Christopher Hitchens, on how we should face the second anniversay of 9/11, in Slate:

What is required is a steady, unostentatious stoicism, made up out of absolute, cold hatred and contempt for the aggressors, and complete determination that their defeat will be utter and shameful.

Yes.

And this, on commemoration:

The time to commemorate the fallen is, or always has been, after the war is over. This war has barely begun.

He's right. Our President keeps reminding us of this, and we should be listening.

And finally:

Two beautiful fall seasons ago, this society was living in a fool's paradise while so far from being "in search of enemies" that its governing establishment barely knew how to tell an enemy from a friend. If there is anything to mark or commemorate, it is the day when that realm of illusion was dispelled—the date that will one day be acknowledged as the one on which our enemies made their most truly "suicidal" mistake.

Amen.