Giuliani Wants US Prepared for Attack From Space Invaders

Posted by Steve Benen at 5:44 AM on October 16, 2007.

This post, written by Steve Benen, originally appeared on The Carpetbagger Report

Usually, when Republican presidential candidates field questions about "aliens," it's a conservative voter worried about immigrants who've entered the country illegally. Yesterday in New Hampshire, however, a young boy was worried about actual aliens.

Later Sunday, during a town-hall meeting in Exeter, Giuliani assured a young questioner that preparedness will be key for all crises, including those from outer space.

"If (there's) something living on another planet and it's bad and it comes over here, what would you do?" a boy asked.

Giuliani, grinning, said it was his first question about an intergalactic attack.

"Of all the things that can happen in this world, we'll be prepared for that, yes we will. We'll be prepared for anything that happens," said Giuliani, who mayor during the 9/11 terrorist attacks.

Michael Crowley responded, "I know Rudy is campaigning largely on security, but this is ridiculous."

Now, I'm willing to cut Giuliani plenty of slack on this one -- it's not like he brought up space invaders on his own. He did his best to respond to an unpredictable question from a young kid. Fine.

But his response gets back to something we were talking about earlier.

As Giuliani sees it, he's such an expert on counter-terrorism, he's equipped to keep us safe, whether our attackers originate on this planet or not. He'll get us prepared for anything.

But therein lies the point that Giuliani critics have been trying to emphasize all year: Giuliani's record on emergency preparations, particularly in regards to foreign attackers, is awful.

[Giuliani said,] "I don't think there was anyplace in the country, including the federal government, that was as well prepared for that attack as New York City was in 2001." This assertion flies in the face of all three studies of the city's response -- the 9/11 Commission, the National Institute of Standards & Technology (NIST), and McKinsey & Co., the consulting firm hired by the Bloomberg administration.

Actually, Giuliani didn't create the [New York City Office of Emergency Management] until three years after the 1993 bombing, 27 months into his term. And he didn't open the OEM's new emergency command center until the end of 1999 -- nearly six years after he'd taken office. If he "assumed from the moment I came into office that NYC would be the subject of a terrorist attack," as he told Time when it made him "Person of the Year" in 2001, he sure took a long time to erect what he describes as the city's front line of defense. [...]

Instead of being the best-prepared city, New York's lack of unified command, as well as the breakdown of communications between the police and fire departments, fell far short of the efforts at the Pentagon that day, as later established by the 9/11 Commission and NIST reports. [...]

It's not just the radios and the OEM: Giuliani never forced the police and fire departments to abide by clear command-and-control protocols that squarely put one service in charge of the other during specified emergencies. Though he collected $250 million in tax surcharges on phone use to improve the 911 system, he diverted this emergency funding for other uses, and the 911 dispatchers were an utter disaster that day, telling victims to stay where they were long after the fire chiefs had ordered an evacuation, which potentially sealed the fates of hundreds. And, despite the transparent lessons of 1993, Giuliani never established any protocols for rooftop or elevator rescues in high-rises, or even a strategy for bringing the impaired and injured out -- all costly failings on 9/11.

But perhaps the best evidence of the Giuliani administration's lack of readiness was that no one at its top levels had a top-secret security clearance on 9/11.

Giuliani got applause in New Hampshire for saying, "We'll be prepared for anything that happens," but I'm trying to imagine someone who would be less qualified for taking on domestic security and emergency preparedness. The only person who comes to mind is George W. Bush. Sphere: Related Content

Tagged as: giuliani, national security, aliens, election08

Steve Benen is a freelance writer/researcher and creator of The Carpetbagger Report. In addition, he is the lead editor of Salon.com's Blog Report, and has been a contributor to Talking Points Memo, Washington Monthly, Crooks & Liars, The American Prospect, and the Guardian.