2002-06-14T06:30:00.000-07:00

VISIT TO NEW YORK – MAY 11, 2002

It's Springtime in New York City, the trees are in full greenery and flowers are blooming. There's a bit of nip still in the air, but Saturday promises to be a warm day. The subway now takes American Express cards ("Don't Leave Home Without It!") and that softens the steep price since my last trip ten years ago. The nice lady in the booth told me Battery Park and the boats to Ellis Island were just a block or two from the end of the Number 6 line, so off I went.
New York seems to be back in business, and there was something happening at the foot of Manhattan where the subway line ended called the Tribeca Film Festival. The map from one of the festival sponsors quickly showed that not only was the boat ride a ways away but my walk down Broadway would take me by the World Trade Center "Site" – as that place was gently referred to. The events of 9-11 had already affected me on this trip, for I had forgotten to pack and check a small Leatherman's mini-knife my daughter had given me last Father's Day. The security at the airport in Orange County found the item, and so I gave it to a National Guard sergeant. Along my walk, I found of all things just off Broadway a small hardware store – it could fit in the plumbing aisle at my local Home Depot – operated by just delightful people, and they had the exact replacement.
Commerce seemed to be thriving. Stores even here just off Broadway were pushing their wares on a Saturday morning, the sidewalks had enough pedestrians to make any peddler happy, and traffic was week-end light. Sidewalk venders were busy selling t-shirts, hot dogs, honey roasted nuts ("Nuts4Nuts"), and pictures of local scenes.
Across Broadway – the tour books say it's the longest street in Manhattan – I saw an old church and quite a crowd of people. I remembered well from my last visits here Trinity Church nearly on top of Wall Street and the stock exchanges, with its ancient architecture and graveyard filled with early Americans. News photos of that graveyard after 9-11 showed the debris which had landed there during the fires and collapse. But for some reason I did not recognize this scene or the Church. It turned out to be St. Paul's Chapel, another old church that also stood in contrast to the adjoining modern buildings. Around the church was a fence that stretched for some distance to the west.
St. Paul's is now a refuge for the rescue workers at the WTC site – "Ground Zero" it's called – and the fence has become a national memorial. The fence is covered with reminders of the horror or 9-11. There are pictures of lost husbands, wives, children, friends who died in the attack, handwritten notes, baseball-style hats from all over, t-shirts and other clothing, hand-made flags, and handwritten notes everywhere and on everything. Many are from familiar places like San Ramon, California, where my daughters went to high school, or Sante Fe Springs, a suburb of Los Angeles that is half-way to Orange County that I pass through at least weekly on my way somewhere. Some were from far away, and others reflected the diversity of the victims – offering candles from Latino culture, bottles of Japanese wine, messages from England and elsewhere. I stopped and read where I could amidst the crowd.
Walking along the fence westward one comes to Ground Zero itself. It has been described as just a construction site, but that's not accurate. There is much construction activity, but the reality is it's still a recovery effort after all these months. From time to time we are told what's left of someone is found and removed. Sifting for human remains goes on daily here and at the landfill on Staten Island where it all is taken.
Visitors are thick here, and it is obvious that people have come from all over America and the world to see this place. They proclaim their hometowns on clothing, hats, t-shirts, sweatshirts, jackets. Many come from other countries, and there are different languages heard among the crowd. The local paper (called the "Times") recounts a visit by a princess from the tiny European country of Belgium. We are across the street from the site itself, cordoned off by police barriers, and police and firemen are in abundance.
Americans from everywhere want to take pictures of themselves next to the firemen and police, who appear happy and eager to fulfill a role as host at this place. There's little really to see, just activity, men digging in the Earth with shovels and giant machines, some tractors, trucks, construction trailers. There is a steel cross made of construction girders that stands high and close by an American flag is flying on a regular looking pole. Some remnants of the destruction remain, including damage to the facades of nearby buildings. In nearby Battery Park is a piece of art that was in the WTC Plaza, named "The Sphere," a sculpture which is 12 or 15 feet high. It looks like it has been through a war with gaping holes in it, bent metal, marks of destruction, but still it stands in it's proud new place a few blocks away.
I walk just the few blocks near and around this place, try to take some of my own pictures. They will not be adequate, just buildings left standing, maybe a few nice clouds (I used a red filter for my black & white film), men digging with machines, but they will have meaning for me. I do remember the emotions of that awful day, my own fear and anger, and anger that still comes up from time to time. A stop for lunch is a quiet interlude, and I wonder if this is the Deli which fed so many rescue workers during the early weeks after that day.
Passing through this place one realizes this will be a memorial for long after we are gone. The attack and its aftermath will be studied by our grandchildren's grandchildren. Those of us who witnessed the events and lived through them even if only on our TV screens are just as hurt and angry as the good people of New York. I find the emotions coming again, can feel them and do so. The tears are not from the wind or cold.

2002-06-14T06:12:00.000-07:00

Airport Security is Big Failure and Waste of Money.

Check out the writings of Walter Williams at http://www.worldnetdaily.com/news/archives.asp for the real skinny.

The truth is hijackings, suicide missions, and terrorist's acts are carried out universally by young men of Middle Eastern background, Arabs, and the like, and not white-bread middle-aged businessmen or women. These acts certainly are not carried out by your 80-year old white, brown, Black or Asian grandmother carrying knitting needles.

Sure, try to check for guns and bombs, and maybe the too-long knife, but fingernail files? Knitting needles? It just won't work, and the expense -- plus delay -- is simply unacceptable. How many billions are being wasted to check those knitting needles and the occasional pocket knife?

The intrusive searches of my bags and personal goods violates my expectation of privacy. There is a constitutional principal involved here. How is this any different that random searches within two blocks of any large office building? No judge would tolerate such an endeavor. The delays are not acceptable. We will never recover if we tolerate our government searching everyone -- yes, Grannie, you too -- the way it's happening now in airports across America.

My vote is go back to pre-9/11 security. Let's get America back on the road.

2002-06-13T08:54:00.000-07:00

What an ego booster -- my blog is all over the planet. The shepherds in Afganistan, shopkeepers in J'Berg, hookers in A'Dam, and I'net cafe dwellers in Garden Grove -- not to mention in bloggers in The Big Apple -- can read all this nonsense.

The driving force behind all blogging is the Giant Ego.

Dave24C

Rants