I agree, it's Rudi's temper that will take him down, and it's probably these issues that will provoke it. Rudi isn't used to being challenged, from what I've seen, either by the press or by people with enough political stature to fight him on even ground. McCain has already sacrificed his reputation in his quest for the nomination, and he's got a temper too. Sooner or later, one of them is going to hard after the other, and it ain't gonna be pretty.

After the last debate, I'm back to thinking Huckabee's the dark horse

I agree about Huckabee. He's sort of the Bill Richardson of the GOP race.

if Barack Obama were to announce tomorrow that he's pro-life and wants to [appoint] justices who'll overturn Roe v. Wade ...

Just great. This evening Drudge will be reporting this as true, and the Morning News shows will be all over the "Obama is a closet pro-lifer" story tomorrow, and all the crypto-racists in the so-called progressive blogosphere will be hanging their hats on this as the *real* reason they hate BHO.

conservatives these days care more about terror than they do about abortion and gay rights.

Not the primary voters.

I think Kevin's comparison of Giuliani to Reid is not very compellng, for the simple reason that Reid isn't running for president. The dynamic is totally different; I highly doubt Reid's pro-life stance would survive a presidential primary.

Rudy and his richer alter ego Bloomie are the authortarian my way or the highway wing of the non-rural, blueblood GOP coming to the forefront.

My biggest issue with Rudy isn't even his temper, but rather his have-your-cake-and-eat-it-too sniveling. He sounds like a person speaking from a sense of convenience, not conviction, and it's EXACTLY the kind of thing the Faux News media would jump all up and down on a Democrat for doing. Sure I'm against abortion, I hate abortion, abortion sucks (but shhh, don't worry, I don't want to ban it). Sure I favor an individual right to keep and bear arms (but not if you live in DC, NY, MD, NJ, CA, or MA). Sure I think it's an issue best left to the states (which is why I advocated that federal govt preempt all state laws on the issue and export NYC's policies nationwide). Sure I favor gay rights (but don't call it marriage for God's sake).

If a Democrat tried to straddle tough social issues like abortion and gay rights and guns with such obvious non-positions, you'd never hear the end of it from the conservosphere and the so-called liberal media. The hypocrisy of it all stinks to high heaven, and really makes me wish somebody would call him on it.

So, do rank-and-file GOP KNOW about Rudy's extremely messy - not to say nasty - personal life?

To quote Huckabee:
“If Republicans in this election vote in such a way as to say a candidate’s personal life and personal conduct in office doesn’t matter,� he declared, “then a lot of Christian evangelical leaders owe Bill Clinton a public apology.�

Geez, do you think he'll get one?

from the WSJ political wire, here's the URL

http://blogs.wsj.com/washwire/2007/03/31/a-very-spartan-operation/

Brownback is unacceptable because he is Catholic.

Why the hell would you listen to the opinion of someone Edsall who is so out of that he believes David Broder is "the voice of the people?"

Uh, what does "Piss Christ" have to do with anything Giulianish?

So, do rank-and-file GOP KNOW about Rudy's extremely messy - not to say nasty - personal life?

Come the primaries they will.

McCain learned his lesson 7 years ago in SC, and will be the lead utilizer this go-around of the dirty robo call to bring down whomever he needs to.

Ask someone who lives in the NY Metro area: Guiliani will self destruct, probably throwing a hissy fit over nothing, which will underscore how manifestly unfit he is for serving as a dog catcher much less president.

The evangels will line up behind whichever GOP candidate stands the best chance of winning, along with the non-evangel Right. It's not about faith; it's about power and money. They wouldn't want Brownback in the WH: he's a Christianist loon, but he's not a power-mad, deeply corrupt Christianist loon. A Brownback Administration will make sure Roe is overturned, but it won't necessarily be a gravy train for GOP hangers-on.

Given a choice between someone 'electable' who is also corrupt and authoritarian, and someone sincerely Christianist who's not electable and not corrupt, the GOP will go with the 'electable' Giuliani.

