SALON

Monday, Jun 11, 2012 8:20 PM UTC

Ray Kelly is great, according to profile in friend’s magazine

Newsweek says the NYPD chief keeps us safe, and if you don't like his methods, you forgot about 9/11

By

Topics: NYPD, Ray Kelly, New York City, Newsweek, Tina Brown, Media Criticism, Terrorism, War on Terror,

Ray Kelly is great, according to profile in friend's magazineNYPD Commissioner Raymond Kelly

According to a very thorough and convincing profile in Newsweek, New York police commissioner Ray Kelly is America’s best ever terror-fighter, and he personally stops a new 9/11 from happening literally every day. He manages to constantly stop terror plots from destroying the city even though annoying “civil libertarians” and the worthless FBI are constantly getting in his way. It is, clearly, a very fair and unbiased take on the commish, that happens to be written by a guy who has known Kelly for years. And published in a magazine edited by Tina Brown, who has met the commissioner once or twice.

“Kelly’s most critical mission,” according to author Christopher Dickey, “has been to thwart all terrorist threats against the city, and he’s aimed to do that, in some cases, even before a plot is entirely clear to the plotters themselves.” That is some remarkable police work, right? Thwarting plots before they have been plotted!

Plus! “The record, however, is hard to argue with: at least 14 full-blown terrorist attacks have been prevented or failed on Kelly’s watch.” That is hard to argue with, because it is not followed by evidence supporting that claim!

Have critics of “the pugnacious police commissioner, who looks bulldog-tough even in bespoke suits” simply forgotten about 9/11? It seems likely!

Paradoxically, because the approach is so effective, it makes people feel much safer and spurs the belief that aggressive policing is no longer necessary. Like the tattered American flags once draped from windows or flying from car antennas, memories of the horror that settled on New York after 9/11 have faded. Just before the anniversary of the atrocity last year, the Associated Press launched a lengthy series of stories that took a critical look at Kelly’s policing, detailing the surveillance and undercover work in Muslim communities, the cozy relationship with the CIA, and the troubled NYPD–FBI relations. The series won a Pulitzer Prize—and NYPD supporters have been rebutting its details ever since. What Kelly resents in particular is the implication, never proven in print, that he’d gone beyond the very carefully lawyered legal constraints on police activities. And, as he sees it: “These questions would not surface—and did not surface—in 2002.”

There is also a long portion of the article that is very transparently about letting the NYPD push back against a New York Times story that reported on how the NYPD impeded a major anti-terror sting conducted by the FBI and then some stuff about the Etan Patz murder, a case Ray Kelly personally solved himself by waiting for a guy to call in a tip that his brother-in-law had confessed many years ago.

Words you won’t find in the piece: “Mosque,” as in “mosque-crawlers,” the term for informants tasked with monitoring sermons and other religious activities of perfectly law-abiding Muslim New Yorkers as part of a massive surveillance and intelligence-gathering project. “Newark,” where the NYPD regularly conducts legally questionable surveillance and intelligence operations against random Muslim residents and citizens. “Occupy,” the protests and demonstrations that the NYPD has regularly responded to with excessive force, including the arrests of numerous journalists — arrests that Kelly recently blatantly and unambiguously lied about. “Republican National Convention,” where Kelly introduced many of the anti-free speech policing methods that he’d later use against the Occupy movement. “Sean Bell.” “Michael Mineo.” “Michael Marino.” “Adrian Schoolcraft.” “Marijuana arrests.” “Quotas.” “Ticket-fixing.” “Gun-running.” “Evidence planting.” “The Third Jihad.”

But according to Tina Brown, Kelly has “a pugilist’s mug and a lion’s heart” so I guess none of that other stuff, with the constant abuses of power and the complete lack of any sort of accountability, is important enough to mention.

Alex Pareene

Alex Pareene writes about politics for Salon and is the author of "The Rude Guide to Mitt." Email him at apareene@salon.com and follow him on Twitter @pareene More Alex Pareene.

