1/31/2008
A plea from Tom Burnett
A plea from Tom Burnett Sr. to the wonderful people of Somerset
(The ad copy below is running in tomorrow’s Somerset Daily American.)
My son Tom confronted a terrible moment of truth. Faced with a plot against our nation, he and the other heroes of Flight 93 fought back, and at the cost of their lives, foiled that plot to destroy the White House or the Capitol. Now it is time for the rest of us to face our moment of truth. Flight 93 has been re-hijacked, and I am requesting that if you can, you go down to the public meeting of the Memorial Project at Somerset Courthouse Saturday, sign up to comment at the end, and demand that a proper investigation be conducted.
THIS was no accident:
The Memorial Project held an open design competition in time of war, inviting the entire world to enter. Guess who joined in? That group of trees that sits roughly in the position of the star on an Islamic flag is the crash site. Who do YOU think is being memorialized here?
A second Islamic feature that I also protested when I served on the Stage II jury is the minaret-like Tower of Voices, formed in the shape of a crescent, with its top cut at an angle so that its crescent arms reach up into the sky.
Upturned crescents are a standard mosque adornment in many Muslim countries.
Every iota of this original Crescent of Embrace design remains completely intact in the so-called “redesign.” That is why Congressman Tancredo asked the Park Service this autumn to scrap the existing design entirely. Instead of getting rid of the giant crescent as Tancredo demanded back in 2005, architect Paul Murdoch only disguised it with a few surrounding trees.
Also remaining are those damned 44 glass blocks on the flight path. (There were forty passengers and crew and four Islamic terrorists on Flight 93.) The Memorial Project acknowledges the 40 blocks inscribed with the names of my son and the other heroes, and they acknowledge the three inscribed with the 9/11 date, but they pretend not to know about this one: the huge glass block that dedicates the entire site.
When this 44th glass block is pointed out, Project Partners say that it can’t be counted with the other blocks because it is not the same size. What? Because the capstone to the terrorist memorializing block count is magnificent, that is supposed to make it okay?
For every Islamic or terrorist memorializing feature of the crescent design, the Park Service has another equally phony excuse. Please read the exposé below of the Park Service’s fraudulent investigation, and please come to the meeting on Saturday to demand state and Congressional investigations into the Flight 93 memorial.
Tom Burnett Sr.
February 2008
PDF of ad copy here.
Non-locals who want to help, please contact your senators and representatives!
February 6th, 2008 at 8:38 pm
Seeing that tower as an upturned crescent, much less a minaret, is kind of a reach.
February 7th, 2008 at 5:25 am
I see it quite clearly.
February 7th, 2008 at 6:39 am
You miss the point Brad. If one loved one of any of the passengers or crew sees this memorial in this light, then we are better off with the makeshift memorial that is there. The memorial should be about giving those who lost that day, comfort. I have to ask myself, why the people who are pushing this design, when Mr. Burnett is so offended he doesn’t want his son’s name included, do they not say, “Hey, lets make some changes”. Putting something up that everyone who survived can get comfort from should be the purpose. I don’t have to be convinced that all the features point to Islamofascism, the fact that there are soooo many creates the case that Mr. Burnett is well founded in his conclusions. I stand by the families on this issue. They don’t need a source of permanent pain added to their loss.
February 7th, 2008 at 7:17 am
Just change the damn thing, its not that hard… the glass blocks kind of make it super-suspect
March 6th, 2008 at 7:21 pm
hoosierarmymom has it absolutely right.
Why ignore the many people, and particularly the family members of those lost, who find the symbolism offensive? Why ignore them?
And get real about the symbolism. Architects are always using symbolism. One arguably Islamic symbol? OK, maybe a coincidence? Two such symbols, interlocking? Not likely. Three aspects with Islamic symbolism? Can’t be an accident, and there is a great deal more Islamic symbolism than that described above in this design.
It must be scrapped. We must start over. And there should be an uncompromising investigation into Murdoch and how this design was created and accepted.