It’s obvious after Katrina that the presidential stock of “America’s Mayor” would be on the rise and Rudolph Giuliani put his toe in for that office – if not his hat – in a speech to business leaders today.
The business event, hosted by Visa USA, brought together corporate leaders, anti-fraud experts, and government officials to discuss credit card security. But the first question from audience members was about Giuliani’s possible return to public office.
Asked if he had any “political visions,” Giuliani laughed and rubbed his forehead.
“I have some political visions. I don’t know what they are yet, they’re a little foggy,” he said.
Okay, just “foggy” visions, no toe or hat…. but we all know what he means. Giuliani is in the lead in the latest polls for the Republican nomination. Of course, the Conventional Wisdom says that, although he might win the election, the Base will never let him get nominated. “Conventional Wisdom,” “Base”…. these are dull terms of political “art” we have had drummed into us for decades by minds that are indeed conventional themselves. It’s a form of hypnosis, I suppose, mixed with self-fulfilling prophecy. But I suspect that deep down a large part of the electorate is fed up with people telling them what to think or how to be pigeon-holed. It’s obvious that, out here in the Land of Arnold, Giuliani would stand a great chance in the primary and the election itself – but I also think it’s an insult to Texans and Georgians (etc.) to assume that their minds aren’t free enough to back a gutsy politician with whom they might not agree about everything. No, on this one, I’d bet heavily against the Conventional Wisdom (and, yes, once in a while, I’m a betting man).
I strongly suspect that Rudy would rule in Texas as well as Arnold-land, Roger.
First, Texans respect strength of character, and strength generally, and are glad to support any New Yorker who demonstrates same. I recall an example of same from the other side of the aisle: Robert Strauss, the Democratic Texan superlawyer/kingmaker from the last century, began his coronation speech at a fund-raiser for Mario Cuomo in the early 1980s by telling him, “In Texas we don’t know ‘Mario’ but we do talk about cojones, and we can hear yours clankin’ from a mile away.”
(I never found that terribly quaint or funny, btw– “clanking” suggests a nasty prostate problem, to my ears– but you get my point.)
Second, Texas today is full of transplanted yuppie yankees and Californians who came during the 1990s for the tech boom, and also doctors from all over the country and the world. In fact, Dallas and Houston appear to be a paradise for doctors: outstanding, world-class medical facilities and staff; high salaries; and housing costs that are about one-third of the equivalent in LA or metro NYC. (An Australian cardiologist I met through our child’s school relocated from LA, where he was on the staff at UCLA, to Dallas because they couldn’t afford a house). Suburban Dallas, Houston and San Antonio are a lot more purple than Atlanta or Charlotte or Nashville (and of course Austin is blue).
Third, don’t forget 2008′s most crucial demographic of all, hispanics. Don’t know their share of TX Republican delegates but I’m sure that after nearly a decade of careful cultivation by Bush, Rove and Mehlman they’re worthy of notice. I suspect they would overwhelmingly support a Roman Catholic tough-guy paisano over a Romney or Allen type.
Correction: re the tech boom, the yankee techies came during the 1990s, and the Californians came after the bottom fell out of the tech boom in 2001-02.
A slightly frothy but still on target ca. 2000 article on Dallas as a technology hub– the nation’s second-largest after silicon valley– from the American Enterprise Institute’s magazine: http://www.taemag.com/issues/articleid.17238/article_detail.asp
The point here is that the stereotype of the South as a backwater dominated by bible-thumpers is crap. Texas (Dell, EDS, TI, Compaq, BMC, all of the major telcos’ R&D labs, plus #2 chipmaker ST Micro); North Carolina (Big Pharma, SAS, BoA, Wachovia, Nationsbank); and Georgia and Florida especially harbor huge concentrations of cutting technology, much more than the bicoastal chattering classes realize, and with it, a large concentrate of moderates and libertarian professionals who would flock to Rudy in a heartbeat.
I’ll see your Rudy2008 and raise it.
