E-Mail This Article to a Friend 9/11 MEMORIALS The politics of remembrance BY DEIRDRE FULTON

Two nights before Saturday’s candlelight vigil on Boston Common commemorating the third anniversary of the September 11 terrorist attacks, another memorial had taken place just steps away at the Park Street T stop. That one marked the death of the 1000th soldier fighting in the Iraq war. On the surface, the candles at both events were lit for unrelated reasons, and the moments of silence were tributes to separate tragedies. But it didn’t take much to find disturbing connections between the two — as well as to the upcoming presidential election.

Saturday’s 9/11 vigil became a mini-stumping ground when Tita Puopolo, whose mother, Sonia, died on American Airlines Flight 11, described her admiration for John Kerry, his policies, and the support he offered her family. If elected president, she said, Kerry will "lead us to peace ... [and] bring peace to a terribly troubled world."

"I’ve been very upset about the almost sole focus of the Republican candidates on the war," said Cambridge resident Barbara Terry, whose jacket bore a Kerry-Edwards pin. Terry, 60, accused the Bush campaign of preying on people’s fears about war and terrorism to bolster its support.

Her friend Emily Snyder, 59, of Arlington, agreed. "I think the Republicans are really trying to draw that link between 9/11 and the war in Iraq, and I personally don’t believe it’s there at all," she said. "It’s being kind of clouded by everyone thinking about 9/11 and thinking that Bush is keeping us safe [from another attack]."

On September 3, a Newsweek poll asked whether respondents thought going to war with Iraq has made Americans feel safer from terrorism. Fifty percent said no. Indeed, at Saturday’s vigil, one New York City resident with a TROOPS OUT NOW button adorning her backpack said she felt New Yorkers were more vulnerable to attacks "because of the Bush administration’s foreign policy." But praise for Kerry was far from universal. Though she plans to vote for the Democratic candidate in November, 25-year-old Jesse Harold said she still thinks Kerry "missed a huge opportunity to hold up the Bush administration’s policy and say, ‘This is what happens when you run a country for greed.’ "

But the day wasn’t all about partisan politics. Earlier in the evening, at a memorial service at Northeastern University, third-year student Cory Lloyd said he wished the dialogue was different. "I don’t think the right issues regarding September 11 are discussed," the Concord, New Hampshire, native explained. "They’re discussing mostly the war. And what we really should be hearing is what we’re going to do to change our lives so this doesn’t happen again." With two friends in the service, one who just returned from active duty and one who is still in Iraq, Lloyd decided to honor the anniversary of 9/11 in a way that had nothing to do with war, campaigns, or politics and everything to do with celebrating life: he went skydiving.