Can Giuliani survive the GOP primaries to become the GOP nominee in 08?

[saltpoint]

Your thoughts are welcome.

[ps1074]

1. NO

eom

[saltpoint]

3. Ok, that's a direct-enough response, ps1074. Say... isn't that

Bernard Kerik dancing naked there in your signature field?

[Ecumenist]

12. Gracious,

Was that old Bernie himself? Oh my goodness but that's a damn shame. :hide: and so VERY wrong on so many levels for so MANY REASONS... I have to tell you that I just went blind.. I'll have to have my eyes autoclaved and that ain't right...Gee thanks alot, PS...:spray:

[saltpoint]

13. Well, I'm not SWEARING it was Bernie. But it did LOOK like Bernie.

And Bernie does love to dance naked.

Whether it will hold up in court or not, who knows?

[Yupster]

29. Agreed - no

is the right answer.

He's pro-choice and that's a non-starter.

He'll do as well in the primaries as the last pro-choice New Yorkers did, John Lindsey and Nelson Rockefeller.

Good question, but not good enough to make me dance.

[Ecumenist]

2. No, I don't think so at this point.

WAY TOO MUCH baggage... and he has bush and that creep, the police captain, can't remember his name right now. The guy who had all those women and was romancing them at an apartment set aside for business... Well anyway, He has FAR too much hanging on his neck like a huge millstone.

[saltpoint]

4. I wondered the same, Ecumenist. Do you mean Bernard Kerik? I

think that's Kerik up in ps1074's post upthread... dancing naked there in the signature field.

It's going to be hard for Giuliani to overcome so much of the baggage you name, plus he lived a for a time with two gay men after his separation from his wife, who did a stint in the play THE VAGINA MONOLOGUES in NYC. For the record, I don't care what plays his wife starred in and wish her well in that career, and I kind of applaud Giuliani for knowing that two gay people would make perfectly acceptable roommates, same as any other two people.

But you're right. I don't think he translates very well to the hyper-rural parts of the country.

[Ecumenist]

11. Yep, Bernard Kerik...

Whoa...!!:wow: I'm a California girl so I guess this is why I hadn't heard of the two roommates.... Are you serious? He stayed with these two gentlemen? Is this during the time that he had to move out of Gracie(sic) Mansion and his soon to be ex-wife was living there with the children? Man.. It's not enough that he was canoodling his secretary while he was married and as far as I'm concerned, showed himself to have less than upstanding, to say the least?

I stand corrected. He's got trunks full o'bones. As a matter of fact, if you were to open his closet, you'd be killed by the avalanche of skeletons and more than a few monkeys would parade out as well.
Boy, oh boy, he's got a veritable universe of junk in his past.

[alphafemale]

5. No. He won't cozy up to Falwell & Gang.

[saltpoint]

7. True. And even if he did, it would look really gross. I'm being

serious here. He has that gritty New York City thing going and Falwell is not an urban type.

It would be a gross attempt to graft that grit onto Falwell's gospel groove. The very thought makes me edgy.

I think you've hit on the main reason Giuliani won't be the nominee. Veep maybe? But not prez.

[alphafemale]

8. McCain doing it is gross too. Never thought I'd see that.

He threw away bitartisan votes by shifting hard right.

I think the repub nominee will be someone else.

Not sure who yet.

[saltpoint]

10. Yes. Especially after the way McCain talked about Falwell and

other televangelists during the 2000 primary against Bush.

He really let 'em have it back then, and I agreed with at least that part of what he said.

But lately, he's just buyin' and sellin' without much principled thought.

[CGrantt57]

6. It'll never happen.

Rudy has always been pro-choice.

It's a death-knell for candidacy in the GOP these days.

Just ask McCain.

[saltpoint]

9. A huge obstacle for him. There's a gigantic contingency of GOP

base voters who aren't going to budge on that issue either.