The Bushbots in DoJ and the RW lunatics already on the Federal Bench will ensure that, whoever a GOP President is, the laws of the land and the judges ruling on them will still be Bushist.

Rudy's background in allowing financial corruption will ensure that taxpayer money continues to go to GOP backers and Christianist companies.

Rudy's authoritarianism will ensure that the Unitary Executive will also continue.

It'll be a marriage of convenience, just like it's always been.

http://wbal.com/shows/smith/audio/story.asp?articleid=57830

Interesting take on Rudy's likelihood of going off his rocker...maybe he really is every bit the authortarian blowhard he looks like.

If a personally pro-choice person wins the Republican primary anywhere, that would be a sea change in the grassroots conservative movement. If an urban (diverse culture), non-religious man wins a Republican primary anywhere it will be a sea change in the conservative movement.

Having been influenced by the Southern Midwest as a liberal preacher's daughter, the older I get, the more I truly believe that the base, actually, the MAJORITY of individuals in the conservative party defines themselves as being "white," Christian, controlling, separatist, and supremacy oriented (either consciously or unconsciously--or rather, coded). Every single "political/social" issue these fear-filled voters consider is a litmus test for this twisted culturally-oriented position.

There are more people in this country motivated to keep abortion legal (to preserve individual rights) rather than to ban it (government interference in personal rights); but that has not been the Republican Party since the rise of Falwell. Will his death signal a sea change? Who will the press now go to in order to find that people-hating voice?

We must never forget that the Republican party's constant rhetoric is about BLAME and CONTROL.

Same thing I said at Matt's: the Radical Right, and most Republicans, want a Strong Man who can slam small countries and various Others against a wall. Giuliani acts the part right now, and I suspect would very much like to try his hand at being a dictator. Perfect match.

Cranky

The evangels will line up behind whichever GOP candidate stands the best chance of winning, along with the non-evangel Right. It's not about faith; it's about power and money.

That's certainly true of much of the leadership, whether its true of the base I'm less sure. If enough of the leadership goes along, there won't be a competing message in any of the venues where the base is paying attention to cause defections, but Rudy's substantive distance from the ideals that the base has been told for years are key and important would make it very easy for opportunists in the Christian Right who are willing to sacrifice Republican victory in 2008 to assure that they are catered to more carefully in 2010 and beyond an opportunity to sabotage the Republican Party by highlight Giuliani's shortcomings in a way which demobilizes segments of the Christian Right base.

> would make it very easy for opportunists in the
> Christian Right who are willing to sacrifice
> Republican victory in 2008 to assure that they are
> catered to more carefully in 2010 and beyond an
> opportunity to sabotage the Republican Party by
> highlight Giuliani's shortcomings in a way which
> demobilizes segments of the Christian Right base.

Which I don't think would bother the big rats of the Republican Party a bit; they have written off 2008 and are focusing on 2012 at this point. Exposing the worst of the far-right theocrats as unreliable would be a good thing for them.

Crnaky

Rudy might be able to win the nomination because Republicans care about spoils more than anything.

They can see Rudy as just a way to keep the door propped open for more Regency grads and Abramoff enablers.

hell, all the major republican candidates are fatally flawed. my guess: nobody will win the nomination.

Harry Reid voted for the partial birth abortion ban.

"He's not going to do any damage to the pro-choice cause."

FU.

Dear Kevin: I just read the Edsall piece today and thought he made a good argument. Giuliani's big danger is that he'll bully someone the Republicans find sympathetic, like an Iraqi exile or Mancy Reagan.

In that hypothetical Obama case, how would things change if he added the caveat that he would want to appoint Supreme Court justices who are liberal on other issues, but opposed to Roe v. Wade?

There are plenty of people who are anti-abortion, but left of center elsewhere. That's why I despise the litmus test whether it comes from the GOP or the Democrats, whether it be from evangelicals or Emily's List. Let's not be one-dimensional, gang.

