Hecklers shout down Giuliani at 9/11 hearings in Manhattan.





The hearings were into their second day today and this outburst occured by several relatives of 9/11 vitcims. They were angered by the "easy"(obviously in their opinion) questioning of former mayor rudolph guiliani by the panel. After about 90 minutes of questioning, some people began to protest and yell. Most wanted tougher questioning about what went wrong than what went right. One such issue was the communications breakdown between departments and the failure of some radios during that day.

Questions for Debate:
1. Are the 9/11 families justified in their outrage or are they just being counter-productive?

2. Do you believe that some 9/11 relatives are being overly-critical of the whole situation? i.e. We could not avoid 9/11 no matter how much we would want to believe otherwise.

3. In general, do the 9/11 families have too much influence when compared to relatives of other tragedies such as the Oklahoma City bombing?

And here's where some empathy might give people perspective.

1. Are the 9/11 families justified in their outrage or are they just being counter-productive?

If you felt like your loved one(s) died because the city could have better handled the communications/interactions between the police and fire departments and the mayor at the time only wanted to talk about everything he did right... wouldn't you be annoyed? When you've lost a family member and you feel that someone could have done something "better", but the leader of that group won't even address it....

A broken heart doesn't mean you have to be outraged OR counter-productive. But you could want some answers to some hard questions. And getting those answers from politicians can be frustrating.


2. Do you believe that some 9/11 relatives are being overly-critical of the whole situation? i.e. We could not avoid 9/11 no matter how much we would want to believe otherwise.

We actually had many ways to avoid 9/11. We could have tightened airport and border security, we could have insisted that city governments practice -- like they do now -- disaster preparedness, etc. We and our elected officials chose not to.

As to your question: how is asking the hard questions and demanding direct answers being overly critical? Sometimes people who lose loved ones absolutely NEED to understand why in order to attain peace. There are cancer researchers who became cancer researchers because they lost a parent to cancer. People don't always accept "it's God's Will" as an acceptable answer to a loss.

3. In general, do the 9/11 families have too much influence when compared to relatives of other tragedies such as the Oklahoma City bombing?

Without the relatives' outrage, we would NEVER have had the 9/11 Commission in the first place, since Bush and his Administration were dead set against it.

"Too much influence"? I'd actually say they have the right amount; they don't control the Commission or the hearings, but they do get to influence them a bit more than the average citizen. Sounds about right.

As for OK City: the FBI caught the guy, caught his support guys, tried and convicted them. The relatives had influence into what to do with the area around the destroyed building and they were allowed to attend the trial and execution of the idiot. Again, sounds about the right level of influence.

1. Are the 9/11 families justified in their outrage or are they just being counter-productive?



Justified in their outrage, maybe. I can see their point of view, but believe that they aren't helping matters. When you compare this group to all who have lost loved one in 9-11 their actions don't help their cause. That's just my opinion.


Do you believe that some 9/11 relatives are being overly-critical of the whole situation? i.e. We could not avoid 9/11 no matter how much we would want to believe otherwise.

When we lose someone we loved, the first reaction is to place blame. Thir angry while justified, really only keeps the pain alive, and slows down the healing process. For those families that their loved ones where firefighters, and police, honestly, is this any different than losing them in any other fire or shoot-out. These people choose their jobs for many reasoning, and I'm sure one was to help others. For all the complaining, most probably would not have done much different. It's always easy to use hindsight.


In general, do the 9/11 families have too much influence when compared to relatives of other tragedies such as the Oklahoma City bombing?

Yes, I think they do. This is a case of national(that means all of us)reactions and how to handle it in the future. This blame game needs to end NOW. If I was a family member from OK City, I would wonder why those in NY are more important than those who died in OK City.

It's a shame that the media focused more on the screaming minority than what the commission has actually found. In any given situation, there will always be a certain degree of chaos. Whether it was the Titanic sinking, Pearl Harbor attack, or some other disaster, even the best placed protocols of action just won't work 110% of the time. The media should mention that since the '93 attacks, $100 million was spent on physical/structural improvements, as well as emergency lighting, glow in the dark signs, and a "repeater" beacon that was placed on 5 WTC that would strengthen radio communication from building to building. I don't believe that the 9/11 families are justified in their outrage. I can understand why they are upset and everything, but I'm sure that Giuliani was correct in stating that some(though not all) of the firefighters ignored warnings to leave. A good number of them probably did not. Should they have had the best communication system available? I'm not a techie or anything, but I'm not certain that even the best system would work in what is essentially, 110 stories of electronic signals and frequencies. The families are correct in asserting that questioning of Giuliani wasn't as pointed as it could've been. They didn't take Condoleeza Rice's wandering comments, I wonder why they accepted it from Rudy Giuliani.

