WE'VE LOST ANOTHER ONE

We've lost another police officer in the line of duty. I was in the car with my kids when Mayor Nutter and Commissioner Ramsey held their press conference. Sergeant Liczbinski was responding to a bank robbery when he was fatally shot with an AK-47. "Tell my wife I'll miss her" were his dying words.

My heart goes out to his family, and I lament that we live in a city - in a world - that is so violent. I pray for Sergeant Liczbinski's loved ones, as well as his fellow cops. He was 39, with a wife and two kids, and so I cannot help that he and I are not that different, except that my job does not put me in harm's way on a daily basis.

To the men and women who do accept that kind of danger as part of an honest day's work, I salute you and I support you. And my family and I thank you for your service to us and to our city. And I join you in mourning as you will have to do that job this morning with one less member.