Posted on 10/19/2009 6:42:31 PM PDT by presidio9
Democratic pols Monday accused former Mayor Rudy Giuliani of deliberately fomenting racial tension in a coded appeal to get Mayor Bloomberg re-elected.
Bronx Democratic chairman and Assemblyman Carl Heastie said Giuliani had used "code words to try and strike fear in the hearts and minds of persons in the Jewish faith."
State Senator Eric Adams (D-Brooklyn) said Giuliani's remarks were "Willie Horton-style" dirty tricks, reminscient of ads used in the 1988 presidential campaign to stir racial fears among white voters about Massachusetts Governor Michael Dukakis.
The fury began on Sunday when Giuliani invoked the Holocaust, the 9/11 terrorist attacks and memories of city crime in the early 1990s to warn that the city could "easily be taken back to the way it was with the wrong political leadership."
He spoke to ultra-orthodox Jewish leaders in Borough Park, Brooklyn as he urged voters to support Bloomberg, who is running as a Republican, over Democratic city Controller William Thompson in the Nov. 3 election.
Bloomberg later added that economic declines could lead the city to become another Detroit under the wrong mayor.
"It is unfortunate that ... the mayor and Rudy Giuliani have resorted to the politics of division, to the politics of fear," Thompson said Monday.
"But it's also a distraction. They're trying to distract from Mike Bloomberg's failed record."
Questioned about the respose to Giuliani's remarks, Bloomberg largely shrugged off the criticism.
"Look, I've always tried ... to bring people together, not to divide them," Bloomberg said.
Asked whether he really believed that a Thompson mayoralty would mean doom and gloom for New Yorkers, he hedged.
"My view is that any mayor and any candidate for mayor, including Bill Thompson would always work hard to lower crime," he said.
"Do I think that I could do a better job? Of course," he said. "If I didn't think that I could do a better job, I wouldn't be running."
If Rudy mentioned the Holocaust, 911, and the 70’s crime wave and the Dems say that is racist then aren’t the Dems implying that they think blacks were responsible for the Holocaust, 911, and the 70’s crime wave?
No self respecting Republican would stump for Bloomberg.
It’s way past time to start a one line response to this type of attack.
“I’m not going to waste any time addressing a bunch of self-important race baiters, as my record in this area is clear.”
Been hearing that a lot lately. It has to be played often and for everything because it doesn't have the sting it used to.
If Giuliani is not elected governor next year, the Republican party will be completely irrelevant in NY State for a generation. He can’t win without Bloomberg’s enthusiastic support in NYC. It’s as simple as that. Hate ‘em both, but hold your nose and support them anyway.
If Giuliani WON, then you could kiss the NYS Republican Party goodbye.
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