Obligatory Giuliani post.

Given the fact that Rudy Giuliani is still the most popular candidate in recent surveys of Republican voters, I contemplated writing a long-winded piece skewering the political positions and personal life of "America's Mayor".

Then I realized two things:

(1) My blog has a readership of about three people, myself included, and therefore anything I write won't do a whole lot to sway the collective opinion of America's cattle-like masses.

(2) Writing such a piece would be too darn easy.

In theory, convincing a conservative that Rudy Giuliani would make a poor candidate for the Presidency of the United States should be similar to convincing a liberal that Jerry Falwell would make a poor candidate for the Presidency of the ACLU. Giuliani is so diametrically opposed to everything that red-staters hold dear that it's almost absurd to even consider his candidacy a valid one. Let's look at a heavily abridged list of grievances:

Rudy Giuliani is pro-abortion.
Rudy Giuliani is pro-gay.
Rudy Giuliani is anti-gun.
Rudy Giuliani is soft on illegal immigrants.
Rudy Giuliani has had numerous extra-marital affairs and is currently on his third marriage.
Rudy Giuliani has a bizarre penchant for cross-dressing at public events.

Essentially, Rudy Giuliani is a man who has committed every sin against conservatism that one can think of, with the possible exceptions of:

Driving a tiny, European, hybrid car.
Burning the American flag.
Eating a bald eagle.
Driving a tiny, European, hybrid car with a burning American flag attached to the antenna, while eating a bald eagle.

There's no point in writing a lengthy exposition on Giuliani's faults. Everything's already out in the open. Rudy Giuliani is unabashedly, plainly, and completely liberal. The last candidate I wrote about, Mitt Romney, comes as a wolf in sheep's clothing to seduce conservative voters to the dark side of the political spectrum. Giuliani, on the other hand, comes as a wolf in wolf's clothing, wearing an adhesive nametag which clearly reads:
Hello! My name is: Wolf

And yet, despite the hideous 900 pound gorilla of liberalism which remains perched atop Giuliani's candidacy, feasting on bananas of vice and iniquity, Giuliani still enjoys poll numbers that make him the envy of... the candidates who have lesser poll numbers. Why? Every American over the age of 12 knows the three-digit answer by heart: 9/11.

In order to avoid sounding overly cynical, I'll readily admit that Giuliani did an admirable job of uniting a City in a time of tragedy. To millions of people across the country, Giuliani became a symbol of American resolve in the face of terror. And even though it might be possible to make a case for it, I won't charge him with political opportunism. As far as I'm concerned, Giuliani truly loves his city and his country, and poured his heart and soul into the task of healing the gaping wound that was inflicted on both.

But there's a difference between heroism and the ability to lead this country in the right direction. If a dog leaps into a burning building and saves a small child, the dog certainly deserves admiration, praise, and several biscuits. But despite the dog's heroism, no sane human would endorse the canine's candidacy in a race for the highest public office in the country. Heroism is a wonderful trait, but it certainly doesn't qualify someone to become the next president of the United States. Any candidate for any public office should never be judged solely on the basis of their conduct during a single event in their lifetime. Instead, the whole man, his personal behavior, his public record, and his current stance on the issues needs to be put under intense scrutiny. The Republican voters who continue to circle Rudy Giuliani's name on survey forms are making a conscious decision to ignore Giuliani the liberal, and are instead casting votes in favor of Giuliani the hero. Unfortunately, a vote for the latter is also a vote for the former. Let's just hope people realize this by the time the primaries roll around.

Sabotaging the Surge

I'm not the biggest fan of the war in Iraq. We went to Iraq for reasons largely based on faulty intelligence, and the aftermath of Sadaam's fall was terribly mismanaged. But the bill that House Democrats passed yesterday amounted to nothing less than treason. Here's the rundown:

The troop surge in Iraq is getting results. Several top generals, from both the UK and the US, have admitted that our biggest mistake in the early stages of the war was that we didn't put enough soldiers on the ground to secure Iraq. Years later, the military is trying to remedy this security problem by flooding key areas (Baghdad in particular) with thousands of extra troops. And Americans in Iraq, from generals to journalists, have noted a significant improvement in the level of safety in Iraq since the surge began. But in order to keep the pressure on the insurgency in Iraq, the military needs money.

