Giuliani's NRA moment

As what some would call a "gun nut" with an extensive arsenal (though not by some standards) - and also someone who has significant problems with the likely Democrat nominee in '08, one thing that has bothered me the most Giuliani has been his history on gun rights. Bothers me because is stops me from fully supporting a man I think can defeat Clinton - but only if he keeps the base on his side. A large part of the base is pro-gun.

Well, here is his chance to build a bridge - a bridge he needs to win the Republican nomination.

Rudolph W. Giuliani will go before the rank and file of the National Rifle Association on Friday, seeking support for his Republican presidential campaign from a group he once likened to "extremists" for its efforts to repeal the ban on assault weapons.

But even as the former New York mayor strives to burnish his Second Amendment credentials at the gathering in Washington, a panel of federal judges in his home town will be hearing arguments on the lawsuit that Giuliani filed seven years ago aimed at punishing the nation's gun manufacturers for violent crimes involving firearms.

I hope he does this right. My brain tells me that he is one of the best chances to keep the Junior Senator from NY away from the Executive Branch.

I'm willing to give him a chance. BTW, if you don't think guns are going to be an issue in '08, check out this from PowerLine.

My law partner Tom Goldstein previews the upcoming Supreme Court term from a political perspective. Tom's piece should be read in its entirety, not summarized. His basic argument, though, is that the Supreme Court isn't really conservative, it just looked that way on the surface last term due to the nature of the high profile cases it happened to decide in June. This term, the same phenomenon (a small number of cases driving public perception of the Court) is likely to work the other way -- making the Court appear liberal instead of centrist. Moreover, this would occur just in time for the 2008 election, giving the Republican presidential nominee a potentially powerful issue.

As Tom puts it:

There is in fact the genuine prospect that the Court will hold (potentially by a five-to-four vote each time) that the government may ban the possession of pistols (possibly guns altogether, if there is no individual Second Amendment right), that child rapists cannot be executed, that certain federal legislation regulating child pornography is unconstitutional, that the Administration's treatment of alleged terrorists is unlawful, and that sentences for crack cocaine should be reduced. In that entirely realistic scenario, it is conservatives who will be aggressively using the Court as a rallying cry - in particular, the cry of the urgent need to move the Court a single seat to the right with the likely retirement of Justice Stevens - in the 2008 election.