On Sept. 11, 2001, when hijacked airliners destroyed the World Trade Center in New York and crashed into the Pentagon and into a Pennsylvania field, killing nearly 3,000 people in the nation’s worst terrorist attack, it was Mr. Cheney who took charge at the White House.
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Mr. Bush, who was visiting a school in Florida as the attacks took place, was shuttled to secure locations in Louisiana and Nebraska. The vice president activated defense measures across the nation, put American forces on alert around the world and ordered the Capitol evacuated and government leaders removed to safety. From a White House bunker, he maintained continuous contact with the president and other officials and kept what many called a steady hand at the helm through the crisis.
And that, my friends, is a wrap. For the record, the very first Uni Watch column was published in The Village Voice on May 26, 1999; this final blog post is appearing on Oct. 31, 2025. That’s a span of 26 years, five months, and five days — not a bad run for a project that I initially thought would last a couple of years at the most.
Thank you — each and every one of you — for helping to make that 26-year run possible. You all Get It™. And as the saying goes, don’t be sad that it’s over; be happy that it happened. Peace. — Paul
Behind a fence, and past several vehicle checkpoints, the campus was a spacious expanse of nothing, except for one corner, which was populated by a row of numbered sheds. The sheds were white, narrow, tall, and several football fields in length; they reminded me of the livestock barns I visited as a child at the Minnesota State Fair. Flanking each shed was a row of diesel generators and industrial air-conditioners.