Louisiana: Giuliani's Firewall

newshorn.com ^ | 03/26/07 | Christopher Tidmore

[Ellesu]

LA Rep. Boustany endorsed the former Mayor of New York for President Monday morning. The move is the latest in a mounting campaign that could thrust Louisiana voters into peculiar position of rendering to the most moderate of the GOP Presidential candidates a Conservative Respectability.

First, David Vitter became the first US Senator and the first major statewide elected official South of the Mason-Dixon line to support Rudy Giuliani's Presidential Exploratory Committee. Now, Louisiana's Seventh District Congressman Charles Boustany has joined the campaign of America's Mayor, responding to the intensive wooing that Rudy has been doing towards the state's political class in recent weeks.

"As a Republican and a conservative, I know Rudy Giuliani is the best choice to be the next president," Dr. Boustany said. "On the most important issues of ensuring our national security and protecting our families, keeping taxes low and making government more efficient, Mayor Giuliani's record speaks for itself and his leadership is exactly what we need in the White House."

Strong words from a Congressman who prizes his relationships with social conservatives in his decidedly swing district in Acadiana--towards a Presidential candidate that on the surface shares none of the Christian Right's priorities or the social conservatism of Catholic Cajun voters.

To Boustany, Giuliani represents the best hope for the GOP to retain the White House, but his firm endorsement is rare exception to stand taken by most Southern GOP Congressman, who have, in general adopted a "wait and see attitude" rather than jumping on the Rudy bandwagon.

The endorsement did not result from some idle whim of the Lafayette Physician-turned-Congressman. The Mayor won Boustany's backing after a series of conversations, "a full court courting" as one insider put it to 99-5 FM.

Surprisingly, Giuliani has spent alot of time in recent weeks wooing Louisiana politicians. So has former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney, with less open success. Both men are putting in place a strong campaign infrastructure in a state that in past years was an afterthought in Presidential Primary campaigns.

The Mayor's and the Governor's interest confirms the hopes of those local party officials who moved the Louisiana primary to its new Saturday, February 9th perch with a prayer that GOP (and Democratic) candidates would be forced to focus on the priorities of the Pelican State for once. As Republican Chair Roger Villere put it, if they can bow before ethanol subsidies in Iowa, they can promise to help with coastal erosion as well.

The campaign dollars and attention that Giuliani and Romney have given to Louisiana recently proves to some that the strategy has proverbially born some fruit.

Others, though, including some prominent national pundits, have begun to argue that Louisiana's advancement of its primary has become irrelevant. The decisions of the California and New York legislatures to move their primaries to the previous Tuesday, Februrary 5th, 2008, has eclipsed any influence that the Pelican State could have had.

The possibility that some 20 other states, including New Jersey and Florida, could move their primary elections to February 5th, would end the state's moment in the political sunlight, they maintain.

In theory, a triumphant win by Giuliani--or any of the other candidates--on the Fifth would end a presidential contest before Louisiana voters go to the polls four days later.

However, such speculation by pundits ignores a truism about the current primary calender. Giuliani needs a victory in the South to clinch the nomination and lessen anxiety that social conservatives would stay home in the general election if GOP nominates a pro-choice, pro-gay rights, pro-gun control standard-bearer.

There is little doubt that the rush to February 5th has created a primary schedule that directly benefits Giuliani. He leads McCain in Iowa (26% to 22.5%) and is statistically tied in New Hampshire (27% to 28%), but in South Carolina, the third primary state before February 5th, the Mayor faces a problem.

Some polls have him in a narrow lead, but historically in South Carolina, rank and file Republicans often vote the way their party elders indicate. John McCain has won the lionshare of those endorsements. Both the elder and the young Bushes and Bob Dole have used South Carolina as the "firewall", as Bush Sr.'s political consilere Lee Atwater once called it--the place where popular insurgency campaigns were killed.

McCain himself learned this in 2000. His campaign appealed to the large population of militiary veterans in the state and to independent voters, but when former Gov. Carroll Campbell went on the offensive against the Arizona Senator and the local party apparatus began opposing him, McCain's campaign ended ignominiously.

Now, McCain is often considered the establishment candidate, the Republican who has waited his turn. Romney hopes that his pro-life, anti gay marriage stands will steal social conservatives away from the Senator, but the former New York Mayor cannot make that kind of appeal to Carolina voters.

Some campaign experts imagine a scenario where Rudy or McCain essentially split the votes in Iowa and New Hampshire. Tied, they go into South Carolina. If history repeats itself (and no other conservative favorite like Sen. Fred Thompson jumps into the race...a big if), McCain will be able to use the firewall of the local party officials, and also attack Rudy's socially liberal stands, winning the primary decisively.

On the surface, it would seem that a SC victory would be just a blip as the candidates enter the new "MEGA Tuesday" on February 5th. By all accounts, Giuliani would, on that day, be the overwhelming favorite. A Siena Research Institute poll puts the Mayor in his home state at 48% support, followed by Sen. John McCain at 16% and Newt Gingrich at 8%. Romney does not even register. In California, Giuliani's friend, popular Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger has already pledged to actively campaign for the Mayor.

But, would the Mayor be so strong going into February 5th, if he lost South Carolina?

McCain could argue on the eve of the Fifth that Rudy may be a favorite in "Blue State" America, but his liberal social views could keep GOP voters at home in the general election--in the party's usual base in the South and the West--the so-called Republican "L". He could further point to that polls show Giuliani losing New York and other blue states to Hillary Clinton in November, so what good is his popularity in Blue America if there is a possibility that states in GOP base might be in danger.

Even if Rudy won the big state primaries in early February, McCain would not be dead under this scenario. Advancing towards the regular "Super Tuesday" in March with its conservative primary voters in the West and South, the Arizona Senator could mount a counter campaign based on his pro-life, socially conservative stands. Or another candidate, a Fred Thompson or Mitt Romney could, if McCain were to falter.

Political commentator Stuart Rothenburg noted, "But while Giuliani's numbers are high now, [he leads in every national poll of Republicans] will they remain that way when he comes under detailed scrutiny by the media and by caucus attendees and primary voters in Iowa and South Carolina? (Giuliani is better positioned for New Hampshire, since independents can vote in the state's primaries and religious issues have less importance there.)"

That is where Louisiana enters the picture. If Vitter and Boustany are able to influence local voters that Giuliani has enough conservative credentials, that the Mayor can prevail in the Pelican State's Feb. 9th primary, the argument that the Mayor could not win in the South would die. Louisiana would be Giuliani's "firewall" against any other candidate like McCain.

Senator Vitter, now the Giuliani campaign's Southern Regional Chairman, is certainly trying to paint a conservative image of the Mayor to Louisiana voters.

Vitter's says he wants to "communicate the Mayor's optimistic vision and proven record of leadership", concentrating on the Mayor's reforms in New York and competent management style to a state exhausted by bureaucratic ineptitude with FEMA and the Road Home.

Much of this remains speculation until the Presidential race advances to next year, but sources within the local Giuliani camp confess that they see Louisiana playing the role of "conservative savior", a result that could ingratiate a President Giuliani to the Pelican State should he win.