Posted on 02/01/2006 5:23:40 AM PST by areafiftyone
Political pundits have long discounted former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani's presidential prospects, claiming that his particular brand of tough-talking, socially moderate conservatism would never play south of the Mason-Dixon Line. But Rudy has never been one to listen to conventional wisdom, and lately at least, he has been turning up the heat in southern conservative political circles.
In just the last week, he endorsed Texas Republican Gov. Rick Perry for re-election and met with Evangelicals in Florida. Most impressively, he actually outpaced U.S. Senator John McCain in a just-released Georgia poll, garnering the support of 28 percent of Georgia Republicans to McCain's 22 percent, echoing numbers in December's CNN/USA Today/Gallup nationwide poll. The conservative blog, RightWingNews reported last week that while Condoleezza Rice was the top choice of 230 conservative bloggers for the Republican nomination, Giuliani came in second, beating out U.S. Senator George Allen and Newt Gingrich. Nationwide, Rudy earned a 63 percent favorable rating in a Pew Research Center poll in October.
In addition to supporting Perry, Giuliani has planted a Texas-sized footstep in the Lone Star State—now with three more Electoral College votes than New York. Last spring, he became a name partner in a Houston law firm, Bracewell and Giuliani, noted for its Bush connections and roster of major energy clients.
The Catholic mayor is also busy burnishing his ties to Christian conservatives. Pat Robertson has said Rudy would make "a good president" and the mayor was a headliner for a fundraising committee supporting former Christian Coalition executive Ralph Reed in his bid to be Georgia's lieutenant governor. Last week, Giuliani dropped by an Orlando meeting of the Global Pastors Network and told the Evangelical leaders that "only God knows" if he will run for president. The group offered their prayers for him and he responded in kind, showing an openly devout side not many people had seen before: "I can't tell you from my heart how much I appreciate what you are doing—saving people, telling them about Jesus Christ and bringing them to God."
Still, Giuliani's southern strategy may be an uphill climb. "It's a real stretch for Giuliani to get out voters in southern Republican primaries," Richard Murray, head of the University of Houston's Center for Public Policy said. "He has too much baggage to get through the southern primaries." Murray said Giuliani's best shot may be as a "ticket balancer," a moderate vice president to a conservative ticket leader, especially if Hillary Clinton is the Democratic nominee.If that were the case, and Rudy got to take on the senator from New York, he would feel right at home, no matter where he was stumping for votes.
Well then he will fail in his bid. Like I said "Whoever wins the nomination whether it be Rudy, McCain (holding my nose when I vote for him) or someone else I will cast my vote for the Republican nominee.
..everybody has to do what they feel they should do.
Without the 2nd Amendment, we have no security.
[The life issue is not one which can be side-stepped.]
I disagree. It can be sidestepped. Giuliani just got 28% vs McCain's 22% in an SC poll. If he or Rice say they are against abortion after 60 days (infuriating the prolifers who insist on zero days) he can still take the nomination.
Tons of northerners have moved into the Sun Belt in the past 20 years. It isn't as old time conservative down there as many old timers would like to believe.
It is important to note that 9-11 changed the makeup of the Republican Party.
A lot of pro-lifers abandoned us because they said they "didn't want Iraqi children bombed". So the Republicans lost a lot of "pro-life" bleeding hearts who voted for Kerry. I worked on the Bush campaign. I couldn't stand these morons who were listed as ardent pro-lifers but were so "upset over Iraq."
Good riddance to them.
You can see these people posting at DailyKos.com (where you can write to some people to try to convince them to come back).
And whom did the Republicans get in return that more than made up for the loss?
South Park Conservatives. Young people, many going to college, who suddenly had their eyes opened about liberals.
I can write a book about the 8% loss and 12% gain that the Republicans have taken via the WOT.
How does that play for the pro-lifers? Well...the Supreme Court is going to be packed enough to get a reversal of Roe vs Wade. Of course, that will open a pandora's box of backlash from female independents even in red states if no term limits are given. It isn't my opinion that term limits SHOULD be given...it is only a fact that, if they are not, the female independent crowd will be furious and vote until they get what they insist on.
Too many FReepers (and DUers and Kossacks) fail to understand that political decisions are mostly made by the people in the middle. Bush was elected (statistically) by a 50 year old Ohio woman who was pro-abortion but concerned about Kerry's ability to keep the respect of the military. There were 150,000 of them in Ohio who made the difference.
If Kerry hadn't been a traitor to the Swift Boat Veterans, he might be President now...and according to polls, it would be because of the abortion issue and not having anything to do with Iraq.
I respect your adamance about the issue...but it is clearly the biggest impediment to recruitment among women to the Republican Party. The best thing for us would be someone who appears pro-abortion but secretly isn't.
