Whoa. Giuliani is toast. The guy was using city funds to pay for his gambols with his mistress?
This would be good news if it weren’t for the fact that Huckabee, Romney, Thompson…heck, the whole revolting Republican lineup…make me ill.
Pharyngula
Evolution, development, and random biological ejaculations from a godless liberal
We’ve experienced Willard. Be afraid. Horrible governor, and a horrible human.
Wow…
It would have been better if he’d gotten the nomination and THEN had this leak.
Oh crud. Of all the republican nominees, I hated Rudy the least (by a very slim margin.)
The race has been fun to watch. Will it be Mitt-Huckabee-Paul to the finish line? Who woulda guessed?
The WHOLE lineup? Sir- prepare to put on your tin-hat because Ron Paul is gold
http://www.crooksandliars.com/2007/11/28/more-boos-at-republican-youtube-debate-as-mccain-re-writes-history/
(Yeah- he’s a complete nut on any topic which doesn’t involve getting out of Iraq- but at least he’s not bought and sold by the corporations like the rest of the politicians.)
CNN:
The debate turned personal when a viewer, holding the Bible, asked “Do you believe every word of this book? And I mean specifically, this book that I am holding in my hand.”
Huckabee, a Baptist minister, said,”Sure I believe the Bible is exactly what it is.”
Giuliani said he believes the Bible, but not “literally true in every respect.”
After that, Romney stammered a bit when moderator Anderson Cooper asked him if he believed every word. Video Watch the candidates get personal about the Bible »
“Yeah, the Bible is the word of God. … I might interpret the word differently than you interpret the word, but I read the Bible and I believe the Bible is the word of God,” Romney said.
Too bad that most Christians take the Bible as metaphor! (wink, wink)
Quite so.
See? That’s what Rudy gets. Pat Robertson endorses your bid and then, BOOM, your gov’t financed affair gets leaked. Obviously, god is angry at Pat for not being enough of a bigot to make up for Jerry’s absence.
WORD.
I’m not convinced he’s done for yet. His latest line is that the security detail followed him everywhere, even when he was “off duty”, and that he had nothing to do with how the expenses were settled. (I guess the reasoning being that if he’d have gone to ballgames instead, many of the expenses would still have been incurred.)
But given that those expense settlements were done through obscure, unrelated accounts, it certainly will take some explaining, and however you look at it, paying for expensive hotel rooms for your bodyguards while you’re off cheating on your wife, isn’t likely to win you many friends among the New York City taxpayers.
Part of me wishes he still makes it to the nomination, because he is eminently beatable and would not inspire the Republican base to get out and vote for him, but the other part of me believes that no-one that unstable should be allowed anywhere close to the presidency. He’s George W. Bush without the empathy. A dangerous man to put in charge of our already disastrous Middle East foreign policy. War with Iran would be that much closer.
So, on balance, I hope he dies a death of a thousand paper (accounting) cuts, before we get to Iowa.
It would have been better if he’d gotten the nomination and THEN had this leak.
You think? The repugs seem pretty well insulated from any effects of scandal. W could blow a goat on the whitehouse lawn dressed as a kipper snorting cocaine from a GI’s jockstap and Faux news would spin it as supporting the troops and the magnetic sticker/SUV crowd would accuse anyone mentioning this as weird of being unamerican/think of the children/support the troops/we believe in god and nothing would change.
Huckabee, a Baptist minister, said,”Sure I believe the Bible is exactly what it is.”
I actually agree with that, although I could say the same thing about The Handbook of Chemistry and Physics.
Dammit, I was hoping for Guiliani to get the nomination and lose; it would push the whole debate to the left.
You’d think the sex-phobic misers that pass for the Republican base would be terminally aghast at Guiliani’s shenanigans, but the GOP has become so adept at self-delusion the only reliable prediction one can make is “more crazy”.
If Rudy goes it should almost be a given for the Democrats, unless the voting public turns completely stupid. Please all people who want to see the republican trash gone get out and vote, I am voting from 5000 miles away and most can almost walk to their polling place
from bad Jim:
“Huckabee, a Baptist minister, said,”Sure I believe the Bible is exactly what it is.”
I actually agree with that, although I could say the same thing about The Handbook of Chemistry and Physics.”
I’m having a hard time thinking of ANYTHING that isn’t ‘exactly what it is’.
If Rudy goes it should almost be a given for the Democrats, unless the voting public turns completely stupid.
Hahahahahahahaha… Oh, mercy! “Turns” completely stupid?
