Rudy Giuliani praised George W. Bush for his “leadership” and “foresight” and compared him to Abraham Lincoln. I’m not kidding.
Michael Finnegan reports fot the Los Angeles Times:
Republican presidential hopeful Rudolph W. Giuliani praised President Bush’s war leadership on Saturday and mocked supporters of a nonbinding congressional resolution condemning the U.S. troop buildup in Iraq.
The former New York City mayor came to Bush’s defense as he promoted his White House candidacy at a California Republican convention. Drawing parallels between Iraq and America’s Civil War, Giuliani compared Bush’s political troubles to Abraham Lincoln’s. When the Civil War was unpopular, Giuliani said, Lincoln “kept his eye ahead.”
“He was able to say, ‘I know my people are frustrated, and I know my people are angry at me.’ ” But after weighing public opinion, Lincoln had “that ability that a leader has — a leader like George Bush, a leader like Ronald Reagan — to look into the future,” Giuliani said.
Giuliani’s defense of the currently unpopular president comes as he is portraying himself as a decisive leader unafraid to buck public opinion. …
… America, he added, is “very fortunate to have President Bush.”
That’s his campaign speech?
Giuliani made the rounds of Republican constituency groups at the convention, attending small meetings of women, Jews, Asian Americans and lawyers.
But not African Americans? Maybe he’s afraid they know how he behaved after the Diallo shooting.
But he canceled a plan to take questions from members of the conservative California Republican Assembly. The group’s president, Mike Spence, called it “your basic snub.”
The question is, can Giuliani be a bigger whore than he already is? Or has he hit the limits? There even have been reports that Giuliani has shifted his former pro-choice position further right.
Seems to me Giuliani is taking entirely the wrong direction if he expects to be a viable candidate. The one and only attribute he’s got going for him is a perception — a questionable perception — that he’s a take-charge guy who would be tough on terrorism. But if he can’t stand apart from the Miserable Failure-in-Chief and sell himself as someone who would take a new direction, what’s the point?
Yeah right,Giuliani can see Lincoln in Bush, and I’m the one with the drug problem? What am I not getting here? There’s a big difference between a steady hand on the tiller of a right cause and digging in your heels to cover your ass and avoiding the consequences of your actions. Bush is a joke..no refinement, no finesse, no statesmanship, no courage…no brain, and nothing remotely close to Lincoln. Believe me!
Giuliani would be wise in my opinion to stay clear of campaigning on the fighting terrorism platform. I think Bush has beaten that horse to death and American’s want to move on from fighting exaggerated ghosts and gobblins to some more concrete. Rudy should look into his bag of tricks and see if he can pull out something reality based, like restoring the dignity and honor of our nation
like restoring the dignity and honor of our nation
Um, Rudy?
I feel like pouring Guiliani a drink, and letting him talk some more. Yeah, comparing Bush to Lincoln is going to go real far in this country at this point.
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Giuliani and Bush have two things in common:
1. they both made the country feel better in the aftermath of 9/11
2. they both think that George W is a great leader
Rudy might have had a slight edge based on #1 above, but #2 just blew that edge away – and then some.
Whos’s advising this guy anyway? It boggles the mind that any presidential hopeful would start their campaign praising the worst president in history (especially at a time when most Repubs are running away-November elections ring a bell Rudy?). And I find it curious that Rudy used Abraham Lincoln’s name on the same day that Sen Obama did while making his announcement speech? – not. Hmmm, kind of smells of a desperate Karl Rove…..
I desperately want Rudy to be the GOP nominee. He’s the only Republican in the field that wouldn’t carry his home state.
All the GOP candidates are complete morons and traitors to our country. But I’m more worried that by November 2008, there’ll be nothing left about our country to cheer about any election outcome.
Correction Kevin – Mitt Romney is another that won’t carry his home state. But more about him at another time.
What can I add? Gag.
Giuliani the whore, McCain the whore, and Romney the whore.
The Christian right encourages – and rewards! – whoredom.
Very, very weird.
Are they all too stupid to expect betrayal from such total phonies?
Or do they just suffer a lack of sincerely fanatical potential GOP candidates?
In a dearth of the real thing, faux Christian crazies will have to do?
OK, I’ll explain.
While Rudy will almost certainly move to the center-right (rhetorically, at least, a la Bush in 2000) when and if he wins the nomination, right now his plan is to tell the Republican faithful what they want to hear — and he assumes no one will pay attention except those Republicans (and a few grumbly political pros and mavens on the left).
Unfortunately, this is an accurate assumption.
Rudy’s exceeding expectations on the GOP side, just as Obama is on the Dem side. But the GOP is responding to Obama’s rise by making headline-grabbing attacks on him. The Democrats are responding to Rudy’s rise by … snickering that he once wore drag.
That’s apparently our whole line of attack if he survives the primaries. (That and maybe Kerik, whom hardly anyone outside the NY metro area has ever heard of.)
This speech was local news. The lede of every national story on Rudy is still “America’s Mayorâ„¢ — can he be president?” The Democrats are letting him get away with defining himself, rather than defining him. In other words, they’re being Democrats again.
is it a sign of something when politicians seeking election openly advocate minority-held views and yet convincingly believe themselves to be viable electoral candidates?
