Master of Disaster

Giuliani may well be his own worst enemy. His strength in crisis can blur into stubbornness; his resolute conviction sometimes leads to churlishness and a tendency to divide the world into good and evil, with little apparently in between. Voters will have to decide whether his virtues are worth his vices in the White House.

But make no mistake: he is a man of formidable virtues, and mastering the brutal politics of New York is good training for a fast-paced nomination fight and what will likely be a close-run general election.

Will conventional considerations—that is, the ordinary expectations voters have of presidential candidates—apply to Giuliani, or does 9/11 loom so large in the national consciousness even now that Americans will give the mayor a pass on the temperament question in favor of a man who is both strong and competent? (It is hard to imagine a President Giuliani botching the response to Katrina in the way President Bush did.)

The numbers may be strong now, but as British Prime Minister Harold Wilson used to say, a week is an eternity in politics, much less a year. At the event last month in South Carolina, Giuliani looked unsteady as he fielded questions on jobs, immigration and free trade. He still seems un-comfortable when coaxed off his national-security script. But no one knows better than Giuliani that every day is not 9/11, and while the crises of a campaign may seem inane, they are far from inconsequential. In the coming months, there will be a million small disasters—ways to falter or chances to become a man of destiny once more.

With Susannah Meadows, Mark Hosenball, Michael Isikoff, Eve Conant, Sarah Childress, Andrew Romano and Jonathan Mummolo

© 2007