|
| October 22, 2007 8:10 AM
The GOP’s Wide-Open Race
At the Values Voters conference and Orlando debate, candidates make their moves.
By Byron York
We’ve just come through the most revealing three-day period in the Republican presidential race so far. Before Friday and Saturday, when all the candidates appeared at the Values Voters Summit in Washington, and Sunday, when they gathered for the Fox News debate in Orlando, we wondered whether Rudy Giuliani could survive an appearance before socially conservative voters; whether Fred Thompson could show the energy that primary voters demand in a candidate; whether John McCain could regain his place in the contest’s first tier; and whether Mike Huckabee could fully ascend to that top grouping. Now, we know the answers are “yes” on all counts. Those answers, along with the continued strength of Mitt Romney — despite doubts about his record among the voters to whom it means the most — mean that there are now five real contenders for the Republican nomination. It is the most wide-open race in a very long time.
First, Giuliani. When he arrived at the Washington Hilton Hotel for the Values Voters Summit Saturday morning, he had no hope of actually winning over the crowd. There wasn’t going to be a moment when the members of the Family Research Council said, “Wow! — We were wrong about this guy and we’re now going to vote for him.” But Giuliani could show them who he was, demonstrate his respect for them by showing up and taking their concerns seriously, and emphasize the significant parts of his record — freeing New York City from the crime, drug dealing, and pornography that threatened to overtake it in the years before he became mayor — that they would find meaningful.
On that count, Giuliani succeeded, and his efforts might bear fruit later in the campaign. “He didn’t win any converts,” one FRC insider told me after Giuliani’s speech. “Not in the primaries. But he might have won some of them over for a general election.” Another insider conceded that Giuliani had probably helped himself a bit, to the dismay of some FRC staffers who felt that he should not have been invited to the gathering. “We worried about that,” the insider said. “We knew there was an upside for him.”
Giuliani did it by acknowledging the values voters’ problems with him — and by not misrepresenting himself to please them. “I’m not going to pretend to you that I can be all things to all people,” he said. “I’m just not like that. I can’t do that…Isn’t it better that I tell you what I really believe, instead of pretending to change all of my positions to fit the prevailing winds? I believe trust is more important than 100 percent agreement.”
Giuliani stressed his positions with which the audience agreed — support for welfare reform, lower taxes, law-and-order, the protection of religion from government interference, school choice, home schooling, the war on terror, and support for Israel. He listed specific things he would do to try to reduce the number of abortions and increase the number of adoptions. None of that changed his record on abortion — by far, the key issue separating him and the FRC voters — but it didn’t hurt him, either.
In the end, he came out marginally better than he went in. In the straw poll of FRC voters attending the convention — as opposed to the larger poll that included Internet votes — Giuliani placed fifth, behind Mike Huckabee, who blew the field away, Romney, Thompson, and Tom Tancredo. It wasn’t bad, given the expectations beforehand.
Next, Thompson. In his Values Voters appearance, he didn’t dispel any of the doubts about his candidacy; his speech was listlessly delivered and gave people in the room little reason for enthusiasm. But in Orlando Sunday night, Thompson woke up and became a real candidate.
CONTINUED 1 2 Next > |
| | 
|
|
► Subscribe to National Review magazine
here
or NR / Digital here. |
