Posted on 08/17/2005 8:17:56 PM PDT by finnman69
The controversy surrounding the World Trade Center memorial is growing, with one of the city's fire unions effectively withdrawing its support from the 9/11 Memorial Foundation.
At issue is the International Freedom Center planned for the site. Victims' families and the Uniformed Firefighters Association say it won't focus exclusively on the attacks, and some fear certain exhibits could be anti-American.
“To talk about a Freedom Center is offensive,” UFA President Stephen Cassidy said Wednesday. “It's offensive to the victims, it's offensive to the victims families, it will bring no peace to anyone who goes there, and we don't want it there. We want to stop it.”
The UFA backed the 9/11 Memorial Foundation long before the foundation made public its plans to build the International Freedom Center, which the union says will diminish the sacrifice of the firefighters killed on 9/11.
“We made incredible sacrifices; we were part and parcel of that day, that tragic day, and our opinion should count,” said Cassidy. “A memorial there should reflect events of that day and the heroic efforts in the months that followed in the rescue and recovery efforts. This has nothing to do with that. If they want to have a Freedom Center off-site we would support it, but certainly not where 28,000 New Yorkers perished tragically.”
Pressure to remove the Freedom Center and the Drawing Center from a museum next to the planned memorial seems to be working. The Drawing Center is already seeking a new site, and the proposed building for the Freedom Center has been cut 30 percent.
The Lower Manhattan Development Corporation has also asked the Freedom Center to resubmit its proposal, to provide details about its programming, by September 23.
But representatives for the museum say it will never be used as a "forum for denigrating the country we love."
Still, Cassidy says, “It is frustrating that more has not been done. But our main concern is that when a memorial it is built, that it is a proper memorial that reflects what happened on 9/11 - the attack on this country, 2,800 Americans killed - and not about things outside of that event.”
Union leaders have yet to decide what they'll do to block fund-raising by the 9/11 Memorial Foundation if the IFC is to be a part of Ground Zero.
Meanwhile, on the night before the fourth anniversary of the attacks, members of Congress will turn their attention to the health problems still plaguing many 9/11 rescue workers.
Connecticut Congressman Christopher Shays and members of the Government Reform Committee will hold a hearing in Lower Manhattan on September 10th. They've asked officials from Mt. Sinai Hospital, the Department of Homeland Security and other government agencies to testify.
Other lawmakers, meantime, are angered at the federal government's decision to take back some $125 million in unused 9/11 aid. They say it should be used to care for people who suffered exposure to toxic materials from the twin towers' collapse.
Uh, that should probably be "2,800" perished. I notice the error is in the original webpage.
Spine shows! Bravo Fire Unions the wackos would have dragged the Heroes through the gutter before they were done.
Of course it will be. That's what liberal Democrats do best.
Take a tragedy and spin the memorial for that tragedy into something that will back a liberal anti-American agenda.
How did the Liberal Slime worm their way into the 9/11 memorial.
It should be like the Oklahoma City memorial and museum, which centers on the bombing and its effects.
How bout a "Gay Lincoln" plaza at Ground Zero where the homeless can hang out?
Just like Sen. Inouye said that old Senate resolution would never be used as a basis to establish a separate Hawaiian nation? (E pluribus unum? Not in Hawaii.)
Thanks for writing that. I hadn't thought about that before. But you're absolutely right. The OKC memorial is all about the victims and the effects of the bombing on the city, both the physical damage and the mental damage.
That is what the 911 memorial should be also.
And that is why we started FlushHillary.com!
I was moved to tears by the museum. It made me feel as though it had happened in my home town.
Nothing more needs to be said.
Amen! If the leftists want to go off and have their own "911 Memorial" to all the things they feel is wrong about America, have at it and I wish them good luck.
Just don't do it at Ground Zero. That is hallowed ground and should be treated as such and only as such.
Well, now that Robby brought up OC, I can't think of one "memorial" that isn't just for the event, can you?
I can't think of one memorial where other groups have latched on and for all intents and purposes "used" a crowd coming to another memorial to further their agenda.
Ashes to ashes, dust to dust. The first time I heard that was at a funeral. My father took a handful of dirt and placed it in the grave of his father... (So many years ago, I had almost forgotten)
That hallowed ground is the grave of many who were reduced to ashes that day.
They can have a Kum-Bah-Ya, Can't We All Get Along, Make Love, Not War, Memorial anywhere, just not there.
As God is my witness, if allowed to proceed as planned it will be as sanitized as MSM has made it for the country. ("Bodies? Falling from the air? People jumping to their deaths because they did not want to burn alive? I never saw that on TV, so you must be lying.")
I visited the OKC memorial in 2002. My recall is that it was dedicated to the OKC event. I don't recall any outside references. RobbyS?
But it was on TV. Go buy this and you'll never forget.
Excellent!!
Most excellent. I saw the show-I will now buy the book.
Thanks.
It's a DVD of the show you saw. It includes footage that never made it to TV.
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