The Evolution Of Rudy Giuliani

This story was written by CBSNews.com political reporter Brian Montopoli.

Giuliani first rose to prominence as a prosecutor, one known for his exceptional self-confidence - his detractors might say arrogance - and his willingness to take on high-profile cases, including those involving Wall Street and the mafia.

"He was big going against organized crime, and I knew that took a lot of courage," says former U.S. Rep. and Staten Island borough president Guy Molinari, the New York co-chair for Giuliani's presidential campaign. "As an Italian-American, I was pleased to see a man who was an Italian-American taking on the mob."

Giuliani's first run for New York City mayor, in 1989, was a failure, but he was elected four years later on the strength of a vow to clean up a crime-ridden city. The Brooklyn-born lawyer brought his prosecutorial nature with him to City Hall.

"He's a confrontational guy, and he's a combative guy," says Maurice Carroll, director of the Quinnipiac University Polling Institute, who covered Giuliani and City Hall for the New York Times and Newsday. "All of them squabbled with reporters, but he was more that way than any of the others. He wanted to do it all, and he wanted to do it his way."

The list of those whom Giuliani clashed with as mayor is long, and it includes the black community, city bureaucrats, and labor unions. His anti-crime plan, instituted by Giuliani and Police Commissioner William Bratton, centered on a crackdown on the minor offenses such as graffiti and aggressive panhandling. When crime rates dropped Giuliani claimed credit, and his approval ratings soared. He won his 1997 reelection bid overwhelmingly.

But the steamroller mentality that had served Giuliani well in the first term had begun to catch up with him. Bratton, whom had been hailed by Time Magazine as the reason "we're winning the war against crime," had been forced out amid personal clashes with the mayor, who had reportedly become jealous of the commissioner's celebrity.

And Giuliani's handling of the sexual assault by police of Haitian immigrant Abner Louima, as well as the shooting of Guinean immigrant Amadou Diallo by plain-clothed officers, exacerbated simmering resentment of the mayor on the part of the city's minority population. Protests over police brutality raged for weeks, with Giuliani's predecessor David Dinkins, Congressmen Charlie Rangel, Rev. Jesse Jackson among the protestors.

Giuliani was by this point a solidly polarizing figure, loved by some New Yorkers for cleaning up the city and loathed by those troubled by his tactics. Fred Siegel, author of Giuliani bio "The Prince of the City" and a former Giuliani advisor, attributes lingering disapproval of Giuliani to the mayor's refusal to see issues such as crime and welfare as the result of social or economic circumstance.

"Giuliani succeeded by trampling on the most cherished illusions of liberal New Yorkers," he says. "What Giuliani did was not just succeed, he succeeded at the price of people's illusions, and they'd very much like to have them back."

In the spring of 2000, Giuliani's political career was seemingly transformed by two revelations: That he had prostate cancer, and that he was separating from wife Donna Hanover. Giuliani's handling of the latter raised hackles: He announced the separation to the press before he told his wife, and he allowed himself to be seen, and photographed, with the woman he would later marry, Judith Nathan.

Giuliani had been running against Clinton for a Senate seat, but he soon dropped out of the race. With his approval rating low and New Yorkers gossiping about his personal life, political insiders began to view Giuliani as an albatross. "The sooner we get rid of the guy the better," a prominent Republican told the New York Times' Bob Herbert.

A few months later, Giuliani installed his former driver Bernard Kerik, whom Giuliani had previously appointed Commissioner of the New York City Department of Correction, as New York City police commissioner. Giuliani eventually recommended Kerik to head the federal Department Of Homeland Security, a nomination that fell apart amid revelations about Kerik's past. Kerik was indicted last week.

Wayne Barrett, a Giuliani critic and Village Voice reporter who has written two books about the former mayor (including one with CBSNews.com Senior Producer Daniel Collins), says Giuliani's support of Kerik is emblematic of the "transformation of him on ethical terms."

As a prosecutor, Barrett says, Giuliani "was someone who was deeply troubled by any form of public misconduct." But his decision to support Kerik, despite reportedly having been briefed about Kerik's lobbying on behalf of a construction firm rumored to have links to organized crime, reflects how when Giuliani became a politician, his "ethical standards - the antenna he had about this - was thrown out the window."

Siegel sees it differently.

"To most people in the press this is a corruption and loyalty story," he says. "It's not. Bernie Kerik was highly competent. He cleaned up Rikers Island. He was a very effective police commissioner. Is Giuliani loyal to a fault? Yes. Are the people he's loyal to highly competent? Yes."

Giuliani's well-documented performance in the wake of the Sept. 11 attacks transformed him from an embattled mayor into a national hero. He was Time Magazine's 2001 Person Of The Year, and the man who had become known as "America's Mayor" tried to remain New York's mayor a little longer than planned, via a proposal to extend his term due to the attacks. (It failed.) After leaving the mayor's office, Giuliani founded a security consulting firm called Giuliani Partners, embarked on a lucrative public speaking tour, and remained active in Republican politics.

His recent return to campaigning has revealed a seemingly looser and more accessible candidate, one who seems to be a better politician than the combative Giuliani of years past.

"As a public speaker, he was never any great shakes," says Carroll, who recalls Giuliani's "Godfather" imitation as particularly painful. "He's turned into a pretty good speaker. His ability to charm an audience came pretty late in his career."

Giuliani's social liberalism was expected to hamper his candidacy, but many Republican primary voters seem willing to overlook their disagreements with Giuliani on issues like as gay rights and abortion because they see him as a strong leader when it comes to homeland security. He has tried to inoculate himself against charges of "flip-flopping" by largely standing by his socially moderate positions while promising to appoint strict-constructionist justices to the bench. Last week, Giuliani received the endorsement of Christian conservative heavyweight Pat Robertson.

Still, critics say his past positions and personal issues will come back to haunt him. George Marlin, who ran for mayor against Giuliani from the right in 1993, refers to the former mayor as a "lifelong liberal" and says the Sept. 11 attacks made people forget the real Giuliani.

"The last year he was mayor, up until 9/11, it was bad soap opera," says Marlin. "Everybody thought he was finished. 9/11 just put the bad soap opera on the back burner."

Former New York Gov. Mario Cuomo, a Democrat whom Giuliani endorsed for governor in 1994, says Giuliani's personal life won't make a difference to most voters.

"Rudy is an icon, and people don't want to lose him as an icon," says Cuomo. "He represents courage and clear-mindedness in the midst of chaos. They love what they saw for four days, and even if they exaggerate what they saw for four days, they don't want to give it up."

Cuomo says Giuliani is still the same man he was when he served as a prosecutor.

"His basic strengths never left him," says Cuomo. "His intelligence, his ambition, his quickness, his sense of humor. The thing you need most of all in politics, in addition to money, health, intelligence and ability to speak - you need the right circumstances. And maybe the circumstances are the thing that makes the biggest difference. And his circumstances were perfect."
By Brian Montopoli