Crescent of Betrayal

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CRESCENT OF BETRAYAL

Dishonoring the Heroes of Flight 93

What happens when a memorial turns out to be a cruel perversion?

There are, sadly, some offensive and-- dare I use the word--subversive plans unfolding here on American soil.

The justifiable outrage over something like the Flight 93 Memorial you're about to discover is just the sort of thing the ever-vigilent and politically sensitive far left loves to attack, attempting to paint concerned Americans as paranoid and hateful. But it's impossible for any intelligent observer (who takes a few minutes to look at the evidence) to deny there is a real problem here with the planned memorial to the heroes of flight 93.

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First, I would like you to meet Alec Rawls, introducing himself on his site:

Here is a short bio I sent to press people covering the Flight 93 memorial debacle.

My training is as an economist. I was in the PhD program in economics at Stanford until my research led me more towards moral theory and constitutional law, at which point I dropped the program and started working on my own. I was writing a book on republicanism (the system of liberty under law) for World Ahead Publishing when I discovered that the Flight 93 memorial was going to be a terrorist memorial mosque.

World Ahead agreed to first publish my book about this rehijacking of Flight 93 (Crescent of Betrayal, temporarily available for free download at CrescentOfBetrayal.com).

This is not my first venture into journalism. Over the years I have been a writer, opinions editor, and advisor for Stanford’s conservative campus newspaper The Stanford Review, and am currently on the Review’s board of directors.

[end quoted material]

First, let's revisit a moment in history.

On September 11, 2001, forty passengers and four terrorists were on a United Airlines flight from Newark, New Jersey to San Francisco, California. As summarized in a Wikipedia entry:

Over forty minutes into the flight the hijackers breeched the cockpit, overpowered the pilots, and took over control of the aircraft, diverting it toward Washington, D.C. Several passengers and crew members made telephone calls aboard the flight and learned about the attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon. As a result, the passengers decided to mount an assault against the hijacker and wrest control of the aircraft.

The plane crashed in a field in Stonycreek Township, near Shanksville, in Somerset County, Pennsylvania, about 80 miles (130 km) southeast of Pittsburg and 150 miles (240 km) northwest of Washington, D.C., killing all 44 people on board, including the hijackers. Many witnessed the impact from the ground and news agencies began reporting on the event within the hour. The plane fragmented on impact, leaving a crater, and some debris was blown miles from the crash site. The remains of everyone on board the aircraft were later identified.

Subsequent analysis of the flight records revealed how the actions taken by the passengers prevented the aircraft from reaching the hijacker's intended target, thought to be either the White House of the United States Capitol. A permanent memorial is planned for construction on the crash site. The chosen design has been the subject of criticism, but the memorial is scheduled to be dedicated in 2011.

[end quoted material]

A memorial to this horrific attack certainly seems fitting. And plans eventually were underway, as explained in an article in Philanthropy News Digest, January 29, 2005:

Exhibition for Flight 93 Memorial Competition Opens in Pennsylvania

Nearly one thousand entries have been submitted to the competition set up to select a design for the permanent memorial to honor the passengers who lost their lives when United Flight 93 crashed in a field in southwestern Pennsylvania on the morning of September 11, 2001, and an exhibition of the entries has opened online.

The Flight 93 Memorial Design Competition — a partnership among the Families of Flight 93, the Flight 93 Advisory Commission, the Flight 93 Memorial Task Force, and the National Park Service — was made possible through grants of $500,000 each from the Pittsburgh-based Heinz Endowments and the Miami-based John S. and James L. Knight Foundation. A nine-member jury comprising family members, partners, and design professionals will select five finalists in late January, each of whom will receive an honorarium to further develop their concept for the second stage of the competition. A second jury will then meet in July to select the winning entry for recommendation to a federal advisory commission, with the winning design to be announced in late September.

"We are so humbled by the depth and breath of sentiments expressed in these design submittals," said Flight 93 Advisory Commission chair John Reynolds. "The passengers and crew gave their lives here to save our nation's capital, unwittingly winning the first battle in the war on terrorism. This national memorial will serve forever as a tribute to that moment in our nation's history, and generations to come will never forget their heroism."

[end quoted material]

What happens next is an affront to those lives lost, and everything our country should represent.

I'll quote the beginning of a letter to all Americans, written by Tom Burnett, Sr., father of one of the heroes of flight 93:

From Tom Burnett Sr: A petition to stop the Flight 93 Memorial

Dear Fellow Americans:The planned Flight 93 Memorial contains extensive Islamic symbolism. It is an insult to my son Tom, and to the other murdered heroes of Flight 93 who stopped Islamic terrorists from destroying the White House or the Capitol that terrible September day.

Please consider signing this online petition that I and some compatriots have put together. It calls for a new memorial design, and for investigation of the present design. If you want to do more, feel free to forward or post this appeal.

[end quoted material]

To read the rest of this letter, and learn more about this disgraceful planned memorial and its implications, please go to this page, and then explore the rest of Alec's blog:

http://errortheory.blogspot.com/2008/03/letter-from-tom-burnett-sr-please-sign.html

or the TinyURL version of the link:

http://tinyurl.com/65sm5j

To the left here at my blog on my Blog List, you can always find the link to Alec's site, Error Theory, and it will take you to his latest post.

Please note this isn't merely a matter of something being slipped through by a single person of perverted aspirations, which would be horrible enough, but a number of people seem to be taking great pains to enable this obscenity to be erected. This is not a simple matter of a crescent shape; it's far more elaborate and exacting than that, as you will see. Imagine, if you will, the world's largest mosque, erected on the graves of the American "infidels".

Thank you for your kind attention. I stand with Alec and Tom and other citizens on this matter.

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