By
Ryan Finley
If you can read this, then it means the Wildcat has a larger circulation than I thought. I mean, it's sometimes hard to deliver a paper into the pit of whatever ring of hell you're in around now.
You might be dead now, but Americans seem to hate you now more than ever. I guess it's because we're normally pretty forgiving when someone is sorry. Usually when someone is sentenced to die, they invoke religion, apologize to the surviving family members and prepare for the inevitable.
You just wouldn't do that, would you? You took the coward's way out. You wouldn't say anything, you wouldn't explain yourself. You just stared.
The people that witnessed your execution - whether in person or on closed-circuit television - said that the evil coming off of you as you were strapped down was disturbing. You didn't pray. You didn't apologize. Instead, you decided the manly thing to do would be to stare into the camera whose image was being beamed into Oklahoma City - never flinching - until the deed was done.
As if seeing you up close wasn't traumatizing enough for the families of the numerous businessmen and children - children! - that perished in the bombing, you decided to burn your image into the minds of all those who could see you.
Frances Cummins, a woman from Douglas whose husband died in the blast, likely won't be able to sleep for a long, long time. According to Cummins, who watched your execution on closed-circuit television, "Those eyes give you an eerie feeling, like the devil himself. The worst part about the whole thing is, I still see his face and the image of it. I imagine it will be there the rest of my life."
Instead of saying anything or releasing any sort of a statement whatsoever, you decided to use someone else's words. The 1875 poem, "Invictus," were your last words. You concluded, "I am the captain of my soul."
So when they strapped you down in Terre Haute, Ind., you had nothing to say. When you ate your last meal - two pints of mint chip ice cream - you never showed a sign of caring. You didn't give a damn about the 168 people who died in the federal building blast then and you didn't care Monday, either. You had a chance to show some remorse and soften the hearts of the people who lost loved ones in the blast. You had a chance to bring some closure to the people who have spent the past six years depressed during holidays, inconsolable during birthdays, and devastated, well, every day.
You didn't, of course. Your final act on this earth was ever bit as much an act of terrorism as the one that defined your life.
I think, Tim, that you wanted to be a martyr for your cause. You didn't want to show any signs of weakness because, in a way, your death on Monday probably made you a hero in some corners of this world. You were the last angry man, Mr. McVeigh. You took the law into your own hands. Sure, some kids died, but you - and your anti-government cause - won't be forgotten.
Well, sir, I choose to forget. That's the best way for the country to move on, for Mrs. Cummins to get a good night's sleep. Throughout this whole ordeal - the eerie poem, the blank stare and all - you have tried to burn yourself in America's memory forever.
I have 168 reasons to forget you ever existed.
