Who is your freedom fighter?

I’ve been thinking about the claim I heard — that the 9/11 hijackers were anti-imperialists. It may have been deliberately provocative but had a germ that’s sat with me.

It sparks my hate for the phrasing of “the war on terrorism,” as it was an empty and abstract phrase.

A phrase that is wholly based on your perspective.

Washington was a terrorist, but we laud him. Any other number of anti-British fighters in the ensuing 150 years have either faded from memory or become lauded. Washington and Gandhi are lauded pretty much for doing the same thing — standing against the British Empire.

Mohammad Atta or Osama Bin Laden don’t get the same sort of reverence. They’re terrorists.

We remember the picture of Washington crossing the Delaware but forget the fact that the reason Washington was crossing the Delaware was to go into Trenton and kill British soldiers in their beds on Christmas morning.

Makes me think the famous funeral oration in Julius Caesar has it exactly opposite. The evil that men do is interred with their bones but the good lives after them.

Look at the rankings of the best US presidents and at the top you’ll see Washington and Lincoln and FDR. The first owned slaves, the second wanted to avoid freeing them if possible, and the last put Americans and other into camps. But on net they rose to the occasion when presented with adversity. The opposite is true of presidents like Hoover or Trump. When faced with a challenge they lacked the imagination and leadership to take the reins of the country when needed. If I was president, I would prefer a nice nothing really complicated to happen. Challenges present opportunity, but also the opportunity to fail.