[b]It's a shame that the media focused more on the screaming minority than what the commission has actually found.


For once I won't blame the media. I was watching the hearing. So, I can't say anything about the media over playing. Their behavior was in poor taste. At least in my opinion. That and about $1.50 will get you a cup of coffee.

For me, the nightly news broadcasts consisted of just the irate families yelling at Giuliani and giving stump speeches when people began to leave the room. I'm just disappoitnted that the nightly news didn't focus on the findings of the commission in its report, or provide the public information about the report. Instead, they focused on the soap opera esque acting of the families. That's the problem these days with the media--all show and glitz, little substance.

"Justified in their outrage?" At Giulianni? No! "Counter-productive?" Yes! Their energy would be better spent attacking/denouncing Islamist fanatics who plan and kill innocent civilians. Let's be clear however that the "9/11 families" you refer to are not all "9/11 families". You are referring (and they misleadingly imply) that they represent all "9/11 families" when they are in fact only a portion (very vocal and activist I'll grant you) of all the victims families.



"Overly critical?" Yes! But they have to blame somebody right? The actual killers are dead and their accomplices are hiding. Besides, it isn't all their fault right, we made them (the actual killers) do it. We *** NOTICE: THIS WORD IS AGAINST THE RULES. FAILURE TO REMOVE IT WILL RESULT IN A STRIKE. *** them off. We could spend Trillions of dollars on new security technology and personnel and eviscerate our freedoms and civil rights and lock up our country as tight as a drum. But "avoid 9/11? Who really knows? Sure would have been nice if Osama and his buddies would have changed their minds at the last minute and said: "Let's forget the whole thing and go have some pizza and beer and then go see a movie." Ever hear that saying- "Where there is a will there is a way"?



Too much influence? Without question! Bad things happen to good people everyday (not just 9/11 or Oklahoma City). The family of a guy who gets robbed and murdered on his way to work doesn't get a million dollars from the U.S. taxpayers. Every year in this country 15,000-20,000 people are murdered. Are their deaths less important? Less valuable? Should we pay their families as well? People have been killing each other forever. Cops rarely prevent murder. They try to catch and prosecute the murderers. Is the L.A.P.D. responsible for the murders of Nicole Simpson and Ron Goldman? Could the people and the State of California have treated O.J. Simpson in a different way over the course of his life prior to his decision to cut off his wife's head? Could they have done anything to prevent it?

BREAKING NEWS ALERT

Nineteen homicidal Islamist fanatics hijacked four jumbo jets and flew them into the World Trade Towers, the Pentagon, and the Pennsylvania countryside, killing thousands of innocent people.

It was these Islamist hijackers and their accomplices who committed pre-meditated MURDER!

Not Giullianni, not the Mayor of Washington D.C., not the Governor of Pennsylvania, not Bush or Clinton, not Rumsfeld or Cohen, not Powell or Albright.

Are the 9/11 families justified in their outrage or are they just being counter-productive?

Justified in their outrage, yes. Justified in directing that outrage at Rudy Giuliani and New York police and/or fire-fighters, no. If their outrage, properly directed, were to lead to improved communication between national security forces and state or local forces (or even to the president doing his job for a change - like absorbing PDBs), it would be very productive.

Do you believe that some 9/11 relatives are being overly-critical of the whole situation? i.e. We could not avoid 9/11 no matter how much we would want to believe otherwise.

Overly critical of the whole situation, yes. Overly critical of the fact that the White House failed to pass on what they knew to city or state authorities, absolutely not. We will never know if the September 11 attack could have been prevented or minimized, but with more effective leadership, it is a distinct possibility - and the failure to do anything on the basis of what was known is excessively worthy of criticism.

In general, do the 9/11 families have too much influence when compared to relatives of other tragedies such as the Oklahoma City bombing?

Regrettably, I haven't seen them exercising much influence at all yet.


Oh - and, Argonaut, we can read your points even if they aren't screamed in scarlet.

I disagree with how the questions for debate are phrased. Despite the fact that Giuliani provided leadership and guidance on 9/11, he is not above criticism.

From the accounts I have read, the 9/11 Commission was overly respectful and only threw softball questions at the former mayor. At the very least Giuliani should have faced some tough questions about the poor communications equipment the fire department was saddled with. That faulty equipment may have directly contributed to the deaths of hundreds of firefighters.

James Ridgway in The Village Voice wants to know why the feds were so slow in warning Giuliani of what was going on with the attacks. Ridgway believes the failures of the feds were far worse than those of city officials.

