Why I didn't pop champagne last night

Last night was, by any measure, a remarkable night to be an American. Shortly before we were all set to turn in for the weekend (at least, those of us who weren't watching Celebrity Apprentice were), we all received the news that we had been awaiting for nearly a decade--Osama bin Laden, the architect of one of the most terrifying days in American history, had been killed.

Immediately, across the country, the celebrations began, and with good reason. Bin Laden was the head of one of the world's most dangerous and ruthless organizations, one which has claimed "credit" for countless instances of unfathomable death and destruction around the world. Regardless of your thoughts on American foreign policy pre- or post-9/11, there has never been and will never be any justification for the wanton murder of innocent civilians, no matter their national, political, or religious affiliation. The events of September 11, 2001 were then and remain today some of the most cowardly and despicable acts ever committed in human history--I will never forget the unspeakable terror, anger, and overall emotional confusion that I felt that day and in the subsequent weeks, nor do I want to. That day, for better or for worse, will in large part define the lives of multiple generations of American citizens.

Bin Laden was the bogeyman to end all bogeymen, and finally he has been removed from the earth. His death is a loud international reaffirmation of American strength (seriously, the guys who ultimately took him out are absolute badasses, and deserve whatever recognition we can bestow upon them), and it also represents the long-overdue resolution of what had been a significant source of American embarrassment. With all our intelligence-gathering resources and military might, for years we had been tragically, almost comically unable to find the one man we were actually looking for--that ended last night, to our enemies' dismay. In a nation that is increasingly desperate for good news, this certainly qualifies.

Why, then, did I find myself struggling to share in the excitement that seemingly every other American seemed to be oozing from every orifice?

For one, I must confess that I don't exactly feel any safer today than I did yesterday. While Osama was clearly the figurehead and primary inspiration for al Qaeda, and that organization is nowhere near as strong or as organized as it was a decade ago, I by no means think that the death of bin Laden represents the death of al Qaeda. On the contrary, the world is littered with loyalists who are sympathetic to the bin Laden cause (much as it was in 2001, when 19 of them proved just how far they were willing to go to support his vision), and I do worry at least somewhat of the possibility of a symbolic "counter-punch" in support of al Qaeda's now-martyred former leader. The US State Department acknowledged as much when it immediately issued a blanket travel alert for citizens heading overseas.

To paraphrase Winston Churchill, I don't think last night was the end, nor even the beginning of the end, but merely the end of the beginning. To treat bin Laden's death as though it in any way represents an end to terrorism or to the United States' complex relationship with al Qaeda is foolhardy at best, extremely dangerous at worst. Any celebration, then, must first recognize that last night's victory is one mostly of symbolic importance, not necessarily strategic importance. The semi-jingoistic cries of "justice" and "revenge" after Osama's bloodshed left me wondering whether this was in fact a consideration for many of last night's revelers.

But beyond that dynamic, I am most troubled by my nagging wonder/worry as to whether or not the ends (if last night was, in fact, an end) of the American response to 9/11 justified the means. America and its government rolled out an aggressive, multi-faceted response to the economic, diplomatic, and psychological shock of 9/11, and the decisions made in the attacks' aftermath (both immediate and distant) are still being felt today, for better or for worse. To summarize...

• In order to restore confidence in the economy and in financial markets, we eased our monetary policy to an unprecedented degree, holding interest rates artificially low for an extended period, and (perhaps inadvertently) in the process stoking a housing bubble that would eventually burst with devastating consequences.

• At the same time, we passed tax cut after tax cut under the guise of economic stimulus, which, when combined with our decision to pour hundreds of billions into wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, created a ballooning national debt and perpetual budget deficits that are now nearing nightmare proportions.

• By unilaterally attacking Afghanistan (and later Iraq) under the Bush Doctrine, we put significant strain on key diplomatic relationships, and black eyes like the Abu Ghraib incident and the waterboarding controversy tarnished our nation's image to a degree that we still may not fully appreciate. It may take decades or generations for our nation to recapture the moral and diplomatic high ground that we ceded in the aftermath of 9/11.

• Finally, we created a new department--Homeland Security--whose operatives at the TSA may indeed have made our airways safer, but who have done so at no trivial expense to our privacy and dignity when we fly. This invasion of privacy does not seem to be limited to air travel, as we have all learned that the recently-renewed Patriot Act is in fact incredibly expansive in scope.

Ultimately, as I sit here and assess the overall outcomes of the past 10 years, I can't help but wonder whether America is stronger or weaker than it was on September 10, 2001. Our unemployment is high, as is our national debt and budget deficit, the level of our political rhetoric has plunged to what seems like historic lows, we've lost thousands of young soldiers in pursuit of terrorists like bin Laden, and we've consistently sacrificed our personal freedoms, all in the name of preventing another day like September 11th. At which point, I can only sit back and ask myself--even in death, is it at least possible that bin Laden has the last laugh? In catching Osama, did the United States lose a bit of its soul, compromising many of the values and principles that made it great to begin with?

As a proud American, I certainly hope not.

In masterminding the 9/11 attacks, a key part of bin Laden's thesis was that the United States had become a paper tiger, a big, tough-talking, but complacent bully that couldn't take a punch. By capturing and killing bin Laden, our nation finally landed a significant counter-punch, albeit a decade delayed. But it is by no means a knockout, or even a knockdown--our nation still has much work left to do here at home. The best possible counter to the events of 9/11 is a real return to the traditional American unity and prosperity that has clearly eluded us in recent years; at the risk of sounding trite in these heady times, the best revenge against al Qaeda lies not in capturing its leader, but in living well.

It's time for all of us to step up and, one way or another, ensure that the costs we've endured and continue to endure in our pursuit of bin Laden do indeed prove to be "worth it". Last night was, as I've said, merely the end of the beginning. Today marks the beginning of the rest of the story. What can I do, what can you do, what can we all do to ensure that it's a happy ending for America? The real work starts now.