Connect: Today, two years, two days and two "wars" after September 11th, 2001, Bin Laden competes for Irish media space with bin charges, writes Eddie Holt
As ever, the struggle between the global and the local, the epoch-making and the immediate, the awesome and the mundane, continues. Such is life and death. That much, at least, hasn't changed.
Still, the global mood remains, at best devitalised and on bad days, depressed. For the alleged Bin Laden-inspired attacks, the superlatives of horror have been all but exhausted. Likewise, superlatives of condemnation and praise (although praise is fading fast) for the response of George Bush to the attacks. Fatigue, dismay and the urge to repress now prevail in the Western world.
There's grief too, of course, and not just in the West. Many of the bereaved of America, Afghanistan, Iraq and other countries remain consumed by it. Such, too, is life and death. No doubt, there's fatigue and dismay in the Muslim world also. But whether the urge to repress, to forget the seeming hopelessness of it all, prevails, is another matter.
If it doesn't - if, in fact, enough Muslims have been angered by Bush's responses - revenge may be brewing. America, after all, has exacted revenge, albeit a largely alienating revenge. It's clear much of it has been based on tripe comparable to the rightly derided, if questionably highlighted, tripe about dozens of virgins awaiting the suicidal mass-murderers of two years ago.
Certainly, another massive attack in the US (or Europe!) could revitalise Western desire for revenge. Similarly, another bogus "war" on a Muslim country would guarantee Arab vengeance. Indeed, Iraq was - it's undeniable now - an attack too far. The damage may already be done. September 11th, 2001 was wrong; Afghanistan was wrong; Iraq was utterly indefensible.
After all, Iraq was never a terrorist threat to America before, but it certainly is now. The same is true for Britain because of Tony Blair's lapdog assent to Bush's agenda. The great salesman of politics - and Blair was once a wonderful salesman, perfectly suited to his historical time - took on a task requiring too many manufactured excuses even for him.
It's axiomatic that the struggle between the global and the local is peculiarly intense in the US. Given its geography, history, economic dominance and, most vitally, its generally risible media, Americans routinely confuse the local as having global significance. Ironically however, while this spells bad news for Bush and his cronies, it could be good for the wider world.
Bush's domestic policies - tax-breaks for the mega wealthy, welfare cuts, beefing-up an already colossal military - are losing him votes. He and his hawks are failing Americans and voters would surely abandon him in droves if presented with even a semi-attractive alternative. There is no doubt that the US can do better than it has under its current president.
The hopeful sign is that Americans, as people in the rest of the world have done since Bush's dubious "election", are beginning to realise this. All opinion polls confirm that confidence in the "war on terror" is slipping steadily in the US. In Europe - at least in western Europe - voters have almost no confidence in that misguided project.
Some politicians and elements of the media remain, of course, as belligerent as ever. That's to be expected even though Bush's "war on terror" has been more notable for the terror of war than for any positive results. The main villains identified by the US are still at large; the Taliban is reportedly regrouping in Afghanistan; Iraq has no law and order or basic services.
Palestine and Israel remain locked in a spiral of sickening violence. The inescapable conclusion is that the "war on terror" has produced only more war and more terror. Sure, Saddam Hussein is out of business and, in itself, that's commendable. But the flower-strewn democracy that was supposed to replace him in Baghdad was tripe when it was mooted and remains tripe.
If any semblance of it ever materialises, it won't be because of Bush. No wonder the global mood remains devitalized when it's not thoroughly depressed. Within weeks of the attacks on America, the common-sense, UN approach was to play hard-cop with the US administration and soft-cop with traumatized American citizens. That still seems the wisest strategy.
The task surely is to convince US voters of the inadequacy of their government. There is an argument that such a task is up to Americans themselves and particularly to their media (some hope!). External interference - although it will be minimal anyway - can be deemed unethical. It would be too, if the US administration didn't manipulate the politics of other countries.
It's not alone in that, of course, but because it's the most powerful country, it's influence is greatest. There can't be any doubt that the world dislikes America much more now than it did before September 11th, 2001. In spite of genuine and almost universal sympathy for the attacks America suffered two years ago, George Bush and his hawks have squandered that sympathy.
No wonder bin charges now excite more protests than Bin Laden.