Even if I agreed with Charles Krauthammer that the site of the former World Trade Center (ground zero) has the same meaning to Americans as Treblinka does for Jews, the proposed mosque is not at ground zero, but several blocks away. If someone actually proposed building a mosque at ground zero no one would permit it because that property is overseen by the Lower Manhattan Development Corporation which has already approved other projects. The truth is, Krauthammer’s analogies suck. No one wants to see a museum dedicated to the Confederate cause on the Gettysburg battlefield, but would one object to a museum for Confederate artifacts being built adjacent to the battlefield, where the proceeds went to fight racism and promote racial reconciliation?
That’s a closer, though still imperfect, analogy to the proposed mosque in lower Manhattan. Krauthammer concedes there is no legal case against the mosque. He even goes so far as to suggest that the government shouldn’t even open its mouth about it.
Yet, as columnist Rich Lowry pointedly noted, the government has no business telling churches how to conduct their business, shape their message or show “special sensitivity” to anyone about anything.
But that is before he praises Gov. Paterson for doing just that.
Build it anywhere but there.
The governor of New York offered to help find land to build the mosque elsewhere. A mosque really seeking to build bridges, Rauf’s ostensible hope for the structure, would accept the offer.
Again, they are not building it ‘there.’ And Krauthammer contradicts himself in his own column. He’s within his rights as a private citizen to advocate a different location for the mosque but, if he were consistent, he’d criticize Gov. Paterson for doing what he has no business doing.