"America's Mayor" Rudy Giuliani So Desperate for Bush Win and the Spotlight, He Blames U.S Troops

This from CBS News and the American Prospect:

Wednesday on the campaign trail, responding for the first time to the Al-Qaqaa story, President Bush said that John Kerry, in using the story as he has, was "denigrating the actions of our troops and commanders in the field." It's an old tactic: Charge the liberal with not supporting the troops.

So who went on the Today show Thursday to blame the troops? Not Ted Kennedy. Rudy Giuliani, speaking thus: "No matter how you try to blame it on the president, the actual responsibility for it really would be for the troops that were there. Did they search carefully enough? Didn't they search carefully enough?"

It's entirely possible that Giuliani was intentionally undercutting Bush. Do not underestimate his potential to do so. The truest and smartest zinger of the Giuliani years in New York was delivered by Al Sharpton in 1997. At the time, Giuliani's aides were floating to reporters the idea that the mayor would make great vice-presidential material. A reporter asked Sharpton about this, and his imperishable reply was that anyone who took on Giuliani as vice president had "better hire a food-taster." It's entirely possible that, to stop the Bush juggernaut that might logically lead to a Jeb nomination in 2008 if George W. wins this time, Giuliani went intentionally off message.

Or it's possible -- probable, actually -- that Giuliani was on message, dispatched by the campaign to plant a thought seed in the public mind that it would be imprudent for Bush and Dick Cheney to suggest themselves.

But whatever Giuliani's motivation, the juxtaposition of the two quotes tells us a lot about just how dramatically the Times story has rattled the campaign and about what depths the Republicans will descend to warp the debate and smear their opponent. Over here you have Bush, accusing Kerry of blaming the troops, which is an obvious lie because Kerry never did any such thing. And over there you have one of the campaign's chief surrogates doing what? Blaming the troops! And because I mentioned Kennedy: Just imagine the howling on the right if he had made that remark!