What New Yorkers Think About When We Think about Giuliani

Recent opinion polls that have Rudy Giuliani sitting at the top of some kind of heap in the contest for the Republican nomination for president have many New Yorkers shaking our heads in noncomprehension.

As the nation didn’t hear New York when we begged our leaders not to retaliate for the 9/11 attacks by starting a war with Iraq (shouldn’t we know best the face of our enemy?), and when we protested against the spirited campaign for bigotry that was the Republican National Convention in our city in the summer of 2004, today we ring the alarm bell asking the nation to hear the clarion call that Rudy’s not who you think he is.

We couldn’t be bothered to make a campaign against Rudy but we do want to shout out, “Buyer Beware!” to our fellow voters.

You say you didn’t like flip-floppers but here’s a guy who flip flops like a slimey, captured fish on the docks of Dyckman Marina uptown.

You say you want a candidate that respects family values. We’ve never been people that think how that was defined by narrow-minded partisans was the definition of any family we knew but come on… This is not his strong suit unless you’re referencing an intimate family of sycophants that encircle the guy quite like our present president does. And, where has that gotten us?

Again, I couldn’t care less about the rise of Rudy except that I wish the nation would listen to those who experienced his leadership style and the consequences of it for 8 years. He played ethnic groups against each other. He created a climate of hostility and intimidation for African Americans. He was so harsh with the prosecution of the laws that suburban moms that got parking tickets in Greenwich Village while visiting their kid on campus at NYU were jailed overnight if they challenged the ticket. And, what’s a mayor, who is in the titular role for governing, doing prosecuting anyway?

Probe deeply before you accept him as “America’s Mayor.” Remember that Rudy inherited that moniker on September 12th for the one day of non-partisan, non-prosecutorial leadership he demonstrated. Before that the leader who had been anointed with that title was Mayor Ed Rendell of Philadelphia in 1994. He had turned around an intransigent city and had charm to boot. He’s now governor of Pennsylvania and a leader to admire.

As Steven Colbert might say: Nation: listen.