|
|
|
 |
||
 |
||
|
Columns
/ Current
Issue / Goldberg
File / Nota
Bene / Subscribe
/ Ad
Info / Washington
Bulletin / Home
|
||
|
5.22.00 5.19.00 5.12.00 5.11.00 5.11.00 5.10.00 5.05.00 5.04.00 5.03.00
|
 |
||
|
5/22/00
12:05 p.m. |
|||
|
Lopez: Is Rick Lazio the candidate you would have hoped to emerge in the wake of Rudy Giuliani’s withdrawal? Long: Let’s put it this way: He is the conservative candidate we are going to get behind. Joe DioGuardi is stepping down. He’s announcing today that he is not going to seek our endorsement or the Right to Life party’s endorsement. We are now going to move to support Congressman Lazio. Lopez: So, he’ll definitely be getting the Conservative party nomination? Long: Hopefully. I’ve recommended to the leaders to get behind him. Lopez: What makes him different from Rudy Giuliani, who wasn’t going to get your endorsement? Long: Well, 1) Rudy Giuliani was seeking the Liberal party endorsement. 2) Not only was he pro-abortion, he was pro-partial-birth abortion, while Rick Lazio — I would prefer all candidates to be pro-life — at least, he is for a ban of partial-birth abortion. He voted that way. He’s voted to remove Medicaid funding of abortion. My understanding is that he is for parental notification and he would like to keep it to the first trimester. While he’s pro-choice he’s more friendly and, at least somewhat, an advocate of some pro-life positions. Lopez: Are you comfortable defending your party against suggestions that supporting Lazio is hypocritical? Long: Yeah, I am. We’re a pro-life party. I’m personally pro-life and I think I held the bar very, very low for Mayor Giuliani and he would just never step over the bar. I wish all our candidates were pro-life, but they’re not. We try to balance the scales and look at things, not in a compromising way, but in an intelligent way and make our best effort to pick the best candidates. But, clearly, Giuliani was not a friend of the pro-life movement at all — in any way, shape, or form. Rick Lazio falls into a totally different category. And that’s not the only issue. The difference is that Lazio was friendlier to us on gays in the military and domestic partnerships. Giuliani was wrong on those issues. On the social issues, clearly there’s a difference between both of them. Not that Congressman Lazio is perfect on all the issues, but he clearly is more — I guess you could say — “centrist” than the mayor was. The mayor was definitely to the left and Lazio was more centrist and I think that makes the winning combination — a good candidate for New York who can possibly pull this thing off. Lopez: Do you think that the fact that not everyone in New York State knows him is a plus for him? Long: I think it’s a major plus. I think it’s almost a re-enactment of the race back in 1994 between Mario Cuomo and George Pataki. Back in ‘94, everyone was saying, “What is a Pataki?” They didn’t know the state senator from the mid-Hudson region and, quite frankly, I don’t think they got to know him until after they elected him. I think Lazio falls in the same category. You have an ultra-liberal icon like Hillary Clinton, a symbol, but a very negative symbol. This is a makeover. Clearly, her negatives are very, very high and you have this congressman from Long Island — from the suburbs, which is important — who hasn’t got the negatives she has. Besides those who like his style, like his looks, like the way he delivers his message, there’ll be those who will vote for anybody who will beat Hillary Clinton. I think that’s a real plus and I think that she’s really got a problem now. I always categorized the race between her and Rudy as two leaning towers who needed each other in the race to hold each other up. I said months ago that if one of them ever got out of the race — and it made no difference which one — the other one was in trouble because of their negatives. Lopez: Rick Lazio was obviously working overtime this weekend. How do you think he did? Long: I think he had tremendous press, tremendous exposure. I think the polls are going to reflect that within a week. I think he did excellent. The key here was that he was not afraid to go on to every talk show that he was invited on and talk about himself, what he’s done as a congressman, his political background. She has not done that yet. She hasn’t talked on any one-on-one political shows. She’s been only in certain circumstances, controlled townhall-style meetings where there was no real give-and-take and where no reporter could actually ask her questions. She’s not going to continue to be able to get away with that. And if she does do that, I think the general public is going to see that she’s totally controlled, totally isolated from real questions, and that there’s really no substance there. Lopez: Do you have any advice for Lazio as he moves towards getting the nomination and towards the general election? Long: I think he should continue to do what he does. I’m a party chairman, not necessarily a strategist, but I think he needs to point out to the world the difference between him and her — and I think he’s already started to do that. In his announcement, he had no problems — which I was very pleased with — announcing that he thought that late-term, partial-birth abortions are wrong, and he enunciated that very clearly. He didn’t have to do that. On the principles that he believes in, I think he should enunciate them and he will be rewarded. I think people are looking for people who can enunciate the views they really stand for. I think they’re tired of politicians trying to go both ways. He should not necessarily be responding to polls. |
|||
|
|||
|
 |
Columns
/ Current
Issue / Goldberg
File / Nota
Bene |
|
|
National Review 215 Lexington Avenue
New York, New York 10016 212-679-7330 Customer Service: 815-734-1232.
Contact
Us.
|
||
ike Long,
chairman of New York State’s Conservative Party, spoke to NR about newcomer
Rick Lazio's chances to beat Hillary Clinton in the race for the U.S.
Senate.
