As one of his supporters, actor Robert Duvall, might say: Rudy
played this one beautifully.
Last week, all Republican politicians worth their weight came
out blasting MoveOn.org for taking out a full-page ad in the
New York Times smearing Gen. David Petraeus on the day he
was scheduled to deliver his Iraq progress report to Congress. The
outrage among conservatives only grew as leading Democrats failed
to condemn the ad, Hillary Clinton questioned the general’s
honesty, and it was disclosed that the far left group was given a
drastically reduced advertising rate in the New York
Times.
But while other Republicans complained, Rudy Giuliani did
something about it. Speaking to reporters in Atlanta on Thursday, Giuliani
demanded that the New York Times give his campaign the
same discounted rate so it could take out an ad defending Gen.
Petraeus and assailing Clinton and MoveOn.org for “character
assassination of an American general in a time of war.” He also
called on the paper to run the ad at the time of his choosing
(Friday, the day after President Bush’s primetime address to the
nation).
The next morning, American liberals had to spit out their soy
milk while reading their paper of record over breakfast. Within the
front section of the newspaper was a full-page ad documenting Petraeus’s stellar military record as
well as Clinton and MoveOn.org’s attacks. “Who should America
listen to,” the ad asked, “A decorated soldier’s commitment to
defending America, or Hillary Clinton’s commitment to defending
MoveOn.org?” Even better, Giuliani’s public challenge to the
New York Times forced them to give him the same discounted
rate.
But Giuliani was just getting warmed up. After making the
New York Times buckle under pressure, his campaign
released a Web ad contrasting Clinton’s strong comments in
support of the 2002 Iraq War Resolution with her attack on Gen.
Petraeus last week. While none of her Democratic rivals have been
able to lay a finger on Clinton for her opportunistic positions on
the war, the Giuliani ad hammered the point home. The Clinton
campaign was forced to twist itself into a pretzel by once again
trying to assert that when she voted for the Iraq War
Resolution, she was actually voting to allow inspectors more time
to work, and that despite telling Gen. Petraeus that his reports
require a “willing suspension of disbelief” she was not accusing
him of being untruthful.
As demoralized conservatives begin to fear that another Clinton
presidency is inevitable, this episode demonstrates that Giuliani
may represent the Republicans’ best shot at defeating Hillary in
next year’s election.
Throughout his career, Giuliani has excelled at relentlessly
pursuing opponents, whether in the courtroom or political arena. As
a young prosecutor in the 1970s, before he became a celebrity for
taking on the mob, he gained notice for his successful prosecution
of Democratic Congressman Bertram L. Podell in a bribery trial. The
New York Times magazine recounted the dramatic conclusion
in a 1985 profile: “Under Giuliani’s intense cross-examination,
Podell faltered, became so nervous he poked out his eyeglass lens,
asked for a recess and gave up, pleading guilty.”
Giuliani’s background as a prosecutor and gift for speaking
plainly and with clarity makes him ideally suited to cut through
the type of word parsing for which the Clintons are legendary.
That was on display last week, as Giuliani not only criticized
Hillary Clinton as other Republicans did, but also mocked her for
the wording of her attack on Gen. Petraeus.
“I’ll tell you what she said, it’s pretty simple,” Giuliani told
reporters last Thursday. “You go interpret it, because this is
typical — how can I say this in the kindest way about the
Clintons? — not the most direct way of saying what it is you’re
trying to say.”
He continued, “This is what she said to Gen. Petraeus: ‘I think
the reports you provide to us really require the willing suspension
of disbelief.’” Giuliani paused, and then for maximum dramatic
effect, repeated the phrase. “The willing suspension of disbelief I
imagine means the general wasn’t telling the truth.”
While it is popular for conservatives to lament the existence of
the liberal media, Giuliani understands that it is a reality.
Rather than belly-ache about it, or, as the Bush administration
often has done, ignore attacks by assuming people aren’t paying
attention and they will go away, Giuliani understands that
conservatives need to simply be better at using the media to their
advantage, as he did when he fought entrenched liberal interest
groups as mayor.
“If I run against Hillary Clinton, I’m perfectly prepared to
carry this battle, not expecting that the New York Times
or the major networks…are going to give us anywhere the same
kind of favorable coverage they will give her,” Giuliani told
Hugh Hewitt last week. “I’m a realist, I’m not
saying that in any way where I have a chip on my shoulder. I’ve
lived with this all during the time I was mayor of New York City.
The reality is we just have to be better at communicating.”
During the Democratic primary Clinton has gotten a free pass on
one of her biggest vulnerabilities — that she is just at the start
of her second term in the U.S. Senate and has no major
accomplishments to speak of — because Barack Obama and John
Edwards have even less experience. But Giuliani’s strong executive
record and impressive achievements in New York City would highlight
Clinton’s relative lack of credentials. As Giuliani has said
repeatedly when assessing the Democratic field, they share one
thing in common: “they’ve never run a city, state or business.”
This is a weakness of Hillary Clinton’s that neither Fred Thompson
nor John McCain could exploit, given that their political
experience is limited to being legislators.
Mitt Romney can point to executive experience, but he lacks some
of Giuliani’s other strengths in a race against Clinton. For one,
while Giuliani would be well-suited to expose Clinton for her
lawyerly word-parsing, Romney is susceptible to the same criticism
as Clinton. Regardless of whether conservatives come to view his
conversions on a number of issues as genuine, Romney’s overt shifts
will provide ample fodder for the Clinton campaign to use in attack
ads, effectively neutralizing any attempt by Republicans to portray
Clinton as a phony political opportunist.
Right now, despite the low approval ratings of President Bush
and strong opposition to the war in Iraq, Giuliani remains in a
statistical dead heat with Clinton, not only nationally, but in blue states including
Pennsylvania and New Jersey. While there are certainly many
factors that conservatives will have to consider when choosing the
Republican nominee, all they have to do is look at the reincarnated
HillaryCare plan that is being unveiled today to recognize that the
ability of a Republican candidate to defeat Hillary Clinton should
be a major consideration.
This looks like a battle Giuliani was born to fight.
