H.B.: Thank you for being a hero and a true patriot, for coming forth as whistleblowers, as sharers of information that you believe would make us a better society for knowing that. And for doing so at enormous personal cost. And these are definitely the heroes of our time and I think we're going to be seeing a lot more as our government become more covert unless our legislators listen to the people and start pressuring for big changes.
R.K.: Alright. You said you would give me a half an hour. Our last question, you talk in the book about police perjury, everyday we're hearing stories about police murdering people without any accountability. Can you talk a little bit to that subject? Of police breaking the law in different ways?
H.B.: This is a complicated troubling subject because everyday we hear about instances in which the police for example may shoot an unarmed person, engage in a really excessive use of force, and then ruin so many families, devastate communities when really nothing is done in terms of punishment.
It's a difficult issue because police are afforded discretion and are able to use force in the line of duty. I think that things like the "stop and frisk" trial in New York City where we're going to have more monitoring of that by independent individuals, you know I think, again, litigation, public outcry is essential.
When a community is devastated because of a death at the hands of law enforcement officer, when the individual wasn't doing anything wrong, it's again a case where we have to have community outrage, public pressure to the city council members, local officials, protests, and more individuals calling for outside monitors to hopefully press for a change in this. It's just been really an epidemic of tragedy.
R.K.: You mention New York City, it looks like the next mayor is going to be a pretty liberal guy. How do you think he will stand up to Ray Kelly, who to me seems like a horrible fascist?
H.B.: Well it's of course in the next mayor's discretion to appoint a new police head. So I'm not sure Ray Kelly will be staying on but certainly Mr. Kelly has built probably, if not the top counter-terrorism and police department intelligence unit in the world; it's up there. So we do have a lot of policing going on, a lot of intelligence gathering going on in this city, and a lot of activists being watched by the NYPD so I would assume that Ray Kelly may be moving on from here.
R.K.: Okay, good chance he might be appointed the next Homeland Security Czar.
H.B.: Possibly.
R.K.: Well this has been great. I'm going to let you go because you offered to give me thirty minutes and I really appreciate it. You've written a powerful book that we have barely touched anything about. It's just loaded with information. God Bless you, you've been doing great work, keep it up, I hope we can have you back soon.
H.B.: Thank you so much.
R.K.: Keep up the great work and have a great day.
H.B.: Thank you, you too. Bye bye.
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