"Years before he would become the swaggering, crime-busting U.S. attorney in Manhattan, before he would serve two terms as mayor and help lead New York through its darkest day," Rudy Giuliani demonstrated a self-confidence and daring in his job as No. 3 in the Reagan Justice Department, writes the Los Angeles Times' Richard Serrano.
Giuliani craved publicity, sometimes chewing out people who didn't help him get it, but showed a softer side when comforting four families of murdered FBI agents. Personality aside, Giuliani took on combating illegal drugs and dealing with Haitian refugees in typical fashion: head-on. Giuliani ignored concerns from police chiefs and DEA agents about making the agency part of the FBI, believing the partnership would be better at battling illegal drugs and violent crime that go hand-in-hand. Giuliani succeeded in merging the two, but the groups parted ways a few years later after failing to stop the explosion of crack and criminal gangs in the mid-1980s.
On Haiti, Giulaini took the extraordinary step of meeting with the island's dictator to extract a promise that refugees returned to the island wouldn't be prosecuted. Then Giuliani wrote a letter to the State Department arguing for more economic aid to the country as a way of alleviating the poverty that was creating refugees.
Giuliani was also investigated for meeting with a company under criminal investigation but cleared after it was determined he didn't "violate any law, order or standard of conduct." While not illegal, Giuliani used official department letterhead to "pitch job recommendations for friends, including 92 letters for the husband of one of his aides."
Back to the future: the New York Times' Michael Luo has an interesting take on Giuliani's candidacy: attacks from Republicans on his mayoral record on immigration and gun-control show that Giuliani's moderate-to-liberal positions on social issues haven't done that much damage. "I don't think any of the candidates had really taken shots at Giuliani because maybe they thought his stance on social issues in particular would do the work for them," said Chuck Laudner, executive director of the Iowa Republican Party. "It's apparent, not in Iowa but nationally, that that's not the case. They have to start hammering some of that stuff home." Giuliani adviser Anthony Carbonetti said, "Eight and a half months in, we're still standing."
Today it's Mitt Romney who faces his own problem with a key GOP social issue. The Washington Post's Michael Shear reports that Romney "said this week that as president he would allow individual states to keep abortion legal, two weeks after telling a national television audience that he supports a constitutional amendment to ban the procedure nationwide." Romney said two weeks ago he supports a Constitutional amendment to extend Fourteenth Amendment due process rights to the unborn, part of the GOP's platform. Yesterday in Nevada, Romney said he was only for the overturn of Roe v. Wade and states making their own decisions on abortion.
Meanwhile, Mike Huckabee picked up the endorsements of two key conservatives in New Hampshire, writes the Boston Globe's James Pindell. Former state Senator Russell Prescott, a "hero to many social conservatives" and former Executive Councilor David Wheeler who's "still a leader among advocates for the Second Amendment." Huckabee was in South Carolina yesterday.
On the Democratic side, Hillary Clinton took a harder line on Cuba than Barack Obama. Her campaign said it doesn't back "any wholesale, broad changes'' to travel restrictions until Fidel Castro dies. On the same day, Cuba's foreign minister welcomed Obama's call for fewer restrictions on remittances and travel to Cuba.
However, Clinton and Obama are almost indistinguishable on Iraq and tax policies, writes Bloomberg's Kristin Jensen and Julianna Goldman. Minus the fact that Obama hasn't called for the Iraqi Parliament to replace Prime Minister Malaki, as Clinton did yesterday.
Get these and today's other election stories at RCP's Politics and Elections page.
