Archive for July 12th, 2007

Presidential Hopeful Fun Part 1: Giuliani

Thursday, July 12th, 2007

In what I hope to make an ongoing series about our current presidential hopefuls I present to you:
Presidential Hopeful Fun Part 1: Giuliani

We have all seen the footage of him taken on 09/11/01. In fact a lot of his campaign is based around this image. I have the feeling that he is trying to run through the campaign on his image alone.
Let us see if we can cut through the bullshit of the so-called “America’s Mayor” and see what he really is.

We know he supports the war on the “With us or against us” style rally cry, he has stated that the use of nukes should be a option left open in the case of Iran and one of my personal favorite quotes:

“Let those who say we must understand the reasons for terrorism come with me to the thousands of funerals we’re having in New York City-thousands-and explain those insane, maniacal reasons to the children who will grow up without fathers and mothers, and to the parents who have had their children ripped from them for no reason at all. Instead, I ask each of you to allow me to say at those funerals that your nation stands with America in making a solemn promise and pledge that we will achieve unconditional victory over terrorism and terrorists.“

That is a tear-jerker right there folks. He doesn’t seem to understand that if you don’t understand the motivations behind an action you can never fully understand the action itself. You can not change or combat something you don’t understand. Lets face it, the war is good for this fuckwit. His image as the guy who led New York through 09/11/01 is hinged on it and he is running that campaign on that image alone.

I have heard it said many times that he is the most liberal of the Republican army that is currently fighting like starved fat kids over the last piece of pie that is the Republican nomination for president. I have heard many mutterings about him being pro-choice and for gay rights. According to the OnTheIssues.org page about him it appears that him being pro-choice is true… to a point.
Here is his quote on the matter:

Abortion is a very, very difficult issue of conscience for many, many people. In my case, I hate abortion. I would encourage someone to not take that option. When I was mayor of New York City, I encouraged adoptions. Adoptions went up 65%. Abortions went down 16%. I support the ban on partial-birth abortion. I support the Hyde amendment. But ultimately, I think when you come down to that choice, you have to respect a woman’s right to make that choice differently than my conscience.

That sounds not so bad for a Republican especially that last line, but I still don’t trust him. And I don’t trust those figures at all. I think this may be a standard case of bullshit from a candidate that, instead of actually voicing his true opinions, is trying to reach out and give blowjobs to both sides of the argument and win some votes.
According to the New York City Administration for Children’s Services adoptions rose only 17% during Giuliani’s tenure as mayor. So some of that quote is already proven as bullshit.

Let us move on to gay rights.
He did oppose Bush’s ban on gay marriage so I will, albeit grudgingly, give him some points on that but lets look at a later quote he made in regards to gays in the military:

This is not the time to deal with disruptive issues like this. Back in 1994 we went through this and it created a tremendous amount of disruption. In time of war, in a time where we’re trying to deal with this transition to a new kind of warfare that we have to be fighting–and we haven’t gotten all the way there yet, we need a hybrid army, we need to look at nation-building as part of what we have to teach our military–I don’t think this would be the right time to raise these issues. And I think we should rely on the judgment of our commanders in a situation like this. They know what’s disruptive and what’s not. And at a time of war, you don’t make fundamental changes like this.

So civil rights are a disruptive issue to Rudolph? That just cost him all the points previously awarded.

A friend of ours, Matt Taibbi did a bit on him for Rolling Stone called Giuliani: Worse Than Bush

In his years as mayor — and his subsequent career as a lobbyist — Rudy jumped into bed with anyone who could afford a rubber. Saudi Arabia, Rupert Murdoch, tobacco interests, pharmaceutical companies, private prisons, Bechtel, ChevronTexaco — Giuliani took money from them all. You could change Rudy’s mind literally in the time it took to write a check. A former prosecutor, Giuliani used to call drug dealers “murderers.” But as a lobbyist he agreed to represent Seisint, a security firm run by former cocaine smuggler Hank Asher. “I have a great admiration for what he’s doing,” Rudy gushed after taking $2 million of Asher’s money.

Again we see the bullshit come out. I knew I didn’t like this guy.

As a final note, I want to show you what the International Association of Fire Fighters (IAFF) have to say about him.