Jonah Goldberg has a great article at NRO about how Mitt Romney and Rudy Giuliani are two different strategies for handling coming from a liberal, northeastern state. Romney’s strategy is basically to change his position on every issue in sight to come in line with the conservative base. Goldberg doesn’t Read more…
Not that I am. But he’s running for President!
Patrick Ruffini pushed out the news that Rudy Giuliani won the February GOP bloggers straw poll. David All has one interpretation of what this means. I have another. It will be easier for Rudy to control stories about him, especially negative stories. First of all, this means that when the Read more…
So says the New York Post. Wow. That’s a bunch of Rudy Giuliani delegates, right? This just raises the bar. Competing in New York is incredibly expensive. Can someone really pop from Iowa and be able to raise enough money to compete in California, Florida, Illinois, New York, and New Read more…
I have, for a long time, wondered what the Rudy strategy was. At one point I speculated that he was just a regional candidate. I think I was wrong. A couple of nights ago, I was having beers with some friends — that’s what we do in DC — and Read more…
Has Mitt Romney started to unload on Rudy Giuliani? That’s what this Evangelicals for Mitt piece suggests to me. Yesterday, I asked when this would start. The answer seems to be now….
Well, yesterday Rudy Giuliani acted to ease people’s fears. He is really in. I had my suspicions otherwise, but no more. I have friends being offered jobs in New York City (and friends who have already left) and others who are taking jobs in Iowa, South Carolina, and other states.
And now, as if the guns had been loaded, people have started to fire on him.
At first, the social conservative groups, conservative movement establishment, and religious community will fire at him.
But the real question is, when does Mitt Romney go after him? You see, Romney’s whole schtick is that he’s the anti-McCain. But Rudy could also be an anti-McCain. And Rudy is totally electable. And Rudy has executive experience — indeed, as Hotline notes, New York City is larger than Massachusetts. And since pundits are starting to say things like, Chuck Todd’s (see the YouTube after the jump) comments about Romney: "I’m starting to wonder if he can hold up" or "Maybe it’s too soon to say he’s crumbling. He’s not crumbling." Rudy’s sun could eclipse Romney’s.
On the other hand, Romney has already made the mistake of going negative against Sam Brownback (not to mention a "gadfly"). Attacking a hero like Rudy will be tough for people who aren’t interest groups.
This will be interesting to watch.
Earlier I reported a rumor that Rudy Giuliani had hired Jeff Semprini, the son of Wayne Semprini, the former NH GOP chair. It turns out that Rudy hired the dad. Semprini did not seek re-election for health reasons and was considered a bit of a care-taker GOP chair. I was Read more…
A couple of days I wrote on the results of the Diageo/Hotline poll. Most people have focused on the Presidential results. BlogPI has written about McCain’s credibility on security with Republicans. I started looking at how GOPers prioritize issues, and thought it had some interesting presidential implications. So here’s the Read more…
Marc Ambinder at the Hotline spoke with the Giuliani campaign. It appears that they are already changing their strategy: Political aides to ex-NYC mayor Rudy Giuliani (R) will reorganize his presidential exploratory efforts over the next two weeks, expanding his national finance team and adding staff in early primary states Read more…