Posted on 02/06/2007 10:43:27 AM PST by ElkGroveDan
“Murder and graffiti are two vastly different crimes,” Rudy Giuliani once said. “But they are part of the same continuum, and a climate that tolerates one is more likely to tolerate the other.”
Good point, Rudy.
Now, what about a climate — not to mention a Republican presidential candidate — that not only tolerates, but allows unelected judges to legalize the practice of delivering a child until only its head remains within its mothers womb so the child can be killed by sucking out its brains?
What about a climate where same-sex couples are given the same legal status as married couples, whether the resulting arrangements are candidly called “same-sex marriages,” or are semantically papered-over with terms such as “civil unions” or “domestic partnerships”?
Apply the Giuliani Continuum to fundamental issues such as marriage and the right to life, and where does it lead?
Not where conservatives want America to be.
Rudy Giuliani’s observation about the “continuum” running from graffiti to murder was quoted in a piece in the winter edition of City Journal by Steven Malanga. The title of Malanga’s piece neatly encapsulates his argument: “Yes, Rudy is a Conservative — and an electable one at that.”
I believe Malanga is wrong on both counts. Rudy is neither conservative, nor electable — at least, not as a Republican presidential candidate.
As Malanga seems to define it, a politician dedicated to good police work and free-market economics qualifies as a conservative. “Far from being a liberal,” Malanga writes of Giuliani, “he ran New York with a conservative’s priorities: government exists above all to keep people safe in their homes and in the streets, he said, not to redistribute income, run a welfare state, or perform social engineering. The private economy, not government, creates opportunity, he argued; government should just deliver basic services well and then get out of the private sector’s way.”
But that’s not enough. While advocating law and order, self-reliance, and capitalism is laudable, it does not entitle a politician to a free pass for advocating other causes that are deeply destructive of American society.
While it is always wrong to take an innocent human life — whether on a New York sidewalk or in a mother’s womb — Giuliani is highly selective in applying this principle. In 1999, when he was pondering a run for the U.S. Senate, he was asked whether he supported banning partial-birth abortion. “No, I have not supported that,” he said, “and I don’t see my position on that changing.”
“I'm pro-gay rights,” he also said. Indeed, his position is so radical in this area that as New York City mayor he promoted a city ordinance that removed the distinctions in municipal law between married and unmarried couples, regardless of their gender.
“What it really is doing is preventing discrimination against people who have different sexual orientations, or make different preferences in which they want to lead their lives,” Giuliani said, explaining the ordinance to the New York Times. “Domestic partnerships not only affect gays and lesbians, but they also affect heterosexuals who choose to lead their lives in different ways.”
In other words, preserving a legal order that prefers traditional marriage and traditional families is “discrimination.”
Giuliani’s positions on abortion and marriage disqualify him as a conservative because they annihilate the link between the natural law and man-made laws. Indeed, they use man-made law to promote and protect acts that violate the natural law.
Given his argument that there is a “continuum” between graffiti and murder, you would think that Giuliani would understand the importance of the link between the natural law and the laws of New York City, let alone the laws of the United States. At the heart of Rudy’s “continuum” argument, is the realization that when society refuses to enforce a just law it teaches people to disrespect the moral principles underlying just laws.
The late Russell Kirk argued in The Conservative Mind that the first canon of conservatism is “[b]elief in a transcendent order, or body of natural law, which rules society as well as conscience. Political problems, at bottom, are religious and moral problems. … True politics is the art of apprehending and applying the Justice which ought to prevail in a community of souls.”
It is simply not justice to take the life of an unborn child. Nor is it justice to codify same-sex relationships so that, by design of the state itself, a child can be denied a mother or a father from birth, which is one thing legalized same-sex unions would do.
By advocating abortion on demand and same-sex unions, Rudy is doing something far more egregious than, say, defacing a New York subway train. He is defacing the institution that forms the foundation of human civilization.