I suspect that most Republicans know that one way or another, whoever becomes president in 2008 won’t be as conservative, at least on issues of faith and morality, as Dubya is. With that in mind, given a choice (as it stands right now) between McCain, Hillary, or Rudy, Giuliani starts to look pretty darn good, especially to undecided voters. His Churchillian moment in September of 2001, and his ability to transform Manhattan in the years prior will overcome any perceived moderate or liberal opinions in most Republicans’ eyes.
No, on this one, I’d bet heavily against the Conventional Wisdom (and, yes, once in a while, I’m a betting man).
You’d lose.
I write that as someone who right now plans to vote for him in June 2008—not that it’ll matter by then.
I like Rudy too, but a warning flag went up for me when he recommended Bernard Kerik to head up Homeland Security. Remember the resulting scandal? So I am a bit concerned that Giuliani may be a bit lax about his subordinates behaviour. Maybe not a problem affecting job performance, definitely a problem in today’s gotcha environment.
Before Hurricane Harriet I thought the fundies would thwart Rudy’s bid. But we know that Bush is nothing if not a shrewd cardplayer, and the fact that he tacked away from the hard right on the Miers nomination suggests to me that he recognizes instinctively that the Religious Right Moment has passed.
This is not really about Katrina or Iraq or any issue in particular, rather a sense that the nation is suffering a sense of battle fatigue, and hardline, aggressive right Republicanism will be a very tough sell in 2006 and 2008.
See Patrick Ruffini’s online poll of Republicans (I know, I know– online polls overstate libertarian, also lefties’ numbers, but still, this is a huge sample, over 18,800 online voters). Sort by state. Giuliani grabs 33-39%, vs runnerup Allen’s 17-20%, of the Republican vote in every southern state save Allen’s home state of Virginia.
http://www.patrickruffini.com/september05results.php?st=TX
See Patrick Ruffini’s online poll of Republicans …
Name recognition certainly plays a part. I took the poll and wondered “who the heck is Allen, and why is he here?” I also think this counts for a lot of Condi’s popularity as a dream candidate. The job for the contenders in the runup to the nomination will be getting their name out there, and if they succeed everything will change.
In a two-way matchup, Condi doesn’t fare nearly so well as Rudy or McCain against not just Hillary but also Kerry http://www.foxnews.com/projects/pdf/poll_100505.pdf
Giuliani 50, Clinton 39
McCain 49, Clinton 38
Clinton 46, Rice 43
McCain 53, Gore 27
Giuliani 52, Kerry 36
Rice 45, Kerry 43
nb 41% of those polled identified themselves as inclined to vote Dem, 39% as inclined to vote Repub. Condi clearly has very high negatives among moderates and independents and should not be considered a serious national candidate.
I took the poll and wondered “who the heck is Allen, and why is he here?”
Me too. Couldn’t decide whether it was Funt or Konigsberg.
I seriously doubt that an anti-abortion, religious right candidate would defeat Hillary, who would almost certainly take all the states Kerry won as well as either Ohio, Colorado, or Arizona or all three. 2008 will see the pendulum swing back to the center. Bush knows this. Does his party?
thibaud, Miers is an evangelical Christian with specific approval from James Dobson. I’m not so sure the Religious Right moment has passed, but if the party is smart (a gigantic IF), they’ll have to tack to the center for the next election.
Allen was governor of Virginia before becoming Senator. I hate all of our governors so I can’t particularly stand Allen. He is really well liked here though. The word ‘smarmy’ comes to mind (there’s something in the Governor’s Mansion’s water), but with Giuliani as Pres and Allen as VP, they’d both do quite well. I’m not so sure the Religious Right would turn out for an adulterer though even more than his pro-choice stance. If it comes down to Hillary v. Rudy, I wonder if the Dems would be able to play the fact that Rudy cheated on his wife against him while portraying Hillary as “his” “victim”.
Sorry Roger but then you haven’t been watching the reaction of Conservatives to Miers Supreme Court nomination then.
