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The Great Ground Zero Heist
The Wall Street Journal ^ | June 7, 2005 | DEBRA BURLINGAME

Posted on 06/07/2005 6:17:36 AM PDT by Brilliant

On Memorial Day ...three Marines ...were joined ...for a ...ceremony at ...Ground Zero...

The [WTC] Memorial will break ground this year. When those Marines return ...the year it is ...to open...they will expect to see the artifacts that bring those memories to life...

Rather than a ...tribute to our ...loss, they will get a slanted history lesson, a ...lecture on the meaning of liberty in a post-9/11 world. They will be served up a heaping foreign policy discussion over the greater meaning of Abu Ghraib...

The [WTC] Memorial ...will be an imposing edifice... The organizers of its principal tenant, the International Freedom Center (IFC), have stated that they intend to take us on "a journey through the history of freedom" -- but do not be fooled... The public will ...be given a ...tutorial about man's inhumanity to man, from Native American genocide to the lynchings and cross-burnings of the Jim Crow South, from the Third Reich's Final Solution to the Soviet gulags...

The public will ...feel hoodwinked... Most of the cherished objects which were salvaged from Ground Zero ...will never return... But the International Freedom Center will have ample space to present us with exhibits about Chinese dissidents and Chilean refugees...

The driving force behind the IFC is Tom Bernstein...

...it was Mr. Bernstein's organization, joined by the [ACLU], that filed a lawsuit ...against Donald Rumsfeld on behalf of detainees... filed an amicus brief on behalf of alleged "dirty bomber" Jose Padilla... called for a 9/11-style commission to investigate the alleged torture of detainees...

...the IFC's list of those ...influencing the content ...for their Ground Zero exhibit includes a Who's Who of the ...Guantanamo-obsessed world...

Michael Posner... Anthony Romero...of the ACLU... Eric Foner, radical-left history professor... George Soros....

Ground Zero has been stolen... How do we get it back?

(Excerpt) Read more at online.wsj.com ...


TOPICS: Culture/Society; Front Page News; Politics/Elections; War on Terror
KEYWORDS: 911; 911families; twintowers; wtcmemorial
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To: prairiebreeze; tiredoflaundry; HungarianGypsy; JenB; Grendel9; dead; TwoWolves; js1138; ...
Absolutely.

Sorry about the non-Potter related ping. This really needs our attention. The blame America first crowd is trying to take over the Ground Zero Memorial.

From the article..."...it was Mr. Bernstein's organization, joined by the [ACLU], that filed a lawsuit ...against Donald Rumsfeld on behalf of detainees... filed an amicus brief on behalf of alleged "dirty bomber" Jose Padilla... called for a 9/11-style commission to investigate the alleged torture of detainees... "

21 posted on 06/07/2005 7:47:34 AM PDT by retrokitten
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To: Brilliant; Mo1; Howlin; Peach; BeforeISleep; kimmie7; 4integrity; BigSkyFreeper; RandallFlagg; ...

Ping....


22 posted on 06/07/2005 7:48:49 AM PDT by OXENinFLA
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To: retrokitten

Thank you for brining this to my attention. I would like to read the whole article, but don't have a subscription. Hopefully the entire thing will show up on Opinion Journal.


23 posted on 06/07/2005 7:52:46 AM PDT by Miss Marple
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To: Miss Marple

I hope so, too. I tried bugmenot.com to see if someone had a password stored, but they don't. I would like to read the whole thing, too.


24 posted on 06/07/2005 7:53:55 AM PDT by retrokitten
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BTTT


25 posted on 06/07/2005 8:20:52 AM PDT by retrokitten
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To: johnb838
Thanks for the laugh of the day!
26 posted on 06/07/2005 8:30:46 AM PDT by Itzlzha ("The avalanche has already started...it is too late for the pebbles to vote")
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To: dead

"Format...unbearable...reading difficult...must..."


