Symbolic pitch of baseball helps a nation's healing

War on Terrorism: New York

Sporting fervour mixed with patriotic passion at Yankee Stadium in New York late on Tuesday evening when President George Bush strode to the middle of the field to throw the ceremonial first pitch before a World Series baseball game between the New York Yankees and the Arizona Diamondbacks.

For the capacity crowd of 58,000 fans – mostly Yankees followers – it was a moment of sheer emotional overdrive.

Mr Bush is a huge enthusiast of the game and the former owner of the Texas Rangers team in Dallas. When he managed to throw rather a good pitch the stadium erupted into chants of "USA! USA!"

Three F-14 fighter jets roared overhead and a gigantic American flag was brought on to the field by 60 West Point military cadets. As if all that were not enough, a bald eagle flew down to the pitcher's mound after it was released from the main scoreboard.

For the President, togged up in a Fire Department of New York windcheater, his visit was – to use the baseball cliché – a clear political home run. One day after Americans were warned to be on super-high alert for new terrorist attacks, he had walked on to the floodlit field without a bodyguard to do the honours for both teams.

With the President's popularity ratings far into the stratosphere, he hardly needed the additional boost.

But the move was a clear attempt by the White House to show it is serious when it asks Americans to take heed of the security alerts but to lead their lives normally. There is nothing more intrinsic to autumn in New York than a night at the stadium with the Yankees, who have won four out of the previous five World Series.

The Mayor of the city, Rudolph Giuliani, told reporters Mr Bush's visit showed "we're not afraid, we're undeterred and that life is moving on the way it should".

Troy Brohawn, of the Diamondbacks, was also impressed. "I'm sure he's pretty busy right now," he said, "and for him to show up here, it's great – it adds a little more excitement."

Security that would have been tight even without the presidential visit was elevated to extraordinary levels at the stadium in the Bronx. All backpacks and other packages were confiscated from fans and about 2,000 police, uniformed or in plain clothes, wandered through the throng.

Thousands of fans, held up by the queues to get through metal detectors, missed the opening ceremonies and Mr Bush's brief on-field appearance – the first by an American president at a World Series game since Dwight Eisenhower. It was also Mr Bush's third morale-boosting visit to New York since the suicide plane attacks on the World Trade Centre on 11 September.

* Armoured cars were moving out of ground zero in Manhattan last night loaded with tons of gold and silver found under the rubble of the World Trade Centre. The precious metals, worth about $375m (£260m), were inside a vault owned by the Bank of Nova Scotia, housed in building four of the destroyed centre.