From Talking Points Memo:
Rudy:
“The reality is, if we take a look at Bernard Kerik’s service as police commissioner, he was an excellent police commissioner. Crime went down unexpectedly under Bernard Kerik.
“Then on the other side of it, there were these problems. I take the responsibility. We should have known about them. We should have dealt with them. We didn’t. It was my mistake. I made it. I am sorry for it. I’ve learned from it. But in the balance of things, you take a look at the success that I had, it must be that I am generally picking the right people. Because I am sure not doing this by myself.”
TPM Commentary:
Just to point this out one more time, Rudy also personally recommended to George Bush that he appoint Kerik as chief of the Department of Homeland Security. That’s kind of a key appointment for a President. So this seems like a worthwhile fact to keep in mind about Rudy the Presidential candidate, particularly since he’s telling us that he’s the guy best equipped to handle what he calls the Terrorists’ War Against Us.
I don’t know why on earth Rudy would even say such a thing. Or is his just that arrogant of a person to think that people are just going to look the other way…You’d think he’d want this to GO AWAY, and by commenting like this he’s just guaranteed that it’s not going to.
Few comments from the piece:
Anonymous wrote on October 12, 2007 4:51 PM:
Neither Rudy nor Kerik had anything to do with crime coming down in NYC unless similar excellence should be credited to virtually every mayor and police chief in every big city in the US. Crime fell dramatically everywhere during the whole decade.
Dr. Cheese in WI wrote on October 12, 2007 5:14 PM:
Guiliani is demonstrating the exact same “loyalty” attribute that has been so troubling with President Bush. If he takes this same attitude into the White House, it seems likely we will have more “heck of a job, Brownie” moments. This attribute (a seeminly blind, mindless loyalty to one’s friends/appointments) should also be seen as a disqualifying attribute for a president.
David Scher wrote on October 12, 2007 9:03 PM:
I am a New Yorker who lived through the Giuliani years and I can report that I and several of my friends who wanted to report crimes; a mugging, a car theft, an assault and a child being beaten were told that the police could do nothing unless we had eyewitnesses, names and addresses etc. of the perpetrators. This was the policy of the dept. to keep the stats down. A detective in our precinct told me as much.
Share on Facebook
Share This
