Family and friends from several states across the continental U.S. gathered with the University community yesterday in memory of alum Josh Rosenthal, who lost his life on the 94th floor of the World Trade Center’s South Tower one year ago yesterday.
- Paul Wong
- KELLY LIN/Daily
Former National Security Advisor Brent Scowcroft speaks yesterday in the Michigan League Ballroom.
The lecture, titled “The Josh Rosenthal Education Fund Lecture,” was organized by Marilyn Rosenthal, Josh’s mother, in memoriam of her son.
It was presented in the Michigan League Ballroom, in conjunction with the Gerald R. Ford School of Public Policy.
Rosenthal, a ’79 graduate from the University, was a senior vice president at Fiduciary Trust Company International and had a particular interest in public policy.
“Josh was a realist and an idealist all rolled into one,” Marilyn said.
“I think he would understand that we have to balance now, in this new world, the need for security and our strong love of freedoms and democracy. It’s going to be a tough challenge, but we have to find a way to bring those two things together.”
After losing her son in last year’s attacks, Marilyn said she found an answer to the haunting question of where Americans and the world should go from this point.
“Those people who attacked the World Trade Center exploited us, but we have to accept the fact that it happened and we have to get good minds together to learn how to protect ourselves without losing some of our freedoms,” she said.
“In 200 years, we have not needed an office of Homeland Security. That tells you what kind of a world we’re living in,” said Lt. General Brent Scowcroft, who worked as assistant to the President for National Security Affairs under the administrations of former presidents Gerald Ford and George Bush.
“The initial military response was quick and brilliant, but we didn’t fully appreciate that this was a different kind of war,” he said.
“This was fundamentally a war of intelligence and we cannot win this on the defensive. We can only solve it on the offensive.”
While dealing with personal tragedies and security issues, Americans have had to face economic struggles in the past 365 days.
Business Prof. Marina Whitman said two major economic questions that arose after Sept. 11 were whether the U.S. economy would collapse and if America could move toward integration of global economies.
“Our economy was momentarily stopped dead in its tracks on September 11, but it seems to have been remarkably resilient,” Whitman said.
“While we learned a painful lesson in geography and the dark side of globalization, the financial markets recovered extremely fast after September 11.”
One year after the attacks, the struggling economy and fears of more terrorism have taken a toll on the American public with people not completely recovered from the stress of that day.
“The slowly healing American psyche still shows symptoms of mental distress,” Institute for Social Research Forty percent of Americans say we feel less safe now than before Sept. 11,” said David Featherman, director of the Institute for Social Research.