‘Meet the Press’ transcript for July 15, 2007

MR. SHRUM:  But it—it’s a referendum on the war.

MR. MURPHY:  But not in the Republican primary, I don’t think.  It’s a question...

MR. SHRUM:  Well, but even—but he’s got to get some of those moderate Republicans.  He’s got to get some of those independents, especially to score in New Hampshire.  He’s hurt there, and for all of his kissing of the base, they don’t like him.

MR. MURPHY:  Well, we’re the...

MR. NOVAK:  It’s a, it’s a perfect storm for Senator McCain, because although he’s, he’s on this, the, the party he is on, the war is very unpopular.  He’s, he’s unpopular inside the party on, on immigration.  There are so many issues, Tim, that he’s, he’s alienated Republicans on—stem cell research, global warming, campaign finance reform.  It’s a very tough situation.

MR. HUNT:  (Unintelligible)

MR. RUSSERT:  And the majority, a majority of the Republicans in Iowa are against the war, which is really striking.

MR. NOVAK:  Yeah.

MR. HUNT:  That—but that’s a caucus thing.  That’s hard for him.  And in New Hampshire, Mike, I tell you why, why I think it’s so hard for him.  The last time, he won because of the independents.  I mean, that’s what got—this time, they’re going to vote in the Democratic primary, not the Republican primary. That makes it almost impossible for John McCain.

MR. MURPHY:  I think they may split if McCain does his job.

MR. HUNT:  They were 70-30 last time, this time...(unintelligible).

MR. MURPHY:  The one truth of politics is everything is changing, and this is still the beginning of the beginning in the voter world.  Eighty percent of people make their decision last three or four weeks in January or maybe late December.  We got a ways to go.  I’m not saying he’s got a lock anymore, but he’s now running a real McCain campaign, which I don’t think rules him out.

MR. RUSSERT:  Talk about Rudy Giuliani, someone who, pro-abortion rights, pro-gay rights, pro-gun control, was said a year ago he doesn’t have a prayer for the Republican nomination, leading in national polls, and he has become the target of the International Association of Firefighters about his behavior on September 11^th leading up to that date.  Let’s watch part of a 13-minute DVD that union put out.

(Videotape of IAFF FireFighters video)

Unidentified Man #1:  We did need radios that worked.  We didn’t have them. We did need proper respiratory protection.  They didn’t give it to us.  The things that we needed to do our jobs even better, we didn’t have because of his administration.

Unidentified Man #2:  So ultimately, the mayor of New York at the time, Mr. Giuliani, he has—bears the responsibility.

Unidentified Man #3:  And I blame Giuliani.  He was the leader that day.  And he was the leader for the eight years leading up to that.

Unidentified Woman:  I wish I could put him on the stand where he’d have to put his hand on the Bible and swear to tell the truth.

Man #3:  He’s not a leader.  He’s not—he’s running on 9/11, and it’s all a fallacy.

(End videotape)

MR. RUSSERT:  The Giuliani campaign came out swinging, pre-emptively.  Here’s the report.  “Rudy dismisses union’s Swift Boat-style attack.  Rudy Giuliani’s president campaign moved quickly to blunt what it sees as a sensationalist Swift Boat-style attack by [the International Association of Fire Fighters].

“Before [the union] was able to release a video full of angry testimony belittling Giuliani’s support of New York City firefighters, the campaign fired off releases and held a news conference.”

Bob Shrum, you went through the swift boat situation with John Kerry.  How did Rudy Giuliani handle this situation and will this kind of testimony against him hurt?

MR. SHRUM:  He did the best he could.  He’s running a campaign that’s premised almost entirely on 9/11; he had to fight back.  He had a tough week. He seems to have a reversed Midas touch when it comes to picking personnel.  I mean, when you look at Senator Vitter and some of the other people that he’s recruited in the South that have gotten into some serious problems.

I think he has a deeper and more fundamental difficulty, which is, if you believe what they’re saying, their strategy is to shortchange Iowa and New Hampshire and go to Florida.  Well, Mitt Romney’s competing in Florida, he’ll have the money to do that.  He’s investing heavily in Iowa and New Hampshire. If he won there and went into Florida, I think Giuliani’s campaign could be very short-lived.

MR. RUSSERT:  How did Giuliani handle this?