Yesterday, the Democrat controlled House of Representatives voted "yea" on an emergency spending bill that would give that much needed money ($124 billion) to our armed forces. With a catch. Before the bill was passed, Democrats added a clause to the bill that would force US troops to pull out of Iraq by September 2008. Setting a date for a troop withdrawal which would occur whether or not peace has been restored to Iraq is, stated as simply as possible, a terrible idea. What kind of message does that send to the people of Iraq? We came in, dismantled their government, and now we're supposed to leave, whether or not the country is rebuilt? Talk about responsibility. And to add insult to injury, the Democrats couldn't be satisfied with merely inserting a declaration of surrender into a war-funding bill. They also stuffed billions of dollars worth of pork spending into the bill, a move that even CBS news called an attempt to "pay off" House Democrats in return for their votes.

But the goal of the Democrats in hijacking this bill isn't to set a withdrawal date for US troops, or to give billions of dollars to pet causes. Instead, the Democrats are forcing George Bush to cut off funding for his own war. By tacking on a clause that Bush simply cannot agree with, the President will be compelled to veto the bill, essentially halting the flow of money to our military at the very time when they need it the most.

The shameless and deceitful way that the Democrats are trying to undermine our last great hope of ending this war in victory is unbelievable. By mouthing phrases like "we support our troops" while ignoring the advice of our top generals and stabbing the military in the back with treacherous bills like this one, the Democrats are proving to the American people that they are precisely the duplicitous, terrorist-supporting snakes the Republican party accused them of being in the last election. The Democrats say that the American people want a new direction in Iraq. I agree. But we want a new direction that leads to victory, not unconditional defeat.

Hopefully, the bill will be defeated in the Senate and sent back to a vote in the House without the Democrat's precious little add-ons. But I doubt this will the last attempt to sabotage the war effort.

Mitt Romney is basically the devil.

As a people-group, politicians have a pretty dubious reputation. The very mention of the word "politician" conjures up the image of a dishonest, soulless, pandering, womanizing, middle-aged white man with greasy hair who will do anything and everything to get elected. Like death and taxes, politicians are considered to be an unwanted yet inevitable part of life. But do they really deserve this tainted image? Are they really that bad? Most of the time, probably not. As a rule, most politicians aren't any worse than the average Joe. But every once in a while, there comes a politician that lives up to the reputation, greasy hair and all. Mitt Romney is one such politician.

Okay, so maybe he's not that bad. For example, to my knowledge he's never been caught in any personal ethical scandals (dishonesty, infidelity, etc.). But the hallmark of the stereotypical, sleazy politician is a willingness to change political views in order to win points with a given audience. In front of a conservative audience, the politician adopts conservative rhetoric, and when in front of a liberal audience, the politician adopts liberal rhetoric. In the last presidential election, everyone heard a word for this kind of person in countless political ads and op-ed pieces: flip-flopper.

Forget Kerry. Mitt Romney is not just A flip-flopper, he is THE flip-flopper. If he was Catholic, he might be considered as a candidate for the patron saint of flip-flopping, because if Mitt Romney succeeds in his goal of gaining the support of the evangelical voting bloc, he'll be able to take credit for a miracle that would make Saint Peter jealous. Think about it: a man who for years ran as a pro-gay, pro-abortion candidate, the governor of the most liberal state in the USA, reinventing himself as a conservative, pro-life, pro-marriage, evangelical-friendly candidate and succeeding.

But why should I waste words attacking Romney? I'll let the man incriminate himself. Romney's first attempt at running for political office was in the Massachusetts senate race of 1994. His opponent was Ted Kennedy, that venerable statesman whose inspiring presence brings to mind a certain literary creation of Herman Melville... the white whale. Romney lost the election, but left behind a few eloquent quotes from a televised debate with Mr. Kennedy. In the course of the debate, Kennedy accused Romney of being wishy washy on the abortion issue. Romney countered with a firm statement of his views:

"I believe that abortion should be safe and legal in this country. I have since the time that my mom took that position when she ran in 1970 as a US senate candidate. I believe that since Roe V. Wade has been the law for 20 years that we should sustain and support it, and I sustain and support that law, and the right of the woman to make that choice"

Romney had previously stated that he personally believed abortion was morally wrong. Using a classic relativistic line of thinking, he harmonized these contradictory viewpoints:

"I have my own beliefs and those beliefs are very dear to me. One of them is that I do not impose my beliefs on other people. Many, many years ago, I had a dear close family relative, that was very close to me, that passed away from an illegal abortion. It is since that time that my mother and my family have been committed to the belief that we can believe as we want, but we will not force our beliefs on others on that matter. And you will not see me wavering on that."

So not only does Mitt Romney state that he is pro-choice, he gives a personal anecdote which shows how personal the issue is to him, and how deeply he cherishes his pro-choice views. Later in the debate, he was asked to reconcile his liberal views towards gay-rights and his status as a board member of the Boy Scouts of America. He responded thusly:

"I feel that all people should be allowed to participate in the boy scouts regardless of their sexual orientation.