As long as he can convince the social cons that he won't allow liberal moral decay to gain any more of a foothold than it already has

Liberal moral decay like conducting several flagrant affairs while in public office, announcing your leaving your wife at a press conference, and then moving in with a gay couple because a judge wouldn't let you move your mistress into the house you shared with your family? Yeah, Giuliani will sure put a stop to that.....

Rudy might be able to win the nomination because Republicans care about spoils more than anything.

Not exactly everything.

There's one pitch even more compelling than pigs-in-clover.

Which is why if I were running Rudy's campaign, I'd run on, not away from, Abner Louima and Patrick Dorismont and Amidou Diallo.

Making America safe for white folks, sea to shining sea.

Create two, three, many Outer Boroughs!

Edsall is so wrong is hard to know where to start. Let's make this simple. Every single Republican will promise to personally put a bullet in the head of any terrorist captured. There will not be an inch worth of difference between the candidates on the big issues and little issues concerning terror. What will distinguish them are the social issues where Rudy will stand nakedly exposed as a heretic. Please, dear lord, let Rudy be their nominee. The Dems will work in a Nixoneque blowout.

Rudy got all in a tizzy over Chris Ofili's Holy Virgin Mary, not Serrano's Piss Christ.

My inner stickler emerging; apologies, but Loris did query.

Rudy got all in a tizzy over Chris Ofili's Holy Virgin Mary, not Serrano's Piss Christ.

Thank you. After I made the query, I realized that was probably what the reference was about. Same difference, I guess. Neither work had anything to do with dissing religious figures (to the contrary, in Ofili's case). Both uproars made me mad enough to spit.

Giuliani will always be popular with a certain portion of the Republican base because they believe one thing: Rudy kicks ass. More important, Rudy kicks dark-skinned ass. He kicked his ex-wife's ass, at least figuatively, he kicked the squeegee man's ass. There are people out ther who worship that kind of stuff.

Rudy has little chance. Right now it is name recognition and lack of knowledge about him. His stance on abortion is intellectually weak and, most surprisingly, is not even well articulated.

It will be McCain or Romney.

As to Reid, he is pro-life in name only. He voted to prohibit partial birth abortion, then criticized the court for upholding the law. But that contradiction may be just because he is not very bright.

Forgot about Thompson. If he gets in (likely), he probably is the next president. Did you see how he floored Michael Moore today?

Said this already over at the good Glenn's blog, but wtf, let's do it again:

1) There's obviously a lot of hypocritical conservative evangelical and conservative Catholic leaders out there, who (as E.J. Dionne points out this morning) savaged Kerry over his stance on abortion, but have been and will continue to be quiet about Rudy's essentially identical stance.

2) A lot of the rank and file will, of course, follow their leaders.

3) However, Rudy's abortion stance will hurt him amongst the evangelical Protestants, especially among evangelical women, large numbers of whom have quite genuinely taken the abortion issue to heart. Regardless of the hypocrisy of the Dobsons, Robertsons, Falwells, Wildmons, LaHayes, etc. of the world, very often the rank and file really believe the things they say they believe.

Whether Rudy's capable of winning the nomination anyway, I can't say. But this will make his quest a lot more difficult.

4) I can't say anything about conservative Catholics; I have no connections with that tribe.

I'll add to what I said over at Greenwald's that since none of these bozos can win the nomination, yet someone has to, it's hard to rule anyone out that can get out of the 1% range. But anyone who campaigns for months and can't move the needle, is toast, even if his name is Huckabee. So I'll just say: Go, Mitt! Run, Newt, Run!!

Rudy's biggest problem in 08 is he's a Republican. And not a very good one, at least based on the model currently ensconced in the Big,er,White House.
McCain lost the nomination in the Shariya market, Romney lost at birth (sorry, the evangelicals, despite being heretics themselves, aren't going to back a mormon) the rest are just filling the media's ad coffers.
Hillary/Barack/John/Al...well, maybe not Al, the media hate him, will win in a walk even with the Osama endorsement.

