After laying a wreath at Ground Zero, President Obama is meeting with first responders and families of 9/11 victims today in his first visit to Ground Zero since 2008 and since announcing the death of Osama bin Laden. Retired fire chief Jim Riches, whose son, a firefighter, died while responding to the World Trade Center attacks, was invited to meet with the President, and he said, "I’m gonna thank him for what they did. He was a man of his word. He did [what] he was supposed to do. There will be no closure for me; my friends are not coming back. But I think he deserves an ‘atta boy’ for doing what they did."
9/11 Families (Mostly) Look Forward To Meeting Obama Today
WikiLeaks Posts Alleged 9/11 Pager Messages
Yesterday, WikiLeaks began posting "half a million US national text pager intercepts," saying, "The archive is a completely objective record of the defining moment of our time. We hope that its entrance into the historical record will lead to a nuanced understanding of how this event led to death, opportunism and war."
Giuliani Livid Over Bringing 9/11 Trials to NYC
Former mayor Rudy Giuliani made the talk show rounds this morning to denounce the Obama administration's decision to try five accused 9/11 plotters—including mastermind Khalid Sheikh Mohammed—in New York City's federal court. On Fox News Sunday, Giuliani said the White House was "repeating the mistake of history" and had reverted to a "pre-9/11 approach... What the Obama administration is telling us loud and clear is that both in substance and reality, the War on Terror from their point of view is over. [Mohammad] should be tried in a military tribunal. He is a war criminal. This is an act of war."
$30 Million for Monitoring of Downtown 9/11 Residents
The NY Times reports that the Center for Disease Control and Prevention will give $30 million "to hospitals and clinics that monitor and treat residents, students and other so-called nonresponders who were exposed to dust and smoke at ground zero." The money will come in three installments of $10 million each, and hospitals and clinics can apply for grants. NY lawmakers are glad the money is coming, but think it's long overdue (it's true--it's going to be the seventh anniversary of attacks this year). And this comes a few weeks after President Bush declined to reappoint "World Trade Center health czar" Dr. John Howard to another term, even despite the pleas of NY lawmakers like Governor Paterson and Representative Carolyn Maloney.
WTC Memorial May Be Ready by 2011
While the Port Authority confirmed there will be many rebuilding delays at the World Trade Center site, executive director Christopher Ward told lower Manhattan residents the WTC memorial will be ready by 2011. The Daily News reports that at a Community Board 1 meeting, Ward said the memorial should be completed by the 10th anniversary of the 9/11 attacks, but "accomplishing this will very difficult...You cannot build a memorial by forgetting its interconnection to the rest of the site."