[bigscott]

14. didn't he have prostate cancer too?

not that it is a big deal but some might make something of it - I think the guy is a dick for tons of other reasons and would never get the nomination from the GOP

[saltpoint]

35. Yes. He was diagnosed with prostate cancer in an early stage and

wound up withdrawing from the Senate battle against now-Senator Clinton.

[BigYawn]

78. Kerry had prostate cancer also, don't think that is a factor anymore

on if you can run for president.

[no_hypocrisy]

15. A list or series of "two words" regarding Giuliani

Bernard Kerik

Abner Louima - A man who was taken into custody for a relatively minor infraction and upon whom police officer Justin Volpe went (literally) medieval on this guy's ass in a bathroom, yelling "It's 'Giuliani Time!'" The mayor was defensive of his police force as opposed to the victim.

Amadou Diallo - A man who merely answered his door when police rang his bell was shot something like 43 times. Giuliani remained ambivalent at best during the investigation, but always supportive of HIS police force.

[saltpoint]

20. You make a VERY deft point about Giuliani by raising the name of

Mr. Louima. I read with abject horror of this account, including the quotation by one of the cops, "It's Giuliani time."

I'm no fan of Mr. Giuliani or the tone and practice of government he brought to New York City. I lived in that town under Democratic mayors and I really miss those days.

[AX10]

63. Dems could beat the living Hell out of Rudy with these two cases.

[DemGirl7]

16. No way in hell

Without the support of the fundies like Falwell, Dobson & Robertson, Giuliani won't be the nominee.
The fundies & their followers are an important part of the base of the Republican party, and last time I heard Falwell isn't supporting Giuliani because he's too liberal, so I'm sure Dobson and Robertson will follow suit also.

[saltpoint]

21. It's hard for us to imagine Giuliani being liberal at all, but you are

right -- to Falwell, Dobson et al, he's a fire-belching Leftist.

Wow is that pathetic or what?

Without the fundies' organizational and financial clout, I think you're right that a GOP candidate has little chance at the nomination.

[Beware the Beast Man]

17. No. He is way too moderate for the neocon vision of a perfect candidate.

[saltpoint]

22. I think he may take a few Eastern or New England primaries, but only

maybe.

I think the other potential GOP names swamp him in the South.

[displacedtexan]

18. My 30-ish neocon scum pin stripe neighbor has donated to Rudy.

And this is in DC.

I laughed out loud when he told me because I thought he was joking.
Neocons don't joke about their donations. This guy really thinks
Rudy G. will win the nomination.

[saltpoint]

23. I've run into people like that, too, displacedtexan. Kinda frightening,

actually.

But Giuliani has to navigate through a kind of Republican he never much encountered in NYC -- the Bible-thumpin' hellfire variety -- and I don't know if he has anything in his bag of tricks to deal with folks like that.

[zbdent]

19. Yeah, despite the fact that the right wing was trying to make

"dalliances" a death-penalty crime . . .

[saltpoint]

24. Hi, zbdent. You are one of the brave souls answering in the affirmative.

I can make a case for Giuliani for some voters, but I'm not sure how many of them there are in the modern-day Republican party.

If the "moderate" wing of the GOP would have asserted itself, I think his chances would have gone up.

He has a popular appeal, and maybe a cross-over appeal as a general election candidate, but in the GOP primaries I think he faces tough going.

[zbdent]

73. You forget . . . they will do anything to win

and they would have run Osama bin Laden against Kerry and made ObL look like Jesus . . . and Kerry unpatriotic

[saltpoint]

75. Don't worry. I'm not underestimating the skullduggery that can be

visited upon Democratic candidates.

[Bluesplayer]

25. No

[paulk]

26. my Republican neighbor thinks so

I kind of doubt it. But, two years is an eternity in politics - if the Republicans lose big in 2006, who knows? The neocon and religious right stranglehold on the Republican party could weaken.

[saltpoint]

31. It would be good for the Republicans if they could minimize the

influence of the Far Right nutcases. I'm not sure how that's going to happen exactly, but I think you're on target to say their hand is weakened considerably with a blue House and Senate in 06.