Bloomberg vs. Hillary.

Bloomberg spends one billion dollars.

Who wins?

I agree that Giuliani is likely to have a huge, embarrassing hissy fit at some point, but I disagree that it's likely to hurt him. The media will find it a point in his favor. Chris Matthews will say it makes him look passionate and manly and all that. David Broder will say it shows that Rudy has the fire in his belly.

McCain made a complete fool of himself in Iraq, yet he is still taken very seriously and is probably still the frontrunner. These gaffes only matter to the press when Democrats commit them.

The one-trick ponys in the GOP are so pathetic that they still are falling all over themselves to pitch more tax cuts, which this country needs like a fish needs a bicycle! This country is bankrupt and these twits are so lacking in ideas that they keep want to keep piling debt on our children. The Republican Party is a pathetic, rotting corpse.

I have been surprised at how well Rudy has handled interviews and questions. I thought he won tonight's debate.

Substantial numbers of Republicans are pro-choice. If Rudy is the only pro-choice candidate running against several pro-lifers, he could easily win a plurality in many primaries. That's why I think he has a good chance to win the nomination.

I still like Romney, but he didn't shine in tonight's debate. He had little to say that was memorable. I thought McCain did pretty well.

From my perspective as a Republican precinct captain, Rudy has some support among cosmopolitan Republicans, but none among social conservatives and second amendment diehards. The latter group is especially important because it includes a lot of crossover Democrats who see their personal firepower as extremely important to familiy survival during Katrina-like catastrophes, where a lot of anecdotes have surfaced about how nice it is to have a gun to wave at some lawless looter when the social order totally breaks down.

John McCain may yet outlast everyone through this winnowing process, depending on how much resistance he shows to the great global warming humbug snowball. A lot of conservatives essentially believe that algore is full of shit and all his experts are full of shit. The global warming lie about humans causing it all has gotten so far mainly because of bluster, brainwashing, bullshit, and particularly, political bullying with the help of a media that doesn't know science from their telegenic hairspray.

Anthropogenic global warming could be the stealth political show-down issue of all time. Personally, I think it is a total hoax and the greatest exaggeration of wrongly-selected evidence in history, but a lot of Republicans buy into "man is evil, therefore man must cause everything bad" point of view.

The year 2008 may come and go with the "evil Americans burn too much petroleum" dogma still captivating the public imagination, but I am at heart a mystic and confidently predict that by 2012 even the densest of younger Americans will comprehend that (1) man is still puny compared to nature (2) some humans are, indeed, totally evil, but the neo-cons correctly identified and brought them to battle on the best available terrain, and (3) no one yet knows what kind of world order will unfold when Iran not only has an arsenal of its own nukes, but offers them to allied terror networks.

The year 2012 is the Mayan calendar doomsday, I think late in December, but that should be just about right for testing the atmospheric carbon hypothesis as well, because if the world manages to cool a bit and storms are not really off-the-scale in their severity, all while carbon loading in the atmosphere inexorably creeps upward, then that exposes the biggest Big Lie of our age.

Yo Mike Cook,

Great little rant regarding global warming.

I agree, forget all those "scientists" all stuck on their "hypotheses", "data", and "scientific method". I'm sure you heard of all those things a long time ago, back in grade school. What do they ever get you?

What you got, a good "gut" feel on this issue? Sounds like you are pretty up to date on all the details. Probably you should swing by Vegas and see if you can't make some money on this deal.

"...singing a mirror image of the same tune." Yikes. You want that phrase back?

Fred Thompson as the GOP's white knight. Snerk.

Thompson '08: More Of The Same Bush BS Only With A Hollywood Folksy Southern Touch

As a social conservative, we really want to like Giuliani for his tough stances and excuse his liberalism on other issues, but finding out he donates to Planned Parenthood doesn't help. Being personally against abortion but for keeping it legal is one thing, but we don't even get that he personally finds anything wrong with abortion, and that's just creepy.

