President Obama honors victims of 9/11 at Ground Zero

Posted by AzBlueMeanie:

From the New York Times, Obama Honors Bin Laden’s Victims at Ground Zero:

President Obama laid a wreath of red, white, and blue flowers at ground zero on Thursday, honoring the nearly 3,000 people killed in the September 2001 terrorist attacks and marking the death of its perpetrator, Osama bin Laden.

After placing the wreath at the foot of a tree that had been wrested from the rubble, nursed back to health, and replanted on the site as a memorial, Mr. Obama stood silently, his head bowed and his hands clasped before him.

The hushed ceremony on a sunny, breezy day was a somber coda to a triumphal week that began with Mr. Obama’s announcement that commandos had killed Bin Laden in his fortified compound in Pakistan.

Now, in the wreath ceremony and in a series of meeting across Manhattan on Thursday, the president had a chance to meet one-to-one with the people whose lives were changed most deeply by Bin Laden — relatives of the victims, as well as firefighters and other rescue workers who lost comrades that morning.

“Obviously, you can’t bring back the friends you lost,” Mr. Obama said to the crew at a firehouse in midtown Manhattan that lost 15 men, an entire shift, at the World Trade Center. “What happened Sunday sent a message: When we say we will never forget, we mean what we say.”

For more on the President's visit to New York see Live Blog: Obama Visits New York – NYTimes.com.

Text of the President's remarks to the firefighters, as released by the White House:

Well, listen, the main reason I came here is because I heard the food is pretty good. (Laughter.)

But to the Commissioner, to Mayor Giuliani — who obviously performed heroic acts almost 10 years ago — but most of all, to all of you, I wanted to just come up here to thank you.

This is a symbolic site of the extraordinary sacrifice that was made on that terrible day almost 10 years ago. Obviously we can't bring back your friends that were lost, and I know that each and every one of you not only grieve for them, but have also over the last 10 years dealt with their family, their children, trying to give them comfort, trying to give them support.

What happened on Sunday, because of the courage of our military and the outstanding work of our intelligence, sent a message around the world, but also sent a message here back home that when we say we will never forget, we mean what we say; that our commitment to making sure that justice is done is something that transcended politics, transcended party; it didn't matter which administration was in, it didn't matter who was in charge, we were going to make sure that the perpetrators of that horrible act — that they received justice.

So it's some comfort, I hope, to all of you to know that when those guys took those extraordinary risks going into Pakistan, that they were doing it in part because of the sacrifices that were made in the States. They were doing it in the name of your brothers that were lost.

And finally, let me just say that, although 9/11 obviously was a high water mark of courage for the New York Fire Department and a symbol of the sacrifice, you guys are making sacrifices every single day. It doesn't get as much notoriety, it doesn't get as much attention, but every time you run into a burning building, every time that you are saving lives, you're making a difference. And that's part of what makes this city great and that's part of what makes this country great.

So I want to thank you from the bottom of my heart and on behalf of the American people for the sacrifices that you make every single day. And I just want to let you know that you're always going to have a President and an administration who's got your back the way you've got the backs of the people of New York over these last many years.

So God bless you. God bless the United States of America.

And with that, I'm going to try some of that food. All right? Appreciate you. Thank you.