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Hours shy of this column's deadline, not knowing what to write, I decided to watch the CBS rebroadcast of "9/11," a documentary about the destruction of the World Trade Center.

CBS aired this mesmerizing video footage again without bleeping over the expletives uttered by firefighters as the hopelessness and horror of the devastating situation unfolds. Only this time, CBS faces a possible $325,000 fine per incident - a tenfold penalty increase because of an FCC crackdown on "indecent" broadcasts within the last five years.

The Pentagon was also attacked that day, and a plane bound for another target in Washington, D.C., crashed in Pennsylvania, resulting in the loss of more precious lives.

In a University of New Mexico lecture hall that morning, an eccentric, outspoken history professor addressed his class with this regrettable gaffe: "Anyone who can blow up the Pentagon has my vote." The professor, Richard Berthold, an admitted loudmouth, later was forced to resign amid a national outcry that included death threats from an enraged public reeling from the shock of what had occurred.

My father went to West Point and served 28 years in the U.S. Air Force, before retiring as a full colonel. I can't recall him speaking of the Pentagon with much affection. However, like him and many others, I found Berthold's comments highly offensive, inflammatory and disrespectful.

But being a 1994 UNM graduate, I had already been exposed to Berthold's dry wit and sarcastic humor.

His apology five years ago was sincere.

"All I can say is that all of us are jerks periodically in our lives. On Sept. 11, I was an insensitive and callous jerk," Berthold told the Daily Lobo, the independent student newspaper of UNM, a few days after his remark about the Pentagon. Berthold also later published this statement: "In an embarrassing moment of insensitivity and stupidity I made this observation when more than 100 people had just died at the Pentagon, making those words an exercise in incredible callousness."

Berthold was known for drawing political comparisons between ancient Greece and Rome and modern countries. Great empires of the past, like Rome, imperial Spain in 1600 and the British Empire have fallen, generally speaking, for one reason: Their militaries became overextended to the point of economic and political imbalance.

Facing millions of dollars in fines, CBS has reminded us again why that often problematic constitutional right called "freedom of speech" is worth defending.

Berthold now spends much of his time drinking beer at Kelly's Brew Pub while our foreign policy faces serious scrutiny. His censure and silence on topics such as imperialism, military and political history are more disturbing to me now than a repugnant, heartless joke five years ago, which none of us could handle.