Giuliani's Commitments to America

June 12, 2007 — -- As a way of trying to create a vision for his candidacy beyond his performance on 9/11 and his support of abortion rights, former New York Mayor Rudy Giuliani began rolling out policy proposals Tuesday in what he called his "12 commitments to the American people."

"I'm always doing what people think is impossible," Giuliani said Tuesday morning in Bedford, N.H.

Giuliani, who is seeking the Republican presidential nomination expanded on this point in a follow-up e-mail to his supporters.

"Nothing energizes a government and a people better than challenging it to reform, change and improve," writes Giuliani. "We can do what others thought was impossible and couldn't be accomplished. I did it as Mayor of New York City, and I can do it again in Washington."

Giuliani's "twelve commitments" is a laundry list of generally conservative positions on fiscal discipline, tax-cutting and anti-terrorism plans.

The only plank of the Giuliani platform that runs counter to his nine declared Republican presidential rivals and many GOP primary voters is his pledge to "increase adoptions, decrease abortions, and protect the quality of life for our children" -- a tacit acknowledgement that the former New York mayor supports abortion rights.

Many of these issues Giuliani has already established as major themes of his candidacy, including keeping America on offense in the "terrorists' war on us," ending illegal immigration, and imposing accountability.

With the exception of a couple of snipes Giuliani has taken at the immigration reform bill pushed by his presidential campaign rival, Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., Giuliani -- who is leading in most national polls -- he is running a frontrunner's textbook above-the-fray campaign, directing his assaults at Sen. Hillary Clinton, D-N.Y., and other Democratic presidential candidates.

That tactic also serves to remind voters of his implicit campaign argument, specifically that he has a better chance of defeating a Democrat than his more conservative rivals in what looks like it may be a difficult election year for Republicans.

Today was no exception.