Former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani told The New York Post that he “always knew something was wrong” with former New York Congressman Anthony Weiner who resigned from Congress two years ago after tweeting several inappropriate photos of himself.
“I wasn’t stunned when he got in trouble. I know him for years and always knew something was wrong with him,” Giuliani said at his 10th wedding anniversary party last week.
But msnbc’s Lawrence O’Donnell points out that the former New York City mayor may not be the best judge of character, and the recent release of his scandal-clad former police commissioner, Bernie Kerik, proves why Giuliani is not the person you want to listen to when it comes to judging someone’s character.
“Giuliani proved himself to be the worst judge of character in the long history of New York City mayors who have appointed New York City police commissioners, when he appointed his soulmate Bernie Kerik to that job. New York City Police Commissioner is the most important police job in America, running by far the biggest police department in the country,” O’Donnell said Wednesday night.
O’Donnell continued, “Bernie Kerik went on to become the first and only NYC police commissioner to go to jail. But before Bernie Kerik’s crimes caught up with him, he was actually on his way up from NYC police commissioner. It was when the FBI was doing the background check on Bernie Kerik to be George W. Bush’s Secretary of Homeland Security, that the lies of Bernie Kerik started to surface.”
The public discovered that Kerik was a tax evader, deliberately lying to the IRS about his hidden income from a book he wrote about what a hero he was in the aftermath of 9/11. It was also uncovered that Kerik had used a mob-related company that had been barred from doing business with the city of New York to do free renovations on his apartment.
After two unrelated ethics violations and a sentence of four years in federal prison for 8 felony charges, including tax fraud, Bernie Kerik was released early Wednesday on account of good behavior.
In Wednesday’s Rewrite, Lawrence O’Donnell argues that Rudy Giuliani has no reason to offer judgment of Anthony Weiner.
“Now Rudy Giuliani wants to stand in judgment of Anthony Weiner’s tweets. Rudy Giuliani, who has had three wives to Anthony Weiner’s one. Rudy Giuliani, who himself was caught having at least one affair while mayor, wants to judge on moralistic grounds. Anthony Weiner, who unlike Rudy Giuliani and Bernie Kerik, has never been caught having an affair with anyone–he was caught tweeting. Anthony Weiner was not caught stealing, like Bernie Kerik who Rudy Giuliani had judged to be an honorable man.”
MS NOW staff