Ed Koch: Rudy Giuliani, Nasty Man

Guiliani: Nasty Man is a book that I wrote in 2000 when Rudy was considering running for the U.S. Senate against Hillary Clinton. However, because he was then suffering from prostate cancer, Rudy decided not to run. Today, he has not only recovered, he is the Republican frontrunner in the race for president of the U.S. Now that Rudy is back in the limelight, the publisher of Guiliani: Nasty Man, Barricade Books, intends to republish it with a new introduction by me. Many political pundits believe that Republican Rudy and Democrat Hillary will end up the nominees of their respective parties. I am supporting Hillary. However, were she not the Democratic nominee, I expect to support whichever Democrat wins the nomination.

In my opinion, it would be very harmful to our country if Rudy were to become president. Rudy simply does not tell the truth when it suits him not to. When he ran for mayor in 1993 against David Dinkins, Rudy asked me to lunch with him, hoping to persuade me to support him. When David Dinkins defeated me in the 1989 Democratic primary, I supported him in the general election. David acknowledged the critical importance of my support. I decided that I could not support him for reelection in 1993 because of the 1991 Crown Heights riots, when black mobs ran uncontrolled through the streets of Crown Heights in anti-Semitic riots. Yankel Rosenbaum, a Lubavitcher Jew, was killed, dozens of Jews were injured and Jewish homes and businesses were vandalized. The lack of an adequate police response was attributed by Governor Cuomo’s appointee, Richard H. Girgenti, the state’s criminal justice director, to Dinkins’ failure to take charge and require the police to do their job and protect the Lubavitcher community from the raging mobs.

In 1993, I asked Rudy why he had the U.S. Marshal handcuff several stockbrokers when leading them out of their offices after arresting them, shaming them before their colleagues. He responded that he had nothing to do with that decision, saying, “It was the agent’s decision because the brokers refused to leave, thinking the arrest was a joke.” I don’t believe that is true.

I also asked Rudy why he allowed Sukhreet Gabel, daughter of the late Justice Hortense Gabel, to tape her mother on the telephone in order to provide evidence to help in the prosecution of her mother. Rudy said that he had “told [Sukhreet] not to, but she inadvertently pressed the wrong button and taped her.” He went on, “I explained this to the judge at the arraignment.” I don’t believe that is true.

His latest failed test of veracity, this time under oath, is best explained by a New York Times’ reporter’s analysis of March 30, 2007. The analysis related to Rudy’s appearance before a grand jury testifying on his appointment of Bernard Kerik as NYC Police Commissioner. The article stated, “Rudolph W. Giuliani told a grand jury that his former chief investigator remembered having briefed him on some aspects of Bernard B. Kerik’s relationship with a company suspected of ties to organized crime before Mr. Kerik’s appointment as New York City police commissioner, according to court records. Mr. Giuliani, testifying last year under oath … said he had no memory of the briefing, but he did not dispute that it had taken place ... Mr. Giuliani had previously said that he had never been told of Mr. Kerik’s entanglement with the company before promoting him to the police job or later supporting his failed bid to be the nation’s homeland security secretary. In his testimony, given in April 2006, Mr. Giuliani indicated that he must have simply forgotten that he had been briefed on one or more occasions as part of the background investigation of Mr. Kerik before his appointment to the police post.”

Can you imagine Rudy accepting such testimony from a criminal defendant? Is he any different than I. Lewis “Scooter” Libby who was recently convicted of perjury, having relied on a defense of faulty memory? Ridiculous. I don’t believe Giuliani for a moment.

Rudy, who had supported gun control as mayor, but now seeking the support of the Republican anti-gun control ranks, says his support for controls only related to NYC. Not true, since he supported the Brady Bill, which applied gun controls to the entire nation. The Times reports, “As mayor of New York City, Rudolph W. Giuliani became the favorite Republican of gun control advocates … But as a presidential candidate, Mr. Giuliani now talks very differently about guns … as mayor he advocated national standards, while recently he has said that gun control issues should be decided by state and local governments.”

There will be much more on Rudy’s record as he is examined by the national media. I believe the Giuliani myth is already starting to unravel.