Good point, J-Pod. I’ve asked the Giuliani campaign whether he was quoted accurately and also have a call into the reporter. Nothing yet. I’m happy to hear from anyone out there who was at the event. Meanwhile, it just might be that he’s not that interested in appealing to social conservatives, at least if John Dickerson was accurate in reporting this from NH recently (hat tip here ):
After the house party, the mayor met with his hosts and a few influential Republicans in the bar at the hotel where he was staying and where a few reporters had also decamped. In a voice loud enough to be overheard on the other side of the room, he outlined his view that the other candidates would divide up the “right-wing,” voters, as he called them, leaving him to consolidate the moderates and the economic and military conservatives who aren’t fixated on social issues.
UPDATE: I’m hearing from another reporter who was there that there was some ambiguity to Giuliani’s remark, that he might have simply been saying that we need to get beyond issues that divide us.