1115.org

I have gone on record as saying of Rudee G that he “doesn’t stand the foggiest chance of being elected President”.

I would now like to wonder, on the record:
a) Why he doesn’t just give up right now (and misappropriate a few of the millions he has raised and not yet spent)
b) Why anyone in their right mind would donate any money to his campaign at this point

If there’s any finder’s fee for the suggestion in the second half of (a), I’ll be happy to furnish a paypal id, or an offshore account, or the location of a cold-war style drop box.

As for (b), if anyone has a compulsive need to burn his money, send it to me and I’ll be happy to burn it for you.

Giuliani is a complete joke, and not all the sleight-of-hand marketing in the world is going to succeed in selling him to America.

Just this week, Rudee is already reeling from two major setbacks. (And there’s still Thursday and Friday to get through.)

The first has to do with his short-lived association with the Iraq Study Group. The facts seem to be as follows:

Rudolph Giuliani’s membership on an elite Iraq study panel came to an abrupt end last spring after he failed to show up for a single official meeting of the group, causing the panel’s top Republican to give him a stark choice: either attend the meetings or quit, several sources said.

Giuliani left the Iraq Study Group last May after just two months, walking away from a chance to make up for his lack of foreign policy credentials on the top issue in the 2008 race, the Iraq war.

He cited “previous time commitments” in a letter explaining his decision to quit, and a look at his schedule suggests why - the sessions at times conflicted with Giuliani’s lucrative speaking tour that garnered him $11.4 million in 14 months.

Giuliani failed to show up for a pair of two-day sessions that occurred during his tenure, the sources said - and both times, they conflicted with paid public appearances shown on his recent financial disclosure. Giuliani quit the group during his busiest stretch in 2006, when he gave 20 speeches in a single month that brought in $1.7 million.

On one day the panel gathered in Washington - May 18, 2006 - Giuliani delivered a $100,000 speech on leadership at an Atlanta business awards breakfast. Later that day, he attended a $100-a-ticket Atlanta political fundraiser for conservative ally Ralph Reed, whom Giuliani hoped would provide a major boost to his presidential campaign.

The month before, Giuliani skipped the session to give the April 12 keynote speech at an economic conference in South Korea for $200,000, his financial disclosure shows.

That body-blow appeared in Newsday on Monday. Rudee’s campaign’s initial response on Monday was to try and blow off the story:

Once again, the paper wrote a story with little regard to the facts. The facts are these - as someone considered a potential presidential candidate, the Mayor didn’t want the group’s work to become a political football. That, coupled with time constraints, led to his decision.

The campaign apparently had little regard for four little facts:
1) Rudee was appointed to the ISG on March 15, 2006.
2) He missed the first two plenary sessions, in April and May.
3) He resigned from the ISG on May 24.
4) He knew perfectly well in March that he was “a potential presidential candidate”.

On Tuesday, Rudee thought he’d try admitting he’d made a mistake. Unfortunately his concept of admitting he’s made a mistake is cut from the same cloth as the Bush administration concept of taking responsibility for s**t that goes down, or hits the fan, or just happens:

Republican presidential contender Rudy Giuliani, whose tough talk on terrorism is the centerpiece of his campaign, said Wednesday that it was a mistake to join a bipartisan Iraq Study Group, which he later quit.

“I thought it would work, but then after a month or two I realized the idea that I was possibly going to run for president would be inconsistent with that,” he said.

The former New York City mayor said the main reason he quit was that it “didn’t seem that I would really be able to keep the thing focused on a bipartisan, nonpolitical resolution.”

Giuliani, who was mayor during the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, did not attend any of the group’s meeting and made two lucrative speeches on days the panel met, financial records show.

He told reporters after a campaign event in Iowa that … he decided the group was the wrong place for him to be.

“It was a mistake because I had an active political career that could interfere with the way in which the recommendations of the commission would be viewed,” he said.

Nice try, Rudee. You just got it slightly wrong. The mistake was not joining the ISG. The mistake was deciding to run for President. By the time you’re done, you will have reduced yourself to a complete laughing stock. Which will definitely cut into your speaking fees. Which really has to hurt, right?

For some reason, the mainstream media — with the exception only of The Associated Press and Keith Olbermann, as I write this post on Wednesday night — has chosen to totally ignore this story. Not really newsworthy, I guess. Certainly not compared to John Edwards‘ $400 haircut, for example. The officially anointed national security candidate blowing off his only national security assignment. Why would John Q. Public have any interest in that?

Let me stress the timeline once more. This story appeared on Newsday on Tuesday morning. It got a lot of play on liberal blogs. But the mainstream media still hadn’t woken up to it by Wednesday night.

And then there was the little cocaine thing too, wasn’t there?

State Treasurer Thomas Ravenel was indicted on federal drug charges Tuesday and was suspended from office by Gov. Mark Sanford.

Ravenel, 44, and Michael L. Miller of Mount Pleasant are charged with one count each of conspiracy to possess and intent to distribute cocaine.
[…]
Ravenel, a Republican, was elected treasurer in November. The charges filed Tuesday said he has possessed with intent to distribute cocaine since at least late 2005.
[…]
Ravenel also was a state director for Rudy Giuliani’s 2008 presidential bid. The Giuliani campaign said Tuesday Ravenel had left that post.

Rudee sure knows how to pick ‘em.

As for his national security credentials, what Rudee may have thought were mighty fine pants may now officially be described as the male presidential-wannabe version of crotchless panties. That is after this Pulitzer-prize-worthy takedown by The Anonymous Liberal:

Suddenly “America’s Mayor” was commanding six-figure speaking fees to share his “wisdom” (in respect of TWAT) and being touted as a serious presidential candidate, all because he happened to be the Mayor of New York when terrorists attacked.

It’s like treating Ray Nagin as an expert climatologist because he happened to be Mayor of New Orleans when Katrina hit. If Nagin decided he wanted to be the head of the National Weather Service, would anyone take him seriously?*

Once you’re seen in the male presidential-wannabe version of crotchless panties, the presidential candidate gig is pretty much over.

That’s the writing on the wall. Whether Rudee chooses to see it or not really doesn’t matter a damn (except to him, and to anyone who might harbor expectations of a finder’s fee).

* Maybe not, but Bush would appoint him in a heartbeat, of course, if he were a loyal Bushie.