The bookies and bet-trading markets still all have 9iu11ani as favourite for the Republican nomination. You can’t get much better than evens on him. http://www.oddschecker.com/specials/politics-and-election/us-presidential-election/republican-candidate
If you are right about the campaign being dead the internet is giving away free money. (hint: the internet probably isn’t giving away free money)
Unless?
From Hullabaloo and the Village Voice
Rudy’s company is also in deep with terrorist sympathizers in Qatar. Mr. 9/11, indeed.
“Sure, the Bible is what it is” is just about the most craftily evasive answer I can think of.
This implies that Republicans care about sexual impropriety or corruption. They don’t, at least not in their candidates. I’ll be amazed if this affects Giuliani at all, so long as he keeps running as the Designated Fascist in the race.
Who said that? Nobody. Yet. But when they do, you can bet it will be the most scandal-mongering, Clinton-hating, political-person-destroying son-of-a-bitches on the right wing — but that’s only if the milquetoast handwringing liberals of the MSM don’t get there first.
Tacitus
???
I dunno, doesn’t this just make him seem more human and likeable? A minor sex scandal for Kevin Rudd – admittedly a lot more minor than this, since it was just going to a strip show and having a good time – probably helped his campaign here in Australia. Bob Hawke’s well-known philandering helped boost his popularity as well – it certainly didn’t stop him winning four elections, and just gave his image more of a larrikin edge.
Maybe Guiliani would do better here than in sexually-uptight America.
Oops, Giuliani – I always get the spelling wrong. :(
Rudy you need to learn from the master Clinton.
Rudy, say the following, “I did not have sexual relationships with that woman” and “what white dress?” and my favorite, “it depends on what your definition of ‘is’ is”.
I believe that every molecule of the steaming pile of dogshit we see on the ground before us is exactly what it is.
That debate last night was a giant snoozefest. 7 bush clones and a weird little guy.
This specific issue is not about his sex life, since it was already known he had violated the marriage vows he had made in the sight of God and which no man should tear asunder. This is about abuse of power, trying to underhandedly hide expenses to the taxpayers related to his affair. As usual, it’s not about the act, but about the coverup. Misjudgement in one’s personal life is one thing, but these new accusations, if true, speak to his integrity as a public official, which is a very different matter.
Clinton may have been cheating on his wife, but he didn’t (as far as I know) recruit the official apparatus of government to hide that fact.
Yup, Jeff. I’ll skip the usual rant about the health-care “victory”.
It was cool when he jumped on his jet-ski and rescued those people whose boat had capsized, though. Remember that? It’s just too bad he never displayed a similarly heroic or selfless concern for the imperiled when it came to his political decisions.
I realize that a man can change his mind over the course of 11 years, but tell me this flip-flop isn’t largely political:
Imagine that! An out-of-state Republican running to the left of Ted Kennedy! But now, this:
Ignoring, for the moment, what a load of crap that statement is, let’s consider where Romney is really coming from. A commenter (“gj“) on Althouse said it best:
I couldn’t agree more.
Why do y’all think Giuliani has lower approval ratings (or whatever ‘good’ metric they’re using) than Bush in NYC? And it’s not just because Giuliani’s a Republican in a largely Democratic city — Bloomberg’s a Republican, too, but has pretty high approval ratings.
re: 28
Was going to comment about the third quote and then I realized you’d impeached yourself by putting “what white dress?” in quotes when everybody knows the dress is blue.
The context of the third quote is overlooked. In that case, the question “is” was regarding the existence of a relationship between Clinton and Lewinsky. You may think it’s a black-and-white matter as to whether a “relationship” exists at any point in time, but Clinton’s comment was entirely appropriate. Politically stupid, but legally appropriate.
This scandal will blow over.
I am not impressed at all with any of the GOP hopefuls. There isn’t one I’d vote for. I want to be clear on this: I don’t like McCain at all, but I was pretty impressed with his smackdown regarding waterboarding. That was pretty smart. I bet W didn’t like that response. W could watch someone get waterboarded and ask himself, “Hmmm, are we sure this is torture?” At least McCain has the guts to say, “Dude, that’s torture.”
I absolutely will not be voting GOP next year. It will not happen. I’m sort of hoping for an Edwards-Obama ticket, because if it’s Clinton, all we’ll hear about for 4-8 years is “Whitewater”, “Rose Law Firm” and, ironically enough, “Monica.”