And the fact is Rove brought out more Evangelicals to vote that hadn’t previously voted in this election than ever before. I don’t think Rudy’s gonna get those votes? – especially when it comes out he’s not necessarily against gay marriage.
Rudy’s going to be competing for votes in the middle…. which he and/or McCain might get in a national election against a Democrat especially one like Hillary. But he’d have to get the nomination in the primaries first and then win the actual election without the largest part of the Republican base not too motivated to vote.
Plus, Rudy’s got some dirt in his closet…
I would’ve thought Rudy had a chance for all the practical reasons cited above, until I watched what has to be called the Conservative Media Establishment lose their minds over the latest Supreme Court nominee. These people have become the worst kind of purists, and they’re completely blind to their own arrogance. She’s one of *them*, and they still want to reject her because she’s not ‘in your face’ enough. In ’08, no way are these people going to give Rudy Guiliani a pass.
You might think practical people would agree that a hard core ‘values conservative’ would lose to Hilary, but that’s not a good enough reason for these folks not to insist that the nominee pass their litmus test.
Some history: Californians elected Pete Wilson, a moderate conservative, to two terms. He was pro-life and kind of an environmentalist, but conservative in most other ways. It seemed like a winning formula. But when he was through, the party’s elite put forward hard-core values conservative Dan Lungren to face Gray Davis. Davis’ commercials against Lungren were very simple. He’s anti-choice and pro-gun. I’m not sure if they said anything else. It was enough. Davis won in a landslide. It was very forseeable, but rightwingers continue to think that if they can find a guy who’s really forthright about his values, by golly, the public will admire him and vote for him. It’s “in your heart, you know he’s right” all over again.
They need to face facts. There has been an incremental conservative correction in our nation’s politics, but not a conservative revolution. Reagan won because he wasn’t Carter. Bush, Sr. won because he wasn’t Reagan or Dukakis. Bush, Jr. won, barely, because of Clinton scandals and the suspicion he was sort of a moderate. He won again because of the war, and because the Democrats started to look a little crazy with their over-the-top Bush hatred. But Bush will not leave office beloved by anyone, and his coattails will be less than worthless. These facts need to be acknowledged, but they won’t be. The fantasy of a values revolution is more attractive.
A values revolution scares people like me, people who support the war and the GWOT, and who have come to think lower taxes tend to make everyone a little richer, including the poor. But I don’t want gays demonized, which the values right insists on doing. I don’t want abortion legislated out of existence. Preach pro-life all you want from the pulpit. I don’t want HBO or satellite radio censored; if they aren’t the public airwaves they’re using then, sorry, you have no jurisdiction to assert. And so on. If Hilary were to embrace the GWOT on terror, which she does every other week, I’d vote for her in a flash if she was opposed by the kind of guy the Conservative Media Establishment will insist upon.
Funny, I was concerned about George Allen (R, Virginia) because he is a Senator! Now that I know he used to be a governor, I guess he’s the only rational choice.
No, I’m just kidding. No way I’m going to make up my mind this early. I might vote for Rudy in a Republican primary. I have great respect for him. I hope he runs.
It hasn’t been that long ago since I voted in my first Republican primary. The poll workers didn’t ask me for proof I was a Republican. I didn’t even have to wear a tie. If moderates want to influence the Republican Party to be more centrist, the primary is the place to do it. Why not start in 2006? They might stamp “Republican” on your voter registration card, though.
Vail Beach, I don’t trust Hillary Clinton. No matter what she says next week or next year. Do you really trust her? However, you’re right about California Republicans. Arnold Schwarzenegger could never have made it through a Republican primary there.
“But Bush will not leave office beloved by anyone, and his coattails will be less than worthless.”
This is so true. If they intend to get anywhere, they need to choose someone who doesn’t stink of Bush. I voted for the guy in 2004, but even I’ve slowly begun to despise him and his entire family.
lindenun:
Taht was a nasty thing to say.
I respect George Bush and I am not sorry I voted for him.
I am sick of all the back stabbing nit picking snarky people who seem to think that Bush is supposed to say how high when they say jump.
