Here's the meat of his argument:
"Giuliani’s task in the first-stage primaries is one of niche marketing, and his background makes him unusually well suited to this assignment. He is unlike previous pro-choice Republican presidential candidates Pete Wilson and Arlen Specter, who made their “moderation” an essential rationale for their candidacies and were rejected by conservative primary voters because they did so. Giuliani, by contrast, is a celebrity, much better known for his 9/11 security credentials and his record of taming the beast of New York City than for his “moderation.” He actively downplays the role of social issues in his message. While the media and his GOP rivals will undoubtedly make early primary voters acutely aware of Giuliani’s liberal social positions, Rudy will presumably stress his conservative credentials in other areas. In a field of eight other candidates, all of whom are stressing their social conservatism to varying degrees, Giuliani’s social positions give him the largest uncontested block of voters in the electorate. If he’s able to capture the bulk of the socially liberal voters (35 percent in South Carolina), and combine that with a portion of conservatives who are drawn to his security, fiscal, and management records, Giuliani could very plausibly win the 30-40 percent of votes he needs in the three early states to make him one of the two finalists." (emphasis added)
No comments:
Post a Comment