MINNEAPOLIS—In what may be a preview of his keynote speech tonight to the Republican National Convention, Rudy Giuliani spoke to the New York Republican delegation at a downtown Marriott this afternoon and attacked Barack Obama on matters of national security and experience.
“At the top of the ticket they have someone who is the least experienced candidate for president in 100 years,” said Giuliani.
Speaking about the war in Iraq and the surge, he said, “I can’t figure out for the life of me how the Democrats think it’s a mistake.” He suggested that the Democrats supported dictatorships.
“Do they want Saddam Hussein back?” he asked.
He also reminded the audience that the majority of Democrats supported the war.
“Everyone of them voted for it except Barack Obama,” Giuliani said. “And Barack Obama wasn’t there to vote.”
On the surge, he said that “John McCain was right and Barack Obama was wrong,” and, slipping back into his own campaign rhetoric, he said, “We want someone who can keep us on offense against Islamic fascism.”
He then attacked Obama over those “present” votes in the Illinois legislature.
“He has an interesting record of voting present over a hundred and thirty times,” Giuliani said. “I don’t remember having that vote as mayor of New York City. Present?”
And he criticized a key element of Obama’s biography.
“He was a community organizer — what do they do?” he said, echoing remarks made by former Governor George Pataki earlier today. “He was in the Illinois legislature, from the Chicago machine.”
At the end of his remarks, Giuliani mounted the now-textbook defense of Governor Sarah Palin, criticizing the media scrutiny she has undergone in the last several days. “I’ve never quite seen an attack like that, even by New York City standards.” he said. “It’s in the gutter. And it’s below the standards of journalism. The standards of journalism.”
He challenged the Obama campaign’s contention that the town Palin was mayor of was too small to qualify for executive experience. “Sorry senator- if the city is not big enough for you, they are probably that group of people who cling to religion and guns,” he said, adding, “You don’t study about them in Harvard.”
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