There are a lot of pople out there that voted for Bush in spite of the fact that he was a Republican and not because of it. I have gotten sick of the Democrats but right now the Republicans are starting to look just as obnoxious.
Bush has brought more diversity to Washington than any president I remember. Now the right is pissed because Miers is not the “right kind of person”. She did not go to the right schools and hang out with the right people.
oh yeah and she is a crony. she acutally knows the president and he knows her.
for Chrisake, I live in a town of 5,000 people but in many ways it is larger than DC. Everybody knows everybody there and this woman just wasn’t [shall we say] top drawer.
But let’s call it cronyism so that the little people won’t know what snobs we really are.
So you hate his whole family? Laura Bush too? BAbs? Jeb?
That is the kind of over the top rhetoric that has lead to larger and larger numbers of people not even wanting to be inolved in politics.
It is hateful and I for one am tired of hateful.
I have heard all these people bitching and moaning that Bush will not cut spending, he says he want to to cut certain entitlement programs and there are other people out there saying his cuts will kill people.
In some ways he has an impossible job.
I tell you what if the media pundits and talking heads and right wing zealots think they can do a better job then how about they put their lives, the money and their reptuations to the test and run for the job themselves?
Instead of just being mouthy.
The Conservative base was screwed when the Gang of 14 caved under pressure. I trust Bush found a way around those Republican Senators who would ultimately crumble in the fight. I am glad he did not take up the fight in the manner which Conservative pundits wanted because he knew McCain and the other Senators would fail in this fight.
As for Guiliani, all the NYC Liberals and Lefties for almost eight years declared Rudy to be a Nazi Hilter. The hysteria ceased for a time when 9/11 hit but I have no doubt that should he be elected President we will continue to hear the Nazi-Hilter theme.
One prime reason why I hope Guiliani is elected President is so that America can be exposed to the ‘liberal’ and lefty frauds who perpetuated the fascist rhetoric like Bush is a Nazi-Hilter is really just ‘liberal’ and Lefty fascist rhetoric.
That said, thirty years of Marxist-based NOW’s fraudulent feminism is so vicious I do not believe America is prepared to confront her bloody reign.
The problem isn’t the Texans and Georgians. The problem is the Iowa and New Hampshire party insiders.
He might need to run against the primary system and the Republican party business-as-usual.
Giuliani?
You mean the pro-abortion gungrabbing ‘Catholic’ who couldn’t remember what “for better or worse” means? The one whose ex-wife threw him out of Gracie Mansion?
If the coastal fringe was a country he’d have a chance – as a Democrat.
The man did an excellent job as mayor of New York and performed as well on and after 9/11 as any politician could ever hope to do. His anti-crime work as mayor was exceptional and the policies that he developed with Kerik certainly cleaned up the mess that previous administrations had made. He was the right man for that job but he will never sit in the Oval Office as other than a visitor.
Re Texas:
For some months Rudy has been a named partner in a large Houston-based law firm, Bracewell & Giuliani.
He’s the only Republican coming up that doesn’t smell like Bob Dole, and Katrina made the fragrance even sweeter. I am horrified with the current demanding behavior (Miers) of the loud bi-coastal Republican base, but in three years Giuliani’ll likely look better to most of us than anyone the HilGore-Kerries can cough up.
If it’s true Secretary Rice is pressuring EU members to admit Turkey, and if she short-sightedly engineered the scrapping of Gaza, I’m having serious second thoughts about giving her any support, as well as wondering what kind of One-Worlders might arrive in the wake of any office she would hold.
