No Fury Like A Press Corps Scorned

As we've discussed before, members of the media – especially in New York – don't much seem to like Rudy Giuliani. And the feeling is, or at least was, mutual. "He didn't like us. I mean, let's just start with that," Newsday’s Ellis Henican told "On The Media" last month. "He didn't like to be criticized. He took it all very personally. He was quick to anger, and he lashed out very quickly."

Anti-Rudy stories have been trickling out with increasing frequency as the campaign has heated up, even as Giuliani has been more successful in maintaining his lead in the polls than many expected. And today we get a flurry of them. Consider this Associated Press piece, headlined "Giuliani faces questions about Sept. 11" – his presumed source of political strength. Writes Larry McShane: "While the former mayor of the nation's largest city was widely lionized for his post-9/11 leadership…city firefighters and their families are renewing their attacks on him for his performance before and after the terrorist attack."

Then there is a pair of pieces in the New York Times, "Testimony by Giuliani Indicates He Was Briefed on Kerik in ’00" and "In His White House, Giuliani Says, His Wife Might Have a Very Visible Role as Adviser." The former shines a light on Giuliani's embarrassing connection to Kerik, his disgraced former police commissioner; the latter stresses the "unusually overt role" Judith Giuliani would have in the White House and notes his "very public breakup with his second" wife in the second paragraph.

It's not that the press corps is making this stuff up – Giuliani has given reporters plenty of fodder for stories documenting incidents and criticisms he'd rather forget. But the evidence does keep mounting that many journalists, justifiably or not, have a bit of a distaste for "America's mayor." And they want the rest of us to see why.