Sounds Kind of Like My Dog Ate My Homework. . . Giuliani Continues To Offer Questionable Excuses On Judi Security

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December 12, 2007

TOP HEADLINE: Sounds Kind of Like My Dog Ate My Homework. . . Giuliani Continues To Offer Questionable Excuses On Judi Security

Notably, Giuliani also got grilled at the Chronicle over the Judith-security issues that his campaign would like to die. And Rudy is still trying to make the case that by funnelling payments for police details through the loft board and similarly obscure agencies his administration was incredibly transparent about the whole thing:

"These accounts were discoverable. If these had been paid directly by the Police Department, it never would have been discovered, because they are exempt from Freedom of Information."

From this, we gather that the Giuliani strategy on this issue is to keep giving the same answers over and over, even if they don't make any sense, in hopes that they'll eventually become accepted through repetition. But really: Isn't this the lamest of all the excuses and explanations he's come up with?
http://weblogs.newsday.com/news/local/longisland/politics/blog/2007/12/rudys_world_where_hidden_equal.html

Disclosure? We Don’t Need No Stinkin’ Disclosure!! Giuliani Chided For Refusing To Release Client List

Look at Republican presidential candidate Rudolph W. Giuliani's financial disclosure form, and you will see some big numbers. You will see that between January 2006 and May 2007, when the form was filed, Mr. Giuliani earned $4,108,328 from Giuliani Partners, a security firm he founded after stepping down as New York mayor. You will see that Mr. Giuliani took in another $1,200,901 from his law firm, Bracewell & Giuliani. What you won't see are the identities of the clients that Mr. Giuliani's firms represented. According to Mr. Giuliani, you shouldn't expect to, nor should you be particularly worried about it.

"When you deal with clients, and you take on the problems of clients, and you try to help them, it may be that somewhere, someplace, they did something that was questionable or arguably questionable," he told NBC's Tim Russert on Sunday. "So you can't vouch for every single thing they did. The things we have done with them are honorable, ethical, useful and helpful."

So why not disclose the identities of the clients? Mr. Giuliani has two responses to this. The first is that "about every single client of Giuliani Partners, which is my security company, has been discussed, has been examined, certainly every significant one." If so, that's no thanks to Mr. Giuliani, who has declined to release that information.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/12/11/AR2007121101984.html

The Field Flips… Now Trying to Out-Tancredo Tom Tancredo!!

More than any other question, Republican presidential candidates are asking voters to consider a single issue in the weeks before primary voting begins: Who detests illegal immigration the most?

Not only are the candidates toughening their own stances and language, they are using the issue to paint each other as out of step with the border-enforcement wishes of conservative voters. Surveys show that in Iowa, New Hampshire and South Carolina, illegal immigration is an issue of significant concern to GOP voters -- more so than some strategists had predicted. A poll published this month in Newsweek magazine showed that 63% of likely Iowa Republican caucus-goers considered a candidate's views on illegal immigration "very important."

But Giuliani, once viewed by immigrant-rights advocates as the politician most sympathetic to their cause, made it clear this week that he will not be outdone in his opposition to illegal immigration. In an interview for "Meet the Next President," a new book by Washington Examiner reporter Bill Sammon, he lamented that the federal government should have deported all the illegal immigrants in his city -- not just the few hundred that were removed during his time in office.

"If they could, I would have turned all the people over," Giuliani said in a book excerpt published Tuesday in the Examiner. "It would have helped me. I would have had a smaller population. I would have had fewer problems."

The biggest about-face has come from Huckabee, long admired by the immigrant rights movement for his policies as governor of Arkansas. Now, however, he is toeing the hardest anti-illegal-immigration line of any top-tier candidate, with a new "secure the borders" television ad in Iowa and a plan, announced last week, to require all 12 million people here illegally to leave the country within four months or risk serious punishment.
http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-immig12dec12,0,3612843.story?coll=la-tot-national&track=ntothtml

Everyone Pile On Huckabee: Debate Promises To Be All Huck, All the Time

What's that on Mike Huckabee's back? Looks like a political bull's-eye.

