Geoffrey,consider also the Patriot Act and the stripping away of civil liberties.911 was the excuse for endless wars and the invasion and theft of resources/energy.

http://www.ae911truth.org/ Here you will see the scientific forensic evidence that proves beyong any reasonable doubt that explosives brought down the towers and WTC 7.The needs to be a new investigation.

There is no doubt that natural and man made disasters do bring communities together. Celebrations can also bring communities together.

For example, the 20th Anniversary of Macedonia's Independence on 8 Sept. 2011 brought together Macedonians from across the world to celebrate the positive and significant progress made the Republic of Macedonia since 1991. In Australia, the event saw the diaspora organise celebrations across our major capital cities in partnership with key stakeholders in government, parliament, industry, civil society, the media, churches and universities.

Social capital needs to be nurtured by leaders, educational and democratic institutions and the media. Without investment and strategic foresight, social capital can gradually evaporate.

The challenge for academics like yourself and federal MPs like Dr. Andrew Leigh is to prepare a literature review of factors that contribute to building and maintaining social capital beyond natural disasters and anniversaries.

Arjay,
If everyone knew the official version of events on 9/11 then nobody would believe it:

"You Only Believe the Official 9/11 Story Because You Don't Know the Official 9/11 Story

by Jesse Richard"

http://globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=26340

A reenactment of the famous sppeech "War Is a Racket" by General Smedley Butler:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F3_EXqJ8f-0

There probably was a certain of coming together in the USA as a response to Sept 11. But not if you were are Muslim or looked even vaguely like an Arab - like Sikhs do.

One of the results of Sept 11 was the the slogan and attitude of being anti-American or a left-liberal of any kind. A slogan which was used to suppress even alternative arguments re the possible causes of the atrocity - and other possible responses.

But what did it really produce?

A massive ever-increasing expansion of the now all pervasive security state via the Homeland Security and similar acts.
It also created the very bitter Red versus Blue state phenomenon. The Red's basically retreated into a state of primitive nativism with its simplistic Manichean world of rigid binary exclusions. I would thus argue that the Tea Party movement was/is the result of this process.

Another result was the response of white nativists to the election of Obama as President. There was an immediate huge increase in the sales of guns of all kinds, plus a re-emergence and expansion of nativistic militia movements. And of the "birthing" movement which still questions whether Obama is a legal American citizen (perhaps he isnt, but so what?) And how many GOP supporters still believe that Obama is a Muslim?

We now have the absurd situation where nut cases who are full of Orwellian double-speak are considered to be serious candidates to become President of the USA. I am of course referring to Bachmann and the master executioner guv'nor Perry. Of course there is also the pathological liar Sarah Palin too.

Here's a thought, Jay of Melbourne.

>>"You Only Believe the Official 9/11 Story Because You Don't Know the Official 9/11 Story by Jesse Richard"<<

Jesse Richard is a journalist, right? Oh yes, he actually admits to it:

"...but I am a journalist, and I deal in the facts, not the fables."

So when he asks the question, "Why did the news agencies report that WTC 7 collapsed almost 1/2 hour before it did?", who exactly does he imagine filed that report?

Do you know what? I bet it was a... journalist!

And if you care to look closely, every single one of his offerings does not deal in facts, but is pure unadulterated speculation. Just the ridiculous claims about Flight 93 are enough to blow this guy's credibility to the four winds.

I guess he must be monetizing this somehow. Which is pretty creepy.

Pericles,
The "Critics" of 9/11 Truth. Do They Have a Case?

by Dr. Paul Craig Roberts

http://globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=26520

Paul Craig Roberts w/ James Corbett on 9/11 ten years on.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hBOMSj0uNmw

BYW,In 1932 Smedley Butler was approached by a group of "Right Wing businessmen" and asked to participate in a coup to overthrow the U.S Government, one of the plotters was Prescott Bush.