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September 6, 2007
Rudy G


Some college kid just asked a weird, clumsy family values question of him -- basically saying, "Family values are important, and you don't seem to have them, Mr. Mayor. What about that?" Rudy took the opportunity to ... talk about all the fab things he did in New York. Hell, if you asked that guy what he had for dinner, he'd tell you that he throttled squegee men. -Rod Dreher

This reminds me to link to this New Yorker profile by Peter Boyer which nails it:

The common refrain among New Yorkers is that although Giuliani showed leadership on the day of the terrorist attacks, in the preceding months he had been a spent and isolated lame duck, his viability sapped by churlishness and the spectacle of his unattractive personal dramas. But to many in the heartland Giuliani was heroic for what he did in New York before September 11th: his policy prescriptions and, mostly, his taming of the city’s liberal political culture—his famous crackdown on squeegee-men panhandlers, his workfare program, his attacks on controversial museum exhibits (“The idea of . . . so-called works of art in which people are throwing elephant dung at a picture of the Virgin Mary is sick!”), and the like. Speaking before the Alabama legislature this spring, he received a standing ovation, and Governor Bob Riley told him, “One of these days, you have to tell me how you really cleaned up New York.” To conservatives, pre-Giuliani New York was a study in failed liberalism, a city that had surrendered to moral and physical decay, crime, racial hucksterism, and ruinous economic pathologies. Perhaps the most common words that Giuliani heard when he travelled around the country this spring were epithets aimed at his city (“a crime-infested cesspool,” one Southern politician declared), offered without fear of giving offense. Giuliani cheerfully agreed.

More juicy quotes:

In any case, [Giuliani foreign policy advisor Norm "Bomb Iran"] Podhoretz said to me, he believes that George W. Bush will settle the matter himself, by bombing Iran before he leaves office. “I’m probably the only person on the face of the earth who thinks that Bush will order air strikes,” Podhoretz says. “But we’ll find out. If Bush doesn’t kick the can down the road, then the issue becomes moot, obviously. But if he fails to do what I think he will do, Rudy seems to me to be the best bet for doing what is necessary.”...
Stephen DiBrienza, the former [New York] City Councilman, says, “All the things that a lot of New Yorkers, myself included, hate about this guy are the things that are actually fuelling his campaign.”

Are social conservatives backing Giuliani because he's the guy to nuke the terrorists and smack around the commie libs? God help us if this man gets elected.

Posted by Papa-Lu at September 6, 2007 9:01 PM
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