Has Bush no shame?
Relatives of 9/11 victims say the president's new ad campaign desecrates ground zero -- and demand that he pull it off the air.

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By Geraldine Sealey

March 5, 2004 | Andrew Rice, like many 9/11 family members, is speaking out against campaign commercials for President Bush that use television footage from the place where his brother died. Ground zero, fallen firefighters, the torched and toppled remains of the World Trade Center -- these images are sacred to Rice, and he doesn't want them used as fodder for anyone's political gain. "Taking images, sensitive images, like those firefighters carrying that coffin -- that's a dead body in that coffin," Rice said. "It's not Gettysburg 100 years after a battle. They are real firefighters carrying a dead body. That should be hands-off."

But Bush's spokeswoman and longtime advisor Karen Hughes told Rice and other family members on Thursday that they are plain wrong to be incensed that Bush-Cheney '04 is using 9/11 footage in a multimillion dollar ad campaign. "With all due respect, I just completely disagree, and I believe the vast majority of the American people will as well," she said in a television interview.

Hughes, unlike many protesting family members of 9/11 victims, approves of the ground zero footage in the president's political ads, using the kind of language some use to describe softcore porn. "I think it is very tasteful," she said. "It is a reminder of our shared experience as a nation."

And those who disagree with her and the White House clearly have an agenda, Hughes says. They must be partisan. They must be Democrats. "I can understand why some Democrats might not want the American people to remember the great leadership and strength the president and first lady Laura Bush brought to our country in the aftermath of that," Hughes said.

Not all of the 9/11 families who oppose Bush's use of their greatest personal tragedy to win votes are Democrats, of course, although many will likely choose not to vote for Bush in the fall if he keeps this up.

Wright Salisbury of Boston, whose son-in-law Ted Hennessey was a passenger on American Airlines Flight 11, called Hughes' comments that it's Democrats opposing the ads "a load of baloney."

"I have no idea what the political affiliation is of people I've been talking to," he said in an interview Thursday. "I was a Republican up until I voted for Bush. I will still vote for a good Republican, but not for Bush. To say this is Democrats doing this is another damn lie."

If Bush and the Republican Party want a war of words with the 9/11 families, they're well on their way. While the survivors and victims of the tragedy fall across a wide political spectrum -- and many will surely emerge to support Bush and his ad campaign -- leaders of 9/11 family groups, as well as politically influential firefighters groups, say his exploitation of Sept. 11, coupled with his stonewalling of the investigation into the attacks, will rouse them to political action. And that could spell trouble for Bush, who's making 9/11 the centerpiece of a campaign based largely on national security.

Sept. 11th Families for Peaceful Tomorrows, a group that represents 100 family members and opposes Bush's military responses to the terror attacks, has scheduled a news conference for Friday morning near ground zero, where leaders will call on Bush-Cheney '04 to pull the ads. The group is demanding that Bush stick to his word that he has "no ambition whatsoever to use [9/11 or national security] as a political issue," as he said in January.

Families for Peaceful Tomorrows says its members include 9/11 survivors of all political stripes, and insists that it would protest any exploitation of the terror attacks from any party. "If Kerry were doing this or any other politician, we would feel the same way," said Kelly Campbell, a co-director of the family group, whose brother-in-law Craig Amundson was killed on 9/11 at the Pentagon. "This is not about partisan politics. We have people in our group who vote for President Bush, we have people in our group who are Green Party and Democrats. Frankly, we don't want to have to deal with this as a partisan political issue. Unfortunately, the president has decided to run these ads and Republicans have decided to implicate Sept. 11 in their campaign and convention."

For some 9/11 families, the Republican Convention in New York, scheduled later than usual this year to coincide with the third anniversary of the 9/11 attacks, is the true test of [link|http://www.hillnews.com/under_dome/022604.aspx|how far Bush will go] to exploit their tragedy. From what they've heard, they're expecting the worst. News accounts have suggested Bush has plans to travel to ground zero during the convention, perhaps to give his acceptance speech, just as he used an aircraft carrier to prematurely proclaim the accomplishment of his mission in Iraq. Some family groups are already planning their response to this use of ground zero as a campaign backdrop. According to Rice, the GOP's plan to exploit ground zero this fall will motivate some 9/11 families to join the estimated 1 million protesters who will descend on New York in early September.

"There will be heavy-duty mobilization of people," he said. "Those who voted for him four years ago will say 'Hold on.' Obviously, he'll have support among some people, but he's really galvanizing the 9/11-affected communities."

Salisbury, for one, vows to march on New York if Bush dares to appear at ground zero during the GOP Convention. "If he does anything like show up at the World Trade Center, if he even shows his face, he will enrage every family member of the victims, whether a Republican or a Democrat. I'm not a marcher, but I will march if that happens. If he threatens to appear at the World Trade Center, I'll go down and be one more face in the crowd."

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