Who is this Lincoln that folks like Rudy, Kristol and W talk about? It certainly isn’t the Abraham Lincoln who was President during the Civil War. Have any of them actually even seen Ken Burns’ documentary?
Meanwhile, I’m intrigued by the proposed new mathematical concept in physics, the ‘Giuliani limit’. While conventional Euclidian approaches suggest that Giuliani could only be as big a whore as the size of the universe, I think modern multi-dimensional analysis would prove that the limit on his whoreishness is actually imaginary.
A man with three living wives cannot get the endorsement of Dobson, Falwell, et al. Or can he? This kind of thing might play well in NYC, but the folks from Iowa would like to know what woman will be co-habitating with the president in the Whitehouse. Of cousre if he ran on the ticket with Newt, or maybe Mitt, we could have multiple first ladies and second ladies and perhaps a few third ladies.
At what point is the ghost of Lincoln gonna look up rudy and tell him to stop soiling his good name?After all Lincoln did for this country this is the thanks he gets?Being compared to a Jr hitler wannabe? Why pee on poor Lincoln?, the guy is dead let him rest.
Who would Lincoln torture?
To accuse poor Lincoln of being like bush is a disgrace.I don’t recall Lincoln invading a nation based on cooked intell.I don’t recall Lincoln violating the FISA law to spy on his own people.I don’t recall Lincoln creating”signing statements” that claimed him to be above the laws of his own country.I don’t recall Lincoln bombing countries at will. I don’t recall the Lincoln administration outing his own agents for political cover.Oh, and I could be wrong here, but I don’t recall any members of his administration who told a senator to “Go fuck himself” on the senate floor.
Yes, it’s a sad state of affairs when the repubicans DARE to make comments like rudy did and get away with it.Poor Lincoln.After all he did for us and no one even stands up for the poor fellow…. what a shame.I save the bulk of my outrage for poor old “honest Abe” – does bush have an honest bone in his body?
But on to the second part of my outrage/concern.In our current climate I question whether rudys spew will work with the general population now.It might work to re-rally the base,who are like rabid animals waiting for someone to yell attack and get them all fired up.Why give this message UNLESS you expect the current climate to shift back to a pre -war mindset?Rudy is a asshole,he is not stupid.Be afraid, be very afraid.
Sorry, but they are the party of cooked wars and they are never to be trusted again.If he is giving this message it is because he knows something we don’t..
My guess is that Iran will go forward and the repubicans figure once the bombs start flying we will all rally around the war like good little Americans and once again we will desire to be spoon fed little bites of fear and false security(gag).Mushroom clouds!BOO!..Yes that image will set talk radio listeners right over the edge and they will decide that “they” wanna be the ones making those mushroom clouds and as long as they keep doing it, it can’t happen to us…Welcome to total insanity…Makes the mind wobble don’t it?…Sure , the message sounds weird , even silly now, but when your afraid again papa rudy has already told you where you can turn.
Recall the bush ad from 2000….the “madmen and missiles” ad that ran in 1999.We lived in peace.Not fear.Yet here was candidate george warning us about this world chocked FULL of madmen(ironic he didn’t mention he was the biggest one).It sounded as insane as rudys message does now….
This time they have an advantage they didn’t have before.
Candidate george could only plant the seed of fear in the 2000 contest.He couldn’t start a actual war.This time, repubicans can plant the seed before there is a need.Only this time they have the control of creating the need.
After all they have pulled who would be foolish enough to trust them at all? I wouldn’t put anything past them.They just are not a nice group of folks.
Kinda makes me want to believe in ghosts, because people say Abe haunts the White House. I guess only the pure of heart can see him. If only he could pull a Jacob Marley and scare the snot out of the present occy-pant.
Rudy, Rudy, the ego bleater,
had a wife and couldn’t beat her
so he put her a living hell,
and there he kept her very well.
Shanghaibill in #14 makes a valid point..Rudy has had almost as many wives as Brigham Young..If he cant find stability in a realtionship after three ..maybe he might try looking in the mirror. I know it’s absurd to think it, but Rudy might be his problem.
I think Rudy might not be aware of it, but his failed love life has disqualified him for the Presidency.
I am more than a little confused. The last election indicated a TREND among voters – away from Vietnam-style wars with no end, a huge price tag – and a steady stream of body bags. The two front-running Republicans (Rudy & Johny-boy) are both FOR enlarging our commitment in Iraq? The current surge is almost certain to fail, and the call for a BIGGER surge as a fix for the failed surge will be as popular with voters as a fart in a spacesuit.
Obviously Rudy and the entire current administration is clueless about statesmanship, but does anyone in the Republican party understand politics? I may see the Republican candidate as seriously thrashed in ’08 as McGovern was in – well, before I could vote.
The only event that could change the dymanics I see, is a successful terrorist attack that kills thousands. Unfortunately this becomes more likely as the Dems gain power because the jihadists need a Bush-like moron in the WH to keep the mid-east stirred up like a hornets nest. (Just because I’m paranoid does not prove they aren’t out to get me. grin)
FWIW, Canadian psychic Douglas James Cottrell says Hillary will win in a landslide.