NEW YORK, NY March 11, 2004 — President Bush is in Long Island today, attending a ground-breaking for a September Eleventh memorial. His visit today - the first to New York in months - comes as Republican Party officials are vowing to keep 9-11 front and center in the President's campaign for re-election. WNYC's Andrea Bernstein takes a look at how other candidates have handled the terrorist attacks and their aftermath in their own campaigns.

Bush: I'm George W. Bush and I approve this ad.

In the first major ad of the general election campaign, an image quickly flashes across the screen of the smouldering ruins of the twin towers followed by a flag-draped coffin being removed from the rubble.

The ad provoked immediate controversy, and comes in stark contrast to how New York leaders have handled the attacks in their own advertising campaigns.

Mayor Rudolph Giuliani was the most prominent of those officials. Because of term limits he couldn't run for re-election. But his endorsement of his would-be successor, then billionaire media mogul Michael Bloomberg, was political gold.

Giuliani: Its been an honor to be your Mayor for eight years. You may not always have agreed with me. But I gave it my all. I love this city and I'm confident that it will be in good hands with Mike Bloomberg .

There was no need to show images of the then still-burning wreckage. Just seeing Mayor Giuliani was in itself a reminder of the attacks. Instead of causing controversy, this stirred emotions. Many analysts say the ad won the election for Michael Bloomberg.

The closest Bloomberg came to showing any imagery of the ruined World Trade Center was in a negative ad about his opponent, Democrat Mark Green. It showed row upon row of lit candles, and people holding signs that said thank you, and New York's heroes. At the end came a taped radio interview with Green.

Green: I actually believe that if I should have been the mayor during such a calamity I would have done as well or better than Rudy Giuliani.

Really? The ad queried in white letters as it came to a conclusion.

This ad also stirred emotions, but successfully directed those emotions against Green.

A year later, nerves were still raw. Governor George Pataki never used any imagery from the attacks in his reelection campaign. The closest he came to talking about them was in this ad, which ran in early September, 2002.

Pataki: Instead of tough times pulling us apart, they've brought us together. We've set aside our differences and united around on makes us all New Yorkers I'm proud of what you've done. I'm proud to be your governor. I just wanted to take this opportunity to say thank you.

For New Yorkers, almost all of whom seemed to know someone who lost a loved one, that was about all that was needed to bring back the emotion of 9/11. But two years and two wars later, the Bush campaign decided to be more direct.

In the places where the ads are running, eighteen swing states, most viewers watched the attacks on television.

Charles B. Strozier, a psychoanalyst and John Jay College professor has studied the difference in people's reaction to the attacks depending on whether they witnessed the event in person or saw it on tv. Strozier says people outside New York tend to feel rage rather than grief, because the could watch the events from the safe space of their living rooms.

Strozier: not up close, not real, not seeing people dying, not feeling it not smelling the death for four months, not breathing the dust, not knowing people who actually died.

As a result, Strozier says, the Bush ads are far less traumatic for non-New Yorkers.

Both Pataki and Giuliani have defended the Bush ads -- if not the precise imagery in them. And in New York City this week, Republican Party Chair Ed Gillespie promised voters would hear a lot more about 9/11 before the election is through. For WNYC, I'm Andrea Bernstein.