Promise Keeper, by Bernie Kerik (America's 9/11 Police Commissioner)

New York Post ^ | November 1, 2004 | BERNARD KERIK

[OESY]

...I am voting for George W. Bush because he has shown me that he has the resolve and the strength to fight and win the war against terrorism. In this year's presidential election, the first held since the attacks of 9/11, the most important election in our lifetime, these qualities have never been more critical.

I'm voting for President Bush because I was the commissioner of the New York City Police Department on 9/11 and I watched the planes crash into the World Trade Center, and take the lives of 23 of my cops, 37 Port Authority officers, 343 firefighters and almost 2,400 innocent civilians. And three days later, George Bush was at my side, and standing shoulder to shoulder with the grief stricken heroes still searching for survivors. He stood with us at the site of the worst attack in U.S. history and delivered a promise we desperately needed to hear — that the madmen responsible for this evil "would hear from us."

I'm voting for President Bush because he fulfilled that promise in three months, breaking the Taliban and al Qaeda's hold on Afghanistan and turning a terrorist breeding ground, responsible for training more than 20,000 fanatics, into a democracy, where the first presidential vote in Afghan history was cast by a 19-year-old woman....

When I cast my vote, I am going to remember these moments. I am going to remember what I lost on 9/11, and how I felt on that morning. I'm going to reflect on what I would have thought on that day if I had heard someone like John Kerry speak to me about global tests, about nuisances, about how this day "didn't change me much at all."

And then I am going to vote for President George W. Bush.

[OESY]

Bernard B. Kerik served as the 40th Police Commissioner of the New York City Police Department and as Interim Minister of the Interior and Senior Policy Advisor to the U.S. Presidential Envoy in Iraq.

[McGavin999]

He really impresses me. There is something so competent about him, just as steadfast as our president.

[cake_crumb]

I read a "nuanced" article by a brain dead, intellectually elite, left wing hack a few months back and had to write to him to correct his contention that nobody from NYC was in Iraq doing any important work. Sorry, I forget the moron's name.

I have nothing but admiration for Kerik's intelligence, discipline, kind nature, courage and determination. He was an excellent police commissioner in NY and he did an exceptional job in helping to put together the structure of the new Iraqi police force. He left behind people who admire and respect him in Iraq, and came home to many people feel the same way.

Bernard Kerik is a hero who understands the nature of our enemy and continued making America and the world safer, ignored by the news media and virtually forgotten many Americans when he left the NYPD when Rudy left office. He didn't have to do anything spectacular in Iraq : he's a hero for committing himself to do an important job and completing his task

I hope he knows that there are still many, many Americans who remember 9/11/01 and it's aftermath very well. I raise my mug of leukwarn coffee to him in honor of all he has done for the people of New york and Iraq. CHEERS!

[cake_crumb]

"We are a poorly-educated people, but we're not stupid."

Good line, and BUMP! to your entire post. Definitely do not believe the polls, because the only results we hear are those in which the issues were specifically worded in a way that guaranteed teh acheivement of the desired results - anything to make President Bush look bad. Every orning, I do a quick run through local, state and national polls, concentrating on the redundant ones. I've found the results different polls asking different questions adn cunducted in the same region varying wildly. Something's seriously wrong with this picture.

Glad you mentioned John O'Neil. Both in text and TV, the man is a roughly polished gem. The media establishment collectively thought "We'll eat this guy for lunch", but he's proven he's every bit as much a thorn in Hanoi John Boy's side as he was 33 years ago.

I believe the president will be reelected by a comfortable margin. Despite the DNCs best efforts, the focus of this election is our national security. It's almost no contest.