Former mayor of New York and current front runner in the 2008 Republican presidential primary, Rudy Giuliani made a smart move by publishing an ad in today's New York Times. The ad criticizes Hillary Clinton's questions from this week's Congressional hearing with General Petreaus, claiming that Clinton intended to attack the character of the four star general. The ad also links Hillary to the moveon.org ad accusing General Petreaus of being "General BetrayUs."
This is a smart move by the Giuliani campaign for several reasons. By going head to head with the Democratic front runner, Giuliani has removed newcomer Fred Thompson's name from the headlines, replacing it with "Giuliani versus Hillary." Thompson has been the talk of nearly every major news outlet this week as he quickly caught Giuliani in national polls this week. The Giuliani campaign should do everything they can to bring back the media focus to their own candidate. Secondly, it reinstates Giuliani's support for the war in Iraq. While the majority of Americans on the whole are against the war, most Republican primary voters are still for it.
However, the liberal group moveon.org is making up for their earlier ad blunder by doing the DNC's job for them. In a new television ad campaign, moveon.org plans to accuse Bush of a "betrayal of trust." The ad will run all next week. Its unspoken but fairly obvious goal is to link President Bush to General Petreaus by using the word "betray." The Republican candidates are standing behind Petreaus to justify support of the surge and the war in Iraq. If the Democrats (or more likely, moveon.org) can discredit Petreaus' testimony by implying it came directly from President Bush, the Republicans start to to lose their honorable general they have come to know, love, hang on to, and stand behind.
Kevin Hoggatt
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