Tulse (re: Lewinsky/Clinton vs. Giuliani)
Sounds like more classic liberal nuance.
Seriously, where have you been the past 8 years? Do you own a TV? Do you ever read Time magazine? Those are all good points you made, but only to sane paeople. As far as the mainstream media is concerned, it’s exactly the kind of argument they’d expect from a rabid deragned unserious liberal partisan blinded by a Bush derangement syndrome.
Enjoy the campaign.
This incident will blow over. Giuliani had police bodyguards, which is not completely unreasonable for a prominent elected official. Bodyguards costs money. When Giuliani travels, his protection travels. They have to stay somewhere. That also costs money.
So what exactly is the scandal here? I’ll admit it’s weird that it was billed to obscure city departments, but it’s not as if actual malfeasance is evidenced.
Don’t get me wrong, though, Giuliani will never get my vote; I just want a real campaign-ending scandal for him.
Does anybody else remember that woman singing in that viral video from a few months back, “I want Rudy Giuli-on-me. . .” Man, that cracks me up.
Sengkelat:
Yes, Giulani COULD have affairs, I guess, and pay for his body guard staff to stay at the hotel, and it would be “legitimate” in the sense that he’s the mayor and if he wants to go to a hotel, he pays for his room, and the city pays for his bodyguard’s rooms.
BUT Giulani chose to hide the bill among various city departments — which means that various city departments had less money to do what they were charged to do by the people of New York City. “… including agencies responsible for regulating loft apartments, aiding the disabled and providing lawyers for indigent defendants.” [from Editor&Publisher via Dailykos] Giuliani took money earmarked for helping disabled people, and used it to hide his shenanigans. Then he tried to cover it up by claiming some BS secrecy.
That’s abuse of power, plain ‘n’ simple. He’d be a fantastic successor to Bush. I can see why he’s on his way to winning the Republican nomination.
The debate turned personal when a viewer, holding the Bible, asked “Do you believe every word of this book?
When the hell is somebody going to ask Romney if he belives every word of “The Book of Mormon” or “The Pearl of Great Price” and whether he belives either of these books are true revelations of God’s word, equal to the Bible in being jam-packed with spiritual goodness.
I would also like to know the exact content of any oaths Romney has made when he was initiated into the different levels of the Mormon cult. These oaths, I am almost sure, will conflict with the oath of the Presidency, and Mr Romney is, of course a man of his word.
Of course, if any other Mormon would be so kinf as to enlighten us on the content of these oaths, and any other “secret” information possesed by Mormons, that would be alright, too.
Religions don’t have secrets, (although they may have certain aspects which are obscure to outsiders) cults have secrets. Mormonism is a cult.
Religion ask you to promise to obey your conscience, as informed by their particular morals. Cults swear you to obedience to superiors in the cult, and your conscience takes a back seat. Mormonism is a cult, not a religion.
And if it is a religion, it’s balderdash by even the most generous standards.
Matt Heath, can you give us a link to that free money? I’ll cut-n-paste, if you can’t embed.
Another thing that this thread has demonstrated is that Giuliani will never get elected President because his name is too hard to spell.
Giuliani answered the question “Do you believe in the Holy Bible?” with “I think there are parts of the Bible that are interpretive, I think there are parts of the Bible that are allegorical, I think there are parts of the Bible that are meant to be interpreted in a modern context…”
So when those men were writing the Bible, they thought “Hey, interpret this the way they will in over 2000 years, not the way we think now.”
Huckabee then says that there are parts that are “obviously allegorical” and, about the parts he doesn’t understand, “I’m not supposed to”
So why teach what you don’t understand? This isn’t even a political question. Sometimes being an American is so frustrating.
No. But to the best of my knowledge, Clinton didn’t pay for expenses incurred in committing his affairs with taxpayer money, and he wasn’t a candidate from a party that has made pseudo-puritanism roughly half of its platform. Slight difference here.
I caught a minute of Huckabee on O’Reiley (just surfing past, you know). Huckabee made a comment to the effect he was more comfortable with an honest atheist than with a Christian who was not living a Christian life.
So far as private vs public morality, read up on Alexander Hamilton.
We have to remember – these are republicans.
For them, such antics are reason for impeaching – hell, jailing – a democrat, but they forgive their fellow republicans.
Funny how that works….
Don’t hold your breath. If he was going to be brought down by any scandal, it would have happened by now. Besides, he’s on record as saying that he loves the bible. What more do you want out of a Presidential candidate anyway?