Garnering Insight: Are we starting to forget?

By Phil Cobb | September 13, 2025 |

With today being Sept. 11, I ask you take a few moments, even if only fleeting, to remember those Americans who tragically died on this morning 24 years ago in New York, the Pentagon and in a Pennsylvania field. I also ask you to remember the feeling in the days that came shortly after the cowardly attacks on our nation’s soil. Not the feelings of utter shock, anger and sadness, but those feelings of unity as Americans.

As each year passes by from that fateful day, not only do the memories continue to fade away from our collective consciousness as a country, but we also fall farther and farther away from those moments where we as a people reached across political divides and all manner of disagreements, and we hugged and held hands with people of different religions, genders and races. We were American first and foremost.

I remember watching and listening to St. Louis Cardinals Hall of Fame broadcaster Jack Buck deliver remarks and recite a poem he wrote before the game against the Milwaukee Brewers on Sept. 17, 2001. I also distinctly remember President George W. Bush throwing out that first pitch of the World Series game that year and how proud I was of him and how proud I was to be an American. Those moments and so many others like that in the days and months after Sept. 11 were truly American and inspiring.

Oh, how I long for that feeling of togetherness in our still great country. But sadly I’m afraid we as a nation are starting to forget, and I believe there are those who have nearly completely forgotten — or even worse, just don’t really care.

I’m not asking for some tragedy to befall us, mind you, but I yearn for some moment to galvanize us as a nation and a community, because I have not forgotten the pain, the anger, the pride, the togetherness, the unity, the love we held for each other as people in general.

You see, my friends, we don’t need a specific terrible moment or someone to bring us together. It is something that we could do by ourselves, but it will require effort by all of us.

What is it you ask?

It’s remembering.

Seems pretty simple right?

It is, but it isn’t. What we have to remember is that there is so much more that binds us as a people then separates us. It is remembering that we are family, friends, neighbors, coworkers and what have you, who are joined by commonalities, not differences. Let’s celebrate the things that unite us, not the differences that we allow to force us apart.

Let us not forget that together we are the United States of America.

Ken Garner is the owner and publisher of The Maryville Forum and The Post.