How bloody tragic that the official accounting of the events before, during and after the 9/11 attacks, as inadequate as that turned out to be, was not the result of the U.S. government's thirst to uncover the truth, but because of the shaming that 9/11 widows put on George Bush and Congress. And that renewal of the bill providing medical care and compensation to thousands of 9/11 responders was not the result of compassion at the highest levels, but another public shaming, this one led by Jon Stewart.
After lobbying Congress since late summer, first
responders who spent months working at Ground Zero following the
terrorist attacks are set to finally receive lifetime
medical care for illnesses as a result of their labors on what they euphemistically called The Pile.
The James Zadroga 9/11 Health and Compensation
Reauthorization Act is included in the $1.2 trillion omnibus spending
package that was to be approved today and tomorrow by the House and Senate. Zadroga was a New York City Police officer who died at age 35 of a
respiratory disease attributed to his participation in
rescue and recovery operations at the World Trade Center.
"Never again will survivors and responders be
forced to walk the halls of Congress, begging for their health care.
Never again will they lose sleep over fear that this life-saving program
will run out," declared Representative Carolyn Maloney, a New York Democrat who pushed back against the obscene indifference to the plight of 9/11 first responders among too many people Capitol Hill.
Despite being told by the Environmental Protection Agency that the air around Ground Zero was safe to breathe, many first
responders developed cancers and other debilitating illnesses because of their exposure to the Ground Zero
toxins.
Even with bipartisan support for the legislation, some House and Senate
Republicans viewed the program as an unfunded entitlement program and
sought to limit its size and duration. As it is, $680 billion, or about two thirds of the omnibus spending package, is not covered by budget cuts or other tax offsets. (Here's to you, Paul Ryan and John Boehner!)
The Zadroga Act foot dragging drew the wrath of comedian Jon Stewart, who
had guilt-tripped Congress into originally appropriating funds for first responders in
2010 and has been their passionate advocate ever
since. Stewart reappeared on late-night television for the first time
since his retirement to implore people to pressure Congress
to support the Zadroga Act extension. The hashtag #WorstResponders started trending on Twitter and a fire finally was lit under recalcitrant congressfolk.
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As head of the EPA, Christie Todd Whitman, a former New Jersey governor and a rising national Republican star until she was cast out of the GOP temple by the conservative priests, led the big-lie campaign that Ground Zero air was not dangerous to breath.
Whitman asserted in an upbeat September 18, 2001 press release, later found to be one of many altered by the White House as part of its all-encompassing 9/11 cover-up, that:
"We are very encouraged that the results from our monitoring of air quality and drinking water conditions in both New York
and near the Pentagon show that the public in these areas is not being
exposed to excessive levels of asbestos or other harmful substances. Given the scope of the tragedy from last week, I am glad to reassure the people of New York and Washington, D.C. that their air is safe to breath and their water is safe to drink."
Whitman and other
environmental and health officials suspected and later were made well
aware that there were an array of toxins at Ground Zero and in the
surrounding area from the impact of the jetliners and collapse of the
towers. These included minute shards of glass and asbestos, PCBs and other poisons.
About 70,000 people, including 5,300 first responders, have enrolled in the compensation program. More than 4,000 have cancer, many have severe pulmonary diseases, several have died and many are expected to have significantly shorter lifespans.
Whitman, who was forced out of her EPA job because she was too moderate for the anti-environment
Bush administration, initially refused to testify before a House
judiciary subcommittee about her post-9/11 statements before finally
agreeing to appear. At no time during her tenure as the
nation's top environmental watchdog did she ever question the White
House's stage management of her.
In 2003, the EPA’s own inspector general concluded
that Whitman did not have sufficient scientific information to state
that the air was safe to breathe, while the cover-up of Ground Zero hazards extended well beyond the feds and included New York state and city health agencies.
The obdurate Republicans who held up the Zadroga Act renewal are, of course, shameless, but that is of a pattern. George Bush showed no remorse for his complicity in the 9/11 attacks, having spent the entire month of August 2001 vacationing at his Texas ranch posing for photo-ops in a 10-gallon hat as he flashed his frat boy smirk, clear brush and ignored detailed warnings from his intelligence bigs that Osama bin Laden was determined to strike
the U.S. by flying hijacked passenger aircraft into high-profile
targets, including the World Trade Center.
ABOUT THE PHOTOGRAPH
Mychal Judge, a 68-year-old priest and New York Fire Department chaplain, was uptown at the Church of St. Francis of Assisi when the first plane crashed into the North Tower of the World Trade Center. Father Mike donned his FDNY chaplain’s uniform and rushed to the towers, where he removed his fireman's helmet to administer the last rites to a firefighter and a woman who had jumped from the tower when he was struck in the back of the head and mortally wounded by a chunk of falling debris.
You may not realize that you knew who Father Mike was until you reflect on the image above. Reuters photographer Shannon Stapleton's photograph, one of the most gripping images to come out of that horrific day, is a modern day Pietá. Father Mike was so beloved that his death certificate bears the number 00001 -- the first official World Trade Center casualty.
Politix Update is written by veteran journalist Shaun Mullen, for whom the 2016 presidential campaign is his 12th since 1968. Click HERE for an index of previous columns. © 2015 Shaun Mullen.
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