Posted on 05/02/2006 9:42:32 AM PDT by Crackingham
Former Mayor Rudolph W. Giuliani said on Monday that he was seriously exploring whether he has "a chance" of winning the presidency in 2008, as he visited politically important Iowa and huddled with state advisers, donors to President Bush and other prominent Republicans. While Mr. Giuliani was officially in Iowa to attend two Republican fund-raisers, his behavior and remarks came close to politicking for himself. He ruminated openly about running, disclosed he was not sure what he would do if his friend John McCain also ran, and argued that if Republicans are to be a majority party, they need to accept politicians like himself who support abortion rights, gay rights and gun control.
"I've got a lot of places to go and a lot of people to talk to and a long process of figuring out whether it makes sense to run for president in 2008," Mr. Giuliani said before speaking at a daytime fund-raiser in Des Moines for a Republican congressional candidate. "I don't know the answer to that yet."
He added: "My effort this year will be to help Republicans get elected, and then, quite honestly, as part of it, saying to myself, does it look like I have a chance in 2008? And make that decision after the 2006 election."
At a fund-raiser in Davenport on Monday night, Mr. Giuliani offered a stout defense of President Bush's leadership, arguing that the economy was growing and that Mr. Bush would go down in history as "a great president."
"I don't know what we're all so upset about," he said, referring to concerns about the economy and rising costs, such as gas prices.
(Excerpt) Read more at nytimes.com ...
Let's ask Rudy to defend his immigration politics while he was Mayor.
Giuliani sued all the way up to the Supreme Court to defend the city’s pre-911 sanctuary policy to thwart a 1996 federal law decreeing that cities could not prohibit their employees from cooperating with the then-INS.
The INS, Rudy claimed, with what turned out to be grotesque irony, only aims to "terrorize people." Very poor choice of words, Rudy. Though he lost in court, Rudy remained defiant to the end. On September 5, 2001, Rudy'a own boys---his handpicked charter-revision committee---ruled that New York City could still require that its employees keep immigration information confidential "to preserve trust between immigrants and government."
Six days later, on Sept 11, 2001, several foreigners who had overstayed their visas participated in the most devastating attack on New York City that our country had ever seen.
That's b/c Rudy was (and is) a Dim...he magically added an "R" to his name in order to better his chances for the NYC Mayoral race. Rudy always does what he feels in HIS best interests----like endorsing Dimocrat Mario Cuomo for governor b/c Rudy calculated it was in HIS best interests to have a Dim in Albany to further HIS political ambitions.
Rudy stepped on so many in his search for power. He never learned the Big Lesson Of Life: "Be careful who you step on, on your way up---because you are going to meet them on the way down."
The only people Rudy didn't step on on the way up were gays (he once lived with two of them), liberals (he appointed numerous liberals including Liberal Party honcho Ray Harding's sons to high-paying city jobs), and government fraudsters (one of 'em was Ray Harding's son Russell who stole hundreds of thousands from the city housing agency, enjoyed gay porn, and trips with gays, all on the taxpayers' dime.
Harding is now in jail---but the only thing Rudy could say about this outrageous behavior was that he felt bad "for Harding's family" thus making sure Rudy's liberal bona fides were left intact.
Rudy is more effective at police action and his authoritarian bent is much greater than the 'toon's. The 'toon pushed for and obtained major gun control legislation. It expired under Bush, who sat back and said nothing. He did seat AG Gonzales though. I'm not interested in promoting, or even quietly voting for a vocal rabid gun grabber. I'm interested in seeing to it that every ordinary American retains their 2nd Amendment right w/o infringement whatsoever from govm't at all levels. It's not a privilege to be exercised by a few.
Excellent analysis. Allen/Rudy would be unbeatable and makes sense
Let me tell you, taking a beating from Babs Boxer is a minor accomplishment. She is one of the dullest knives in the drawer.
That makes no sense whatsoever. I am not an advocate of the Clintons and never have been.
I see this strange mental filter on FR often, and it's maddening. Being critical of a Bush isn't inexorably an endorsement of a Clinton. Being critical of a Republican isn't an endorsement of a Democrat.
Whatever this mindset is, it's not conservative.
But again, all you've talked about is the ONE time you've seen him.