So far, Romney clearly isn't winning any points with the evangelical establishment. But it must be acknowledged that over time, views can change. So let's fast-forward 8 years to the 2002 gubernatorial elections in Massachusetts, where the issue of Abortion was brought up once again in a televised debate. This time his statement is even stronger:

"With regards to my views on protecting a woman's right to choose, and I've been very clear on that: I will preserve and protect a woman's right to choose. And I'm devoted and dedicated to honoring my word in that regard. I will not change ANY provisions of Massachusetts' pro-choice laws ... I want the voters to know exactly where I'm going to stand as governor and that is I'm not going to change our pro-choice laws in Massachusetts in any way. I will preserve them. I will protect them. I will enforce them. And therefore, I'm not going to make any changes which would make it more difficult for a woman to make that choice herself"

You don't get much more clarity than that. Mitt Romney is pro-choice. End of story.

But wait! In a quote from 2005, taken from the Mitt Romney for president website, we find this quote:

"I am pro-life. I believe that abortion is the wrong choice except in cases of incest, rape, and to save the life of the mother. I wish the people of America agreed, and that the laws of our nation could reflect that view. But while the nation remains so divided over abortion, I believe that the states, through the democratic process, should determine their own abortion laws and not have them dictated by judicial mandate."

Suddenly Mitt Romney:

(1) Is Pro life.
(2) Believes that Roe V Wade is wrong.
(3) And believes that states can vote for their own abortion laws.

What happened to "I will preserve and protect a woman's right to choose"? A little something called Presidential ambition. Since as early as 2004, insiders knew Romney had his eyes on a certain house lacking in pigment. As an MSNBC article stated during the last Republican convention:

"It has been talked about for some time now within tight political circles that Romney has his own sights set on the White House. Romney dismisses the speculation and says he is staying put at the State House, even beyond 2006."


Now we know how sincere his dismissal of speculation was. And we also know that when you're running for office in Massachusetts, the bastion of American liberalism, it pays to be pro-choice, and when you're trying to get the presidential nomination from the country's conservative party, it pays to be pro-life. All he had to do was switch positions. Of course, that in itself presented a challenge. He had to find a way to make it sincere. So Mitt Romney and his family came up with a story that would explain how he became pro-life:

"Romney says he changed his mind in November 2004, when he met with a scientist from the Harvard Stem Cell Institute. Romney claimed in a June 2006 interview that the researcher had told him: "'Look, you don't have to think about this stem cell research as a moral issue, because we kill the embryos after 14 days.'" Romney went on to say that both he and his chief of staff had an epiphany, recognizing that embryonic stem cell research cheapened respect for human life."
(Weekly Standard, Jennifer Rubin 2/5/07)

So, due to his encounter with a Harvard scientist, he realized that human embryos were human beings, and deserved protection. It all makes sense. Of course, the scientist denies ever saying the magic words that converted Romney:

"Governor Romney has mischaracterized my position; we didn't discuss killing or anything related to it, I explained my work to him, told him about my deeply held respect for life, and explained that my work focuses on improving the lives of those suffering from debilitating diseases."

Maybe I'm just being mean. Maybe I'm unreasonable. Maybe it's not just political maneuvering on his part. Maybe Mitt Romney is a sincere man, who truly believes in the unalienable right to life. But maybe I'm right. Maybe Mitt Romney is a political opportunist, pure and simple, willing to shift his views to any side of the political spectrum if it means votes on election day. Maybe his neatly packaged conversion story is a little too reminiscent of another neatly packaged conversion story:

"Many, many years ago, I had a dear close family relative, that was very close to me, that passed away from an illegal abortion. It is since that time that my mother and my family have been committed to the belief that we can believe as we want, but we will not force our beliefs on others on that matter."

He told that story in '94 to convince the voters of Massachusetts that he was pro-choice. Now he's telling another story to convince Republicans of his commitment to the pro-life cause. Where does Mitt Romney really stand? His opponent in the 2002 gubernatorial race summed it up this way:

"When Mitt Romney ran against Ted Kennedy in 1994, he accepted the endorsement of Mass. citizens for life. When he went to Utah and was thinking about running for governor of the state of Utah, he made a point of writing a letter to the editor, to the Utah paper out there, specifically stating he was not pro-choice. And then when he came back to Massachusetts, he's become a passionate supporter of a woman's right to choose. Ted Kennedy said it best: Mitt Romney isn't pro-choice, he's not anti-choice, he's multiple choice."

And for once, I agree with Ted Kennedy.