Rudy Talks Energy, Iraq, On "Late Show"

Iowa is a must. So is California, if you're hoping to sit in the big chair in the Oval Office at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue.

And don't forget the talk shows. Dave, Oprah, Jay, and many more.

Rudy Giuliani is the latest presidential hopeful to grace a talk show stage, in this case, CBS' "Late Show with David Letterman," where he dropped by Monday to trade quips and do his best to showcase the reasons why he thinks America should vote for him.

It was a familiar venue for the former New York City mayor, who marked his 28th visit on "Late Show" as he made his case for both the GOP nomination and the general election.

Letterman, who has relentlessly poked fun at President Bush in his nightly comic bit "Great Moments in Presidential Speeches," had questions both serious and comic for the man whose national reputation was bolstered in the days and months following the Sept. 11th attacks.

Asked about the war in Iraq, Giuliani said there should have been a better strategy.

Asked what he'd do on first as president, the New York Republican joked that he'd first locate the bathroom, but he was quick to move on to serious issues.

The first steps a new president should take, says Giuliani, would take place before that first day on the job.

"The first thing you do is you see where you are on Iraq and the war on terror, and make sure they're doing the things you want us to be doing. We don't know where we're going to be on Iraq then," said Giuliani. "You make sure the country is secure, you make sure it's safe. You begin focusing on how we can make progress in keeping the country safe on terrorists, by staying on offense."

Next, he said, would be the process of getting control of the budget. "I would start working on how to reduce spending, how to get it under control, how to look at ways to stimulate the economy — those are the things you start working on right away."

Letterman, speaking for many an aggravated motorist, then asked Giuliani for his views on why gasoline prices have gone through the roof.

"The situation in the Middle East has something to do with it, the fact that we don't have enough refineries has something to do with it," said Giuliani. "There's sort of a bottleneck that occurs — even if we find more oil, it's going to be tough to get it to where it needs to go because we haven't built a refinery in 20, 25 years, 30 years."

"It's because we haven't pursued energy independence — maybe a better way to describe it, energy diversity," he continued. "We haven't pursued ethanol the way we should, we haven't licensed a new nuclear power plant in 30 years. France is 80 percent nuclear power, we haven't done a new one in 30 years, licensed a new one in 30 years. China's going to build 40 nuclear power plants. We haven't licensed one in 30 years."

"All those things probably combine to put us in a situation where not only the price of gasoline is high, but money has to go to our enemies," said Giuliani. "[Oil] used to always be a problem for our economy, going back to Jimmy Carter and even Richard Nixon. But now, it's a problem of national security."

"One of the things I'd commit myself to doing is to achieve energy diversity, or, let's call it — as much energy independence as we can," he said. "And we've got to do it over the next ten years, like we put a man on the moon."

"Wow, nothing's easy, is it?" said Letterman, following up on Giuliani's modified stump speech. "Why would a person want this gig?"

"No, this is a great endeavor," Giuliani replied. "Energy independence is a great endeavor — it creates another new industry for us that we can go sell to China, to India. We need new industries that we can sell to these emerging markets and this would be a great one for us."

"Every night, before you fall asleep at night," said Letterman, nudging the dialogue back into more familiar comedic terrain, "do you think: 'It's going to be me and Hillary, me and Hillary' — is that what it'll come down to?"

"That is not my last thought before I go to sleep at night," said a broadly smiling Giuliani, who was eyed as a rival to Hillary Clinton in the New York Senate race which he left for medical reasons and she ultimately won.

"It could be Senator Clinton, it could be Senator Obama, it could be Senator Edwards, or — who knows? It could be Vice President Gore. Who knows!"

"It's fascinating," Giuliani said, taking a step back from the race and enjoying the view with himself in it. "It's a great, great honor. Every once in a while I wake up in the morning and I pinch myself: 'I'm getting to run for president!' I'm a kid from Brooklyn."
By Francie Grace