So glad to hear inselpeter and Helen are okay. I lived in New York for a few years, and I'm still trying to get in contact with a number of friends there, but I think everyone I know and love there is okay.

I'm sure there are many people who will have "what-if" stories - I keep being stopped short by the thought that my partner and kids just flew from the east to California on Sunday, and that my mother was supposed to fly from Boston to San Francisco on American (not on one of the targeted flights, but still so similar) on Wednesday! She is thinking of flying on the weekend, and I'm torn - I've told her to drive or take the train, but I know we must not let fear grind us to a halt, for then the villains win, but it's hard when it's one's own mother.

On the broader question of our response - I agree that action must be taken, and that it must be swift and decisive, both to deter such acts in the future and to reduce the likelihood of reactions against muslim communities around the world that had nothing at all to do with this heinous act. At the same time, I have some hope that this will change the way Americans act in this world. Ted is right, that we have contributed in huge ways in this world, but we have also shown great arrogance in how we operate. I guess my hope is that from this experience we will develop some sort of guide for our own behavior - that the US, and most especially US corporations, will ask "Is what we're doing fair?" or "Can we do it in a way that makes everyone better off?" before acting abroad.

By this I do not mean to say that I sympathize with the mad, evil people who did this in any way - looking back at what I've written I fear that will be the interpretation. I think I'm looking, in the midst of all immediate loss of life, and the huge, difficult changes this tragedy will bring to our country and our world, for some good to come of it, for some basic change in the way we all treat each other, that may make it somehow a better world than we had before these horrible events.