He should just sell himself as a "Kill them all!" candidate.

but I am at heart a mystic and confidently predict that by 2012 even the densest of younger Americans will comprehend that (1) man is still puny compared to nature

Is this what motivates these people, is this why they are actually offended by the idea of global warming, that evidence of our capacity to directly affect all of nature globally directly casts doubt on the existence of god?

It may be possible for a Republican to win the nomination without a history of being anti-abortion. However, this takes away one of their tools for firing up the base.

I enjoyed mike cook's post. I see this so much. Tens of thousands of scientists make detailed measurements for decades and expend great effort analyzing this information then when they come to a conclusion people just deny it. Really makes you scratch your head.

My Cook: "Anthropogenic global warming could be the stealth political show-down issue of all time. Personally, I think it is a total hoax..."

All those craaaaazy scientists, eh? And "if" you are wrong, well, what's the worst that could happen?

Guiliani has a good chance of winning some of the primaries simply because the opposition to him is divided. I can easily see him winning more than a few states with 30-40% of the vote. However, I doubt that he can win 50% of all the delgates, which is what he will need to do to win the nomination.

My best guess is that the Republicans will face a brokered convention. Guiliani will be in the lead with 30-40% of the delegates, but without an absolute majority. After him, you will see McCain, Romney, Fred Thompson, and possibly Gingrich each with 10-20% of the delegates, meaning that Guiliani will need to strike deals with at least two other candidates to get over 50%. My guess is that Giuliani strikes deals with McCain and Thompson, and the Republican ticket ends up being Guiliani for President, Fred Thompson gets the Vice-presidential slot, and McCain gets his choice of Sec. State or Sec. Defense.

Bottom line is that the Republican field is so fractures, and the candidates so flawed, that I doubt anybody enters the convention with the 50% of the delegates needed to win the nomination.

Note that in theory this could also happen on the Democratic side as well, with Hillary around 40% and Obama and Edwards each around 30%. In that case, I'm guessing that you end up with an Edwards-Obama ticket and Hillary gets left out in the cold.

Republican in-fighting showing us what a bunch of fools they really are, do you really want to test the fate of America with another Republican president? myself I think not. The rich need to ask themselves is the extra money in your accounts from the tax breaks the Republicans give you worth the risk? Republicans have been spending money like a druken sailors for 8 years and we need to put a stop to it in 2008.

I'm not sure how it will affect him in the primaries, but I think the rural, redneck southern male voter will not vote for Guiliani. He comes off as a loudmouth, yankee know-it-all, and that is an archtype that rubs Billy Bob the wrong way. And on top of that, he favors gun control and abortion?

Cmdicely has a good point. If I'm the religious right, why bust my hump fighting an uphill battle to elect someone I don't really like? Why not take this opportunity to punish the party, stay away in droves and make them court me in 2010 and 2012?

I don't thing the goopers and goobers can sit out 2008 if it means a Democrat in the WH, and that goes double if there's also a Democratic majority in Congress.

For onesies, it will be rather difficult for the MSM to keep on framing things the Republican Way when the entire federal government is Democratic. That means the national dialog shifts, the Overton Window shifts, and that means the GOP message will sound even more irrelevant and insane when 2010 and 2012 roll around.

The GOP can only prosper in a closed system. Once light gets in, they're goners.

important to familiy survival during Katrina-like catastrophes,

when the social order totally breaks down.

Funny how the threat of this happening is always extremely high when a Republican is President.

The only reason I think Giuliani's temper won't sink him is that I think he's medicated to the gills.

But I think 9/11 will prove to be his downfall, if his fellow Republicans use it right, or if he makes it to the general election and the Democrats do.

He blatantly ignored warnings from security experts not to put the emergency services center in the WTC -- the only building that had been bombed, and the ones with a bullseye still implanted firmly on them. Those shots of him running around lower Manhattan on 9/11,looking all manly and in charge? The reason he was running around is because there was no command center once the towers fell. That footage could be turned into a powerful commercial.

