Fox News called in ex-con Bernard Kerik to lecture the rest of us about obeying the law in the wake of a New York grand jury’s decision not to indict white police officer Daniel Pantaleo in the choking death of unarmed, African American Eric Garner today.
In case you’ve forgotten, Kerik was the police commissioner under Rudy “blacks need to start behaving better” Giuliani and might have headed Homeland Security under George W. Bush were it not for the criminal behavior that was revealed during the vetting process. In the end, Kerik pleaded guilty to eight felony charges, including corruption and tax fraud, and was sentenced to four years in jail.
But on Your World today, Kerik was identified merely as a former New York City police commissioner.
Kerik said:
People have a right to protest. They have a right to peacefully protest. They do not have a right to commit arson, robbery, violent assaults and burglaries and all the other stuff that we’ve seen over the last several weeks.
…This process has taken place. It is our Constitution, it’s the laws we live by. Get over it. Understand that it happens. Our system is not perfect, by no means. …But the bottom line is the grand jury made a decision, we have to live by that and we have to move on.
Of course, the issue is much larger than this particular case. But Kerik and host Neil Cavuto seemed not to have noticed. Or maybe they just didn’t care.
When asked, Kerik said he saw no reason not to go through with the tree lighting ceremony in Rockefeller Center tonight:
We can’t stop the tree lighting. We can’t stop the events that will happen from now throughout the Christmas season. We shouldn’t change our lives because some people are irritated or agitated by a process that is our law.
To top it all off, Kerik blamed Garner and Brown for their own deaths:
Once they violate the law, then they have to be taken into custody, they have to be held accountable for their actions. And keep in mind, Eric Garner and Michael Brown would be alive today had they not resisted arrest. That is the bottom line and I think people have to realize that.
Don't get me wrong. I abhor and condemn any kind of violence or law breaking. But excuse me for not wanting a lecture from a convicted felon who flouted multiple laws when it suited him - while holding himself up as an icon of good citizenship.
Other Fox hosts are questioning the death of Garner. But Cavuto never challenged a word.
Watch it below.