Rudy Giuliani Is Dangerous
The great thing about having no interest in breathlessly covering every jot and tittle in a presidential race that still is 15 looong months from the finish line is that I can drop in whenever I damned well please, whether it is to opine on the paucity of candidates’ offspring in the military or Mitt Romney’s crazy pet tricks.
Which leads me to today’s installment on a guy even less electable than Romney — Rudy “The Teflon Don” Giuliani — who in word and deed has proven himself to be out of his depth and out of his mind.
Let’s motor right past Giuliani’s personal indiscretions and serial philandering, willful misrepresentations, flip-flopping on gun control and immigration, anger-management problems, suck ups to right-wing demagogues and long-time ties to shameless sleazebags like Bernard Kerik.
What we have left is a guy for whom every day is 9/12 and as president would be the baddest ass on the planet.
If you don’t believe me, check out Giuliani’s cut-and-paste job on foreign policy in . . . um, Foreign Policy, which is giving all of the presidential wannabes an opportunity to strut their stuff on what may be the single greatest issue confronting America as it ponders Life After Bush.
According to the article, Giuliani would increase the defense budget by a gadzillion dollars, invade countries that diss America, drive a further wedge between Palestinians and Israelis and spy on everybody all the time. In short, out-Bush George Bush, who has worked tirelessly to earn the moniker as the most unpopular president in modern history but seems level headed when compared to Giuliani.
Please don’t give me any crap about Giuliani going bonkers on foreign policy because he is trying to curry favor with the GOP base and knows that his moderation on social issues will be attractive to voters whose knuckles don’t drag on the ground when they walk.
It won’t work that way in 2008: Even if Giuliani would deign to allow women the right to their own reproductive freedom (while he backpeddles on civil unions and other moderate-liberal positions), he will be seen as one scary dude — a wolf in wolf’s clothing — when it comes to the Big Picture issue.
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9 Responses to “Rudy Giuliani Is Dangerous”
I mighily disagree with you about Giuliani’s electability. He is perhaps the most electable Republican candidate. He might be the only one who can beat the democratic nominee.
I’m actually hesitant about Rudy for the reasons you note, Shaun. However, the coherence of your argument and the accessible almost rhythmic flow of your prose are degraded, I think, by the headline. Net, I think you’re point is made and made well without name calling.
My two cents. Perhaps I’m wrong.
Hi Pete:
Objection noted, but somehow “Hazardous Dunderhead” or the equivalent doesn’t work.
How ’bout just “Rudy Giuliani is Dangerous”?
Done.
Come on now, the last seven years are going “swimmingly”. I haven’t read the Rudy piece yet, but Norman Podhoretz smells of helping with this policy. The Norman Podhoretz crowd is batting .090 or right now.
I started to read Rudy’s article but couldn’t get past the summary.
1)terrorists’ war on global order
2)With a stronger defense
2) This is just a rehash of the PNAC call to fix the ME, but where are we going to get more troops(War Czar Lute: Involuntary Draft a Possibility)? Will FCS and a stealth Navy stop the
GWOTTWOGO?1) We can’t stop prox triggered IED’s with W’s military, Rudy’s superficial renaming of a failed policy is a JOKE> Why shy away from GWOT Mr. Mayor 9-12?
Right up until you mentioned the so-called big bad “right-wing” demagogues (as opposed to “left-wing” demagogues…oh wait I forgot, the left is always good and pure and has no demagogues to pander to, silly me), I coulda sworn you were talking about our buddy Bill Clinton. Oh well…
Having seen Giuliani’s style as mayor, I would have to concur that the man is, indeed, dangerous.
He is Bush’s psychological twin. He wants to do the right thing, but he disdains other voices in a single-minded, power hungry drive to get what he wants accomplised. I shudder to think what he might be capable of once he decides on a goal . Were he to become president, we would see executive powers balloon in what is, even today, unimaginable ways.