A Decade of Hope Read Online Free PDF

disappeared or dissipated. We might have pushed some Taliban out of Afghanistan, but they’re still there, a force in that world that sees whatever we’re doing over here as evil. I’m offended when people think that anyone who took a stance against building a mosque near Ground Zero is a racist or a Muslim hater. Look at it this way: Muslims killed many of my friends, killed family members of some of the people who said I don’t like the idea of a mosque down by Ground Zero, and so I am sensitive to the subject. We have to be sensitive to those 9/11 families who think this. We owe it to them. They’re not saying that they believe there shouldn’t be Muslims in America or that Muslims don’t have a right to exist. The idea of building a mosque has now grown to that of building a great Muslim cultural center, and it is just too close to a place that’s considered sacred to many people. Why would one think these family members should get over it?
    No one is saying that every Muslim in the world is to blame for 9/11, but it is undeniable that a battle exists between some segment of people who believe in the Muslim faith and what we would call the West. I think everyone can agree to that. It’s not just a few guys, and once we get rid of those guys who are locked up somewhere in a cave, it will all end. I don’t think anyone believes that. The world continues to be very dangerous, and I am afraid that the next attack could be even more heinous than 9/11.
    I’m talking about a nuclear or radiological event that will affect many thousands of people for many years. I don’t have a security clearance, so I don’t know what intelligence we’re gathering around the world, but just the knowledge that there are people out there who are willing to put a bomb in their shoe or their underwear—that disturbs me. People danced in the streets after 9/11, and I know there would be people who would dance in the streets if a nuclear device were to be detonated in Times Square.
    Can they be successful? I’m not so afraid of it that I’m living out in a cabin in Montana. My family and everyone else I know lives here in New York. We are still the biggest target. We are not running away from it, but certainly we know that it’s possible. In one way we in New York are very fortunate, because we have good leadership in our Police and Fire departments. We all benefit from that. For now, anyway.

Ray Kelly
    Ray Kelly is the only official to hold the office of police commissioner of the city of New York under two mayors—David Dinkins and Michael Bloomberg—separated by eight years. He is a man who was molded by the caring and the personal motivations found within a close-knit Irish Catholic family. He is perhaps the most educated police commissioner who has ever served a major police department (a group that includes President Theodore Roosevelt). A former U.S. Marine, he brings to his leadership style the values of integrity, strength, and courage that were taught in his training and refined on the battlefields of Vietnam. He is known as a creator of innovative and important programs and policies designed to keep the public protected from the social hazards of crime and safe in the midst of New York City’s greatest challenge to the security of the homeland.
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    I was the youngest of five—three brothers and one sister—and my parents were loving, hardworking people. I always remember my mother working—she had a part-time job as a checker at Macy’s. My father was basically a milkman for a significant period of time, until there was a change in the law, brought about by [Mayor Fiorello] LaGuardia. LaGuardia was not a hero in our household. To the best of my knowledge, the milk regulations were changed so that you could now buy it in supermarkets, and so the price was lowered. As a result, the route deliverers basically went out of business.