MR. NOVAK:  I think he has a deaf ear when it comes to Republicans.  I’ve felt that for a long time.  I still would like to see him win a Republican primary.  You know these polls are great, Bob, but winning in New Hampshire, winning in Iowa, as you say, is going to be difficult.  I would say this. When he talks about a swift boat campaign, you know, for, for Republicans a swift boat was a very good thing.  Kept John Kerry from being president.  So, I mean, the idea of...

MR. SHRUM:  I’m not sure that’s what happened.  I think Osama bin Laden did that.

MR. NOVAK:  The, the—well...

MR. SHRUM:  With his tape.

MR. NOVAK:  I think it had a lot to do with it, particularly the way the campaign handled it—the Kerry campaign handled it.  But this—to make that a pejorative, it’s like, it’s like a lot of liberal Republicans would talk about McCarthyism, a lot of Republicans liked McCarthy.

MR. RUSSERT:  And you said that’s a whole other show.

MR. HUNT:  You know, Tim, I, I still have a great deal of difficulty imagining the Republican Party nominating a pro-choice, pro-gay rights, thrice mayor New Yorker, but Rudy has shown he can take a punch.  I would slightly disagree.  He really has shown that in the last couple of months.  He hasn’t been shaken.  And I think every time this issue is joined, even from critics, Rudy wins.  If the issue is 9/11, people think Rudy is the hero.  That, I think, is good for Rudy.

MR. MURPHY:  Tactically, his response was great.  I think the firemen are half about pensions and salaries and the other things other than 9/11, but Rudy has two big problems.  One is his campaign does not have a second story that moves forward in a change election.  We know about 9/11.  He’s going to get caught on a referendum of 9/11 instead of moving for—what he’s going to do for the country.  If he doesn’t get over that hurdle, he’s going to have big problems And I agree with Shrum, this strategy where I’m going to let somebody clobber me for a while then I’m going to come up through the floorboards invincible and shock everybody, it’s been tried.  It is a deadly strategy, and he’ll lose if he does that.  The process doesn’t wait for you to pick later states to make a stand in.  It’s totally fluid.  You got to win early and ride the bounce.

MR. RUSSERT:  Let’s go to the Democrats.  Here’s the latest national poll. Hillary Clinton’s at 42 percent; Barack Obama, 26; John Edwards, 16; Iowa and New Hampshire a little closer than that in some of the surveys.  The big news the last few weeks, Bill Clinton re-emerging on the campaign trail.  Here he was in Iowa last week.

(Videotape, July 3, 2007)

MR. BILL CLINTON:  (Iowa City, Iowa) I know some people sort of say, “Well, you know, look at them.  They’re old.  And they’re sort of yesterday’s news, you know?” Well, yesterday’s news was pretty good.

(End videotape)

MR. RUSSERT:  Yesterday’s news was pretty good.  Here they are campaigning in New Hampshire again just this week, Bill Clinton, Hillary Clinton.  And it’s led to these kind of covers.  Here’s the cover with “The Bill factor,” and “Hillary’s Dilemma,” that’s Newsweek and The Week.  Which reminded me of 1992. We saw this cover, “The Hillary Factor.” What role did she play in that particular race?  Which led to this comment by Barack Obama.  “Bill Clinton crowed that Hillary Clinton had emerged from his shadow as a new leader for America, but Barack and Michelle Obama intimated both the ex-president and former first lady belong to the past.” Quote, “It’s time to turn the page.”

Bob Shrum, is that the whole campaign?  We can bring back the great days of the Clintons or it’s time to turn the page?

MR. SHRUM:  I think it is.  They, they, they tried this week to redefine change as nostalgia.  To borrow Bob Dole’s phrase, they want to build a bridge to the past.  And Democratic voters can cross that bridge, look at the 1990s and vote for Hillary Clinton.  It’s a strategy born of necessity.  They understand that she is the establishment candidate in a change election.

There was one other thing that was remarkable, by the way, in these appearances—Bill Clinton giving speeches five or six minutes long.  That hasn’t happened since he spoke at Boy’s State in high school.  He really wants to win this thing.

MR. MURPHY:  Here’s, I think, the Bill Clinton problem.  I’ll use a Hollywood example.  If you’re Robert Redford’s agent and the producers want him to star in a new movie, and they come to you and say “We’ve got a great co-star, Brad Pitt.” They’re going to, “No, no, no, we want Ernest Borgnine.” He takes the energy and the...

MR. SHRUM:  Are you calling Hillary Ernest Borgnine?

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