Ground Zero Kidnapped - Update II

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Taken from the Take Back The Memorial website:

FROM THE IFC WEB SITE: IFC Myths and Facts

The IFC says?

Myth:
The International Freedom Center (IFC) will have more space than the World Trade Center Memorial Center.

Fact:
Each will have roughly the same square footage of exhibit space. The Memorial Center will house all of the key 9/11 artifacts. And both it and the IFC will be dwarfed-as they should be-by the World Trade Center Memorial, with its ?Reflecting Absence? pools, where the names of the honored dead will be inscribed.

Truth: The plan for the IFC?s building calls for 300,000 sq. ft. of exhibit space. The plan for exhibit space in the underground Memorial Center is 50,000 sq. ft. Yes, there will be giant pools of water underground, just like you?d see in any fancy hotel lobby, but you can?t ?exhibit? crushed fire trucks in them, you can?t see footage of mass destruction in them, they will not ?exhibit? anything at all.

The IFC says?

Myth:
The IFC is inconsistent with what 9/11 families want to see at the World Trade Center Memorial.

Fact:
The Mission Statement for the Memorial, which was crafted in 2003 and was the product of very substantial input from many family members, calls on us, through the Memorial, to ?strengthen our resolve to preserve freedom, and inspire an end to hatred, ignorance, and intolerance.? That is what the IFC is about. A clear majority of family members on the WTC Memorial Foundation Board support the IFC and this Mission Statement.

Truth: The WTC Memorial mission statement appears in full on the TakeBacktheMemorial home page. IFC cherry-picked from this quote, ?May the lives remembered, the deeds recognized, and the spirit reawakened be eternal beacons, which reaffirm respect for life, strengthen our resolve to preserve freedom, and inspire an end to hatred, ignorance and intolerance.? See anything in there about ?Freedom?s Failures??.

Truth: Three family members on the WTC Memorial Foundation Board are adamantly opposed to the IFC at the Memorial site. Here are the remaining four:

* a board member of the LMDC, which voted to bring the IFC onto the Memorial site and to give it $300 million federal dollars
* a personal family friend of the LMDC chairman; the only family member selected to be a Memorial design juror and who is now a Vice Chair, board member and salaried employee of the IFC
* a Vice President of Gilbane Building Co, which was awarded a $45 million contract at Ground Zero by the LMDC
* a former aide to Gov. George Pataki who now works for the LMDC

The IFC says?

Myth:
The IFC and its building are somehow a late entry on the site.

Fact:
Daniel Libeskind?s site master plan, announced more than two years ago, called for a museum where the IFC building will be built. The selection of the master plan was in part the product of the ?Listening to the City? process that included thousands of people, and hundreds of family members. The IFC itself was publicly designated for the site in June 2004.

Truth: Because federal (HUD) money was being used for redevelopment of Lower Manhattan and the WTC Memorial Site, the LMDC was statutorily required to establish a public comment period. HUD officials recently acknowledged that soliciting public opinion did not in any way require the LMDC to either respond to these comments or conform to the public?s desires. 9/11 families were stonewalled, ignored and misled. The 2004 roll-out of the IFC was deliberately vague. Only last month did it become clear the ?museum? Libeskind imagined would contain nothing about the events of September 11, 2001.

The IFC says?

Myth:
The IFC leans left.

Fact:
The IFC is entirely non-partisan and outside of politics. It has enlisted nearly 100 advisers for its museum and service programs. These are bi-partisan. They do include people from leading human rights organizations. But also three former top White House officials from the George W. Bush Administration, as well as a former top aide to Senator Bob Dole and the director of the conservative Hoover Institution. Isn?t that kind of balance what America is about?

Truth: Take Back the Memorial doesn?t support the use of the 9/11 attacks to push ideology from the Left or the Right. We don?t want ?balanced? politics, we want no politics! The question is, when it comes to content and programming, who will the IFC organizers listen to? See, The Great Ground Zero Heist, for a clue.

The IFC says?

Myth:
The IFC will celebrate America?s failures.

Fact:
The IFC?s highest aims are to inspire people, and engage them in service. It will tell the stories of Naziism-but also of the Greatest Generation that defeated it; of the Soviet gulag-but also of the courageous dissidents who helped bring it down; of Jim Crow segregation-but also Martin Luther King, who helped stamp it out. Inspiring people through these stories to do freedom?s work today is our best long-run defense against more 9/11?s.

Truth: We?re stunned to admit, we agree! Put the IFC museum in Saudi Arabia, Syria or Egypt. At Ground Zero, if we want an atrocity that teaches and inspires, make the World Trade Center Memorial about September 11th.

The IFC says?

Myth:
The IFC will excuse or rationalize the 9/11 attacks, either in exhibits or in evening discussion programs.

Fact:
No it won?t. The attacks were inexcusable, barbaric, and cannot be defended. Period.

Truth: ?To be sure, the International Freedom Center will host debates and note points of view with which you?and I?will disagree.? Richard Tofel, IFC Pres./COO, from A Fitting Place at Ground Zero, Wall Street Journal, June 9, 2005. See, The Great Ground Zero Heist for a preview of the IFC speaker line-up.

We need to stop this thing, please contact the below folks to let them know how you feel about this.

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Curt

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