Talk Elections

"My name is Rudy Guiliani, and I'm here to scare the living sh*t out of you".....

Is it possible to produce an ad more over-the-top than the new Rudy ad? This reminds me of some of the most ridiculous ads from 2002, but even worse:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y2iFhGtKO-Q&eurl=http://www.dailykos.com/comments/2008/1/3/0550/60229/33

Should we just pretend like these things aren't happening?

omg...that is like a parody

I also dont understand what exactly is Rudy's argument....if worries over terrorism are top for you and you feel the country needs a 'tested' and 'ready' guy...then McCain is your man...not someone whose only foreign policy cred is dealing with parking tickets for UN diplomats

We shouldn't base political campaigns on trying to scare the sh*t out of people.

I'm not the first to say it on this thread but... you don't like the ad because you don't want to think about these things. It's all not only true but the leading items on the world agenda. What the hell else are you going to vote on, saving the kangaroo rat?

The country is at war, and if our civilizational confidence is shaky, there's isn't.

Romney, Huckabee, Obama, and Edwards are singularly unequipped to handle a world in crisis.

No one's "ignoring" the problems going on in the world, they just want to handle them in a sensible manner. The Bush doctrine doesn't work, hasn't worked, and won't work in the future.

And we're sick of the Republican policy of trying to scare people to death so they will stop thinking.  And oh yeah, you need to settle down.....

I don't like the ad because it's sensationalized, over the top garbage designed to appeal to the worst instincts in people.  It also reminds me of a bad Saturday Night Live parody.

That was some good satire...... Right?

I'm sorry but I think you've just topped anything Naso has ever posted.

No one is trying to forget about what is going on in the world but that Giuliani ad is nothing but scare tactics and it won't work.

I'm still trying to understand what Rudy Giuliani has done to show he knows how to deal with these problems. He was Mayor after 9/11...ok....

If these are the issues that we face today it's clear that McCain is the candidate best suited to deal with them, based on his experiences.

If I didn't know any better I would've thought that ad was some spoof of Giuliani's campaign made by a liberal.

And yes, what gives Giuliani special qualification to handle all this?

Giuliani gets it. His foreign policy team, led by Norman Podhoretz, is composed of people who understand that only freedom counteracts tyranny and terror.

It's a new twilit stuggle, and America can't survive a sunshine patriot. McCain gets it, but there's no doubting that Rudy does, too.

oh god this is going to give me nightmares for, like, the rest of my life

i guess i have no choice but to vote for rudolph william louis "9/11" giuliani otherwise california might get set on fire :-\ :-\ :-\

Freedom, yes. But what freedom does Giuliani endorse? Never-ending warfare? He certainly wasn't fast to condemn Musharraf and has no intent to loosen ties with Saudi Arabia. If we are supposed to be combating terrorism with freedom, and we should be, we need to be looking at allying with democracies, not dictatorships which only further fuel the image of the US as aggressive and imperialist (regardless of whether the US actually is aggressive and imperialist; this seems to be a key blind spot).

Giuliani exploits the death of Benazir Bhutto, a true stateswoman, to win the votes of some uninformed xenophobes. This why I'll never vote for him. He's cynically manipulating the emotion of fear, he surrounds himself with neocons and considers 9/11 his reason d'etre. Once the NYC firefighters swiftboat Rudy, the Hizzoner's numbers will collapse. Unfortunately for him, they already dropped.

Well that settles it, I'm obviously voting Giuliani now because clearly we need more of what we got with Bush in power.

>>Giuliani gets it. His foreign policy team, led by Norman Podhoretz<<

That's all I need to hear to know Giuliani doesn't have a clue.  The neocons completely, utterly dropped the ball in Afghanistan and refused to confront Pakistan and Saudi Arabia.  These are the places where the real threats were.

Podhoretz was one of the architects of the Bush "attention span of a 7 year old" policy.  In short, can't get Osama? Convince people Saddam is the problem.  We CAN get him.  And in the process, we get to test drive lots of other lemons like...

** They will welcome us as liberators **

** We can win this "on the cheap" **

** A mushroom cloud over Washington **

** Fundamentalist Osama's in bed with Secularist Saddam **

** Mission accomplished **

Yeah -- he's  a real genius alright.  

Opponents of the war in Iraq do not have their heads in the sand, individually or collectively.  They include such radical, left wing subversives as Bob Novak, Pat Buchanan, Brent Scowcroft, Hugh Shelton, Rep. Walter Jones, Doug Bandow and Senator Chuck Hagel.