Rudy is simply El Supremo on TV, on talk shows, and in debate on the American scene and that appellation includes Bubba, who is not running. That Rudy went through a messy public divorce is meaningless. His pal Bernie Kerik’s seamy affairs will not tar and feather Rudy who comes with a Churchillian persona, true or false, of being the guy who saved New York City. Importantly, he has time to run for president being not burdened by past votes and persistent vote calls from the Clerk of the US Senate. My three imponderables are: who will Bush Rove support pre-nomination, what red states will still support Rudy and what blue states can he win.
the fact is Rove brought out more Evangelicals to vote that hadn’t previously voted in this election than ever before. I don’t think Rudy’s gonna get those votes? – especially when it comes out he’s not necessarily against gay marriage
You’re forgetting the million+ national security Dems who crossed over in 2004 to vote for Bush. For ex in Florida, it’s pretty clear that Bush won in 2004 because of the defection of several hundred thousand Democrats who thought Kerry unreliable in the war on islamist terror (see the voter reg and voting data for Broqard and Dade counties, for a start). These voters, a not insignificant number of whom are transplanted New York jews, will have no such qualms about voting for Hillary. So Florida’s in play, if not already leaning to Hillary.
Evangelicals may well have made the difference in Ohio, but again, I think it highly unlikely that Hillary would not do much better than Kerry did outside the three big urban counties. Look at counties in rural, upstate New York, where Hillary has won over a majority of voters with diligent, centrist positioning (not to mention some populist grandstanding). If Hillary can win them over in Oswego, she can win them over in rural OH and PA. So Ohio must also be counted as leaning toward Hillary.
And then there’s Colorado, where the large and growing fundie continent in Colo. Springs is more than offset by a huge infusion of libertarian yuppies in the technology centers of Denver and Boulder. On top of which, hispanics, as in NM and AZ and NV, will probably hold the key to victory. I seriously doubt that a right-wing evangelical presidential candidate will win a majority of hispanics and Denver-Boulder moderates. So add at least one of the previously red southwestern swing states to the leaning-toward-Hillary column as well.
Note: all Hillary needs to do to win is retain the states Kerry won and add just one of the following: Ohio, Florida, Colorado or Arizona.
Do you still seriously believe that rational Republicans will ignore the numbers and hand the keys to the Oval Office to Hillary in 2008?
thibaud:
You ask: Do you still seriously believe that rational Republicans will ignore the numbers and hand the keys to the Oval Office to Hillary in 2008?
No, and, neither are the Democrats going to hand the nomination to Hillary. The MSM may talk about the presumption of Hillary but Edwards and Kerry and Gore and Bayh are not going to approach her altar in Chappaqua and hand over the scepter to her. She will have to run for it. The Dems are not like the GOP when it comes to the nomination. Queen Hillary may be loved on the Chris Matthews Show but she ain’t loved by the women of America. Her negativity rating is over 25% so don’t crown her yet.
Thibaud,
Subtract the evangelicals and church attending Catholics plus the 2nd Amendment NRA members from your equation and what are you left with?
I’m surprised that no one has figured out that Rudy might be running against Hilary for the NY Senate seat. I’m sure that she has.
lindenen,
If they intend to get anywhere, they need to choose someone who doesn’t stink of Bush. I voted for the guy in 2004, but even I’ve slowly begun to despise him and his entire family.
terrye,
lindenun: That was a nasty thing to say.
Love and war and politics, remember? It’s uncanny how the right’s critique of Bush’s behavior in the Miers affair mirrors almost exactly the left’s critique of Bush’s behavior in the run-up to the Iraq War. The attack points are that Bush and his team are
1) unconscionably arrogant, and respond to criticism with the undemocratic and, to many, insulting, line, “Trust me on this.”
2) tainted by favoritism and cronyism, with an undertone of possible corruption
3) dumb (cf George Will’s unbelievably snide piece on Bush’s depth, which could have been lifted from Kos)
I don’t necessarily agree with all or some of the above; I’m simply pointing out that, by a purely political yardstick– not PR, but politics, ie winning approval from important groups in a democracy– Bush is widely seen by people across the spectrum as failing.
It’s one thing to be unloved but respected. Reagan was hated by many, loved by many, but nearly everyone respected the man as a straight shooter with a clear vision for the nation. So in a way, respect engenders love, over time.
However, if you’ve lost respect, there’s no way to recapture even your supporters’ love. I’d say that when your own side takes potshots at your core integrity and intelligence, you’re starting down the path to Clintonville.
