Bob McCarty Writes

“If I endorsed anyone else, you would say I was flip-flopping.”

“I’m going to campaign with John as much as he wants — or not!”

The sound bites above, spoken moments ago by Rudy Giuliani as part of his endorsement of fellow Republican John McCain, may have been well-intentioned, but they missed the mark in the opinion of this recovering public relations professional and political campaign manager.

Observing the event at the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library with jaded eyes and ears, I couldn’t help but wonder what Giuliani was thinking early on when he mentioned “flip-flopping.” By mentioning the words that describe McCain so well, Giuliani did the Arizona senator no favor.

Same goes for the second comment above which, in effect, amounted to an offer to stay away from McCain’s campaign. If Giuliani thought he might be a liability to McCain (and it’s clear that he did), he should have kept his comments brief, to the point and, borrowing a word from the ice cream industry, vanilla.

Whether other conservatives interpret the former New York City mayor’s lines the way I did remains to be seen. I know one thing: Mitt Romney and Mike Huckabee will, and Rudy’s words will likely appear again in campaign television spots during the next six days.

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