The 9/11 attacks had the specific purpose of undermining Americans' self-confidence in their economic and political system. Bin Laden saw America as a symbol of evil because its capitalist system was devoted to greed and secularism and was devoid of faith. Phil Boas' lengthy editorial decrying our inability to work together harmoniously, predicts "another bloody year ahead." One must ask whether Bin Laden got it right. Did the attack on the Twin Towers cause America to lose faith in itself and bring about all these divisions? Phil points to the stressed out students, struggling teachers and principals and Cantor's research into the continuing levels of poverty among the disadvantaged and the growing gulf between rich and poor Americans, as a consequence of our failure to unite together under a shared purpose. He points out that an American education should be the means by which young people's ambitions and talents and entrepreneurial drive are released. It's not happening as well as it should.

I think Phil is right about the mediocre state of our education system but the failure is not one of confidence or 9/11. Basically our education system is weak because it is underfunded. And what top graduates coming out of university are willing to devote their lives to education and a relatively meager salary. If teachers' salaries and the state of our schools reflect our priorities then we need to change. Look at the spending figures. In 2018 we spent $59 billion on education. We spent $639 billion on defense. Singapore spent $11 billion on education and $12.8 billion on defense. The combined Chinese and Russian defense budgets are less than half of ours. Does that not suggest a lopsided set of priorities? We, as a people, seem very keen to spend our money on armies and ships and guns and weapons of war but not so keen on educating our children. To me the choice is obvious. Unless we alter our priorities and make our education system as important as defending our country, we will eventually fail. 9/11 or not.