Date: Wed, 12 May 2004 00:19:03 -0400 (EDT) From: Louis Epstein Subject: WTC Rebuilding #300:More to Fight and Write About! Yes,this series of list emails has reached THREE HUNDRED... all but the most recent few already stored at http://www.put.com/wtc/archive.html if you've missed any! For the last few I've been meaning to remind people of the URL for the Restorewtc.com messageboard,more orderly and sensible than NYCS these days: http://www.restorewtc.com/cgi-bin/ikonboard/ikonboard.cgi It's a registration-required board,which is not the kind I participate on,but people should be aware of it. One thing mentioned there is a news item that I was recently forwarded by list member Brian Yoder: http://www.wnd.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=38413 Osama Bin Laden's family (who disowned him) are bidding to build the 1900-foot Burj Dubai tower! Can we let one set of Bin Ladens build the world's tallest building in Arabia while another has robbed New York of its own? Cecil Shepherd has forwarded me a link to a Wall Street Journal article that tells of the Sears Tower being sold to a group led by the Chetrit family,who intend to rename it.The price was considered rather high,so the market is strong.However,it saddens me that the article mentions the name of the building is likely to be the subject of a naming-rights contract,one of the things lately disgracing countless sports venues taking money to be known by the names of entities that neither own the land nor own nor built the structure or any team that plays there.Whose name is on it should have something to do with the ownership or history of the building! That article comes with a misleading silhouette building that shows the cagework section of the Fraud-'em Tower as if it were solid structure.To show where the real structure ended would make the comparison to other supertall structures quite embarrassing! A small company has jumped for publicity by promising to rent one floor of the FT,and official spin doctors have seized on this with glee. May 18th is the day that the International Olympic Committee decides the short-list of sites that will be voted on next year when the city of the 2012 Games is decided.So Doctoroff's machinations on that score could be cut short within a week if New York doesn't make the cut. However,he continues to twist arms and seek approval for his West Side plans around a stadium and office space that he doesn't want Downtown office space to compete with...except of course if Bloomberg is beaten for reelection next year Doctoroff will be out of his City Hall job! John Lictro spotted a new note on the Team Twin Towers site that on September 12th 2001 John Kerry called on the Senate floor for the towers of the WTC to be rebuilt...John wrote to the Kerry campaign asking if Kerry still holds that position.He suggests others do likewise. From another list member: ==== Today's New York Daily News includes a column by Richard Schwartz that incorporates the following sentences: "New York was promised - by President Bush and by Gov. Pataki - that downtown would be rebuilt. In most people's eyes that meant, first and foremost, replacing the twin towers." This New York Daily News column is on the Internet at: http://www.nydailynews.com/news/ideas_opinions/story/192016p-165988c.html I think it would be very helpful if as many people in the pro-rebuilding movement as possible sent e-mails to Mr. Schwartz to thank him for writing those two magnificent sentences. His e-mail address is: RSchwartz@edit.nydailynews.com . ==== Over at http://www.justinberzon.com/ Berzon is proceeding with his book, and other books attacking the process are proceeding also. Of course there are now LESS THAN TWO WEEKS FOR FINAL-GEIS COMMENTS to the officials busy bungling the rebuilding process. The NY Post has had some recent articles: http://nypost.com/news/regionalnews/20264.htm is Pataki's pledge of keeping his runaway train screeching ahead. http://nypost.com/postopinion/opedcolumnists/20478.htm is a Steve Cuozzo column,pro-Downtown but pro-Silverstein, as is his usual tack on things. http://nypost.com/postopinion/editorial/20483.htm is an editorial REBUILDERS SHOULD RESPOND TO!! It refers to the idea of rebuilding what was destroyed, "exactly or almost exactly as it was",as something whose having "never got far","Americans should regret". But it praises our cause IN THE CONTEXT OF PRAISING ITS BIGGEST OBSTACLE...GOVERNOR PATAKI! We have to write (letters@nypost.com) and tell them we still want what's right and the man they're supporting has been standing in our way all along!(Some of us have written but none gotten printed...that may change if there are enough of us who write!) The editorial is right in condemning those who want something SMALLER built at the site,but there is no reason that the Libescheme should be pressed forward rather than improved upon in ways more evocative of what was destroyed. See you on the 111th floor on 9-11-11! -=-=- The World Trade Center towers MUST rise again, at least as tall as before...or terror has triumphed.