The former Arkansas governor, riding a double-digit lead in Iowa polls and gaining nationally, likely will be the prime target when Republican presidential candidates meet near Des Moines this afternoon in their final debate before the first-in-the-nation caucuses Jan. 3.

"The gloves are off," said Lee Miringoff, director of the Marist Institute for Public Opinion. "If you're Mitt Romney, if you're Fred Thompson, you certainly want Huckabee to be roughed up a little bit."

Huckabee's pleasing manner and his adroit debating style won him a pass in the early faceoffs, mostly because smart money predicted then he was going nowhere.

Gearing up for today, a senior operative for one of Huckabee's GOP rivals laughed, "Welcome to the NFL."

Huckabee is quite vulnerable on immigration, tax increases, the reversal of his opposition to Cuba trade sanctions and his clemency intervention for a felon who later killed a woman, officials of rival campaigns said,
http://www.nydailynews.com/news/politics/2007/12/12/2007-12-12_mike_huckabee_to_be_main_debate_target.html

Not Gunning For the Utah Vote . . Huck Has Some Interesting Thoughts On Mormon Religion

I asked Huckabee, who describes himself as the only Republican candidate with a degree in theology, if he considered Mormonism a cult or a religion. ‘‘I think it’s a religion,’’ he said. ‘‘I really don’t know much about it.’’

I was about to jot down this piece of boilerplate when Huckabee surprised me with a question of his own: ‘‘Don’t Mormons,’’ he asked in an innocent voice, ‘‘believe that Jesus and the devil are brothers?’’
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/12/12/magazine/16huckabee.html?_r=2&hp=&oref=slogin&pagewanted=all

Tancredo Calls Out GOP Group for Anti-Mormon Questionnaire

Presidential candidate Congressman Tom Tancredo (R-CO) today released a statement in response to the remarks released by a group calling themselves “GodVoter.org”.

“The attached “questionnaire” purports to be intended to help voters in Iowa determine the Christian qualifications of those seeking the Republican nomination for President of the United States,” Tancredo said. “I believe it is anything but Christian in its tone and intent and I call on every candidate to repudiate it.”

Among the numerous prejudiced responses, Godvoter.org refers to “Mormonism as a Christ-dishonoring cult” while bashing Governor Mitt Romney and calling for him to renounce his religion.
http://shotpolitics.com/does-tancredo-favor-mitt.htm

Rudy Digs His Planned Parenthood Hole Even Deeper: Says He Donated To Promote Adoption?

In an interview for the book, Sammon asked Rudy why he gave money to Planned Parenthood at least six times in the 1990s

“Those were contributions that were made by my wife and by me at the time,” Giuliani told [Sammon]. “I can't remember exactly the reasons for them, but Planned Parenthood, I also always thought, is an organization that made information available about adoption.”

They do offer family-planning advice of all kinds, including about adoption options. But they also are the largest abortion-provider in America.
http://www.politico.com/blogs/jonathanmartin/1207/Book_excerpt_Rudy_cites_adoption_to_explain_contributions_to_Planned_Parenthood.html

MA v. Romney? Ex-Gov. Warns of Mitt’s Flip-Flop Vulnerability

In her op-ed, Swift recalls her own political history with Romney.

Swift, then lieutenant governor, succeeded Cellucci as acting governor in 2001 when he resigned to become U.S. ambassador to Canada. She planned to mount her own campaign for governor in 2002, but tearfully stepped aside after Romney returned from the Salt Lake City Winter Olympics and made it clear he would challenge her for the nomination.

"As a Massachusetts state senator, I was one of Mitt's early supporters in his 1994 contested primary for the U.S Senate. As acting governor of Massachusetts in 2002, I ended my own campaign for the Republican nomination to give Romney the best opportunity to beat the Democratic candidate that November," Swift wrote.

"Once elected governor, however, Romney began his transformation of consciousness. His flip flops on social issues are well documented," she added. "As his national ambitions grew larger, it seems Massachusetts grew smaller in Romney's rearview mirror. The governor who promised to be the salesman-in-chief for his state's economy instead toured the country using us as the butt of his jokes."

Swift closed with a pitch for McCain that itself included jabs at Romney.

