I stand corrected, he was 28.
Okay, 28. I'm sure at 28 you were a died-in-the-wool conservative at 28, no doubt. Having been a 28 year old man myself at one point, I think I safely assume that neither of us was a paragon of virtue at that age, so why should Rudy be held to a different standard?
As Winston Chuchill once said "Any man under the age of 30 who is not a liberal has no heart. Any man over the age of 30 who is not a conservative has no brain". Translation: people very often grow up and leave youthful idealism behind. Not everyone grows up on the same schedule.