Rudy Giuliani a New Yorker for Everyone
A little background-I lived in NYC. I lived in NYC while Mayor Giuliani was Mayor. I lived in NJ during the terror attack with my husband working at the World Financial Center 1/2 mile away from the Twin Towers. So, one would think, okay maybe Colleen is a bit biased toward Rudy at this point. But, I am also a farm girl at heart. I grew up in a town of farms-that have now almost all but disappeared-so, I have a sensitive spot for some of the democrats who will rally to help preserve the farmers and open space, etc.
So, to get to today...I have been reading everything I can about the candidates on all sides. I have to put my Master's Degree in Political Science to use somehow these days, and I have been very impressed with what the Mayor has done in the past and how he says he can acheive his past successes on a national level for education and crime control, and boosting the economy. As a mother of two school aged children I am particularly interested in changing up the school system. The mayor spoke about effecting change by offering parents more choices in school through voucher systems (he also created 17 charter schools in NYC-but this wasn't spoken about today-along with grants that were offered to the newly created schools).
He spoke about the US universities being the top schools because the students chose to go there and put their dollars to that particular college or university. Public schools would have to become better if there were more affordable choices and parents started taking the children out of the bad schools and putting them in the good schools. In theory that sounds great-but in this country private and parochial schools are quite expenisve and public schools are often the only choice-the vouchers would be great idea-but he did not clearly explain (at least I didn't catch it) where the money would be coming from to create such a program.
Overall, I really enjoyed Rudy Giuliani. He was engaging. He did not hem and haw while thinking about his answers. He answered the question asked-he did not conform the question to make it easier for him. He was clear and did not stray-though he mistakenly called a young boy a girl (the boy did have long hair though). All in all I have to say he is definitely a contender!
----------------Some other details that stuck with me ------------------------
The Mayor also spoke about immigration and how he would stop the influx of illegals and what he would do about the violent illegals. He would put up two fences-a physical fence and a technological fence. The technological fence would alert the border guards to the fact that people were approching the fence and where they were to stop them from coming across to the US. The violent ones (once caught) would be made to serve time in a US prison then sent back to their home country never to be allowed back in again (though they made it in once-he didn't say how they wouldn't get back in again).
Giuliani was asked a question regarding global warming and finding alternative forms of energy-he is very keen on solar, wind and nuclear. Nuclear seems to be his top choice due to safety reasons in comparison to oil, coal, etc. Wind and solar are dependent on things we can't seem to control all the time.
On terror, something he has seen first hand, he would make sure that all communities are prepared to protect the citizens of their town/city/village as best they can. To keep everyone in communication to make sure that in a crisis everyone reacts to the emergency rather than taking flight and not having any idea what to do.
A kid asked him a question Giuliani had never faced before. What would he do if aliens, the UFO type, attacked. He said, in that case, the same terrorist plan would take take effect!