One station, I don’t know which one, we’re constantly flipping around*, has a continuous crawl naming the victims known so far.
“I’d hate to be squinting at this stuff through my tears, hoping not to find the name I’m looking for,” I thought.
“There are too many people here for a double-page spread in Newsweek,” I thought a little later.
“Too many for a multi-page spread.”
“Maybe too many for a normal-sized magazine.”
Then I realized what that really means, and how it will motivate us.
What is the estimated total? I’ve heard 20,000; I’ve heard 50,000. How many have been identified so far? I heard on the radio that NYPD have requested 60,000 body bags.
Sixty thousand body bags.
SIXTY THOUSAND.
I don’t know what the final body count will be. But I do know that we’re looking at more than Gettysburg. Maybe as many as Vietnam. (Or was Vietnam in the six digits? I don’t have time to research these things.) There are small cities that have 60,000 people. Do any of us know 60,000 people?
There were 168 victims in Oklahoma City. There were thirty-something (depending on whether or not you count Harris and Klebold) in Columbine. I’m sure there are people in Oklahoma who, if you say, “Mrs. Oleander Twinklebop”, will say, “Oh…She was one of the victims in the Murrah building.” Many people in Littleton must have known all the victims. The teacher must have been known to every student, at least by sight.
There is no way this will go unanswered. Not when the dead number so many. How many Americans died in Desert Storm? We lost as many civilians yesterday as we could lose soldiers in a war. By that definition, this is war. And the first 60,000 enemy casualties don’t count.