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Some on the right begin to warm to Giuliani
Socially liberal ex-mayor makes good showing at conservative event
 Susan Walsh / AP Republican presidential hopeful Rudy Giuliani addresses thousands of conservative activists in Washington Friday. |
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Yet in the early stages of the 2008 Republican presidential race, some conservatives are adopting Giuliani, because he’s asking for their votes. And because — if you believe current polling data — Giuliani could carry Pennsylvania, New York, and other Northeastern states that no GOP presidential candidate has carried in recent elections.
“No other (Republican) candidate offers the opportunity to carry New York state,” insisted former New York state Conservative Party leader, now a Republican, state Sen. Serphin Maltese, one of Giuliani’s enthusiastic backers.
As for New York’s next-door neighbor, in the past 60 years no Democratic presidential candidate has lost Pennsylvania and still won the White House. A poll conducted by Franklin and Marshall College in Pennsylvania last week showed Giuliani defeating Sen. Hillary Clinton in the Keystone state, 53 percent to 37 percent, if she were the Democratic nominee.
But Maltese’s old comrade-in-arms, Mike Long, the current chairman of New York state’s Conservative Party, isn’t yet convinced Giuliani is the right man for 2008.
A Democrat in his heart?
Long has known Giuliani for years and knows Giuliani is no conservative. “In his heart, he’s a Democrat,” Long said in 1994 when Giuliani supported Democrat Mario Cuomo in the governor’s race. The Conservative Party provided the margin of victory for Republican George Pataki that year in his upset victory over Cuomo.
Giuliani ran three times for mayor of New York City; not once did he run on the conservative party line; in fact he ran on the liberal party line.
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At this past weekend’s Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) in Washington sponsored by the American Conservative Union (ACU), Long said, “There’s a clear separation (between conservatives and Giuliani) on important issues that a president has to embrace to win conservative minds and hearts.”
He added, “In all fairness to the mayor, he’s starting to go through an evolution, so we have a long way to go. We haven’t talked to him about anything yet at this stage of the game; we have not had a sit-down on issues.”
In his speech to CPAC Friday, Giuliani’s avoided any discussion of differences with deep-dyed conservatives. He told the crowd that “one of my heroes” was Ronald Reagan and reminded them that he’d worked in the Reagan administration in the third-ranking position in the Justice Department.
He quoted Reagan, “My 80 percent ally is not my 20 percent enemy. What he meant by that is we don’t see eye-to-eye on everything. You and I have a lot of common beliefs that are the same and we have some that are different…. We do believe in many of the same things, I’m sure.”
Assessing Giuliani’s speech, Long said “He didn’t really get into heavy issues. He gave an acceptable speech, but he certainly didn’t touch on a lot of issues nor did he lift the crowd…. The audience was looking for an indication of where he is on a lot of issues.” Long said, “If Rudy wants conservative support across the country he has to move on a lot of issues.”
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