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9-11

The attack on America was the result of zealotry, an extremist distortion of one value system to terrorize another. While the means of attack were as modern as they were depraved, the motivation was as ancient as humanity itself–the perpetration of evil under the guise of good, because evil recognizes not its own name.

Through the most graphic and gruesome of images, the attack forces the understanding that we have now experienced a preview of war in the 21st century, where there are no rules of engagement, no distinction between military personnel and civilians, no act too atrocious to be carried out by human tools of destruction.

We must now face the faceless perpetrators, their sponsors and protectors with all the might that we possess, with the united resolve that we can, when needed, summon and with a cold pragmatism that we must develop. Some of what we must do in prosecuting a war like none we have ever fought will be unpalatable, but, after this act of barbarism, all who would harm us must comprehend that any attack on us is a certain path to self-destruction.

There is no concept of civilization more potent than an open society based on individual freedom and sustained by free markets, free speech, free worship, free movement and free elections. Our freedoms were diminished on 9-11, because the psyche of freedom is no less important than the reality. Living with the immeasurable grief of one attack and fear of the next is not living in freedom.

Immediately required is recommitment to national security, gone stagnant from complacency, bickering, moral revulsion, miscalculation of danger and shifting national priorities. That presents numerous dilemmas and difficult choices, large among which is the mandatory balance between security and civil liberties for all who live within our borders or under our flag. Sacrificing the latter to guarantee the former is no solution. We cannot take from ourselves those freedoms we are prepared to defend by unleashing the deadliest of force on others.

No one of us and no group of us has the wisdom or the authority to set the course. Once again, however, those who risked and gave their lives to initiate this republic and those who structured it point the way. If we follow their spirit and adhere to the Constitution to which we are pledged, we shall protect and preserve the grand experiment of democracy entrusted to us.

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