America’s Song, Part 2

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The Washington Post

News, True Crime, Politics

4.1 • 4.6K Ratings

🗓️ 10 September 2021

⏱️ 32 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

With his performance of “God Bless America” during Game 3 of the 2001 World Series, New York City Police Department Officer Daniel Rodriguez comforted a nation still grieving in the wake of 9/11. It felt like a timeless moment. Instead, it proved fleeting. Twenty years later, the reasons for that tell a sad American story of political divisions and the embellished patriotism that now polarizes sports. The weight of it all can be felt through the struggles of Rodriguez, a man still trying to bless people with his voice, while America attempts to rediscover its own.

Join Washington Post sports columnist Jerry Brewer, sports features writer Kent Babb and audio producer Bishop Sand as they explore how a man and a nation attempt to heal and find meaning after trauma and tragedy.

In Part 2, Jerry, Kent and Bishop visit Daniel in L.A. to see what his life is like now, and look into the origins of the song that made him famous. Then they look at what else happened to him, the song and the country in the years after 9/11, as shifting political winds drove Americans further apart.

To find photos of Daniel Rodriguez then and now, visit wapo.st/911.

Transcript

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0:00.0	Give a helping hand this holiday season with the Washington Post helping hand.
0:04.6	This is John Kelly and I'm writing about Bread for the City, Friendship Place, and Miriam's Kitchen over the next few weeks.
0:11.1	Go to posthelpinghand.com to learn more and donate today.
0:16.4	Hi, Allison here.
0:18.0	Today as we look back on the 20th anniversary of 9-11, we're bringing you part two of our series, America's Song.
0:24.8	If you haven't yet heard part one, please go back and listen to that first.
0:28.1	Otherwise, here it is.
0:30.1	Previously on America's Song.
0:32.1	I was known as the Singing Policeman, 9-11 Singing Cop.
0:37.1	Oh, it's the kind of thing.
0:42.1	55,000 people had the same heartbeat and he rose to the occasion.
0:47.1	This was the dream that I was meant to have.
0:49.1	The jobless America was powerful then, but now we're divided as a country.
1:03.1	We spent a couple of days with Daniel Rodriguez in New York.
1:06.1	He opened up about his past and what brought him to St. God Bless America at that World Series just after September 11th.
1:13.1	The performance changed his life, but we're starting to learn that it only pushed down his own grief.
1:20.1	We wanted to know more about his life since that day and how he's doing now.
1:25.1	So a month after that first trip, Jerry produced her Bishop Sam and I flew to California to meet him at his home.
1:32.1	He lives in a little town called Sierra Madre, about 20 miles northeast of downtown LA.
1:38.1	It ain't Brooklyn, it's not Hollywood either. Peacocks were on the streets.
1:45.1	Daniel moved here in 2017 with his third wife, Marla Kavanaugh.
1:52.1	Hello, Marla. Nice to meet you.
	...

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