Tag: Rudolph Giuliani
Giuliani Proves That Patriotism Truly Is the Last Refuge of Draft-Dodging, Adulterous Scoundrels
Samuel Johnson said it 240 years ago: “Patriotism is the last refuge of the scoundrel.” Rudolph Giuliani proved it last week at a fundraiser in New York for Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker when he exhumed commie-baiter Sen. Joe McCarthy by asserting that while he and Republican fatcats like himself were America-loving patriots, Pres. Obama and his family were not.
“I do not believe, and I know this is a horrible thing to say,” Giuliani said, “but I do not believe that the president loves America. He doesn’t love you. And he doesn’t love me. He wasn’t brought up the way you were brought up and I was brought up through love of this country.”
In the media frenzy that ensued, Giuliani — who spent $50 million campaigning for the Republican presidential nomination in 2008 only to win just one (1) delegate to the Republican convention — embarked on a victory lap of right-wing media outlets during which he doubled down on his petty spitefulness.
That seemed to come to a halt yesterday when he issued a banal non-apology, which included this delicious tautology: “My bluntness overshadowed my message.” Bluntness was his message. After all, when you’re accusing the president of being anti-American, why be polite?
Rudy’s Adultery Problem Raises Its Ugly Head
During his term as mayor of New York, which coincided with his 16-year marriage to Donna Hanover, a local television personality, Rudolph Giuliani reportedly had at least two extramarital affairs. The first of these, as alleged by Hanover and a Vanity Fair article from the time, was with his press spokeswoman, Cristyne Lategano. Their affair apparently ended around 1999.
Mayor Giuliani billed obscure city agencies for tens of thousands of dollars in security expenses amassed during his affair with Judith Nathan.
Soon afterwards, the mayor began seeing Judith Nathan, a pharmaceutical sales executive. In May 2000, Giuliani famously called a news conference to announce he was seeking a divorce from Donna Hanover — who learned about his plan to divorce her while watching his announcement on television.
The divorce proceedings were messy and played out like a reality show version of “Dynasty” or “Dallas” in the local news. Hanover and the Giuliani children remained at the mayor’s official residence while the mayor decamped to the apartment of a gay couple. His affair with Nathan was an open secret — she was barred by court order from visiting the mayor’s residence — but unacknowledged publicly.
Yesterday, news reports suggested that during this period, Giuliani may have cooked the books to hide expenses related to his visits to Nathan at her home in Southampton, in the Long Island suburbs:
As New York mayor, Rudy Giuliani billed obscure city agencies for tens of thousands of dollars in security expenses amassed during the time when he was beginning an extramarital relationship with future wife Judith Nathan in the Hamptons, according to previously undisclosed government records.
The documents … show that the mayoral costs had nothing to do with the functions of the little-known city offices that defrayed his tabs, including agencies responsible for regulating loft apartments, aiding the disabled and providing lawyers for indigent defendants.
At the time, the mayor’s office refused to explain the accounting to city auditors, citing “security.”
The Hamptons visits resulted in hotel, gas and other costs for Giuliani’s New York Police Department security detail.
The alleged billing shell game went on for three summers, from 1999 through the first weekend in September 2001, just days before the attack by al Qaeda that brought down the World Trade Center towers.
Giuliani and Nathan were married in 2003.
