By Allan Lengel
ticklethewire.com
Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg has always tried to be a good host to the countless visitors who come to the Big Apple each year.
But he seems to be changing his tune about playing host to suspected mastermind of the 9/11 attacks, Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, and four others, who are supposed to go on trial in Manhattan sometime in the next two years or so.
“It would be great if the federal government could find a site that didn’t cost a billion dollars, which using downtown will,” he told reporters on Wednesday, according to the New York Times.
“It’s going to cost an awful lot of money and disturb an awful lot of people,” he said. “Can we provide security? Yes. Could you provide security elsewhere? Yeah, and I mean — the suggestion of a military base is probably a reasonably good one. Relatively easy to supply — to provide security. They tend to be outside of cities so that they don’t disrupt other people.”
The Times noted that it was an about face from the Bloomberg of two months ago, who said: ”It is fitting that 9/11 suspects face justice near the World Trade Center site where so many New Yorkers were murdered.”