Wow...I...too...had...prob...lems...graspin...g...the...context...o..f...that...a..r..t.i...c..l.e


27 posted on 06/07/2005 8:54:53 AM PDT by Blzbba (Let them hate us as long as they fear us - Caligula)
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To: OXENinFLA

Thanks for the ping


28 posted on 06/07/2005 11:22:02 AM PDT by firewalk
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To: Brilliant

Can you please link to the printer friendly version next time? I'm tired of registering for something that should be and is free of charge. Completely redundant.


29 posted on 06/07/2005 5:02:45 PM PDT by USAfearsnobody
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To: Soliton

Point?


30 posted on 06/07/2005 5:07:55 PM PDT by Valin (The right to do something does not mean that doing it is right.)
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To: SuzanneC

Suprising news. Nothing on this on Goggle news.


31 posted on 06/07/2005 5:19:26 PM PDT by Valin (The right to do something does not mean that doing it is right.)
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To: Brilliant

 

 

"Ground Zero has been stolen, right from under our noses. How do we get it back?"

Excerpts from The Great Ground Zero Heist by DEBRA BURLINGAME From the Wall Street Journal, June 7, 2005.

"The World Trade Center Memorial will break ground this year. When those Marines return in 2010, the year it is scheduled to open, no doubt they will expect to see the artifacts that bring those memories to life. They’ll want a vantage point that allows them to take in the sheer scope of the destruction, to see the footage and the photographs and hear the personal stories of unbearable heartbreak and unimaginable courage. They will want the memorial to take them back to who they were on that brutal September morning.

Instead, they will get a memorial that stubbornly refuses to acknowledge the yearning to return to that day. Rather than a respectful tribute to our individual and collective loss, they will get a slanted history lesson, a didactic lecture on the meaning of liberty in a post-9/11 world. They will be served up a heaping foreign policy discussion over the greater meaning of Abu Ghraib and what it portends for the country and the rest of the world."

[...]
"The public will have come to see 9/11 but will be given a high-tech, multimedia tutorial about man's inhumanity to man, from Native American genocide to the lynchings and cross-burnings of the Jim Crow South, from the Third Reich's Final Solution to the Soviet gulags and beyond. This is a history all should know and learn, but dispensing it over the ashes of Ground Zero is like creating a Museum of Tolerance over the sunken graves of the USS Arizona."

[...]

"...the IFC’s list of those who are shaping or influencing the content and programming for their Ground Zero exhibit includes a Who’s Who of the human rights, Guantanamo-obsessed world:

• Michael Posner, executive director at Human Rights First who is leading the world-wide “Stop Torture Now” campaign focused entirely on the U.S. military. He has stated that Mr. Rumsfeld’s refusal to resign in the wake of the Abu Ghraib scandal is “irresponsible and dishonorable.”

• Anthony Romero, executive director of the ACLU, who is pushing IFC organizers for exhibits that showcase how civil liberties in this country have been curtailed since September 11.

• Eric Foner, radical-left history professor at Columbia University who, even as the bodies were being pulled out of a smoldering Ground Zero, wrote, “I’m not sure which is more frightening: the horror that engulfed New York City or the apocalyptic rhetoric emanating daily from the White House.” This is the same man who participated in a “teach-in” at Columbia to protest the Iraq war, during which a colleague exhorted students with, “The only true heroes are those who find ways to defeat the U.S. military,” and called for “a million Mogadishus.” The IFC website has posted Mr. Foner’s statement warning that future discussions should not be “overwhelmed” by the IFC’s location at the World Trade Center site itself.

• George Soros, billionaire founder of Open Society Institute, the nonprofit foundation that helps fund Human Rights First and is an early contributor to the IFC. Mr. Soros has stated that the pictures of Abu Ghraib “hit us the same way as the terrorist attack itself.”

[...]

"The so-called lessons of September 11 should not be force-fed by ideologues hoping to use the memorial site as nothing more than a powerful visual aid to promote their agenda. Instead of exhibits and symposiums about Internationalism and Global Policy we should hear the story of the courageous young firefighter whose body, cut in half, was found with his legs entwined around the body of a woman. Recovery personnel concluded that because of their positions, the young firefighter was carrying her."
[...]
"Ground Zero has been stolen, right from under our noses. How do we get it back?"

