Rudy's Achilles Heel

Everyone remembers the lightning striking the building when Rudy was explaining his... nuanced opinion about abortion, right?


Well, Ann Althouse calls this Kerry syndrome.

There's far more support out there for the merger of politics and religion than the separation of politics and religion. And yet, Giuliani is popular. So was Kerry (up to a point). What's different about Giuliani is that the disjunct between his religion and his politics is also a disjunct between his politics and his political party.

Can a barely religious Northerner get elected President? Conventional wisdom would say no. You have to be either genuinely religious if you're a Republican or you have to pander to the religious freaks if you're a Democrat if you want to get elected. Also, everyone knows only Southerners vote and they only vote for fellow Southerners.

But is it true?

My gut says no. My gut says that people will see Giuliani's convictions and abilities and qualifications, and look at Hilary's lack of convictions (alas) and Obama's lack of experience and substance, and will go Rudy.

Most people, after all, hold competing and contradictory opinions. I, for example, believe that homosexuality is a grave sin and I think the state has no business in the bedroom. I believe that we should give tax cuts to the rich- they create wealth, which creates business, which creates jobs, which creates wealth- and I also believe rich people are jerks who should be shot. I believe that most social services are a waste of taxpayer money and I also believe that many social services are vital. I support the death penalty and oppose abortion. I am glad that Saddam is dead and Chemical Ali has a date with the hangman, and
I am saddened immensely that any human being, anywhere, has to lose his life.
Do I contradict myself? Very well, then, I contradict myself. I am large, I contain multitudes.

As for conventional wisdom-

The enemy of the conventional wisdom is not ideas but the march of events. John Kenneth Galbraith