I write this from Ground Zero--or as close to Ground Zero as
regular people can get. As most of you did, I watched TV with
morbid fascination, looking at pictures of the destruction of the
World Trade Center and surrounding buildings. My sister Robin told
me you can't really "get it" until you see it in
person. She was right. I stared at what were familiar monoliths and
now are yards and yards of rubble, saw mighty steel skeletons
barely standing, walked through the dust and debris, and passed by
fire hydrants and street signs hanging on by a thread. You really
have no idea of the true depth of destruction until you walk these
streets.
I did walk these streets filled with shuttered businesses:
flower shops, drug stores, bagel shops and so much more. I've
never been in a war zone (and never want to be), yet I imagine this
is what one looks like. Now I'm sitting in Moran's, an
Irish pub, the only open business on its block (they were closed
for 10 days after the attacks, suffering mostly "extensive
dust damage"). It's lunchtime and business is brisk.
People are buzzing loudly as if oblivious to the devastation lying
mere feet away.
But that is how it should be. That is how it needs to be
now.
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Before September 11, our economy was headed south in a hurry.
The tragedies just accelerated the plunge. Jobs were being
dis-created in record numbers. Politicians seemed more concerned
with their political agendas than serving their constituents, who
were desperately in need of programs and solutions, not knee-jerk
rhetoric.
I recently heard some small-business experts riding the waves of
doom and gloom. "It's not going to get better for a long
time," they said. With that attitude, this could easily become
a self-fulfilling prophecy. So to all you doomsayers out there, I
say, "Shut up!"
A decade ago, we emerged from our last recession into the
biggest economic boom our nation has experienced. We did that
because of you--you entrepreneurs who started businesses, who
created jobs (about 85 percent of all jobs in the decade), who
bought stuff, who hired people who bought stuff. And the economic
revival was born.
The U.S. economy started to boom 10 years ago not from the top
down, but from the bottom up. You created the jobs; you bought the
technology; you made it all happen. And you will again.
Experts, pundits and government officials need to get out of
their cloistered towers and take a good look at you, the people.
Entrepreneurs and doom and gloom don't mix; if they did, most
businesses wouldn't be started in the first place.
Yes, business is down. Yes, people are scared. And yes, we
haven't been in this position for over a decade. But it
won't last--it never does.
Despite my nearly 24 years living in California, I am a New
Yorker, born and bred. New Yorkers are fighters, and the buzz in
this pub is the classic NY noise--it is the sound of hope. This
city will be rebuilt. Our spirit, as New Yorkers and as Americans,
will survive. Why? Because we are a nation of entrepreneurs. We
don't see opportunities; we seize them.