The International Terrorism Center Is Dead

....Long may it molder.

And three cheers to New York Governor George Pataki for delivering the coup de grace (via Powerline):

Governor George Pataki has cancelled plans to build the controversial International Freedom Center at the World Trade Center site - and representatives of the center say the location change has forced the entire project to be scrapped.

The center had drawn criticism from some 9/11 victims' family members because it would not focus exclusively on the terror attacks. Family members also said the IFC could potentially contain exhibits that were anti-American.

Pataki said Wednesday that he's given the center a chance to clarify its intentions, but there's just too much opposition.

In a statement, Pataki said: “The creation of an institution that would show the world our unity and our resolve to preserve freedom in the wake of the horrific attacks is a noble pursuit. But freedom should unify us. This center has not.”

Now it should be understood, lest I oversell Governor Pataki's achievement, that he only banned the IFC from being constructed on the WTC site itself. The anti-American terror-symps could have built their Osama shrine anyplace else around Ground Zero. But in a very telling decision, they've chosen to forget the whole thing instead:

[F]reedom center officials abruptly terminated their project after learning of the governor's decision.

"We do not believe there is a viable alternative place for the IFC at the World Trade Center site," read the freedom center's statement. "We consider our work, therefore, to have been brought to an end."

Based on this decision, one can only conclude that their "work" was to rub the noses of New Yorkers and Americans at large in dhimmist anti-nationalist self-loathing:

[T]heir reaction makes clear that they intended the IFC not just to present an alternative viewpoint espousing a why-do-they-hate-us exploration, but that they wanted to ensure that their approach supplanted the memorials that would directly recall the barbarity of the acts themselves.

The IFCers didn't want their golden bin Laden statue to compete with proper memorials to the thousands al Qaeda murdered four years ago; they wanted it to supplant them. They wanted the dead and their surviving loved ones to be silenced and forgotten as though they never existed. One can scarcely imagine OBL himself not favoring sentiments much different from these.

And when Governor Pataki denied them their site, they picked up their ball and went home. To which the proper response is, "Good riddance to bad rubbish!"

If only it was a last goodbye....