How much 9/11 commemoration is TOO MUCH?

As you all know, today is the anniversary of the attacks on 9/11/01. This nation has spent the better part of the last 6 years enamored, scared by, and reminded of constantly of this date. YCD is convinced NO Republican candidate can give a speech without invoking it. That's not a political statement, merely an easily made and researched observation. This very morning two very fine Americans who are still feeling the horrors of 9/11 planted 2997 flags in and around the Diag to commemorate those killed on 9/11/01.

How long must this go on? Johnny sees this day slightly different from most apparently. Johnny sees this day as nothing more than a memory of a mass murder on a historic scale. We didn't mourn like this after Oklahoma City. WHY? That's a question very much open for discussion. Why 9/11 and not Oklahoma City? Do we need to constantly commemorate a mass murder anniversary as publically and in front of the cameras as we do? Suppose Jeffrey Dahmer, an evil man by any accounting, had set off bombs in the Trade Centers and murdered 2997 or so people would this day still have the same impact?

Is this day simply becoming a day to show al-qaeda (YCD refuses to capitalize al-qaeda) we won't be kowed? If so shouldn't this day be a celebration of all that's GOOD with this nation and not just the dead of 9/11?

YCD thinks we either need to change the tenor of this away from a commemoration of nothing more than mass murder and re-focus it into a positive help-your-neighbor and your town kind of day.

Of course 9/11/01 will always be ingrained in our memories but should we seek to refocus our message towards more positive goals? Instead of looking back should we look forward?