Podhoretz is a one-trick pony with one simple agenda: use the United States to destroy any and all enemies of Israel.  He's Reverend John Hagee, without the tongues-speaking and the faith healing.

You know, I have met Norman Podhoretz... he helped me out with my paper for the Center of the Study of the Presidency... and he didn't seem like the Jewish Hitler, but I guess you would have more insight into that then I would.

The Bush policy has failed because Bush is a total idiot who listened to some smart people, got about 1/8 of what they were saying and then put his "plan" into action.  Bush is too simple minded to understand the intellectual complexity of what other people were telling him in the beginning which is why we are in such bad shape now.  If McCain had won in 2000 the same situation would have turned out way better... and don't say "McCain wouldn't have listened to the neocons because he was their man in 2000.

This is my point dammit... saying "there is a problem and this proves it" is not exploitation.  When I think of all the ways that Clinton exploited... everyone... especially the military, I have to wonder why you people aren't up in arms over what he did... well, no, I don't have to wonder, I know... I'm not gonna bother being polite... blind partisanship is the answer.

As for your question, you are right, McCain is just as qualified... perhaps more so, but I have other reasons for supporting Rudy over McCain.

The policy failed because it's malignant and arrogant.  It reverses the strong, but humble foreign policy practiced by Truman, Eisenhower, Kennedy, Nixon, Ford, Carter, Reagan, H.W. Bush and Clinton.

We always attack those who attack us.   We attack those who attack, or at least invade and occupy, nations allied closely to us.  We do not attack (to say nothing of invading, occupying and attempting to Americanize) those who have not attacked us.

Weapons of mass destruction?  Yeah, the USSR had em.  Most of them pointed directly at our cities.  I still thank God Ronald Reagan had both the toughness and the humility to dually stand up to and dialogue with the Soviet monster.  The Chinese had and continue to have them.  But President Nixon and subsequent Presidents were smart enough to contain the threat.  

Saddam DIDN'T have them.  But still we invaded and occupied.  Meanwhile, the putrid sack of pus who DID attack us continues to live somewhere in Afghanistan or Pakistan.  Because the neocons enabled and emboldened the Decider to take his eye off the ball.  Moving the 10th Mountain Division out of Tora-Bora and into the desert makes about as much sense as transferring Norwegian ski troops to Cuba or some other tropical clime.

And rather than humbly admit they got it wrong...rather than suggesting we redouble our efforts in places where Al Qaeda actually IS...the neocons want to start a third war, with Iran.  And some favor a fourth war, with Syria.  All without a draft...without increasing taxes...without building a coalition.  They're sure if we just "step out on faith" the democracy fairies will make it all work out to our advantage in the end.

Jewish neocons are simply all about Israel, when Israel is right and when Israel is wrong.
Christian neocons are simply all about Armageddon.

I've never been so ashamed to be an American. Hopefully, voters will get it right this time.  Rudy McRompson is banking on fear getting the best of courage once again.  

This is, very possibly, the biggest "stick my head in the sand and cry 'la la la'" post I have ever seen on this forum.

When the invasion of Iraq was begun, not a single neoconservative complained that their plan was not being fully followed or that Bush was messing things up. No, they cheered incessantly and uproariously. The final victory was at hand in spring of 2003.

If these were really people of "intellectual complexity" who made a fool-proof plan for the end of terrorism once and for all, don't you think they'd have objected when only 1/8 of it was being carried out? Don't you think they'd have quickly become aware that the Bush administration was incompetent? They did neither; they supported him in 2004, in 2005, and in 2006. Sure, some fell by the wayside, but those who did were not suddenly disaffected neoconservatives, they were people who changed their minds about neoconservativism altogether; Thomas Friedman springs to mind.

No, the Bush administration followed the neoconservative playbook by rote, at least until things got so bad that continuing the plan (Iran) was no longer feasible. And the neoconservatives supported him right up until he decided Iran was not getting invaded after all. If the invasion of Iran is what the great and glorious victory requires, then I am afraid you have simply lost touch with reality.

Ummm... those people were far, far, far from being of the same mind on foriegn policy.  I have an a habit of overgeneralizing, but that's just laughable.


Look up some of the CIA's actions during the 50', 60's and 70's and then look at what you just said.  If you could, I would tell you to look up "Track One" and "Track Two" you can, but you won't find much.


