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In Reality, A Hair-Raising Candidate

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By DANIEL RUTH, The Tampa Tribune

Published: January 31, 2008

As revelations go, this probably qualifies as a poor man's epiphany-lite meets "I coulda had a V-8!" moment.

A few weeks ago the editorial board here at the Ministry of Truth allowed me to sit in as an observer as it interviewed Rudy Giuliani during his presidential campaign.

I had been in Giuliani's presence on other occasions and had always been struck by the aura of brilliance admirers cloaked around the shoulders of the former mayor. Whatever.

But sitting there to Giuliani's left that afternoon, I was struck by two inescapable truths.

You may have noticed Giuliani has the irritating habit of often beginning sentences with "in reality."

And it was clear that although Rudy Giuliani might have been an able mayor of New York City, in reality when it came to political acumen, he wasn't that bright.

Or put another way, as a political strategist, Rudy Giuliani makes that nut Lyndon LaRouche look like the Sun Tzu of the hustings.

Simply There

Then again - in reality - Giuliani was always the smoke and mirrors candidate of 2008.

Giuliani's entire raison d'etre for the presidency was that he was mayor of New York City on one of the worst days of this nation's history. Did he prevent the attacks? No. Did he capture the guys who plotted it? No. Did he rebuild the World Trade Center? No.

In reality he was simply "Being There," the Chance the Gardener of catastrophes.

Now in all fairness, Giuliani did play an important role as a symbol of resilience, a symbol of grief, a symbol of hope. They were symbols that eventually allowed Hizzoner to parlay his role as the mourner-in-chief into a lucrative public speaking career.

But president of the United States? In reality - no thanks.

It is not enough to merely scare people into thinking there's a terrorist behind every Democrat, waiting to pounce.

The Next Frankie

As well, Giuliani's insane strategy to dedicate virtually all of his time and money to Florida as a launching pad to the White House was more obviously misguided and delusional than 99.9 percent of the contestants on "American Idol" thinking they are the next Frank Sinatra.

In reality any candidate this arrogant, this dumb, doesn't deserve to be president.

Sitting there listening to Giuliani, one reaches the conclusion that all these folks running for president are simply average people - no more thoughtful, or wiser, or creative, or imbued any special knowledge to solve the society's woes than any other reasonably informed American.

Oh yeah, the second revelation. There was the hair thing.

Just as it is impossible not to stare at a truly bad, horribly bad, clearly obvious toupee, so too, there is probably nothing more awkward than a comb-over gone terribly awry.

Some years ago, Giuliani decided to get rid of his painfully conspicuous comb-over. However, the end result was a haircut with what appears to be two wings on each side of his head which come to a point.

As Rudy Giuliani spoke to the editorial board, I was transfixed by his hair. Where had I seen that before?

Ah, yes, the munchkins in "The Wizard of Oz."

In reality - too weird.

Keyword: Book of Ruth, to read and comment on Daniel Ruth's blog.

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