Rudy will back off on the gun issue. He will say that he had to take this position in New York City. I don't see this as a problem.
then you cant believe or trust him.
no dice Rudy
[Rudy will back off on the gun issue. He will say that he had to take this position in New York City. I don't see this as a problem.]
This is correct. Heartlanders need to remember the history of New York. It was occupied by the British during almost the entire Revolutionary War (shortly after July 4th, 1776 it was captured). New Yorkers were held hostage. They started to think of the place like a saloon or gentleman's club where you checked your weapons at the door.
Some western cities also had laws that said "check your weapon with the sheriff" when within a certain downtown area.
That doesn't mean that New Yorkers felt that suburbanites or southern farmers or western ranchers shouldn't have guns. They understand the ready militia concept. They understand that the people have to be ready to fight a corrupt government some day.
They banned guns because they only black criminals had them at the time. That was their only thought. And it wasn't a stupid thought either. They knew that THEY didn't want to carry guns themselves around Manhattan. There were very few whites who wanted to pack a pistol around town to protect themselves from muggers (unless a law wasn't passed). They KNEW that FReepers from the south and west were not going to be tourists ready to protect them if they got mugged. They also knew that the black kids DID carry guns around and had a desire to rob people.
Sometimes you do the opposite thing in one place and time that you would do in another.
Then of course, Son of Sam was white and, when he bought his second .45...he was suspicious as all heck...and the woman behind the counter was lackadaisical about it. That one gunhandler's irresponsibility ruined it for a lot of gunhandlers.
But Republicans in New York City were not agains the right to bear arms in 99% of the USA. They just felt Manhattan, surrounded on all sides by water, didn't need to fit the militia model the rest of the country was founded on...especially considering the history of New York City as having been completely shut out of the Revolutionary War do to an early capture by the British.
In order to be against gun control in a well-defined city surrounded by water that is filled to the brim with criminals with guns...you have to want to carry a gun yourself. You have to want to be able to defend yourself personally.
If the white men just don't want to pack pistols with their business suits...but there are tons of vicious minority kids with pistols all around...passing a law that puts these kids in prison immediately just for owning a gun actually makes sense for that small environment only.
And believe me, white people or honest older black males, who were caught with a gun that they didn't want to use for crime but only wanted for protection...got off with small fines and no jail time.
The gun law was used as an excuse to jail the people Rudy wanted to jail. And Rudy used it to fill an entire jail with nothing but minority criminals (there was a race war going on at the time).
Imagine we make a law saying that no Muslim in the USA can own a gun.
I would be for that law.
In New York, it was the same thing almost. Since the race war is mostly over, they could repeal the gun law now...but it was a handy law to have when whites didn't want to carry guns and angry black criminals did want to carry them.
So what I am saying is that, what some macho FReepers are trying to project as pansy liberalism (Rudy's narrow geographically defined gun control law) really was a tool that Rudy used to put maybe 10,000 minority criminals in jail in a very short period of time...while letting anyone who wasn't a criminal just get off with a fine for having a gun.
Plus, I knew plenty of white Manhattanites who kept guns in their apartments that Rudy and the police were never going to search for.
There was a race war at the time. It was very real. It is still going on maybe in LA?
..welcome to America.
[I disagree
..welcome to America.]
:-)
By the way, if one goes to www.dailykos.com, there are tons of isolationist "republicans" over there who say they are Christians and are pro-life...but they are accepted over there now because the paramount concern of the left is making sure the Iraq War is remembered as a "mistake."
The pro-lifers in the anti-war movement really show how "conservatism" and "liberalism" get mixed up in the minds of tons of people in the USA today.
Wasting his time
Also known as "paleo-cons". Remnants of the old, pre-Reagan GOP.
Since I'm throwing labels around, I guess you could color me a Religious Right Neo-Con.
The media only speculates what they want you to think. p>They would mess their pants if Jeb announced he was seeking the GOP nomination because he would get it without much of a fight.
I think George W. Bush is a lot more popular than either the media, the 'rats or the RINOs want us to believe.
And in comparison to any Democrat possible (except maybe Zell Miller), Jeb Bush would walk all over them...
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I'm just thinking that it might start to seem weird to people...almost like a hereditary presidency.
Hereditary like Hillary?
None of that crap is going to make one iota of a difference in the GOP primary. This Republican ain't gonna cast a ballot for him.
Thanks for lowering the language bar on this thread to that of DU.
"Fart Proudly" --- Benjamin Franklin ;-)
Yes, but Rudy lowered the crime wave, got the spray paint off the subway cars, ended loud music from boom boxes, designed a car that gets 400 mpg and calls me up to remind me that my ice cream is getting melty.
In Manhattan, that is true. In Brooklyn, it took a machete and the Ramones to get my neighbor from blasting Merengue and hip hop at 3AM on a Tuesday.
Someone mused today (on FOX) that he may be a VP candidate and could actually be a very strong help to a conservative Presidential candidate bringing a lot of votes with him.
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