Next Article

Related Stories

More Related Stories

Featured Slide Shows

The week in 10 pics

close X
  • Share on Twitter
  • Share on Facebook
  • Thumbnails
  • Fullscreen
  • 1 of 11
  • Lisa Montgomery embraces her nephew Thursday after a tornado tore apart her home in Cleburne, Texas. The twister killed six people and destroyed entire swaths of the North Texas town.
    Credit: AP/LM Otero

  • Jack McMahon, the defense attorney for abortion doctor Kermit Gosnell, speaks outside the Criminal Justice Center in Philadelphia Tuesday. His client was convicted of killing three babies in his clinic, and will serve multiple life sentences.
    Credit: AP/Matt Rourke

  • A photo taken Monday captures Vice President Joe Biden's response to a Milwaukee second-grader's innovative proposal to end America's epidemic of gun violence. This guy!
    Credit: AP/Jenny Aicher

  • Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., flanked by a grouper-eyed Michele Bachmann, addresses the IRS' admission that it targeted Tea Party groups in advance of the 2012 election. In an op-ed for CNN Thursday, the Kentucky senator slammed the president for his faux outrage.
    Credit: AP/Molly Riley

  • Ousted IRS chief Steven Miller is sworn in on Capitol Hill Friday. Miller testified before the House Ways and Means Committee on the extra scrutiny the agency gave conservative groups applying for tax-exempt status.
    Credit: AP/J. Scott Applewhite

  • Attorney General Eric Holder pauses as he testifies on Capitol Hill before the House Judiciary Committee Wednesday. Holder is under fire, among other things, for the Justice Department's gathering of phone records at the Associated Press.
    Credit: AP/Carolyn Kaster

  • O.J. Simpson sits during an evidentiary hearing at Clark County District Court in Las Vegas, Nev., Thursday. Simpson, who is currently serving a nine-to-33-year sentence in state prison for armed robbery and kidnapping, is using a writ of habeas corpus to seek a new trial.
    Credit: AP/Las Vegas Review-Journal/Jeff Scheid

  • Major Tom to ground control: On Sunday astronaut Chris Hadfield recorded the first music video from space, a cover of David Bowie's "Space Oddity."
    Credit: AP/NASA/Chris Hadfield

  • When it rains it pours. President Barack Obama speaks during a news conference Thursday with Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan, inexplicably inspiring an #umbrellagate Twitter meme.
    Credit: AP/Jacquelyn Martin

  • A smoke plume rises high above a road block at the intersection of County A and Ross Road east of Solon Springs, Wis., Tuesday. No injuries were reported, but the the wildfire caused evacuations across northwestern Wisconsin.
    Credit: AP/The Duluth News-Tribune/Clint Austin

  • Recent Slide Shows

  • Share on Twitter
  • Share on Facebook
  • Thumbnails
  • Fullscreen
  • 1 of 11

Related Videos

Comments

 28 Comments

Comment Preview

Your name will appear as username

You may use these HTML tags and attributes: <a href=""> <b> <em> <strong> <i> <blockquote>

follow salon

Most Read

Popular on Reddit

links from salon.com

vote
Journalists file suit against Manning's trial secrecy: Plaintiffs including Glenn Greenwald and Julian Assange demand press, public access to trial and documents
126 points127 points | comment
vote
Report: Nearly a quarter of Americans struggle to afford food
115 points116 points | 10 comments
vote
Kaitlyn Hunt refuses plea offer, will go to court over high school relationship - The 18-year-old rejected a deal that would have labeled her a sex offender and placed her under house arrest
73 points74 points | 16 comments
vote
Kaitlyn Hunt refuses plea offer, will go to court over high school relationship - The 18-year-old rejected a deal that would have labeled her a sex offender and placed her under house arrest
72 points73 points | 75 comments
vote
Journalists file suit against Manning trial secrecy: Plaintiffs including Glenn Greenwald and Julian Assange demand press, public access to trial and documents
58 points59 points | 3 comments

From Around the Web

Presented by Scribol
listener_new_rect The Listener: Chekhov's story mirrors Russia's own

Recommendations