Posted on 05/07/2006 4:20:38 AM PDT by carbonarc
The kerfuffle over the slow pace of restoring -something- at the site of the World Trade Center is ridiculous.
Obviously there would have to be a memorial on the site. I'm content to let the various powers argue over the specifics during the years of construction of the new WTC, but I think a display in the lobby of each building, perhaps like The Wall in DC, with the names of the victims inscribed, would work just fine. No commentary, no political baggage.
Now, for the elephant in the room. Who would occupy the new buildings? Isn't it a certainty that the Towers would simply be a more juicy target than ever in the eyes of the terrorists? Well, yes, but thats the point. I feel like we should use the biggest thumb we can get to stick in the eye of the murdering bastards. No matter what we put there, it's going to be a target. We may as well go for the maximum value one finger salute. Here's a little discussed fact. The tactic of using airplanes as wrecking balls is fully played out. Shoot, it didn't even last all the way through the 9-11 attacks. A twenty five percent failure rate even after acheiving complete surprise would seem to indicate that, now that we expect it, its a pointless excercise. Enterprising capitalist mercernaries could probably make some money developing and teaching a new close quarters combat discipline called Briefcase-Fu. Copyright uh, me. I'm sure a -special- briefcase used with a bit of skill could make hamburger out of one of Allahs more evil minions. But seriously, the actions of the heroes of Flight 93 are the reason we don't need to worry about more 9-11 style attacks. The terror thugs will never even make it to the cockpit door next time.
Build `em and rent `em.
Note to Zacharias, who will never see it: That funny look you see on the faces of the two guards who escort you out of your cell for one hour each day, is their reaction to the smell that permeates you. It is the smell of failure, the failure of your mission and your life. It stinks, and you reek of it. If you are bothered about losing out on the seventy two white raisins you were supposed to get for being a good little martyr, maybe you can at least console yourself with the knowledge that you will get used to the smell of failure. Hopefully the next time I read about you will be your obituary. And maybe, in a few years, George Bush or Condi Rice can have delivered to you a postcard showing the WTC, intact, as though -you- never existed.
The entire process would have already been under way, if the devoloper who took the "lease" on the WTC not too long before 9/11, had instead been able to buy the buildings from the political black hole known as the Port Authority.
There would have been no Lower Manhatten Redevelopment Corp, run by Bloomberg and Pataki. There would have no interferance from the Port Authority, no public financing and no politicians arguing over who gets to be in charge of what.
The developer would probably already had half the buildings rebuilt by now. Instead, he has to continue to use the insurance money to pay millions each year in "rent" for the property that politics has denied him the ability to rebuild, yet.
On Crony-capitalist quasi Marxist Bloomberg is now making the politicians right of using eminant domain however they please as his next crusade. Coulda predicted that one.
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