Rudy Can Fail

Lots of observers, myself included, expected Rudy Giuliani to have considerable difficulty winning the GOP nomination. But it has to be counted as remarkable just how far he’s fallen over the last month, first in early-state polling and voting, and now in national polls. Yes, he’s a social liberal with no political experience outside New York and a host of skeletons in his closet, and yes, it was only a matter of time before all of that caught up with him to some extent. But like most people, I expected that his personal celebrity and (well-earned) reputation as a tough-guy problem solver, when joined to a divided field rife with ideological imperfections, the enthusiastic support of the Manhattan-based slice of the right-wing intelligentsia, and the deep pockets of the remaining Rockefeller Republicans in the party, would more or less guarantee him at least a quarter of the primary vote. Now, though, he can't even manage that level of support in his supposed firewall of Florida.

As unsettled as the GOP race remains, it's way too soon for post-mortems. But it's interesting to contrast the campaign Rudy has run with the one that Reihan and I suggested that he run when he first jumped into the race. Our vision would have taken him in a more populist direction, into territory that Mike Huckabee has owned in this campaign; it would have drawn on the persona Giuliani cultivated, while New York's mayor, as the friend to the city's forgotten middle class. And Rudy wouldn't have had to listen to us: He's got David Frum, who advances a variety of practical ideas for a middle-class-friendly GOP in his new book, as an adviser to his campaign! Yet as Frum himself allows, Giuliani has adopted exactly none of his ideas; instead, on domestic policy he's campaigned as the supply-siders' supply sider. Maybe this was the right choice: Maybe his only chance at the nomination was to lock down the Club-for-Growth vote and build from there. But at the moment, it looks like Rudy should have at least considered a Plan B.