The Korea Times reports that would-be Homeland Security secretary and former NYPD police commissioner Bernard Kerik fathered a South Korean girl, named Lisa, while stationed on the peninsula in the 1970s -- then abandoned the child and her mother when he returned to the States. But because the estranged family reunited and reconciled on the Oprah Winfrey show in 2001, all is well. Except for the 26 years in between.
There's more from Newsweek. Kerik, while NYPD commissioner, bought several $50,000 security doors which ended up being too heavy for the floors to support. Three of the four doors are collecting dust in storage. He was then hired by the door company as an advisor. He resigned when the company's president was indicted for defrauding the city.
Still more. Kerik was fined $2500 for using police officers to help him research his memoir.
Even more. He used $3000 of the Police Foundation fund to purchase 30 bronze busts -- of himself.
More, you ask? Of course. He was named in a civil suit in which a Democratic warden claimed that Kerik forced prison guards to work for Republicans in their off hours. The warden won.
Want one about Tasers? Taser sold stun guns to the NYPD during Kerik's term. Sometime after he left the department, he attained stock options in the company. Recently, Kerik cashed out those options to the tune of $5.8 million.
He sounds like, as Lynn Cheney would say, a bad man. Good material for a Michael Moore documentary, except there isn't a dubious connection with the Saudi royal family so-- oh crap. The Saudi Royals, who preside over the world's most heinous human rights violations, hired Kerik as a security coordinator.
He told Newsday in October, 2003: "Political criticism is our enemies' best friend." Before you take over, Bernie, can you clairfy who the enemy is? Is it the jihadists or is it those of us who criticize your party and their hypocritical posture on moral values -- a hypocrisy which includes your nomination to reign over Homeland Security?