By that standard, based on the first debate, Walter Mondale would have won 1984 by a landslide.
That's not all I have seen of him. It's just the most memorable.
When you've followed his career as long as I have, I think you'll change your opinion.
"A philosophical question here for all those looking at this thread. This is something I have debated with myself and a few friends for a few months now.
Since Bush engaged the terrorists on their side of the world, and we seem to have gotten two pretty good jurists on the SCOTUS, would you vote for someone like Rudy who is pro-choice (though I think he would appoint jurists and not legislators to the courts) if you knew he was going to finish the war and be a champion of National Security? My friends and I always come back to the fact that he was on the ground on 9/11 and lost a good amount of friends and colleagues and he knows more than anyone the importance of finishing/continuing this war until we win. Seems the primaries will come down to the social issues, like abortion, in which case Rudy would lose, but I would trust the guy on National Security. Thoughts please."
I will take a stab at answering your question.
First, I worked down at World Trade and was there on 9/11. I survived. Rudolph Giuliani was not the only person at Ground Zero. Yes, he provided leadership, particularly symbolically, during the aftermath of the attack. But then, so did the Chief of Police, the Fire Marshall, the chaplains. There was a lot of heroism that day. Rudy has always been a glory hound. I remember the great snowstorm of January 1996, with Rudy down in The Bunker, the Command Post he had erected. Snowploughs were sent left and right, and the City was practically in lockdown. The snow got cleared quickly and efficiently, and Rudy was hailed as practically a hero by many, for facing up to the storm with aplomb.
Of course, just this past winter we got a WORSE storm, and New York City cleaned it up just as quickly and efficiently. Bloomberg was not hunkered down in the bunker and standing before every television camera in battle fatigues. New York is a big, sophisticated city with big, sophisticated, extremely well trained public workers: firemen, police, road crews, transport personnel. RUDY didn't clear the streets in the Blizzard of '96, or save those who were saved at Ground Zero on 9/11. The road crews and rescue crews did. Rudy got the lion's share of the CREDIT, because he's a New York politician in the tradition of Schumer and Peter King: great on camera, and always seeking one out.
Likewise the crime statistics. Nobody can dispute that murders in New York dropped precipitously during Rudy's watch. But they also dropped precipitously in Detroit, which remained the same morass of corruption and drift. Rudy had a politician's knack for successfully taking credit for the New York version of a national downward trend in crime. It wasn't Rudy that did it though, nor even the police (again: Detroit's murder rate plunged too, and they didn't change anything). It was what Wall Street Journal Online's James Taranto has dubbed "The Roe Effect" - the abortion of the criminal unborn during the preceding 17 years - that probably is the real reason.
Don't get me wrong, I appreciated Rudolph Giuliani as Mayor of New York. I voted for the man. But the hero worship is the result of good marketing. He put a face before the cameras and got credit for the hard work of other people. And he also axed the Chief of Police who presided over the crime drop, because he saw in him a rising political rival.
When thinking of the President, I would NOT vote for Giuliani under any circumstances. Giuliani is pro-choice. It's whistling past the graveyard to think that he is going to put anybody pro-life on the bench: he will put New York lawyers up there, of the likes of Jeanine Pirro - tough on crime, and socially liberal, like himself. He will not put a conservative in the Attorney General slot, but a liberal who is tough on crime.
He will never close the border nor take any other measures to stem illegal immigration. And he has a New York liberal and New York cop's view on guns: they're bad and people don't need them. He is a tough, stubborn, principled man, and he is not going to change any of those policies.
Also, please remember that he's an open adulterer. Some people care a great deal about those things.
So, the only thing left is the bare assertion that Giuliani will be better in the War on Terror than anything the Democrats put up.
Really? General Wesley Clark (whom I don't much care for) would certainly be a more competent Commander-in-Chief for the purposes of fighting and winning the War on Terror than Rudolph Giuliani. Rudy has no more military experience than Hillary Clinton. Clinton has been as pro-war as Rudy. Now, perhaps the assumption is that she's just saying that to get elected, but that's actually not a good position for her to take vis-a-vis her own base. Also, there is no reason to think that Lady MacBeth would be anything but a bloody-minded hardass ballbreaker if she were in power. Do you really think that the First Woman President, particularly the Harridan-In-Chief, would let herself also be the only President other than Richard Nixon to intentionally lose a war? No way in Hell.