"Ms. Burlingame is a member of the board of directors of the World Trade Center Memorial Foundation and the sister of Charles F. “Chic” Burlingame III, pilot of American Airlines fight 77, which was crashed at the Pentagon on September 11, 2001."

 

Ms. Burlingame's full commentary can be found here here.

Bill Bennett's radio interview with Ms. Burlingame is here.

How You Can Help Take Back The Memorial

Contact America's Mayor

Giuliani Partners LLC
5 Times Square
New York, NY 10036
Tel: 212.931.7300
Fax: 212.931.7310

Contact the International Freedom Center Board of Directors & Staff

120 Broadway, 31st Floor
New York, NY 10271
Fax: (212) 336-6727
IFC Chairman Tom Bernstein 212-336-6200 (Chelsea Piers Complex)
IFC President Richard Tofel

Contact the World Trade Center Memorial Foundation

Contact Your US Congressional Representative

Contact Your US Senator(s)

Contact NY Mayor Michael Bloomberg

Contact NY Governor George Pataiki

Contact The White House

Do YOUR part. Use this contact information, NOW.

For more information: 911@takebackthememorial.org

Feel free to download and display this graphic on your blog or web site with a link back to takebackthememorial.org. Please, no hot-linking.

 

 


32 posted on 06/09/2005 5:59:11 AM PDT by Behind Liberal Lines ("I say we take off, nuke the site from orbit. It's the only way to be sure."--S. Townsley on Ithaca)
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To: nutmeg

ping


33 posted on 06/09/2005 6:08:09 AM PDT by ELS (Vivat Benedictus XVI!)
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To: ELS

I just heard this on Fox & Friends today. This is outrageous and must be stopped. How do these anti-Americans crawl in and take over? Where is Giuliani...what is he doing about this?


34 posted on 06/09/2005 3:59:38 PM PDT by bluerose (Howard Dean...the gift that keeps on giving.)
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To: Brilliant

This is just not right. It is not sitting with me very well at all.


35 posted on 06/10/2005 7:03:21 AM PDT by commonguymd (My impatience is far more advanced than any known technology.)
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To: Miss Marple; All
The article is also available in Opinion Journal and no registration is necessesairy

The Great Ground Zero Heist

36 posted on 06/10/2005 7:30:20 AM PDT by Kaslin
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To: Brilliant
Rather than a ...tribute to our ...loss, they will get a slanted history lesson, a ...lecture on the meaning of liberty in a post-9/11 world. They will be served up a heaping foreign policy discussion over the greater meaning of Abu Ghraib...

The anti-war/anti-American socialists in this country must have finally lost all reason and sanity if they think they can throw out the planned 9-11 Memorial and put in it's place a anti-war/anti-American propaganda center stating how the Arab Terrorists were justified in bring down the World Trade Center Towers.

37 posted on 06/10/2005 7:45:17 AM PDT by Paul C. Jesup
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To: Brilliant

terrible --this has to be stopped..does the ARIZONA memorial have an exhibit about the internment camps??makes me want to get out of here


38 posted on 06/12/2005 8:54:14 AM PDT by rang1995 (They will love us when we win)
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To: Behind Liberal Lines

Thank you!


39 posted on 06/12/2005 9:10:34 AM PDT by BlessedBeGod (Benedict XVI = Terminator IV)
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To: Brilliant
The public will ...be given a ...tutorial about man's inhumanity to man, from Native American genocide to the lynchings and cross-burnings of the Jim Crow South, from the Third Reich's Final Solution to the Soviet gulags...

God damned liberals, get these pinheads out of decision making jobs !
40 posted on 06/12/2005 9:14:35 AM PDT by John Lenin (My cousin is gay; I always tell him that in our family tree, he's in the fruit section)
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