Been writing about this for some time, but since I am on vacation, Bouldin beat me to the latest installment of Giuliani's 9/11 facade crumbling thanks to the efforts of firefighters, the REAL heroes of 9/11.
I will simply repost Bouldin's piece from Daily Gotham since there is not much I can add except a reminder that this is not the first time firefighters have been down on Rudy [1]. From here this diary is Michael's:
It was on September 11th, 2001, that I first started hating George Bush. We watched the towers come down, three miles away, and the Decider was nowhere to be seen, delivering a scared little video message to the nation only hours later from some Air Force Base in some god-forsaken spot. Later, he gave an equally cringe-inducing little speech from the Oval Office; that speech must have left most of the country wondering how this crisis was going to be mastered with such a scared little man in charge. "Little" is the operative, descriptive word on so many things about the Bush era; on 9/11, little turned into too little, too late.
Into that vacuum stepped Rudy Giuliani, reassuring his grieving City, telling us what we needed to hear without sugar-coating, and with a tone of grace that was and remains admirable. Out of this, however, he has woven, with great skill, a modern myth of heroism, one potent enough to make him the front-runner for his party's nomination for President. Indispensable to that myth are the firefighters of the City of New York.
They aren't having any of it. Yesterday, the International Association of Firefighters released this video:
Here's a partial transcript (any errors are mine):
There are a number of candidates on both sides of the political aisle running for the highest office in our nation. Our job is to inform you on their positions on the issues important to our profession and you as a firefighter.
In the 2008 Presidential race, one candidate is running on what he perceives as his 9/11 credentials. Rudy Giuliani has used the horrible events of September 11th, 2001, to create a carefully crafted persona. But the fact is what Rudy portrays is not a full picture of the decisions made, that led in our view to the unnecessary deaths of our FDNY members, and the attempt to stop the dignified recovery of those lost.
The urban legend of America's Mayor needs to be balanced by the truth.
Giuliani deserves credit for grace under fire. He stepped into the vacuum created by the bigger failure that was George Bush's performance. There is another side of that story, one that needs to be told; this video tells it. Pass it on.
[Update]: There's an associated web site, here [2].
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