Posted on 03/03/2007 10:04:21 PM PST by FairOpinion
The man who was named Time magazine's "Person of the Year" for his response to the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks is now leading in a slew of national polls and testing whether cultural and religious conservatives in the GOP will support a candidate who offers strong leadership on security and terrorism rather than ideological purity on social issues.
Whit Ayres, a Georgia-based Republican pollster, said he has been struck by the number of conservatives he encountered who disagree with Giuliani on abortion or gay rights but are still attracted to him as a possible Republican nominee. The issue is whether that appeal can survive through a long campaign in which Giuliani's New York record, his position on issues, his three marriages and his complex business dealings will be subjected to withering scrutiny.
The latest Washington Post-ABC News poll showed Giuliani leading McCain by 44 percent to 21 percent, with former House speaker Newt Gingrich at 15 percent and former Massachusetts governor Mitt Romney at 4 percent.
Many GOP strategists still question whether Giuliani can survive the scrutiny and develop a message that appeals to voters across the spectrum of Republican conservatism. In his speech Friday at the Conservative Political Action Conference in Washington, Giuliani highlighted his record as a tax cutter, crime fighter and welfare reformer. But he offered little resembling a traditional conservative agenda for the future, other than saying the United States must remain on offense against terrorism. The speech won a polite but hardly enthusiastic response from the audience of activists.
(Excerpt) Read more at unionleader.com ...
Keen observation. Thank you.
Right. The public already knows the basics about Rudy, and yet--they are supporting him in spite of all the details people believe will cost him supporters.
Clearly at this point in time people do not care about his social conservatism. Maybe that will change in the next year, but it's not true now.
On the other hand, a Newsweek poll out Saturday (March 3rd) showed this:
Of those polled, 82 percent of registered Republicans said a candidate's marital history isn't a significant factor in selecting a nominee, Newsweek said.74% of "social conservatives" say "no big deal."The fact that Giuliani has been married three times isn't an important consideration to 75 percent of registered Republicans and to 74 percent of social conservatives, the magazine said.
Modern conservatives are pretty hip and well informed. They pretty much read up about Rudy.
Enjoy the primaries, LdSentinal. I know I will.
All I like are the polls.
"As an evangelical Christian, I hang out with a lot of conservative Christians. I've been asking people I know and fellowship with what they think of the candidates. About half haven't decided whom they'll be supporting. The other half are for Rudy."
I was puzzled by your comment until I saw that you are from CA. Here in OK the conservative Christians (the majority of them anyway) are not supporting Rudy. Interesting how Christians on the left coast have a different take on Rudy than those of us in the heartland.
Stupid Christians, they've probably never even marched in a gay pride parade. Stuffy Bible thumpin' squares...
The anti-Rooties here do us evangelical Christians a disservice in thinking that we're too stupid not to know about Giuliani's personal past, and in thinking we're some monolithic block that allows Pat Robertson to do our thinking for us.
Now you just knock it off with that stuff. Inconvenient Truth Day was LAST Sunday!
PKMom, your husband has been taking an informal poll of evangelicals in your area in Oklahoma. What's he found out?
"Rudy is a very good friend of mine and I would think he would did a super job running the City of New York and I think he'd make a good president. I like him a lot, although he doesn't share all of my particular point of view on social issues. He's a very dedicated Catholic, and he is a great guy".
Pat Robertson (May 1, 2005)
No he wasn't. The Iowa tracking polls showed Kerry surging to #1 five days prior to the Iowa Caucuses.
Rudy gave a hackneyed speech at CPAC 2007. To me he looked uncomfortable and overplayed his Reagan card big time. Rudy and Reagan come from opposite ends of the political spectrum. Rudy didn't fool anyone with his impersonation of a conservative.
....you mean Christians from Calif are not as Christian as those in the Hearland?.....my folks are from Michigan before they moved to Calif so I would like to think I was raised with those Midwest Values....
"Divide and conquer works. Take a good look at how the coverage of the immigration issue was purpose designed to split conservatives over a domestic issue, enabling Liberals to pick up seats in the House and Senate.
I saw the coverage, and I recognized it for what it was - a liberal stratagem. ..."
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Your entire post 11 is right on the money and excellent!
You are very astute that you figured this out. So did I and I am in complete agreement with your assessment.
It is disastrous that other conservatives can't seem to figure it out, even when it's all laid out for them.
I hope someday you'll run for president, preferably before the Democrats succeed to totally destroy the US, while the conservatives are proudly "preserving their purity".
As has been pointed out numerous times in recent days, the early frontrunner among the Democrats never eventually wins the nomination. The early frontrunner among Republicans pretty much always wins the nomination. You can't compare the bipolar nature of the Democrats with the more rock-steady preferences of the Republicans.
Not content to only divide the conservatives in the GOP, you are now taking on the Christians?
And how close are we now to the iowa caucus? When it comes down to crunch time, Rudy will be sucking canal water.
Thank you for that. I was aware that Robertson had some nice words about Rudy, but I couldn't put my hands on it.
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