"Consider now: Who, being innocent, has ever perished?
Where were the upright ever destroyed?

As I have observed, those who plow evil
and those who sow trouble reap it.

At the breath of God they are destroyed;
at the blast of his anger they perish.

The lions may roar and growl,
yet the teeth of the great lions are broken.

The lion perishes for lack of prey,
and the cubs of the lioness are scattered."

-Job 4:7-11


Why do You stand afar off, O LORD?
Why do You hide Yourself in times of trouble?

In pride the wicked hotly pursue the afflicted;
Let them be caught in the plots which they have devised.

For the wicked boasts of his heart's desire,
And the greedy man curses and spurns the LORD.

The wicked, in the haughtiness of his countenance, does not seek Him.
All his thoughts are, "There is no God."

His ways prosper at all times;
Your judgments are on high, out of his sight;
As for all his adversaries, he snorts at them.

He says to himself, "I will not be moved;
Throughout all generations I will not be in adversity."

His mouth is full of curses and deceit and oppression;
Under his tongue is mischief and wickedness.

He sits in the lurking places of the villages;
In the hiding places he kills the innocent;
His eyes stealthily watch for the unfortunate.

He lurks in a hiding place as a lion in his lair;
He lurks to catch the afflicted;
He catches the afflicted when he draws him into his net.

He crouches, he bows down,
And the unfortunate fall by his mighty ones.

He says to himself, "God has forgotten;
He has hidden His face; He will never see it."

Arise, O LORD; O God, lift up Your hand.
Do not forget the afflicted.

Why has the wicked spurned God?
He has said to himself, "You will not require it."

You have seen it, for You have beheld mischief and vexation to take it into Your hand.
The unfortunate commits himself to You;
You have been the helper of the orphan.

Break the arm of the wicked and the evildoer,
Seek out his wickedness until You find none.

The LORD is King forever and ever;
Nations have perished from His land.

O LORD, You have heard the desire of the humble;
You will strengthen their heart, You will incline Your ear

To vindicate the orphan and the oppressed,
So that man who is of the earth will no longer cause terror.

-Psalm 10


Today kinda snuck up on me: intellectually, I knew what today would be; but it only hit me when I got into work this morning what today was. I have nothing terribly insightful to say, except these:

I do not now, and will not for the foreseeable future, trust any modern Democrat to try to the limits of Executive power to stop another September 11th from happening again. Roosevelt? Truman? Kennedy (John)? Scoop Jackson? The last of those men died or became Republican years ago. I vote Republican, generally, because of abortion and taxes. But even if the two parties reconciled unfavorably on those issues, I'd still vote Republican, because alone among our political parties -- Republicans, Democrats, Greens, Libertarians, Whatever -- I can trust Republicans to do what must be done to stop vicious men from slaughtering my family in their sleep.

Necessarily, when bad men are trying to kill you, you must sometimes kill them to stop them from killing you. Sometimes, they will admit no other argument.

I could care less about sixteen words. A vicious man who would certainly have destroyed us given a chance holds power no more. That is enough.

The Left is proof that good intentions can lead inexorably to evil.

As an otherwise fairly dense fellow once said, we're still coming for you, you bastards.

UPDATE: Wanted to note Senator Cornyn's clarion words of today:

"The passengers on Flight 93 were everyday Americans, men and women with jobs, with families, with dreams. Like all of us, they made promises to their loved ones before they boarded that plane: promises of vacations and baseball games, of presents and anniversaries, small promises and big ones. Some promises don't come cheap; some cost us nothing; others require that we risk all, even our very lives.

The crash site of Flight 93, nestled in the quiet hills of Pennsylvania, is filled with memories of the promises those heroes made and will never keep."

As the Senator notes, we now have a duty to keep the promise they made that day.

Victory.