That is not conservative.
Rudy will not win the Republican nomination because enough of the people who vote in Republican caucuses and primaries still respect life and marriage, and are not ready to give up on them — or on the Republican party as an agent for protecting them.
In all fairness, no one knows who Hillary will face, let alone if she'll win the nomination.
It means that when you tolerate minor crimes you are enabling acceptance of more major crimes. So in some sense the answer is "yes." By tolerating graffiti you are in some small way tolerating an environment which tolerates murder.
Agreed, which is why I posted his obvious support for PBA, no matter what Politi-Speak he uses.
I'm not on the Rudy bandwagon at this point and may never be. My wife informed me recently that she would never vote for Rudy or Newt because they are both cheaters. I posted that on here and was roundly chastised for wanting to lose the next election.
Point being that the primary is the time to sort out this kind of stuff. The disgruntled ones who sit out general elections because the nominee doesn't rise up to their high standard are the ones who lose elections to the REAL bad guys, like Hillary. Is that what you want to happen, should Rudy happen to get the nomination?
My thoughts on Rudy improved after hearing him talk about Alito, Roberts and Scalia on the Supreme Court. That will make him a more palatable candidate to social conservatives. Basically, he said he would pick judges like them - "strict constructionists."
Yes, but NYC is not it's own state, so it has zero electoral votes, and they would go Demonrat if it were a state. So Rudy has no track record except running in a place which is about as representative of America as is San Francisco.
He got the national spotlight right after 9/11. Otherwise no one would even consider him. He sounds hawkish about terrorism, but that's probably also designed to play well in NY, which is heavily Jewish. Why that makes him a deserving Pres. candidate for the party once led to triumph by Ronald Reagan beats me.
If you don't think Rudy is a hawk on terrorism you need to get your eyes and ears tested. He's been tough on this issue since Day One. Where have you been?
Hopefully it won't come to that. Not much of a choice, in my opinion. But I can say without a doubt that I'd NEVER vote for Hillary for anything.
Good grief. Politicians will say anything to get elected, unless they have real bedrock principles, like Reagan or Goldwater. You should look instead at Rudy's track record, which is very liberal, not what even a middle-of-the-road Rupublican would support.
It means that if people sense that a place is lawless, they will act lawless.
It's called the 'broken window' theory. It basically says, if some kid walks by an old factory with busted out windows, he's likely to throw a rock to break another window. If it's clean, and it's windows are in tact, he isn't likely to throw a rock at the window.
Rudy took this theory to heart, and as Mayor of NY, made a big point of arresting 'squeegy men', men who would 'wash' your window (usually making it dirtier) when you were stopped at a stoplight, demand money, and kick your car and spit at you if you didn't pay. He had them cited for jaywalking, and it turns out, most of them already had warrents out for their arrest for other things. People speculated that there were hundreds of these guys in NYC at one point, because they seemed to be everywhere. Ends up it was less then 100 guys.
Anyhow, his actions solved the problem literally overnight. It took less then 2 months. This was seen by many people as the start of the transformation NY has undergone since.
I don't know the answer to that. A lot of them seem just plain angry. Period. And have for years.
If a Republican got elected Mayor of San Francisco, reduced crime by 2/3rds, cut taxes 23 times, and kept the city together in it's time of greatest crisis, I'd be VERY interested in having him run for President.
LOL. That's funny because Robertson himself admits that he's ultra conservative. I think he used a different term trying to be hip, but I've forgotten what it was.
You mean he's been rhetorically "tough?" Talks a good game? That means nothing, if this guy can't even oppose partial birth abortion, and if he opposes an armed citizenry. The guy is a typical urban liberal. Let the Demons nominate a phony from NY. Republicans shouldn't be stupid enough to do the same.
Rudy will win because most of the country thinks like Rudy on the big issues. Rudy is a mans man.
Thank you for admitting that the two statements were not inconsistent.
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