Personal Finance

Capitalist Pig · Guest

WSJ WONDER LAND
By DANIEL HENNINGER

July 1, 2005

Fourth of July weekend begins today, and among the verities certain to
occur is that every waking hour across four days people will be
standing at the high steel fence near Church Street in lower Manhattan,
staring at Ground Zero, at what's left of what we now call "September
11."

We know these visitors to Ground Zero will be there looking into this
austere pit, because those of us who work nearby and walk past it see
them there, every day. They came the moment they were allowed to on
Dec. 30, 2001, at the famous viewing platform, and have come each day
since, amid the disgusting cold winds of February and impossible August
heat. But if their presence is a certainty, its meaning, of course, has
gone up for grabs.

Nearly four years after what happened on September 11, we must now
debate whether a linkage exists between that day and the war in Iraq.
After President Bush associated the two several times in his defense of
Iraq this week at Fort Bragg, both the House and Senate Democratic
leaders pounded the linkage.

House Leader Nancy Pelosi was explicit: "He is willing to exploit the
sacred ground of 9/11, knowing that there is no connection between 9/11
and the war in Iraq." Senate Leader Harry Reid said the September 11
references don't offer "a way forward" in Iraq and only remind us that
bin Laden "is still on the loose." To be able to separate September 11
and Iraq into wholly unrelated realms may be possible for very smart
people -- but not everyone.

On a very warm Wednesday this past May, during Fleet Week in New York
City, a passerby at Ground Zero encountered some 150 astonishingly
young Marines in fatigues, wet with sweat after a run, standing at
attention on the site's edge, outside the fence. They were from the
24th Marine Expeditionary Unit, and they appeared to be in the middle
of a formal ceremony. Yesterday the organizer of the May event, Major
Dave Anderson, explained they were laying a wreath to honor the victims
of September 11, and that the three Marines chosen to lay the wreath
had earned Purple Hearts while serving in Iraq. When the ceremony
ended, he said, a woman came out of the crowd, crying, and grabbed his
wrist to say that her brother had died in there that day, and she said
to him, "When people see you Marines doing this, they'll know that you
will take the fight forward."

So it is that below the level of exquisite analysis now common in our
politics, some Americans do exist who credit a connection between
September 11 and events in Iraq. Perhaps there will be a poll out in a
few weeks that will expose their sentiment to the greater weight and
rigor of statistical science.

In time even Pearl Harbor became more a symbol than the bloody reality
that ultimately hurled American forces against a Germany that didn't
attack us at Pearl Harbor. But time seems to pass faster today. The
first Fourth of July after September 11 was a day of national unity, in
sorrow but also in belief that the U.S. had to go on offense, over
there, against the force that had hit us. Now there is no unity;
September 11, the war in Iraq, pretty much anything George Bush does
and even Afghanistan is a fair target.

After Mr. Bush delivered the speech on Iraq that many said, rightly,
was overdue, David Letterman made jokes about the war. DNC Chairman
Howard Dean dismissed it as the "darkness of divisiveness" and
"pandering to fear." John Murtha, the party's top spokesmen on military
affairs said, "I believe they are going to cut and run." A Times
reporter announced as well that "for the first time," Afghans are
"feeling uneasy about the future."

The day following the President's speech, architect David Childs
unveiled the latest design of the long-overdue tower intended to
replace the twin towers in downtown Manhattan. If we must have an
office building in this space so the Port Authority can restart its tax
flows, and if it must be a "designed" 1776-foot-high skyscraper, Mr.
Childs' building is perfectly acceptable. But no, Ground Zero is first
of all about one's politics now, so for the New York Times architecture
critic, Mr. Childs' tall building "is an ideal symbol for an empire
enthralled with its own power."

We've watched September 11 drift from unity of purpose to unhinged
vituperation. The partisanship is easy to dismiss, but I believe the
Bush team's deep disdain of a hostile opposition media has caused it to
miss -- until now -- the need to organize a homefront to support the
remarkable sacrifice in Iraq. This failure may prove to be the one
unforgivable thing.

As to September 11's stern symbol -- Ground Zero -- its place is secure
no matter what New York's politics dumps into the Port Authority's 16
acres. The only true memorial that will ever be -- that huge hole in
the ground, that zero, a filthy, ripped and awesome aftermath -- has
been there to see for more than three-and-a-half years.

This is what it means to visit the memorial there now. A steel fence is
on all four sides. On two of them, the Port Authority has hung simple
descriptions and pictures of what happened there, at the Pentagon and
in Pennsylvania. You can read a short history of the two towers. You
can read the names of each person who died there that day. After people
absorb these things, they get very close to the fence and stare into
the open space. Then they take some pictures, and then they go
somewhere else.

By now anyone with sufficient desire or need has come to Ground Zero.
By now unfathomable numbers have seen that hole in its barest form.
They have taken the experience home with them. I think September 11 is
going to be properly remembered, no matter what happens in lower
Manhattan now. It remains for this administration to do the same for
the commitments already made to Iraq and in Iraq.

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