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Judge my public record, not my private life.
That was Rudy Giuliani's plea yesterday as questions about the
presidential hopeful's family dramas followed him into New Hampshire
for a second day - leading the former mayor to gently chide the press
and urge balance.
"I think the best thing to do is to concentrate on the public things
that I accomplished," the former mayor told reporters in Manchester.
"Measure that, take a look at that, and then see how much do newspapers
really have to probe into these things, or how much of it is being done
really for reasons that have nothing to do with measuring public
performance." Click here to watch 'NYFD-is-no-friend-Of-Mr-9-11-Rudy-Giuliani-'
Giuliani's appeal comes a day after a conservative activist at a
voter forum asked why voters should support him if his children do not.
His daughter, Caroline, 17, indicated support for Illinois Democrat
Sen. Barack Obama in an online group, and his son Andrew, 21, isn't
participating in his father's campaign.
But it also underscored again the delicate tightrope that Giuliani
must walk when it comes to his family - which he was once more than
happy to weave into his political life.
When he ran for mayor in 1993, Giuliani's ads - designed to soften
his tough-guy prosecutor image - showed him playing softball with
Andrew, then 7.
In another, he sat on a park bench, saying that while people may
know about his legal career, "They don't know about the most important
part of my life: My wife, Donna, and my two children, Andrew and
Caroline."
That picture has clearly changed for Giuliani, and experts said Giuliani may now have a hard time pleading for privacy.
"There is a certain irony here," said Hunter College professor of
politics Ken Sherrill. "But I do think every person has a zone of
privacy that they are entitled to."
"What's different now for Giuliani is this isn't playing out in
front of a cosmopolitan city, but rather before the Republican primary
electorate," added Sherrill. "And they could be much less forgiving on
this."
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