International Freedom Center finally blocked

After a vigorous campaign on the part of many families of the September 11th victims, with the help of the New York Post and the blogosphere (in particular Michelle Malkin), the International Freedom Center has been finally moved from the WTC site:

Governor George Pataki said today he will direct development officials to drop plans for a museum of freedom at the World Trade Center site, saying it has stirred "too much opposition, too much controversy."
The International Freedom Center would have been put in a cultural center adjacent to a memorial for the Sept. 11 victims, and was part of the master plan for redeveloping the devastated 16-acre site of the nation's worst terrorist attack.
In the last several months, some victims' families, groups of firefighters and police officers and public officials said the center, which would feature historical exhibits expressing the worldwide struggle for freedom, would detract from the Sept. 11 themes and provide a possible forum for anti-U.S. messages.

It is a relief to hear that the site will not be used to distract from memorializing the victims and events of September 11th and I find it surprising that anyone could have thought such a thing appropriate in the first place. Here is the Wall Street Journal editorial by Debra Burlingame (the sister of Charles F. "Chic" Burlingame III, pilot of American Airlines fight 77, which was crashed at the Pentagon on that day) that explains why the IFC would have been a bad idea. Read the whole thing.