Reagan was listening to the exact same people (or at least the direct intellectual decedents) that you now deride as being terrible.  Reagan gave to hearing to people like Kissinger.  As for the issue of WMD... I refuse to accept that Saddam didn't have at least some, and there is, indeed, evidence that some existed.  The Pentagon was not completely wrong.  And at the risk of being laughed at I believe that there was a concerted effort inside the Federal Government, by groups unnamed (though not "unpatriotic liberals") to discredit Military Intelligence and derail the Bush Administrations efforts internationally... a well funded, well organized fifth column, not beholden to the the people and indifferent about the Constitution.  Though I am sure this will come back to bite me in the ass (or blow my head off) later in life, I will paraphrase John McCain and say that if you want to look into the eyes of the United States' current failures internationally, you will see three letters...

A "C". An "I". And an "A".


As for the rest of what you say, there were strategic, historical and immediate reasons for the choice of Iraq.

As for the response to the current situation in Iraq and possible invasion of Iran... I love how you think the neocons are somehow more organized than America's real enemies, but I assure you they aren't.  Even a quick and dispassionate glance at what various neocons are saying on these issues would show you that "their" opinion is actually all over the map.

And actually, many neocons have objected loudly to the way the war was carried out, and the total lack of real strategic planning on the side of the Bush Administration, particularly the "rush to Baghdad" which totally ignored that the objective of war is to destroy the enemies army, not to capture cities.  They should have used Baghdad as a albatross for the Republican Guard to hold them down and destroy them.  It would have cost more soldiers from the  outset, but it would have given us a whole year to build up before the foriegn insurgents showed up.  Many of "us" realized this at the time, but were largely ignored.

Moreover, the extend to which neocon influence has existed in the Bush Administration has been vastly exaggerated... neocons opposed many of Rumsfeld's policies, just as they opposed Cheney's dismantling of the armed forces when he was Sec. of Defense.

And, BTW... we had a coalition... a bigger one than the one that went into Iraq in 1991... sadly, it has since vanished, another product of Bush and his neglect of the State Dept with his appointment of Condi Rice... also not a neocon.

Oh... and of course, the Jews never have their home countries interests in mind, right?  After all that Germany... I mean... America has done for them, they have stabbed us in the back in favor of there Jewery.

I've never understood why people pointed to Giuliani as someone with foreign policy experience. Certainly no more than a first-term Senator. He was mayor of New York City during the largest attack on that city, on any American city, in American history. Why does that suddenly make him a terrorism-fighter?  And then he walked around for a few hours before telling the firefighters to stop searching for their dead comrades. Woop-dee-doo.

Umm... question. The explosion at 0:15 - isn't that the place where that statue of Saddam once stood? I'm not really criticizing him for it, it's a minor detail... I just find it a little ironic that "Democracy under attack" as the voiceover said is the place where Saddam's statue stood for decades.

yes there are very bad men out there who like to kill americans. But what qualifies Rudy as the one who can do anything about it.

Also realistically is terrorism the biggest issue for the next president? What about the economy, health care, immigration, trade, etc.

Well I loled.

There's nothing wrong with highlighting your strength in an election campaign... except when all it does is expose that you've got NOTHING else to offer.

He's a one-trick pony, and even that trick is growing dull.

2004

OMG, rapture is indeed coming in 2008!!!

Pah, it came in the 1940s; didn't you play BioShock?

Nope, I didn't. :)

More from Soulty ---

And, BTW... we had a coalition... a bigger one than the one that went into Iraq in 1991... sadly, it has since vanished, another product of Bush and his neglect of the State Dept with his appointment of Condi Rice... also not a neocon.

The coalition was nothing like what invaded Iraq in 1991. For one thing, the 1991 coalition included other Arabs.  Other Muslims.  Combat troops, even.  Syrian tanks and Saudi planes. French, Saudi, and Egyptian combat troops were seriously engaged. The Decider's coalition -- at its strongest -- consisted of a powerful British force and a token Australian contingent.  The rest?  A few bomb-clearing units from Denmark and Bulgaria...some Italians guarding our planes...some Spaniards doing construction.  And most of them, as you honestly point out, are gone.  But hey -- The Decider still claims there are what?  37 nations in the coalition?  The Marshal Islands, Albania, Togo?  We can all rest easy...

I do hope you know, Soulty, that though this exchange is vigorous and sharply contentious, I really do like you and appreciate your input.  I hope you know it's not personal and if I have been nasty, accept my apologies.  Any Pennsylvanians is A-OK with me!

Answer video:
http://youtube.com/watch?v=Pa56rwR_Qos

HAHAH! what a wonderful video! Very original!

What a joke old Mr. Fascist was.