“Texas (Dell, EDS, TI, Compaq, BMC, all of the major telcos’ R&D labs, plus #2 chipmaker ST Micro)”
When I lived in Austin, IBM, Motorola, Samsung, and AMD all had fabs there. Dell and IBM were the two largest private employers. Plus tons of dot.com startups until the bust.
thibaud:
I remember Ronald Reagan and he may be deified today but back then he was a moron, a war monger, a liar, a sneak, an air head, a hypocrite and when he raised the social security tax a traitor to Republicans.
He is respected in retrospect and the fact that the righties are sounding more and more like the lefties says more about them than it does Bush.
thibaud:
I remember Ronald Reagan and he may be deified today but back then he was a moron, a war monger, a liar, a sneak, an air head, a hypocrite and when he raised the social security tax a traitor to Republicans.
He is respected in retrospect and the fact that the righties are sounding more and more like the lefties says more about them than it does Bush.
not again….
Wow–i LOVE these political threads!!!! “It was the best of times, it was the worst of times…” Of the potential 2008 candidates on the republican ticket, Rudy is my personal fave (assuming condi doesnt run). A primary fight between Rudy and Condi would be painful for me.
Yes, Rudy has a lot of personal baggage–but he also has a track record in governing NYC which is no mean accomplishment. He understood that broken windows cause crime; squeegie men cause crime, he cleaned up the festering sores. And I thought his role as leader after 9/11 was spectacular. And, since I am a squishy republican, I love his social positions. In short, we have values congruence
To me, a dream ticket would be Rudy/Condi (keeping my fingers crossed).
As the President supporting a candidate for 2008? somehow I think he wont go on record–I think he will stay out of it.
Terrye
That place has let trolls rule for so long that more moderate and female commenters have been driven out by the abusive language and combative hierarchical nature of the place. The pundits there are for the most part young unmarried males…
They moderate the place in an unpredictable, uneven, and therefore-I think-unfair manner. They almost protect the trolls because the trolls say things for so long and when a Conservative commenter finally lets loose they will chastise the Conservative because they already know the troll does not care what the pundit thinks. The Conservative they know they can embarrass into behaving.
What’s worse is that they will respond to trolls while ignoring thoughtful considerate questions from Conservative commenters.
Easier to respond to the trolls cheap shot rather then answer something that would take some thought.
I have watched them lose moderate commenters left and right.
Don’t judge the Republican Party by that nuthouse-me included-I am unfortunately addicted to politics….
I can’t believe you are letting them get to you. Ugh- they are bums especially whoever called you a troll.
RogerA
Rudy/Condi
I’ll second that.
The one thing Hillary’s gonna find hardest to shake off, no matter which way she triangulates:
vote for her, get him back.
Hi Madawaskan (would you at some point expand on your nom de plume?–I love it)
You raise some interesting points–being a reader and sometimes poster on Polipundit, I suspect Terrye’s point are relevant to that blog–Yes, I think you are right, and I dont know if Roger’s stats he compiled earlier shed any light on it) but I suspect most bloggers are male
esp on the political blogs.
I have noted that many more female readers popped up with respect to the Miers kerfluffle which suggests to me that there are more female lurkers than posters.
I for one am happy to hear from the (warning: politically incorrect term) distaff side because I have always assumed women are like men with just bigger boobs.
OK–women do see things differently–I recall during the Kerry Bush debates when Kerry was asked about women who had an influence on them and he didnt mention his wife. Most women pounced on that, and honestly, it never really registered to me–but that was one defining moment–so thank god for the gender difference.
The Miers thing has raised all kind of interesting issues among the electorate; and I particularly enjoy the feminine take on it–and that isnt meant to be sexist or condecending–I have lived long enough to know there ARE signficant differences between the genders.
jedrury,
My three imponderables are: who will Bush Rove support pre-nomination
Jeb, or no one. None of the contenders kisses the Family’s arse. McCain and Bush have buried the hatchet, and Rudy never committed lese majeste, even when he had, by default, the bully pulpit after 911.
what red states will still support Rudy
In the primaries, probably all except Virginia (to favorite son Allen) and a few deep red fundie states such as AL, OK, MS, UT and maybe TN. I’m confident Rudy will do well in Texas, and for that matter, in the libertarian mountain states like CO and AZ.
