Great day at Ground Zero on Thursday. The weather — sunny, cool, and clear — was more than a little like it was on the morning of September 11, 2001. For a lot of folks around New York City, that kind of a day always brings back memories of 9/11.
The mood was somber — not sad. Solemn. Serious. Satisfied. Not triumphalist. Not vengeful. Not smug.
Satisfied.
Obama looks thin, but he doesn't look hungry. He looks satisfied — as if an actual fucking mission had actually been fucking accomplished. People accuse him of preening? Lord. If Bush and Cheney had had the chance to take this victory lap, we'd need no DNA test to prove Bin Laden's death: W would have Osama's balls on a necklace, Cheney would have his skull on a pike, and the Fox News jingoes would be decrying term limits during wartime.
The few words Obama spoke after the wreath-laying were inaudible to the media; he spoke to the victims' families and the first-responders, briefly, and then he left. Ten minutes before the event was supposed to begin, Elvis had left the building: Counter-terrorism at its most basic level.
The site itself is beginning to rise. Not just Tower One — the Freedom Tower — and Tower Four, and the Memorial: the entire sixteen acres are coming up from the ground literally. It's a complex, profound resurrection. I've been visiting here since June 2005, when it was still raw slab-on-grade seventy feet below street level, and for years, the tumult of construction has masked the deeper and more contemplative aspects of this patch of land.
Thursday was different....
Source: http://www.esquire.com/blogs/politics/obama-ground-zero-visit-5696796?src=rss
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