Guiliani
You know him well. He’s been in the public eye for decades. Now, he’s Donald Trump’s attorney, caught in the middle of Trump’s futile campaign to wrest the presidency from Joe Biden, the acknowledged and certified winner of the recent election. That he is prepared to join Trump in this inane, some would say insane campaign, brands him as loopy as Trump. What does he expect to gain? Attorney fees would be of no interest; notoriety will be the only dividend he can expect. Why would he covet that? Is he, like Trump, so desperate for publicity, no matter how tawdry, that he is prepared to take his hand and accompany him to the political oblivion and the ridicule and loss of respect Trump will surely suffer?
We have often asserted that Trump’s narcissistic personality disorder is now so advanced that he is incurably deranged. Anyone doubting that need only to reflect on his recent insistence that he won the election and examine his bizarre attempts to prove it via a variety of nefarious, illegal and laughable moves, to conclude that he is even more deranged than ever. Although Trump’s supporters blindly cling to him like followers of a weird cult while he continues to insist that he won the election despite all the documented evidence that he did not, why would Guiliani?
Until now, Guiliani has had a distinguished career, successively filling major posts as United States Associate Attorney General, US Attorney for the Southern District of New York and Mayor of New York City where he ran successful campaigns against crime and social disorder. For his mayoral leadership after the September 11 attacks in 2001, he was called ‘America's mayor’. He was named
Time magazine’s ‘Person of the Year’ for 2001, and was given an honorary knighthood in 2002 by Queen Elizabeth.
As mayor of New York, he reformed the police department's administration and policing practices, applying the broken windows theory, which cites social disorder, like disrepair and vandalism, for attracting loitering addicts, panhandlers, prostitutes, and violent criminals. In particular, Giuliani focused on removing panhandlers and sex clubs from Times Square, promoting a ‘family values’ vibe and a return to the area's earlier focus on business, theatre, and the arts. As crime rates fell steeply, well ahead of the national average, Giuliani was widely credited, although critics cite other contributing factors. In 2000, he ran against then First Lady Hillary Clinton for a US Senate seat from New York, but left the race once diagnosed with prostate cancer.
In April 2018, Giuliani joined President Donald Trump's personal legal team. His activities as Trump's attorney have drawn media scrutiny, including allegations of corruption and profiteering. In late 2019, Giuliani was reportedly under federal investigation for violating lobbying laws, and possibly several other charges as a central figure in the Trump-Ukraine scandal which resulted in Trump's impeachment.
After the 2020 election, following Joe Biden being named President-elect, Trump placed Giuliani in charge of lawsuits related to alleged voter irregularities through unsubstantiated conspiracy theories involving a communist conspiracy, rigged voting machines and polling place fraud to claim that the election had been stolen from him. Guiliani still occupies that role.
The question then is why he would risk contaminating his career, which although it has low points, includes several significant achievements, by associating so closely with the deranged Trump who will soon limp into obscurity and disgrace? Is this just old fashioned loyalty, or is it another example of publicity, no matter how disgraceful, being more important than obscurity? Is this another instance of the menace of Trumpism?
For Guiliani, the enduring image that will be recalled by political commentators though is that of rivulets of hair dye streaming down his face in the heat of the political turmoil into which he has so foolishly wandered. What a sad legacy!
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