NYT: "Take Back the Memorial" is Un-American

Fri, Jul 29, 2005 at 8:47:17 pm PDT

The New York Times labels those who think the Ground Zero memorial should be apolitical: “un-American.”

But this is not really a campaign about money or space. It is a campaign about political purity - about how people remember 9/11 and about how we choose to read its aftermath, including the Iraq war. On their Web site, www.takebackthememorial.org, critics of the cultural plan at ground zero offer a resolution called Campaign America. It says that ground zero must contain no facilities “that house controversial debate, dialogue, artistic impressions, or exhibits referring to extraneous historical events.” This, to us, sounds un-American.