Quite an understatement, Eric!
Rudy's strategy depended on keeping the front-runner mystique because Florida voters are influenced by national trends, just like everyone else. National opinion always begins to coalesce around winners in New Hampshire and, for the Republicans, South Carolina. It made no sense to skip Iowa, N.H., Nevada and S.C. and think the lead would hold. I understand he's out of money now, too.
He really didn't skip NH. He was here, often, in the spring and early summer. He ran ads.
He wasn't doing well, and then decided to focus elsewhere. His campaign spun it as "skipping NH," which is simply inaccurate. But it still was an incredibly inept campaign, for someone who supposedly possesses great "leadership" skills.
Giuliani's baffle-gab to dupe the electorate flopped miserably. His whacked-out bizarre strategy of "saving himself for the big states" saying he wasn't competing in early primaries/caucses was a big crock. His flop in Florida on Tuesday will tbe sound heard round the world. His presidential ambitions are over.
Up until the bitter end, Giuliani was duping the voters. He just announced his top staffers are working gratis---b/c Giuliani wants voters to think he managed to spend all his campaign money without having actually competed in any of the early primary/caucus states.
Bigtime Baloney. The truth is that Rudy spent all his money because he HAS competed in all those states, and he lost dismally. The number of times Rooty went to New Hampshire to campaign was second only to Romney.
Rudy just CLAIMS he hasn't been competing because the results show he is a bigtime loser, a political reject, trounced by primary/caucus voters.
Giuliani practically lived in Florida to get his campaign launched---and he can't even get transplanted New Yorkers in Fla to rally behind him. Giuliani's flim-flam game has made him lose whatever credibility he had left (not much).