorist, toxic agents, I didn't hear about it. Instead, 91 people died from toxic agents for each 9/11 victim because the government was weak on the environment. Weak on health care, weak on the environment, weak on law enforcement, weak on gun control and 2,200 people died for each 9/11 victim. 9/11 was a horrific tragedy. There are many tragedies: Katrina, tsunamis, global warming. This Summer 30,000 people died from heat in Europe during one of the hottest Summers ever, 10 times as many victims as 9/11, but our government has refused to discuss global warming. weak on global warming, weak on ethics, weak on corporate corruption, weak on equal opportunity Over 120,000 people, most of them innocent women and children, have been murdered in Afghanistan and Iraq as a result of U.S. and U.S. backed military operations. 40 of them for each 9/11 victim, when is vengeance satisfied? They might have had nuclear weapons? I don't think so. The United States has nuclear weapons and it is the only country that has ever used them against an enemy. We have attacked Iraq twice. They have never attacked us. No article can even scratch the surface of all the misguided thinking behind even one Bush administration sin let alone all of them and there are as many Bush administration sins of omission and commission as there are stars in the heavens or grains of sand upon the earth. "If they were ever written down in full detail, I suppose the world itself could not contain the scrolls written." (from statistics in "Actual Causes of Death in the United States, 2000" by Mokdad, Marks, Stroup, and Gerberding) |