Giuliani slams Democrats, the press
By Brian C. Mooney, Globe Staff
MINNEAPOLIS -- Assuming the role of Republican rottweiler, former New York mayor Rudy Giuliani ripped the Democratic ticket and the news media in remarks before his home state delegation this afternoon, offering a preview for his later keynote address to the Republican National Convention.
Giuliani lavished praise on the party's presumptive nominee, John McCain, and his running mate, Alaska Governor Sarah Palin, but he was scornful and sarcastic in his criticisms of the Democratic ticket of Barack Obama and Joe Biden. In vintage Giuliani fashion, the failed presidential candidate was also contemptuous of the news media with which he has battled for two decades.
Obama, Giuliani said "is the least experienced [presidential nominee] in the last hundred years. He was a community organizer ... What do they do? .. Then he was in the Chicago legislature, no the Illinois legislature, no the Chicago machine ... [The Democrats] have got their experience at the bottom [of the ticket] ... Joe Biden, Joe's got a lot of experience which he'll tell you about ...He's got a lot of experience talking ... talking ... talking," Giuliani said at a luncheon at the New York delegation's hotel.
(Biden issued perhaps the most memorable put-down of Giuliani's presidential candidacy. In a televised debate last October, Biden remarked: "I mean, think about it! Rudy Giuliani. There's only three things he mentions in a sentence -- a noun, a verb, and 9/11. There's nothing else! There's nothing else! And I mean this sincerely. He's genuinely not qualified to be president.")
As a state senator, Obama had "an interesting record," Giuliani said, noting that Obama voted "'present' almost 130 times. I don't remember having that vote when I was mayor of New York City ... You're supposed to make a decision."
Obama and others have said voting present was a common practice in the Illinois legislature, often as partisan strategy or to express objections to portions of bills he would otherwise support.
Giuliani also criticized Obama and Biden for opposing the successful troop surge last year in Iraq, of which McCain was the leading proponent. Of the Iraq invasion, Giuliani said: "I can't figure out for the life of me how the Democrats think it was a mistake."
McCain and Biden both voted in favor of the Iraq war resolution, which Obama opposed in a speech while still an Illinois lawmaker. Biden later became a harsh critic of the conduct of the war.
Giuliani praised McCain as a principled man, ready to be commander in chief, and vigorously defended Palin, a little-known figure on the national political stage who is now the subject of intense news media scrutiny. Giuliani praised her as a "doer" who cut taxes and spending and was fearless in taking on corrupt officials within her own party.
But he saved his most acerbic criticism for the media, which he accused of launching "unrelenting" and "vicious" attacks on Palin.
"I've never seen an attack like that, even by New York City standards," Giuliani said. "It's below the standards of journalism," he said, smirking and pausing before repeating the phrase slowly in a lower voice ... "the standards ... of journalism."
"What do her children have to do with what kind of vice president she is going to make?" Giuliani asked, apparently referring to reports that followed a statement Palin issued saying that her 17-year-old unwed daughter is pregnant and plans to marry the father.
Giuliani's own presidential candidacy was rocked periodically by reports of his messy personal life that includes three marriages, a well-publicized extramarital affair during his second marriage, and his strained relationship with his two children from that marriage.
About Political Intelligence
Glen Johnson is Politics Editor at boston.com and lead blogger for "Political Intelligence." He moved to Massachusetts in the fourth grade, and has covered local, state, and national politics for over 25 years. E-mail him at johnson@globe.com. Follow him on Twitter @globeglen. |