He ignored requests to outfit the firefighters and police officers with radios that worked, even though three-quarters of major cities had such equipment by 2001. Hundreds of first responders were killed as a result.

And of course there's Bernie Kerik, whose incredibly checkered past and mob connections he was warned about before naming him as police commissioner and then recommending him as head of the Department of Homeland Security.

9/11 and national security are his weakness, not his strength, and it's about time opponents started pointing that out.

"For onesies, it will be rather difficult for the MSM to keep on framing things the Republican Way when the entire federal government is Democratic. That means the national dialog shifts, the Overton Window shifts, and that means the GOP message will sound even more irrelevant and insane when 2010 and 2012 roll around.

The GOP can only prosper in a closed system. Once light gets in, they're goners."
Posted by: CaseyL on May 16, 2007 at 10:24 AM

Bingo.

... Did you see how he floored Michael Moore today? brian at 9:20 PM

Substantial numbers of Republicans are pro-choice..... I thought McCain did pretty well. ex-lax at 11:16 PM

From my perspective as a Republican precinct captain.... (2) some humans are, indeed, totally evil....mike kook at 11:25 PM

I'm torn as to whether Giuliani's authoritarianism is enough to win him the primary--it'll certainly help, but the question is, by how much?

The really interesting thing will be if/when Fred Thompson gets in the race; he worries me more than any current Republican candidate. He's much less likely to commit a gaffe or melt down (thanks to his acting experience) and is already alarmingly good at pretending to be folksy.

To really prove their case, all those "tens of thousands" of scientists with all their elegant data are obliged to prove that nothing else could be causing the slight bit of warming they have so painstakingly measured in the last century. That "nothing else" would not only include the usual culprits, like the actual energy that the sun emits (which is variable) to the actual energy that the world's various surfaces absorb, which must take into account a bewildering variety of local conditions.

To further complicate matters, chaos theory informs us that there need not be one single culprit driving climate change. A huge variety of factors perform an elaborate dance and that is why climate models rarely are able to predict anything and they most often can not even explain why past conditions evolved in certain ways.

The biggest problem is that there is no way to know which of those "tens of thousands" of experts experiencing the academic version of mass hysteria is not over-reaching with the true importance of their conclusions, especially since much that is claimed must be filtered through the media to reach us.

To explain my skepticism, consider the "disappearing bumble bee" story. Yesterday in my yard I counted forty bees in only a few minutes. None of those bees appeared to be African killer bees, either. They were all happy to go about their business. The media have been conveying the impression that someone out their maintains a good census of ALL bees (as opposed to those in certain commercial applications) which is nonsense.

I'm going to Vegas on Friday and if I can find someplace that will take a bet that the summer Arctic ice pack extent in 2017 will not be 5.8% less than it will be measured to be this summer, I will happily place that bet.

My Cook: "The biggest problem is..."

...people like you. A lousy American and an even worse citizen of the world. Go ahead and gamble, but not with our world, please.

Mike,
You're a dipshit.

The "it's the sun" thing was debunked pretty thoroughly about three years ago. Spend about five minutes on www.realclimate.org.

Dear Kenji: Are you willing to gamble on what Iran or North Korea will do with nuclear weapons?
But you don't want to "gamble" on the chance that a meager 40% increase in a trace gas (one of the least potent of greenhouse gases, by the way) will raise our mean temperature by another degree centigrade in 30 years? I suggest you are the mentally deficient citizen of the world!

Dear Sebastian, did you note that I mentioned chaos? In chaos theory one element does not have to be overwhelming. In algore's theory one element is presumed to be overwhelming absolutely everything else, which strikes me as a very safe thing to bet against.

If I have a specialty, it is the social dynamics of mass confusion and injustice. Please see my first book: Maximum Distrust, Unusual Stories of Injustice, Unbalanced Thinking, and Mob Psychology in America, or my second book: Why the Innocent Plead Guilty and the Guilty Go Free, which you should be able to Google in about three weeks by title.