Shot In The Dark: Frikkin' Giuliani!

May 20, 2005

Frikkin' Giuliani!

Connect this dot.

I attended last night's annual dinner at the Center of the American Experiment, as a guest of the always-gracious John Hinderaker. The guest of honor and keynote speaker was former New York mayor Rudy Giuliani. I sat at a table with the Hinderakers, Captain Ed and King Banaian.

Giuliani was up to his reputation as a great speaker. He spoke for about 40 minutes on the subject of leadership - or more importantly, the idea that leadership isn't about popularity, it's about vision. He peppered the speech with examples from his own administration in New York - how he followed a vision to simultaneously reduce taxes and crime and the welfare rolls, while attacking the stultifying bureaucracy and parochialism of the New York establishment. Amid invocations of Reagan, Giuliani's message; leadership is about having a vision, whether a popular one or not, and sticking to it no matter how the lilliputians hack at your ankles.

And I sat, and listened - and hoped that the word got to the Minnesota GOP. I think Governor Pawlenty gets it; the local media is as irate about his "No Taxes" pledge as the NYTimes was about "Broken Windows" and "ComStat" and Reykjavik and the Pershing missiles, but he's stood his ground.

Right message. Right place. Right time.

Posted by Mitch at May 20, 2005 08:14 AM | TrackBack

Comments

The always gracious John Hinderaker? You mean the Hinderaker who said this?

"You dumb shit, he didn't get access using a fake name, he used his real name. You lefties' concern for White House security is really touching, but you know what, you stupid asshole, I think the Secret Service has it covered. Go crawl back into your hole, you stupid left-wing shithead. And don't bother us anymore. You have to have an IQ over 50 to correspond with us. You don't qualify, you stupid shit."

Posted by: Eva Young at May 21, 2005 02:24 PM

Jeeez, Eva, get over it. John has apologized for that. It was, furthermore, an outburst caused by the behavior of many morons who harassed John's family, his co-workers, his office, and him personally.

You know - like when someone's private contact information gets scattered indiscriminately to a bunch of whackjobs. You know all about that, Eva.

Let it go, obsessives. It's a non-starter.

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