As to whether a News Corp. official asked Judith Regan to mislead federal investigators about her relationship with Bernie Kerik, as she claims, Rudy has a surprisingly elusive response:
Rudy Giuliani dismissed questions Wednesday about allegations made by his ex-police commissioner Bernard Kerik’s former lover – that she was asked to lie about the affair to avoid hurting Giuliani’s presidential ambitions.
The candidate laughed when reporters asked for his response to one-time publishing powerhouse Judith Regan’s $100 million lawsuit claiming that her former employers directed her to lie to federal investigators about Kerik because of the implications for Giuliani.
“I don’t respond to the story at all. I don’t know anything about it. And, it sounds to me like a kind of gossip column story more than a real story,” Giuliani said at the end of a 20-minute campaign stop, his only one of the day in this early voting state.
Asked if he was aware of Kerik and Regan’s relationship, the former New York mayor said: “I think that’s a gossip column story, and the last thing in the world you want to do when you’re running for president is respond to gossip column type stories.”
Is McCain doubling down with the paranoid wingnuts? McCain’s campaign manager just sent out an email claiming that CNN ran the McCain/Hillary “bitch” vid because CNN execs know he’s the only Republican who can beat Hillary. Feast your eyes …
Friends,
The CNN Network, affectionately known as the Clinton News Network, has stooped to an all-time low and is gratuitously attacking John McCain for not defending Hillary Clinton enough when a South Carolina voter used the ‘B’ word to describe her when John McCain stopped into a luncheon yesterday at the Trinity restaurant in Hilton Head, SC.
A voter used a word that I would not have used to describe Senator Hillary Clinton and asked the Senator how he was going to beat her. Senator McCain first responded by saying that he respected Senator Clinton, as he has said repeatedly throughout the campaign. Then, focusing on the question, he pointed to the new Rasmussen national poll showing that he is the only Republican candidate who can beat her in a general election. No other Republican candidate beat Clinton in the poll.
As an independent news agency, CNN owes John McCain an apology because of the outrageous behavior of their network host Rich Sanchez. Liberal bloggers and their friends at CNN went on the attack yesterday and continued their attacks through the night. They said the McCain campaign was over because of the statement of one, lone voter in South Carolina. Well friends, we are on a comeback, we are the only campaign that can defeat Hillary Clinton and CNN knows it. We are not going to let Senator Clinton’s friends in the liberal blogosphere and on CNN try to destroy our campaign. Senator McCain is a fighter and he is not going to back down to CNN.
Please click here to watch how John McCain responded to the question.
Please click here to watch CNN’s Rich Sanchez’s biased and factually incorrect “reporting” try to end the McCain candidacy.
Why are they doing this?
Because John McCain is the only Republican who beats Hillary Clinton in recent national polling data and who will beat her in the general election. The Rasmussen poll shows that he leads Senator Hillary Clinton by two or three points while Rudy Giuliani loses to Hillary Clinton by six points. State-by-state polling shows that he can win important swing states in the general election whereas Rudy Giuliani loses those swing states. John McCain is now in a strong second place in most, if not all, recent national polling. These polls emphasize what CNN and their liberal friends are afraid of: John McCain is the best general election candidate.
John McCain is improving in primary polls. A poll released yesterday by CBS News shows that he is now in second place in New Hampshire. He won New Hampshire in 2000 and he will win New Hampshire in 2008. The McCain comeback is here and it is real.
John McCain displayed leadership on Iraq when others were silent. He was the only candidate who criticized the Rumsfeld strategy and argued for a new strategy in Iraq – a strategy that is now succeeding. The liberal media knows that if John McCain is nominated they can no longer try to use the War in Iraq for political gain.
The liberal media has figured out that John McCain is the only thing that stands between a Hillary Clinton presidency, and they are therefore trying to stop the McCain comeback. Simply put, CNN is scared that John McCain will beat Hillary Clinton. They are right to be scared. We are not going to back down.
We need your help. We need you to stand with John McCain, a man of honor, integrity and love of country, against the liberal media and liberal blogosphere that are trying to bring him down. We need you to stand with John McCain against Rick Sanchez and his friends at CNN and their biased reporting. We need you to stand with John McCain against Hillary Clinton’s allies who will do anything to prevent him from winning the Republican nomination.
Can we count on you to stand up and support John McCain against these attacks?
Will you stand up and help strengthen the resurgence of our campaign as the best candidate to defeat Hillary Clinton?
As we’ve been reporting on the Kerik-Giuliani relationship, a number of TPM Readers have referred to this NYPD blog NYPDConfidential.com. The November 12th entry, still the most recent as of this moment, gives some background on Rudy’s soft spot for Bernie and other crushes which trumped all else.
At today’s White House press briefing, we learn that the troops are coming home (and they’re winning!) . . . that terrorism is born of poverty and despair . . . and that Dana Perino is no longer commenting on the Blackwater shooting:
The indictment in the Kerik case suggests the White House knew about the mafia problems well before they trotted out the “nanny” cover story.
Not looking good for State Department Inspector General “Cookie” Krongard. Today he told the House Oversight Committee that his brother wasn’t on the Blackwater advisory board. Then when he was later confronted with news to the contrary, he said he’d only just found out and would henceforth recuse himself from all Blackwater inquiries.
But Spencer Ackerman just interviewed Krongard’s brother, “Buzzy” Krongard, who told Spencer that he definitely did tell his brother all about it. Only a few weeks ago apparently.
Perjury charges have been made of much less.
Hillary comes out against driver’s licenses for illegal immigrants after NY Gov. Eliot Spitzer drops his plan to do just that, providing instant fodder for her opponents.
From The Hill …
Staring down the threat of a White House veto and some internal opposition, House Democrats Wednesday night passed legislation linking $50 billion in funding for the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan to a withdrawal date.
The spending bill, which requires Bush to begin bringing troops home from Iraq within 30 days and to complete that withdrawal by Dec. 15, 2008, passed 218-203. Rep. John Lewis (D-Ga.), who had said he was undecided earlier in the day, voted present.
Republican Reps. Phil English (Pa.), Walter Jones (N.C.), Christopher Shays (Conn.) and James Walsh (N.Y.) supported the bill. English and Walsh had never sided with Democrats on war-related funding measures.
Fifteen Democrats voted against the bill, including conservative Democratic Reps. John Tanner (Tenn.), Brian Baird (Wash.), Dan Boren (Okla.), Jim Cooper (Tenn.), Gene Taylor (Miss.), John Barrow (Ga.), Jim Marshall (Ga.), Jim Matheson (Utah), Nick Lampson (Texas) and Vic Snyder (Ark.) voted against the bill.