The Battle for Ground Zero, Part 209

Some 9/11 families have come forward with yet another proposal on how to display names at the WTC Memorial. If you thought that this issue was settled at the end of last year, you haven't been paying attention. Those opposed to the Mayor's naming plan are going to begin a media blitz.

The plan backed by Bloomberg will organize the names of 2,979 victims randomly around the memorial's reflecting pools. Most names will be grouped only by the tower the victims were in.

Firefighters, cops and other first responders will be listed together, as will the passengers aboard the four hijacked airlines, victims of the Pentagon jet crash, and those who died in the 1993 WTC bombing.

But Lutnick and other 9/11 family members say they want the names and ages of their loved ones grouped by the firm they were working with, with the floor numbers and company affiliation spelled out.

Bloomberg defended the proposed format for listing names.

"We've addressed the issue. As I said you can't please everybody. We've come up with a rational basis on which to list the names and to both memorialize and make a memorial we'll all be proud of," Bloomberg said.

Meanwhile, in sad news, Cesar Borja died just hours before the State of the Union Address. His son, Ceasar Jr., attended the Address, seeing it as his duty to draw attention to the plight of Ground Zero workers who have fallen ill.

The cop's death came just 21/2 hours before his son appeared at President Bush's speech before Congress as a guest of Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton in an effort to draw attention to the medical horrors so many Ground Zero workers are now facing.

"Heroes are not to be failed," Borja said yesterday, as he prepared to return to New York. "Heroes are supposed to be helped and rescued, because that is what they do. They save innocent lives. They deserve the right to be saved themselves.

"I will continue to fight," he added. "I hope that the American people can feel what I feel - and I hope they never feel what I feel."

Borja, 21, was eating dinner before the event when he got a call from his cousin, telling him that his dad, 52, had died.

"Now I represent all of these things that are bigger than me or my family or my father," Borja said. "I can do this because sooner or later I will be again a normal, hardworking middle-class boy in New York City working at Starbucks and going to Hunter College."

Ceasar Borja's mom, Eva Borja, 47, said yesterday that Clinton called after the speech to offer condolences.

Cesar Borja, whose son spells his name differently, worked for 20 years as a city cop and volunteered to help comb through the rubble at Ground Zero after the devastating 2001 terror attacks.

Never a smoker, he developed lung disease roughly two years later.

The younger Borja said that he had hoped to speak to Bush "to express to him the importance of the funds to continue."

UPDATE:
For those who haven't been watching the Ground Zero webcams, here's a photo that should get your attention. That's the sight of Freedom Tower structural steel reaching to near street level. We're still a long way away from a completed building, but this is tangible. Two massive cranes that will help hoist the steel and concrete skyward are going to be assembled by the end of February.