Excellent point.

[Dulcinea]

27. Not gonna happen.

He definitely won't play well in the South. He's Catholic, which the fundies down here regard as heathen, plus he's pro-choice, tolerant of gays, & too "Noo Yawk."

Southern rural Repubs prefer the good ol' boys. Rudy is not that!

[saltpoint]

32. Right. I don't think Rudy will ever have that good-ol-boy thing down.

Cement-Head Allen will lay claim to that demographic, and Rudy's fight would be much more uphill.

[Freddie Stubbs]

28. Not unless he drastically changes his positions on

social issues like abortion and homosexuality.

[saltpoint]

33. And he needed those more moderate positions to get elected in NYC.

He's in a bind, no question.

A lot of voters admire what they consider his "resolve" in the wake of 9/11 but frankly I never saw it as much more than showing up for work on his part. I'm sure that sentiment rankles his fans over on the Republican side, but that's how I feel.

I never felt that Rudy Giuliani was anything more than successfull, and in public life, being merely successful doesn't inspire confidence. I think to win presidential primaries, there has to be something more there, and my guess is that Giuliani doesn't have it.

[SteppingRazor]

30. Can he? Certainly. Is he likely to? Probably not. n/t

[Stinky The Clown]

34. Notta chance

He's wasting his time with dragging is sorry ass to all the Talibornagain Temples.

Its not that they particularly mind sex 'crimes' among their standard bearers, they just can't tolerate them being so out in the open.

[saltpoint]

37. How viable do you feel he might be as a vice presidential nominee?

It would call for the Republican Convention to try to squeeze one more drop of propaganda and PR out of 9/11. A very conseravtive candidate at the top of their ticket and Giuliani as veep nominee.

[Stinky The Clown]

54. I think Giuliani is sorta their

Bill Clinton, but only in the sense that people love or hate him, with very little middle ground. I can see the temptation to use him for that last drop of 9/11 mother's milk, but in my view, he has waaaaaaaay too much negative baggage to play well with their base. And as to the rest of the country, I think people are just over him.

Consider this ...... nobody even wants to be reminded of 9/11. I say that, but we'll have to wait to see how this new movie does. I suspect it will go down in flames (no pun intended). If it does, then Rudy's stock goes right down with it.

[saltpoint]

59. You may be right about the 9/11 film. The farther away we are from

that event, the harder it may be for Guiliani or the GOP generally to capitalize on it.

[JohnKleeb]

36. No

You hear the Republican leadership talk about how they like him and hell would even rescind that ban on foreign born people being president for people like Arnold however it won't happen. Here's why Giulani is pro choice, pro gun control, pro gay rights, and has supported environmental protection. It's the same thing with Arnold too. They're both conservative on crime issues and on economics but they're not social conservatives and the key as far as I know to winning a GOP primary especially in the early going in the Iowa Caucus is the backing of the Christian Right which is something that John McCain when he ran in 2000 didn't have and Bush did. Just my objective opinion on it. Giulani would be a hard nominee in my opinion even though the highest he's been in office is Mayor.

[saltpoint]

38. All key points. Howdy, JohnKleeb. I hear you on the Iowa caucuses

and the number of conservatives who play hardball in that caucus. I remember Pat Robertson placing a very strong second against Poppy Bush some years back, and it definitely shook things up for a while. Lucky for America, Robertson couldn't keep a streak going but it shows that the fundie GOP voters are definitely out there.

And you're right that they'd be a problem for Giuliani. I'm having a tough time picturing him in a coffeeshop in one of those smaller northwest towns in Iowa, explaining to people why he's pro-choice and pro-gay rights. They might honor his role in 9/11 but I think you nailed it on those social issues.

It's going to be a steeper climb for Rudy than he thinks.