No Republican will withdraw, but some Republicans might try to micromanage the war. Watching Rudy in New York makes me suspect that he might do with the military - concerning which he has no experience whatsoever - what he did with the New York Police Department: micromanage, and seek to monopolize the glory.
Of the Republican candidates, McCain is unquestionably the most qualified and experienced military man, and there is no reason, at all, to believe that he would be any less dedicated to winning the thing than Bush is. However, he brings more understanding to the table than Bush or Cheney, and given McCain's temperament, there is little reason to think that he would make mistakes like pulling back from Fallujah, as the Bush Administration ordered the first time. McCain's errors are likely to be more on the side of excessive violence and fire, rather than excessive patience and timidity. Rice could be expected to carefully weigh the advice of her military commanders. Allen? Don't know anything about his military knowledge or experience. Pence? Ditto.
If you are just focused on the War on Terror, then you have to vote for McCain. McCain would probably be as good as Bush in the War on Terror, maybe better, because he is less patient and would have broken more heads early on.
If your sole front of consideration is the War on Terror, then McCain has to be your man. If you raise the objections to McCain that many have, about his position on campaign finance reform, the border, the judicial filibuster, etc., then you've moved off the pure look at just the War - and if you do that then Rudy is a left wing liberal horrorshow.
I voted for Rudolph Giuliani for Mayor of New York City, and he was a great Mayor too. I would have voted for him for Governor of New York, or for Senator had he run against Clinton. But for President? No. Giuliani would be an effective Chief Executive Officer: very effective at ramming through a bunch of policies and judicial appointments I could not stand.
If we're ONLY going to look at the War, then the most credible candidate is McCain, period.
In all honesty, he's one of the smartest people I know. In person, I've ~never~ seen him off his game.
So maybe he isn't ~slick~ on TV. Is that such a bad thing? We had ~slick~ with Clinton.
As for Bush, I don't think the trouble has been his communications problems. I think it's been the message. I'm still a fan and a supporter. It's just very difficult sometimes.
P8riot, could you help us out here?
Sure Corin,
Allen is very pro 2nd Amendment.
During his term as governor Virginia became a "shall issue" concealed carry state, meaning that the state has to issue you a concealed carry permit, unless you are specifically legally prohibited from posessing a weapon. No justification is required to any local authority either.
Also, while governor Project Exile became law in Richmond, targetting criminals and not law abiding citizens. Put simply, if you are caught with handgun and are legally prohibited from posessing one, you will do a MINIMUM of 5 yrs in a federal pennitentiary. The program was so successful in reducing Richmond's murder rate (at that time one of the highest in the country), that it became law statewide under Jim Gilmore.
What a lot of short sighted progunners mistate about George Allen's stand on the Clinton "Assault Weapons" ban is that Allen was for it.
While running for his first term in the US Senate, George Allen stated that he would be for renewal of the ban if it could be proved that it had a positive impact on violent crime. When Senator Feinstein of CA attached a "poison pill" amendment to the "Gun lawsuit immunity" legislation before the Senate, George Allen voted against it citing that he had taken the opportunity to study the effects of the ban and was convinced that it had zero effect on violent crime.
In fact in a conversation that I had with him before the vote, I pointed out some by products of the ban that he had not considered.
What some folks here and elsewhere consider an "anti-gun" vote against the lawsuit immunity bill was in fact a pro-gun vote that allowed a draconian gun ban to sunset.
Bottom line is that George Allen is very strong on the 2nd amendment. You can be rest assured that if you vote for him, he will not come after your guns.
Thanks. I promise to bookmark it this time.
"Rudy, McCain"
NEVER!!!!!!!!! I would not under any circumstances put McCain a heartbeat away from the presidency.
The dems and pubs really ought to merge parties. There's not that much difference in them.
Bring on a conservative third party with candidates that really do care about our Constitution and the Laws of our land and let the chips fall where they may.
We can't afford a Giuliani presidency. It would set the "conservative" movement back decades.
I copied your post and pinged you to another thread.
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