I Was A Teenage Ground Zero Rescue Worker

(bumped because there's video now.)



Rudy Giuliani apparently sent a clone or cyborg out to all of those post-9/11 motivational speeches across the country, because he spent all of his available time on the cleanup crew:

ABC News' Jan Simmonds Reports: In Ohio on Thursday, Republican Presidential candidate Rudy Giuliani (R-NY) handed his critics new ammunition regarding his role surrounding 9/11.

Speaking to reporters in Cincinnati, Giuliani said, "I was at ground zero as often, if not more, than most of the workers... I was there working with them. I was exposed to exactly the same things they were exposed to. So in that sense, I'm one of them."

Michael Palladino, head of the Detectives Endowment Association, the union of NYPD detectives, told the Associated Press that the mayor's record can't compare to those who spent 12 months sifting through toxic debris for evidence and human remains.

I'm not sure you can get more tone-deaf than this. First of all, if it's true, then Rudy! is completely unfit to be President since he's about to come down with a terrible respiratory disease like 70% of the other rescue workers. But the fact is that it's just a gross exaggeration. Giuliani was only mayor for a few months after 9/11 before being replaced by Michael Bloomberg. And you can trace his steps through the media and find him at lots of speaking engagements, not in the muck at Ground Zero. I mean there's a public record. Which he should be asked about at every opportunity.

In addition, for Rudy to equate himself with those rescue workers, who actually risked their lives doing their job, mainly because they were told by Rudy's office and Christie Todd Whitman's EPA that the area was safe from toxicity, is just the height of tastelessness.

UPDATE: One worker tells Rudy to stick it:

"That's insulting and disgraceful. He's a liar. I was down there on my hands and knees looking for my son." -- Fire Captain and Giuliani foe James Riches

UPDATE II: Rudy's on the run, now claiming that he was just showing solidarity. The video doesn't lie. His staff must know that these comments will hurt. He's just opened up a HUGE can of worms. Here's quote machine James Riches again:

“He is such a liar, because the only time he was down there was for photo ops with celebrities, with politicians, with diplomats... On 9/11 all he did was run. He got that soot on him, and I don’t think he’s taken a shower since.”

Wow, this is bad.