In brief, ours is a history of the abuse of the democratic myth and our privileged status in the world. And we naively ask ourselves why some fanatical, political, religious extremists, raised in deprived third world countries, would want to attack such a wonderful place as ours. We are an adolescent nation awaiting the maturity of this acknowledged complicity with evil. With such maturity come a gratitude rather than an arrogance toward privilege, a sharing rather than a hoarding of the earth's resources, an empathy rather than a contempt toward less developed nations, and a principled application of the democratic myth in the global community. My last observation is that this tragedy we face is a reflection of a much larger mythic battle.
Myth is a view of reality.
It is our answers to life's compelling questions about the mystery of our existence. Myth is the filter through which we push our experience to create meaning. Every individual, every institution, every nation lives through and by myth. That is, all humans and the cultures they create are shaped by peculiar views of reality. History is nothing more than the interpretations we give to the conflicts or consorts of myth.