Do the Right Thing
That seems to be the message the U.S. government is sending the victims of the Oklahoma City bombing. The second worst terrorist attack on U.S. soil has been overshadowed by the worst (9/11, of course). More to the point, the victims and survivors of the World Trade Center attacks were compensated quite generously, while, as this Chicago Tribune article points out, many of the Oklahoma City families are struggling:
"`You don't count,'" is how Randy Ledger, an Oklahoma City survivor, says he and other victims of the attack interpreted the snub from Congress. "`You're just a bunch of redneck hicks down in Oklahoma.'"Now certainly there were differences between the 9/11 attacks and the Oklahoma City bombing. One, as the article points out, is that 9/11 left Congress feeling an economic imperative to rescue the airlines from potentially devastating lawsuits.Ledger, 48, a custodian in the Murrah building, suffered multiple skull fractures, brain damage and hearing loss, and has two chunks of glass embedded so near his spine that surgeons are reluctant to operate. Other shards periodically still work their way out through his skin.
After 10 years, he is still battling the federal Department of Labor over a worker's compensation claim.
Another is that the Oklahoma City attack was perpetrated by Americans. When the U.S. governments screams "Terrorist!" they don't very well like to be pointing home. That some of our own people could be inspired to hate our government so much that they would murder fellow Americans for being employed by that government is not something any of us like to think too much about.
But I think the more telling issue is economic. Many of those killed on 9/11 were well off financially, and the compensation after the fact was based on income, as the same article points out:
Kenneth Feinberg, the Washington, D.C., attorney who was the fund's special master and decided the amount of each multimillion-dollar award, questioned the fairness of Congress' instruction to replicate the tort system and base compensation on the lifetime earning potential of each victim. That decision ensured that the richest survivors received the most."That decision ensured that the richest survivors received the most." Yeah, there weren't a lot of rich people in the day care center, or the Social Security office, or any of the other offices in the Murrah building. And I can't help thinking that's why their families are depending on charity while the families of the 9/11 victims suffer through the loss of their loved ones at least knowing they can pay the bills."The system . . . fuels divisiveness among the very people you're trying to help," Feinberg said. "The fireman's widow comes to me and says, `My husband died a hero, why am I getting a million dollars less than the banker who shoveled pencils for Enron on the 103rd floor?'"
Not to say that our government should be making everyone millionaires for having a loved one in the wrong place at the wrong time. But if we're going to take care of the victims of one terrorist attack, it is only right that we do more to aid the victims of other such attacks. And we must do so without regard to their income: to do otherwise is to say that some American lives are more valuable than others. Our system is founded on equality, and we like to think we are a compassionate nation. Let's prove it by taking care of the people who suffered in Oklahoma City.
1 Comments:
Right on, sister.
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