Having husbanded his cash as deep into the season as possible, Rudy Giuliani is hitting the airwaves in New Hampshire today with the first television ad of his campaign. Called “Tested”, there are two rather remarkable things about the 60-second spot. First (and you might want to sit down for this), there are no images of 9/11 in the ad, only the most oblique reference by Giuliani to having been “tested” by crises. But he says this in the context of having become mayor when New York was in a sorry economic state; there’s no mention of terrorism. Second, and this is more subtle in its presence than 9/11 is in its near total absence, there is a line in the script in which Giuliani obliquely acknowledges that he hasn’t lived an Ozzie & Harriet personal life:
So, I believe I’ve been tested in a way in which the American people can look to me. They’re not going to find perfection, but they’re going to find somebody who has dealt with crisis almost on a regular basis and has had results. And in many cases exceptional results. Results people thought weren’t possible.
The “not going to find perfection” line is an attempt, I assume, to pre-empt stories about his personal life — specifically his three marriages — by obliquely acknowledging that he hasn’t always been a saint as a husband. It’s a pretty vague attempt. We’ll see if it works. Here’s the ad:
