What Ifs

As we use our hands-on approach to combat terrorism, and grope our way to try to find solutions, I try to envision a different world. I know we don't reside in a land of counter-factuals, but what if:

The hanging chads had hung in the favor of Gore in those days after the November 2000 election? Or

The voices inside W's head had not told him to attack and attack again? Or

There had been the institution of a draft that required that not only their child, but yours and mine were at risk?

Would we still be looking for the inner secrets of the babies and the grandmothers as they prepared to take flight? Would we still be residing in a place of ever escalating fears? Would we still be subjected to the same level of psychological and physical invasions that we must now daily endure?

In retrospect, we seem to have made so many bad decisions that has led us to the screening room. If we had taken an alternate path would we now be stronger or weaker?

Those who perpetrated the wrongs of 9/11 could not possibly have envisioned the havoc that would consume our minds and bodies nearly a decade later. They have succeeded in creating a world where we are forced now to look inside the heads, and pants of each of those who come before us to assure that their hearts and their bodies are not wired for our destruction.

Terrorists seem to have grown more resolute, not less, over the years. I only ask what could we have done differently, what could we have done better. I do not pretend that the questions I raise are answers. I only wonder what if.