1115.org

The WSJ has an unbelievable story about Rudee’s habit of taking phone calls from darling Judith in the middle of campaign appearances.

First, it happens a heck of a lot more often than previous media reports have led us to believe:

The estimate from those in a position to know is that he has taken such calls more than 40 times in the middle of speeches, conferences and presentations to large donors.

I had read that before I clicked on the link for the story itself. I was all prepared to read an exposé about how these calls are staged as an elaborate if misguided attempt to make us love Rudee. Imagine my shock at finding that these are not staged calls at all. Mrs. Giuliani the third insists on calling her husband up in the middle of these appearances. Giuliani aides have “warned over and over again that the phone calls are rude and inappropriate and have alienated everyone from local officials to top donors to close friends”. Either Giuliani doesn’t get it, or he’s unable to do anything about it.

Read the whole story, it’s pretty mind-blowing. Here are some highlights, though:

Columnist Robert Novak cites “supporters from outside the Giuliani staff” who claim that taking phone calls from his wife as been “part of his political bag of tricks all year.” But Mr. Giuliani’s deputy press secretary Jason Miller told me the NRA incident was definitely not a stunt. (Bob “Douchebag” Novak gets it wrong again, huh? What a surprise!)
[..]
The fact is that people inside the Giuliani campaign are appalled at the number of times their candidate has felt compelled to interrupt public appearances to take calls from his wife. The estimate from those in a position to know is that he has taken such calls more than 40 times in the middle of speeches, conferences and presentations to large donors. “If it’s a stunt, it’s not one coming from him,” says one Giuliani staffer. “It’s an ongoing problem that he won’t take advice on.”
[…]
Consider a spring incident in Oklahoma City. Mr. Giuliani spoke twice at the Oklahoma History Center, first at a small private roundtable for $2,300 donors and then to 150 people who donated $500 apiece. Ten minutes into the roundtable, Mr. Giuliani’s phone rang. He left the room to take the call, apparently from Mrs. Giuliani, and never returned. The snubbed donors received no explanation. “The people there viewed it as disrespectful and cheesy,” says Pat McGuigan, a local newspaper editor who was asked by the Giuliani campaign to moderate the roundtable.

An hour or so later, Mr. Giuliani was speaking to the bigger group of donors when his phone rang again. While he spoke with his wife, he invited her to say hello to the assembled crowd. “It was remarkable, and was not viewed by the audience in a positive way,” public relations executive Brenda Jones told me.

So it’s not that Giuliani is pulling a phony act staged just for the cameras when he answers the phone from Judith during a major speech. No, the problem is that he’s a submissive phonee who can’t tell his phoner to cut it out.

But poor tough Rudee stands ready to stand up to the terrorists, right?

(Hey, Rudee, if you’re terrified of your wife, then she’s a terrorist too.)