Monday’s political round-up

August 6, 2007

Today’s installment of campaign-related news items that wouldn’t generate a post of their own, but may be of interest to political observers:

* Jerome Hauer, who served as Rudy Giuliani’s emergency management director in NYC, is criticizing his former boss’ presidential ambitions. “Rudy would make a terrible president and that is why I am speaking now,” Hauer said. He based much of his criticisms on Giuliani’s decision to ignore warnings and locate his crisis control room in the World Trade Center complex, despite a pervious attack at the site.

* Jonathan Martin: “Mitt Romney engaged in a heated discussion about his Mormon faith with a prominent Des Moines talk show host off the air on Thursday morning. The contentious back-and-forth between Romney and WHO’s Jan Mickelson began on the air (video link courtesy Breitbart.tv) when the former governor appeared on the popular program that has become a regular stop for GOP presidential hopefuls. But the conversation spilled over to a commercial break and went on after the program ended, where a visibly annoyed Romney spoke in much greater detail about his church’s doctrines than he is comfortable doing so in public.”

* Though the senator is still keeping his plans close to his chest, Sen. John Warner (R-Va.) is expected not to seek re-election next year, at least as far as the Virginia GOP establishment is concerned. Bob Novak reported that the state’s Republican leaders now expect Rep. Tom Davis (R) and former Gov. Mark Warner (D) to face off, with Warner as the favorite.

* Barack Obama took some heat last week over his foreign policy positions, but the senator isn’t backing down: “‘I made a simple proposition that I’d like anybody here to challenge me on,’ Obama said of his Wednesday speech in which he said that he would use military force in Pakistan, a U.S. ally, if necessary to root out terrorists…. ‘Everybody knows that you’d use conventional weapons in those circumstances,’ he said. ‘Every military expert knows that you’d never use nuclear weapons in that situation.'”

* And former Sen. Sam Nunn (D-Ga.) is reportedly unhappy with the state of the presidential race and has reached out to NYC Mayor Michael Bloomberg about an independent campaign. “We’ve had conversations about frustration with the fact that the process is flawed,” Nunn said of Bloomberg, who has denied he plans to launch a White House bid. “I’ve told him … it may be time for some serious people to look at what I call a timeout and having people of good faith in the Democratic and Republican parties to come together and address the issues that the parties don’t seem to want to address.” No word on what those issues might be.

Bloomberg running would be a disaster for the Democrats.

I, for one, really like Mayor Mike. He was a liberal Democrat and ran New York City as a moderate Democrat who understands business.

I am a yellow dog Democrat but I would consider voting for Bloomberg. If Bloomberg and (fill in the blank Democrat) split 65% of the vote then the Republican will probably get 270+ electoral votes.

  • “Rudy would make a terrible president and that is why I am speaking now,” Hauer said. He based much of his criticisms on Giuliani’s decision to ignore warnings and locate his crisis control room in the World Trade Center complex, despite a pervious attack at the site.

    Agreed. And let’s not forget that Rudolf’s crisis control room was indeed located in World Trade Center 7, which, as has been mentioned here at TCR a number of times by myself and others, was the building that was not struck by an aircraft yet collapsed at 5:20 PM ET, 9/11/2001, but was entirely omitted from the 9/11 Commission Report.

  • * Jonathan Martin: “Mitt Romney engaged in a heated discussion about his Mormon faith with a prominent Des Moines talk show host off the air on Thursday morning. The contentious back-and-forth between Romney and WHO’s Jan Mickelson [deletia] .”

    That was an interesting clip. The radio guy was such a turdblossomic conservative that I almost took Romney’s side. Almost. He clearly stated that he didn’t necessarily obey Mormon “law” thus making the common argument in favor of selective hypocrisy. He also pointed out that some leaders in the church were pro-abortion. He failed to point out that leaders of the church also used to get first pick of young girls to marry. He made some good points about religion should be personal and not affect secular politics. Then he tortuously tried to explain how he came to be anti-choice in some secular road to Damascus realization that made no sense at all. He is a pretty good communicator though. Not as obviously a pretty boy as I’ve seen him painted. He could persuade a lot of wingnuts to go for him. They’re used to that kind of “logic”.

  • I think it’s high time the Democrats stopped listening to Sam Nunn’s offers of advice. That bastard is the main reason why candidate Bill Clinton’s repeated promise to make Executive Order #1 the admission of gays to the military devolved into the disastrous and hurtful and by now quaint “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” policy.

  • Everybody keeps talking about how Bloomberg is a moderate to liberal Democrat. Maybe; but he has given hundreds of thousands of dollars to The New York State Senate Republicans in recent years. He also bent over backwards for George Bush and the rethugs when they used NYC for propaganda purposes when they held the NYC rethug convention, also donating hundreds of thousands of dollars.

  • I pity poor Romney having to defend his religion when he’d much rather campaign for president.

    Not that he should be exempt from having to defend his religious views, or the church to which he belongs. Those things are as open to criticism as any other subject. If Romney had thought ahead, though, he would’ve embarked on a nationwide “LDS A-OK” tour, making a full-time job of marketing the Mormon brand. He should’ve built his presidential campaign on the notoriety from that effort. Now he’s having to do two jobs at once, which doesn’t do justice to either.

  • As a DC resident, I really with Davis would stay in the House. He has been a good advocate for the District.

  • “I’ve told him … it may be time for some serious people to look at what I call a timeout and having people of good faith in the Democratic and Republican parties to come together and address the issues that the parties don’t seem to want to address.”

    There are no “people of good faith” in the Republican Party – there are only the con artists and criminals in charge of the conspiracy, and the morons who follow them.

  • Good for Obama. I guess it’s a sign of my enduring naivete, but I was absolutely shocked that ruling out using nukes against a bunch of goons in caves was considered the “irresponsible” position. What have we become when we–the Democrats!–publicly contemplate something so monstrous?

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