"I have great admiration for John McCain because he sticks to his beliefs, even when they are not politically popular," she wrote. "We disagree on important social issues, but I know where he stands and why."
http://www.southcoasttoday.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20071212/NEWS/712120315/-1/NEWS01

Republican Strategist Says Party in Worst Shape Since 1974

On Tuesday, the New York Times and CBS News released a national survey that had none of the Republican presidential hopefuls receiving more than 23 percent support. The top three - Mike Huckabee, Rudy Giuliani, and Mitt Romney - all were within six percentage points of each other, with Giuliani leading at 22 percent.

The results, even Republican strategists admit, reflect a dire political situation: only weeks before the Iowa caucus, the party is extremely vulnerable, and despite nearly a year of campaigning, it remains without a true leader.

"The party is in uncharted waters right now and the GOP had never been so rudderless," Craig Shirley, a Republican consultant, told the Huffington Post. "You combine this with the financial condition of the GOP and the stench of corruption and you'd have to go back to the fall of 1974 to find the GOP as bad off as it is today."
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2007/12/11/republican-strategists-se_n_76304.html

You Scratch My Back, I’ll Scratch Yours. . .Romney Wins National Review Endorsement, After Pouring Out Donations

In the months before announcing his bid for the Republican presidential nomination, former Gov. Mitt Romney of Massachusetts contributed tens of thousands of dollars of his personal fortune to several conservative groups in a position to influence his image on the right.

Last December, a foundation controlled by Mr. Romney made contributions of $10,000 to $15,000 to each of three Massachusetts organizations associated with major national conservative groups: the antiabortion Massachusetts Citizens for Life, Massachusetts Citizens for Limited Taxation and the Christian conservative Massachusetts Family Institute.

Mr. Romney and a group of his supporters also contributed a total of about $10,000 to a nonprofit group affiliated with National Review. Over the past two years, he contributed $35,000 to the Federalist Society, an influential network of conservative lawyers. And in December 2005, he contributed $25,000 to the Heritage Foundation, a leading conservative research organization.

The recipients of Mr. Romney’s donations said the money had no influence on them. But some of the groups, notably Citizens for Life and the Family Institute, have turned supportive of Mr. Romney after criticizing him in the past.
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/03/11/us/politics/11romney.html?pagewanted=print

Fred Done In NH … In Other News, Ice is Cold

Fred Thompson has decided to abandon the Granite State, and will campaign in Iowa full-time until the January 3 caucuses.

The former Tennessee senator is planning to begin a bus tour of the Hawkeye State next week that will run through the end of the year, with a brief break for the Christmas holiday, campaign spokesman Jeff Sadosky tells CNN.

A "strong finish" in Iowa "will allow us to springboard into South Carolina, Florida and the rest of the February 5 states in a very strong position," said Sadosky.
http://politicalticker.blogs.cnn.com/2007/12/11/fred-thompson-is-done-with-new-hampshire/

There Is Such A Thing As Too Much Information … Reporter Sees Candidate’s Skivvies

On the eve of the 2002 Olympics, The Sun's Candus Thomson was one of a handful of reporters invited to dinner at Mitt and Ann Romney's Park City, Utah, home, a $5 million "cabin" on Rising Star Lane.

Rather than make the reporters line up to use the facilities off the kitchen, Romney sprinted down the hallways of his home, pointing out other bathrooms. Thomson ended up in the one off the Romneys' master bedroom.

But Thomson, ever on duty, noticed a pair of underwear hanging on the back of the door as she reached for the knob to leave.

Not that she'd really care about her host's undies. (Assuming, of course, they were his and not somebody else's.) That is, unless five years later, he was running for president, and TV talking heads were wondering aloud if he wore regular underwear or the Mormon kind - a garment similar to an old-fashioned union suit that's sacred to Mormons and, well, a little odd to the rest of us.

The answer, which should be good for a free drink anywhere but the Romney White House: regular, off-the-rack Fruit of the Loom briefs, size 34.

I ran all that by Romney spokeswoman Sarah Pompei. She was not amused and not commenting.
http://www.baltimoresun.com/news/local/bal-md.vozzella12dec12,0,5820165.column

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