Good question.

So why wasn't April 19, 1995 the day that changed everything?

I came across this question at David Neiwert's blog Orcinus, and it sparked recollections of the times - when the day the World Changed treacle got too thick - that I would inquire exactly what had changed.

"We discovered we weren't safe from terrorists," was the inevitable rejoinder. Then, because I am who I am and we are where we've wound up on this issue, I would gently bring up the first World Trade Center bombing and (gasp, horror) Oklahoma City.

For some reason OKC really pisses them off. Whether it was the run-up implicating Muslim extremists or the denouement wherein the villains were revealed as white right-wing terrorists unhinged loners, the everything-changed crowd don't like their little story being ripped aside.

One guy even told me the difference was that the federal building in OKC was a "legitimate military target".

And we wondered why Robert A. Heinlein called these the Crazy Years.