The city’s other four boroughs are full of work-a-day people leading normal lives and many of them are potential Republican voters Upstate

The city’s other four boroughs are full of work-a-day people leading normal lives, and many of them are potential Republican voters Upstate, there are plenty of conservatives. Ronald Reagan carried the state twice; it is only in recent years that New York has seemed to drift out of the Republicans’ reach.In the immediate aftermath of 11 September, it seemed that 2004 might be a good year to put that right. Back then, there was no reason to suppose that security issues would be so divisive. George Bush showing solidarity with the violated city: what an ideal way to project presidentiality and use the power of incumbency to sweep back to office, perhaps even carrying New York state.That now seems a long time ago. The Republicans are no longer thinking in terms of capturing New York, and some of them regret that they are not in Detroit or Philadelphia, where their presence might assist the campaigning effort in battleground states.Yet the Republicans might derive an advantage from being in New York. But Manhattanites were inspiring themselves to be even more outrageous than usual.

An island off the coast of America, Manhattan is the capital of a country which does not exist. A lot of the world’s richest people have homes here, as does an even higher proportion of the globe’s most exotic inhabitants. There were more androgynous creatures on display yesterday in Fifth Avenue than the average Thai brothel. I could not face crossing over into the US from Canada this summer because so many of my nice, middle-class American Muslim friends warned me that they feel they are living under a new McCarthyism, fascism even.We must engage with angry young Muslim men – who have many good reasons to be angry – and give them back some faith in genuinely held and lived Western values. They would forgive our arrogance with one iconic show of humility.We must also start to deal with potential recruits to terrorism with more intelligent analysis, maturity and sophistication And don’t, for heaven’s sake, lie to them any more.

‘Some of My Best Friends Are…’ is published by Methuen this week
More from Yasmin Alibhai-Brown. Only this will stop them believing that the West is always against their interests.y.alibhai-brown independent.co.ukThe author’s collection of articles. He is their latest hero, someone who stood up to white power. We can only understand this (and we must) if we can emerge from the political and cultural solipsism that has gripped us since 11 September 2001.Perhaps Bush and Blair can use this anniversary to come clean and apologise for the misguided war in Iraq (in my dreams, I know.) That would have a profound effect on the Muslim world. This isn’t about public relations, but about how we can behave with integrity even when we are as terrified as we are today.Although I understand the need for special powers in these perilous times, some of the more pernicious anti- terrorism laws in the US and UK are not helping us to fight terrorism, only encouraging it. Thanks to our immoral Iraq crusade, untold more warriors are joining up across the world. We are told by our politicians that a wish to destroy our Western civilisation is what prompts these soldiers of evil Maybe this is true for some.