[JohnKleeb]

39. Iowa Caucus Republican voters tend to be Christian Right members

Now New Hampshire is just a weird state with apologies to Granite Stares but it's a state that I believe Pat Bucahanan won a primary in. Yeah social issues will sink Giulani however he would make a tough general election opponent same deal with Chuck Hagel only Hagel's problem is that he's not a neo-conservative.

[saltpoint]

40. Yep -- Buchanan did win the New Hampshire primary.

He beat Bob Dole narrowly, but it was a big win for him.

I don't know all that much about New Hampshire, but it can surprise people when it comes to politics. After that, all I really know about it is that it's beautiful. A friend of mine lives there with his family and they wouldn't leave it if you offered them an entire country.

Sen. Hagel. Yes, he would be tougher to beat in a general election. He might even be the GOP surprise winner in New Hampshire, for all I know.

Damn, this is going to be interesting for the 06 and 08 elections.

[JohnKleeb]

45. Hagel would be tough

because I've actually met the man and he's not a foaming at the mouth republican. He's questioned the conduct of the Iraq war and while he is socially and economically conservative he said in 2004 that he agreed more with Kerry on foreign issues than he did Bush. However I think Hagel could win a Iowa caucus because Iowa has a lot of farmers and he's from a neighboring farm state.

[saltpoint]

46. Good point on Hagel as a neighbor to Iowa. He could stand in those

farm fields and talk turkey with the people who work those farms.

You get to meet some famous folks, John. Very cool.

[JohnKleeb]

49. Met him last year as part of something I did in poli sci

Met Mary Landrieu too but I didn't get to ask her a question. Yeah the whole being near the state of Iowa will help Hagel there but I think his opponents will go after him for his maverick stands on Bush's foreign policy.

[madville]

41. anti-gun

Many good points made. The anti-gun position is a big one, millions of NRA members and gun owners will be instantly against him for that. Pro-choice and anti-gun, he wouldn't win a single midwest, southern or western state primary, except for maybe CA or WA.

[JohnKleeb]

44. Thanks and yeah

I think maybe he could win a California primary and that's a maybe. The only states that I could see Giulani winning in a GOP primary are New York, Massachuetts, Rhode Island, and Connecticut, ah and maybe Maine too but I hear they got a bit of hunters.

[TheFarseer]

42. I want to say no

because of the strong fundy vote, but you never know. If "the money" supports him, he has a chance. Who will "the money" support? The fact that a dumbsh*t like bush got elected proves that "the money" has most of the say.

[saltpoint]

48. Money talks in politics, that's true. It can mean little or a hell of a

lot.

It will be interesting to see how much cash on the barrel Giuliani can muster by say, November of 2007.

[napi21]

43. I doubt it. Robertson has already said he cannot recommend

supporting him, and although I haven't heard, I'd bet the rest of the fundie preachers will join him in that opinion.

I'd like to believe there are still reasonable Pubs out there, but if a candidate has the RW against him, it would be nearly impossible for his to win the primaries!

[saltpoint]

47. Yep. And I'm not sure what could be offered to persuade the fundies to

change their minds.

(Assuming they HAVE minds!)

[JohnKleeb]

50. I heard Robertson say otherwise actually

at least it was that he personally liked Giulani and would never like McCain despite the fact that McCain is more like he is.

[saltpoint]

51. John, if you met Pat Robertson, all I can say is I'm glad you made it out

ok.

He's on the volatile side.

Don't ever go near him again without an armed escort! :)

[JohnKleeb]

52. No I read the papers how I got that news

Thats where I heard the whole thing about his liking of Giulani and dislike of McCain. Sicne I started college last summer I haven't met anyone real famous.

[saltpoint]

53. Well, you will as the year goes on, I bet. This is going to be a real

interesting summertime.

And you're in a good spot.

[JohnKleeb]

57. Semester ends next friday

Then its out for job hunting/sleeping to 1 daily.

[saltpoint]

60. Well, good luck on that hunt. I predict good things ahead.

:thumbsup:

:hi:


:dem:

[napi21]

67. I heard him say he liked Rudy, and he did a fantastic job in NY

but he couldn't support him for Prez because of his stance of Abortion and gay rights. I can't remember who was interviewing him. Wolfe, or Tweety, I think.

