Republican pollster Tony Fabrizio, who advised Bob Dole's 1996 presidential campaign and is considered one of the GOP's best pollsters, captures the essence of the problem facing former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani as he tries to win the 2008 Republican presidential nomination:
"As a presidential candidate, Rudy Giuliani should absolutely be taken seriously," Fabrizio says. "As a contender for the Republican nomination, he should be taken significantly less seriously. He has the stature to be president, but how does he get the Republican nomination? That is the fundamental disconnect."
That's the subject of USA Today's Thursday cover story - can Giuliani's political advantages - a hero of 9/11, a crime-busting federal prosecutor, a two-term Republican mayor in an overwhelmingly Democratic city and one of the most admired politicians in the country - offset the disadvantage created by his liberal views on social issues that are at odds with the GOP's social-conservatives?
Giuliani currently is leading in the polls, and his two nearest rivals - Arizona Sen. John McCain and former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney - also have troubled relationships with GOP conservatives, which may work to Giuliani's advantage. Social-conservative Republicans may not like Giuliani on those issues, but they don't exactly have an obvious strong candidate to turn to.
USA Today sketches out a basic "game plan" for Giuliani in the early primaries:
Finish in the top tier of candidates in Iowa, then win or at least finish second in New Hampshire, a Northeast state with a libertarian streak. (That would mean besting McCain, who won the primary over George W. Bush in 2000, and/or Romney, the former governor of neighboring Massachusetts.) Then Giuliani would need to survive in South Carolina, a Deep South state with a solidly conservative electorate.
If all that happens, he could be well positioned for the unprecedented crush of primaries on Feb. 5 that may include California, Florida, Illinois and New Jersey.
"We feel very good about the consolidation of primaries on an early date," says Michael DuHaime, a former political director of the Republican National Committee who is poised to run Giuliani's campaign. Contests in those big states would favor candidates with high name identification and deep pockets - that is, candidates like him.
Can Giuliani thread that needle? With a year to go before the Iowa caucus and the New Hampshire primary, it is simply too early to predict who will win or to write any candidate off.
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