If the federal agencies had acted promptly, passing on the news of the hijacking to the Pentagon and White House and from there to New York, it might well have been possible to fully evacuate at least one of the buildings before it was struck.

http://www.villagevoice.com/issues/0420/mondo5.php

I don't think the 9/11 families have been overly influential or pushy. I think they're demanding answers and accountability from a government that doesn't want to provide either.

There is a problem with that scenario. Former FDNY chief Thomas Van Essen testified about radio equipment. In his official testimony, he stated that newer digital radios were traded back in for older analog radios due to problems of frequencies "stepping on each other" When it came to utilizing the "repeater" system on WTC 5, the chief stated that it: "worked and didn't work" Firefighters misoperated a radio and presumed that the repeater was down. The terrible thing-it was still up and running. It's kind of similar to when a man in combat presses down on the clicker on the side of a hand-held radio and is puzzled as to why he can't receive anything from the other side.

Are such statements just to be said, who knows. I would gather that something like having you loved ones die at the hands of something like that occurred(9-11) would be fuel for such emotion, be it whatever it is.

To some extent i guess its a point about being human and or being there in the experience. Then those outside of such reacting to whatever it brings, to put it down or agree with it would be purely based on the observer. Telling someone to simmer down while venting the feelings about a great loss as such itself could be thought of as wrong or out of place again by whomever is observing it, or not.

On the bottom line to me, i would think a person who entered such a point in life should have been ready for something like this to happen. I feel that he should be grilled for that at least, save the fact New York had been hit once, same location by the same group if memory serves correct. Overall where was the emotion to go? local government, federal government, some divine being, the buildings owner, the people that committed the act? To me this just leads to the question of how to answer those peoples questions fully, but even such a process like that may be muddy and less then what is wanted vs. the whole truth of what lead up to it, be whatever that was.

When you have an event such as 9-11, the answers as to how and why such a thing happened, as well as questions regarding appropriateness of the given response, tends to be rather vague or as Hugo put it- "muddy" The simple fact is, human error is always a product of catastrophes. No one proceeds to the lifeboats in a calm, orderly manner when a ship is sinking, no one leaves in an orderly way when a volcano explodes(i.e.-Pompeii) and no one way to respond at a given time could save more lives. I believe the families are justified in wanting answers, but I doubt that any leader at any level can provide definite answers.

1. Are the 9/11 families justified in their outrage or are they just being counter-productive?

I agree with several other posters here that the families of the 9/11 victims are justified in their anger, but are venting that anger in the wrong direction. IMO, they are justifiably angry and want someone to vent on. So why aren't they placing the blame for all the events of 9/11 squarely where the blame belongs? The 9/11 massacres are the fault of the terrorists who highjacked those aircraft, and all governments, clerics, and private citizens who have ever supported, financed, trained and equiped international terrorists? Why aren't these protesters shouting about that. Why isn't the media asking them?

2. Do you believe that some 9/11 relatives are being overly-critical of the whole situation? i.e. We could not avoid 9/11 no matter how much we would want to believe otherwise.

I believe their criticism is mis-directed. I also saw former FDNY chief Thomas Van Essen being interviewed on FOX News the night of his testimony. According to that interview, the repeaters were working, but many of the fire fighters were not using it. Those that were using it overpowered the system. If these families are so up-set why haven't they found these answers for themselves. This information has already been made public.

As for preventing the 9/11 massacres, I believe that was vertually impossible. Those who think otherwise are not facing the facts. IMO, there is a core of people in the United States who truely believe they should have 100% protection from everything and anything that might adversely effect their lives. They refuse to face reality, and thus are overly angry and somewhat amazed, when that security fails.

3. In general, do the 9/11 families have too much influence when compared to relatives of other tragedies such as the Oklahoma City bombing?

Yes I am afraid I do. I believe if they should be using that influence in a positive manner by directing it towards lobbying congress and their state representatrives to get problems with emergency services resolved.

One thing we must remember is that these protesters are a very small portion of the Survivers and victims families. In some ways these few are much like terrorists themselves.

1SG

Right you are about that, I've yet to hear the protesters criticizing Al-Qaeda or becoming engaged in some effort to shore up the war effort. This kind ot ticky-tacky criticism does little good in my opinion.



Again, you are dead on about this. The simple fact of the matter is that there is absolutely no way that this kind of thing could've been prevented, or thousands of more lives saved. Yes, some key chances were missed, but in hindsight, how many chances or leads were not pursued that didn't lead to a major catastrophe? It's easy to play arm-chair quarterback after the fact, and it's just a cruel fact that life is unfair and bad things happen when you least expect it.