Fate-Respecting Giuliani Uninterested in Formal Announcement
With the chattering classes chatting away about when will former Sen. Fred Thompson make his formal '08 announcement, why hasn't Rudy Giuliani followed tradition and made his own, splashy I'm-in-this-race-to-win declaration?
"We don't want to tempt fate," the ex-NYC mayor told reporters before his 5/30 Beverly Hills fundraiser. "Everyone knows we're running. I guess if we see a period of time we're not getting enough attention maybe we'll do something to create more attention for ourselves. But right now we're really comfortable, we're moving along exactly as we had planned."
He jokingly told a Silicon Valley , CA audience on 2/12 that he'd announce in "100 different places," a campaign promise he has fulfilled ably. That remark actually came after the Rudy Giuliani Presidential Committee made their '08 bid official on 2/05 by filing the mandatory statement of candidacy with the Federal Election Commission.
"That means he's in," said F.E.C. press officer Bob Biersack. "The definition of a candidate under the statute is if you've raised or spent at least $5,000 campaigning for the office, then as far as the law is concerned you are a candidate. Once you've met that that threshold you're in."
But must campaigns plant their flag with a formal announcement? No. "For the Federal Election Campaign Act, making a formal announcement of candidacy is not a step that the statute recognizes," Biersack said.
Sen. Hillary Clinton declared online her WH ambitions on 1/20. ("I'm in, and I'm in to win.") Sen. Barack Obama compared himself to Lincoln , ("tall, gangly, self-made...") at his 2/10 announcement in Springfield , Il . On 2/28 Sen. John McCain announced on David Letterman's "Late Show" but "officially" started campaigning on 4/25. Former MA Gov. Mitt Romney ignited his GOP rocket on 2/13 at Michigan's Henry Ford Museum ("I believe in America "). The next day Giuliani went on CNN and told Larry King, "Yes, I'm running. Sure."
The campaign has felt no pain from bypassing a formal launch. "I don't think voters are particularly attached to it, the ritual, unless there's uncertainty about whether you're running or not," said Jim Dyke, Giuliani's senior comm. advisor.
Opinions range on the importance of an opening salvo event. "An announcement is a way of framing the campaign," said Fred P. Hochberg, a Clinton fundraiser in NY and dean of New School University 's Milano management/urban policy school.
Ex-RNC Chair Ed Gillespie said formal announcements are important but their power, "has diminished in the 24/7 cable news and internet environment." He said a bigger problem is '08's decidedly brutal pace: "This calendar is just so expedited it's understandable that some people will wait awhile."
Such as Fred Thompson. But Dyke said whether Giuliani makes a big announcement becomes increasingly irrelevant because, "to the average layperson, they think he's already done it." [DAVID FINNIGAN].
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