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In the interests of maintaining the historical record, items that are removed from the Home page are inserted below.
The attacks of 9/11 were aimed at our people, our property, and our core ideals. Muzzling the public to ram through an unpopular, uninspired, and unworthy World Trade Center is not acceptable – under any circumstances. It is alarming that those who were hired to run our government – and those who are trusted to keep the flow of information honest – sold us out. Dedicated patriots fought an empire to break free of that sort of high-handed governance and forged a great country. Political expediency be damned. We will continue to oppose the current rotten plan and fully expect to defeat it in the end.
What Every American Needs To Know About the World Trade Center
Opie & Anthony / Just Build Them
Everyone who supports the idea of rebuilding the Twin Towers can take action to make it more than idea by helping us to advertise. That is the only way we can break through the sound barrier that has been built around this subject. If we organize our efforts and translate our support into dollars, we can win this fight to give the world the majestic Twin Towers back. Will you help us make our united voice heard? We don’t have forever.
This is an issue that has been badly misrepresented in the press, but the decency of the effort to rebuild is one that resonates in most people’s hearts and minds. For those who want to dig deeper into the background of a very complex issue, the pages are designed in a linear fashion. So, rather than requiring the navigation of layers of hyperlinks, whenever possible, the site unfolds by simply scrolling down.
The following excerpt is from “The Reluctant Fundamentalist” by Mohsin Hamid, a Princeton/Harvard-educated Pakistani writer who left New York for London after 9/11. The novel “appeared to lavish reviews” and was a finalist for the Booker Prize for Fiction 2007. It is meant to foster understanding and it certainly does that:
I stared as one — and then the other — of the twin towers of New York’s World Trade Center collapsed. And then I smiled. Yes, despicable as it may sound, my initial reaction was to be remarkably pleased… my thoughts were not with the victims of the attack…no, I was caught up in the symbolism of it all, the fact that someone had so visibly brought America to its knees.
What will it take to wake up those who are behind the shameful effort at the WTC to change the subject? The whole world knows that if we do not put the Towers back where they belong, we will be making an enormous propaganda victory permanent. Putting anything else in their place would in no meaningful way address the reality of what was inflicted on us on 9/11 and being in denial won’t do us a bit of good. Instead, it is likely to do us a great deal of harm.
The New York Post published a puff piece on September 5th entitled “Ground ‘Zero to 60′” – designed to convince the public that there is no turning back – but it could just as easily have appeared in any one of the New York City papers. It was a sharp reminder that we have a ruling class in this country that thinks our cities and government are their private domain – or more to the point – their private playground. It is time for the American people to be let in on the secret that they are being defrauded at Ground Zero. The facts speak for themselves. This would never have gotten as far as it has if the press hadn’t rolled over to the special interests who buy their access to news outlets.
It’s time for our media to stop listening only to public relations operatives and start listening to the public.
Zero to 60 is nothing to cheer about if you’re on a runaway train going in the wrong direction. With just a little leadership we could still pull the emergency brake and go on to build a World Trade Center we can all be proud of. We don’t need a merely utilitarian renewal in form that puts an end to any hope for a renewal in spirit. The American people should be allowed to judge for themselves what is best. That cannot be decided by people with vested interests to the exclusion of those whose only interest is in doing right by the American family – the one that came together so memorably on 9/11.
With six difficult years of coming to terms with September 11, 2001 behind us, don’t we owe it to ourselves, our children, and the thousands of innocent people who were slaughtered on that day to really make certain that we know what we’re doing before we do it? Rebuilding the World Trade Center is not just about steel and concrete and glass. It is so much more about showing respect, taking pride, being free. We can erect a noble memorial and restore America’s Skyline.
It can’t hurt to take an honest look, before it’s too late, at the case for building stronger, safer, better Twin Towers. We’d like to hear someone make a convincing case that the current plan is truly the best we can do, but we doubt anyone would even try. Millions of people don’t think it comes close. It is up to all of us to prevent a terrible tragedy from being compounded by a series of terrible, still preventable mistakes. All we have to do is SAY NO. We’re not spoilers. We’re not crazy. We’re engaged citizens doing what we see as our duty. Addressing our concerns, testing their validity, could only help build the best World Trade Center we can build. Isn’t that what we all really want?
Some would suggest that we are not representative of most Americans. The evidence suggests that we are. And everyone from a curator at the Smithsonian to World War II veterans have thanked us for our efforts – so to say that what we are doing is out of the mainstream is suspect and ill-advised. So why don’t we find out? Everyone should want to know the truth about how we got to where we are today. If our charge that a dishonest process led to an illegitimate result is wrong, then that should not be hard to prove.
Otherwise, straightening this out is in everyone’s best interests. We don’t see the people who oppose us as enemies – but we think that they are sadly misinformed and unwilling to examine their assumptions. Why should political complacency prevent us from rethinking the plan, if it can be established that we were misled and manipulated against our will? What is really standing in the way? Nothing insurmountable. Nothing that will matter in the end. It will take some undoing, but it’s our land, our money, and by rights, our choice.
It all boils down to this: What do we want the future to look like? What do we want to see when we drive, fly, sail into New York: inspiring new Twin Towers or something that is merely the byproduct of commercial interests and elitist tastes? What a colossal waste! It falls so far short of all it could be…
In that spirit, The Twin Towers Alliance is airing a radio ad starting this week in New York. It challenges the idea that we are locked into something just because our officials say we are, regardless of whether or not it is honorable, whether or not it makes sense. Why should officials who behaved like willful children be allowed to flout our authority? That is not what America is about. Our country is in our hands. They aren’t our rulers, they’re our public servants – or, as Thomas Jefferson referred to them, our “functionaries”.
A recent signer on the petition commented that “it feels like we are giving up on America.” We think that the Voice of the People is the best medicine for what ails this country and that the World Trade Center is the perfect location to come together and be heard. We hope that visitors will click on the slogan at the top of this page to read some thoughtful, common sense comments – and then, we hope you will click on the banner at the top of this page and make a tax-duductible contribution to our radio campaign. That’s all it will take to put something unstoppable in motion – because, regardless of the powerful Madison Avenue spin, the truth remains that we really can get there from here.
