If you get a chance, I highly recommend reading Mayor Giuliani's piece in USA Today. What it shows is that if Giuliani jumps into the presidential race he'll offer a tough, clear-minded view into the nature of the enemy, and he will be unabashed in taking on the liberals on national security issues. The mayor may want to consider following up with some speeches defending our strategic policy since September 11 and note some of this regarding America's global image. Some highlights from the Giuliani piece:
The attacks did not begin on Sept. 11, 2001. They actually began sometime in the late 1960s, when Islamic radicals started hijacking planes and directing terror at civilians. The first attack that drew significant international attention was the slaughter of the Israeli wrestling team at the Munich Olympics in 1972. Numerous attacks followed, leading up to Sept. 11 and the deadliest ever attack on American soil. The attacks have continued unceasingly since 9/11 and include those on Bali, Indonesia; Madrid; Beslan, Russia; London - and the recent interrupted plot in the United Kingdom, which might have been even deadlier than the attacks five years ago. So the killing of innocent civilians by Islamic fanatics has been going on for some time. What was quite different about the attacks of five years ago is that Sept. 11, 2001, marks the day that our nation went on offense against the terrorists. We broke the pattern of inconsistent response to previous attacks. We began a concerted effort to defeat Islamic fundamentalist terrorism…. The United States has successfully prevented domestic attacks over the past five years, but the terrorists have not relented. Think of the innumerable attacks from Israel to Iraq and the reported attacks planned by sleeper cells in Buffalo; Portland, Ore.; and Canada that were disrupted by alert authorities. Some argue that the attacks continue because of the war in Iraq. But the attacks began decades before the Iraq war. Some argue that our enemies seek negotiation and understanding. But our enemies have made clear to us that what they seek is the annihilation of our most precious freedoms. One of the main reasons for the founding of the United States was to establish freedom, particularly freedom of religion. Our enemies oppose freedom, particularly freedom of religion. This was made shockingly clear by the recent gunpoint "conversion" of two kidnapped journalists in Gaza. The terrorists don't want to understand and co-exist alongside Western democracies. There are those over the past 30 years, and even to this day, who want to negotiate with the fanatic Islamic terrorists. But the fanatics don't want to negotiate. They want to establish a world in which everyone practices a perverted version of their religion. They want to return to a time before the modern age, to a world in which women have no rights and religious dissent is met with death. These attacks are about a radical form of Islam that views our very existence as a grave threat. This is not a debate over values or policies. This is not a border dispute. This is a war over the preservation and expansion of the modern world.