[snowbear]

55. Are you SERIOUS Crusoe?

We're talking about a man who was married to his own cousin!!!

Your thread question HAD to have been a joke, right? http://eliteleague.co.uk/forum/images/smilies/duh!.gif

[saltpoint]

56. I'm at my very best when I'm SERIOUS, larissa.

[JohnKleeb]

58. I had forgotten that

Funny how Southerners get that rap yet Rudy and FDR are the only notable public politicans that I know of who marreid a cousin, and yes I know Elenor was distant.

[NYCGirl]

61. And don't forget that he announced his divorce from Donna Hanover

at a news conference before he mentioned it to her!

[AX10]

62. The hard-core GOP base will never support him with his....

social record: pro gay rights, pro-choice, against prayer in school. Still, Rudy is a douchbag.

With that said, the GOP will chose McCain or Allen. :puke:

[saltpoint]

64. I'd love to see the GOP fractured over who is the truer Republican.

May chaos reign over their convention.

I predict Haley Barbour will emerge as their candidate for president.

[AX10]

65. That is too possible.

and again: :puke:

[JohnKleeb]

74. You're not the first person to say that

It makes perfect sense.

[saltpoint]

76. And it would be a hoot to watch, too! We're going to need a

mountain of popcorn!

[JohnKleeb]

79. I think at least one of the two party's nominees will be a governor

Barbour has no direct connection to the things that have gone wrong with Bush's administration however he as a staunch social and economic conservative can cherry pick what the Republican primary voters liked most about Bush's administration and run with it.

[saltpoint]

80. Yes. He could be a problem for us. Still, 06 is looking good and

if we can build from there, 08 could be a blue election.

[alfredo]

66. It depends on the theocrats during the primaries. If they show,

they will push for someone more to their liking. If they don't he could win the party nomination, but the theocrats could sit on their hands come Nov 2008. Of course he could pull a McCain and drink the Kool Aide.

[saltpoint]

68. Hi, alfredo. Yeah. It probably does depend on how revved up the

Right Wing can get the fundies.

They could put a real mark on the 08 campaign.

But I'm thinking their big peak has come and gone, and with Dubya's drop in the polls, their influence will be less.

I hope so, anyway!

[alfredo]

70. will they try to reassert their power come the primaries, or will

they be turned off. I think their aspirations are much larger than bush. Will they see their fate tied to a post bush republican party, or will they have to go it alone, forming a third party or using extra legal means to gain power.

[saltpoint]

71. Interesting possibilities. I wonder if George Allen or Sam Brownback

or someone else will be the most successful with the fundie vote.

I'd kind like to see them tear each other to pieces so the vote is split into several factions.

That would give Democrats the opening they need.

[alfredo]

81. George Allen has gotten some press, but I don't know enough

about him. This might sound shallow, but It looks like he wears a rug. That might expose him to ridicule he can't overcome if he is indeed covering up his bald pate.

[childslibrarian]

69. Too much baggage

No.

[saltpoint]

72. Really liked your signature, childslibrarian. Reminds me of a certain

president and vice president.

The sweep of this thread agrees with your 'No' and also with your too-much-baggage. Some notable exceptions throughout, but from this group of respondents Maylor Giuliani's odds are long.

[saltpoint]

77. And this from the New York OBSERVER:

_ _ _ _ _

During the last several months, Rudy Giuliani (R) has "spent a lot of time under the radar and below the Mason-Dixon Line, quietly building coalitions with conservative Republicans as he prepares for a potential 2008 Presidential bid," reports the New York Observer.

"He enjoys enormous national name recognition and is widely seen as a strong leader because of the resolve he showed during the Sept. 11 attacks. But there is also a serious question of how long Mr. Giuliani can remain at the top of national Republican…while holding starkly unconservative positions on abortion and gay rights."

_ _ _ _ _