Twenty-four years ago this autumn, I stood on the Brooklyn Bridge and watched the south tower of the World Trade Center fall in front of my eyes. That terrible season, like all New Yorkers, I saw Republican Mayor Rudolph Giuliani establish himself as a bona fide civic hero. If you had said to me then that in my lifetime, a socialist Muslim would be elected to fill shoes once worn by Rudy, I would have considered it the utmost madness.

Life comes at you fast.

Did you note that Zoh...