In the general, all the red states unless Edwards runs, in which case Opie may pull a Carter1976 in a few small southern states (though not Texas or Florida).
and what blue states can he win
New York, obviously, and with it NJ and CT. Also would make NH red again. Not likely to win any of the crunchy/Lutheran blue states (WA, OR, MN, WI), but competitive in the heavily Catholic industrial midwest– Reagan Dem appeal in Michigan and Ohio. Perhaps competitive enough in California to force Hillary to burn huge amounts of time and $$$ there.
Rick B,
Reagan was divorced, and his pappy was a drunken Irish catlicker, and yet the fundies had no problem with any of the above. I doubt the NRA will go to the mat against Rudy, either– no better way for them to marginalize themselves once and for all than to smear the anti-crime cred of the one politician in the US whom the public identifies strongly with tough on crime policies.
And “church-going Catholics”? Please. Catholics are far less fundie and far more tolerant than you imagine when it comes to pols’ peccadilloes. A century of support for Irish and Italian badboy toughguy urban pols could hardly dispose them otherwise.
RogerA
Madawaskan is a name I came up with when Prodigy went down and AOL came into being.
I couldn’t believe my Croatian last name was taken with numbers added even so a book that my uncle wrote about my French Canadian side of the family Madawaskan Heritage was sitting by the computer and I figured it was soooo long that no one had taken it yet and I didn’t want a name with numbers in it.
It’s about being Acadian. As an aside he was Charge d’Affairs for the U.S. to Tunisia but I guess more heart rendering he was the longest serving ambassador to Rwanda, he later was in charge of the Africa desk in the State Dpeartment. He was a career diplomat-if you read between the lines-there. Leo G. Cyr.
Anyways from him I became immensely interested in Central Africa. Before the Rwanda genocide-he was appointed by LBJ-he suffered from Alzheimer’s and also went blind-he enjoyed the study of genealogy and pent hours at the Library of Congress doing research. I was really upset that he went blind but then God gave me the answer-it was so he could not see how Clinton ignored Rwanda. Clinton-Gore even got him to sign a letter of recommendation before their first election.
Ugh.
Great now I’m going to tart things up-but I laughed so hard at this-I still feel dizzy.
Howard Dean on Hardball talking about the harriet Miers nomination-
DEAN: Well, certainly the president can claim executive privilege. But in the this case, I think with a lifetime appointment to the Supreme Court, you can’t play, you know, hide the salami, or whatever it’s called. He’s got to go out there and say something about this woman who’s going to a 20 or 30-year appointment, a 20 or 30-year appointment to influence America. We deserve to know something about her.
Link Here Get It While It’s Hot or Before They Change It
Honestly can someone teach Howard some er, things!?
Oh curses!
That rat Tim Blair already beat me to it-and here I thought I was leaving Roger a hot tip.
Dang it!
Classic, Madawaskan, thanks. The comments at Tim Blair are choice. Remember: Salam is not the enemy, bush is.
If the Democrats do not ditch this jackass, and soon, then I’m going to have to ditch the Democrats. And to think they make fun of Bushisms.
Rudy would do well in the primaries in TN, AL, and GA (but probably not MS)–*IF* the leading contenders for the Democratic nomination are Kerry-like. Why? Because relatively “conservative” Dems will cross over in mass droves to vote in the GOP primary–or as it will be called around here, the “primary that matters”. OTOH, if the Dems have a plausible centrist (not Hillary) making a solid run, then the flow may go the other way.
Some of you may recall a certain alcohol related story in 2000 five days before the election that did have an effect on the GOP base vote. You might also recall what effect this had on the 2004 vote–zilch. A lot of of the south east voters feel about personal foibles the way Lincoln felt about Grant.