RUDY VERITAS

CONVENTIONS

I figured I would start by listing some entries - McCain & Huckabee - that concern my past encounters with prominent republican presidential candidates, as we are in the season.  The first Rudy related piece, JUDITH, appears because it has previously circulated. Within the coming weeks strictly Rudy specific pieces will be appearing.

RAH

THE CHINA CONNECTION

It seemed for awhile this year that no matter whom the Republican Party nominated for president I would have some connection to that person.  I of course knew Rudy Giuliani for over 12 years.  I had my Vegas outing with John McCain and I also had a relationship of sorts with their unlikeliest, albeit, short-lived front runner, Mike Huckabee.  Here’s the story of how Rudy Giuliani’s insular City Hall atmosphere lead to what was a nice friendship with the former Governor of Arkansas.

Kate Anson, the Mayor’s Assistant for Scheduling, and I were going over some upcoming events at her desk. I was giving her a hard time as recently she had sent me a large number of State Department and USAID invites for me to handle.

Part of my job as Coordinator of Inter-Governmental Affairs for the Mayor’s Office involved receiving foreign delegations wanting to meet with the mayor.  They had to meet with me instead of Rudy as he would meet with practically no one below the rank of President or Prime Minister. And even then it was highly iffy as I will elaborate on further in the next few weeks.

It was not just a matter of his time or scheduling. He just was not interested in foreign affairs. Kate and Beth Petrone, his executive assistant, both knew he had no interest and did not even show him the invites. They were just rejected out of hand. Those things were funneled first to First Deputy Mayor Peter Powers, who did have an interest, and then to me. Everyone knew Rudy’s interests were strictly parochial. And even then national affairs were limited to matters as they related to law enforcement.

I met constantly with groups of foreign legislators and deputy prime ministers. It was a fascinating part of my job. Since the Soviet Union broke up nearly every new republic wanted to learn how to set up a democratic system of government.  They came to New York City as part of their tour of the United States. I was happy to facilitate these meetings and often invited others to sit in and join on the discussions.

My favorite meeting may have been with a senior delegation of Brazilian legislators and representatives of the Rio city government. They were fascinated by our recent crime reduction. We went through the usual explanations and knowing ahead of time of their interest, I had invited someone from the NYPD.

We laid out things both simple and complex:  Compstat, deployment, drugs, personnel, training, gangs, etc. We were working through an interpreter, as we always did. At one point I asked, “What is your biggest problem?” One of the Brazilians answered through the interpreter, “Corruption. The police are all taking bribes. It is our biggest problem. We do not know what to do about it.”  All of the Brazilians nodded vigorously in agreement. The guy from P.D. followed up by asking, “What do you pay the average police officer who patrols your neighborhoods?” They all looked to one Brazilian whom they seemed sure knew the answer. “Fifteen dollars a month”, he said. They all nodded.

We all cracked up. There was clearly a total disconnect - absolutely no connection between that salary and the entire constabulary being on the take. I explained our brilliant analysis and they seemed stunned that there could be a linkage. We assured them that there was. Higher salaries would probably solve most of their problems.  They seemed to find this revelation worth the price of their trip.

While I was giving Kate crap about my latest meeting with Uzbekistan or Kazakhstan or wherever, she mentioned that Peter had declined a meeting with the Lieutenant Governor of Arkansas and wanted me to do it. “Really”, I said. “It’s Arkansas, but the guy’s the lieutenant governor.  Shouldn’t Peter at least meet the guy?” “Jo said Peter’s not going to do it and wants you to,” Kate said referring to Peter’s scheduler. “Do you want me to decline?”  “No, no.”, I said.  “I’ve heard of this guy, he’s a Republican. We have to meet with him.  It just shouldn’t be me, I’d like it to be Rudy.”  “Well the Mayor can’t,” she said. “Can’t or won’t?”  I asked. “Let me go look at the book.” Beth Petrone kept the giant scheduling book and was the final word on his schedule. Beth confirmed this was a case of won’t. Rudy didn’t want to. It was passed to Peter Powers who passed it on to me.

My next stop was Jo Yagid, Peter Powers’ scheduler.  She also confirmed that Peter could meet with Mike Huckabee, Lieutenant Governor of Arkansas, but was choosing not to. I left the matter alone and decided to do some checking up on Huckabee on my own. After placing calls to the Republican Congressional Campaign Committee, the Senatorial Campaign Committee, and my friend at the President’s Dinner, a Republican congressional fundraising operation, I was getting back the same response. Huckabee is a comer who’ll be either governor or senator someday and Rudy should be nice to this guy.

Two days later at Peter’s weekly staff meeting I added the Huckabee meeting as an agenda item. I told Peter that I thought it was a mistake that Rudy wasn’t meeting with this guy and that at least Peter should meet with him. Would Peter talk to Rudy? “No”, he said. And Peter didn’t want to meet with him either. I explained the man was a Republican and a rising star.  Peter was surprised to hear that the lieutenant governor of Arkansas was a republican.

Peter was a much better republican than was Rudy and we always bonded on that level as I had been a life-long republican of the Goldwater stripe. We were always loyal republicans and much more consistently conservative than Rudy ever was. Peter and I were grounded philosophically, although we did not get along personally.  I was hoping on party discipline to appeal to him to meet with Huckabee but the Arkansas appellation was killing my argument.

Notwithstanding having a president from there, the name of that state was sinking this for me. Not even the governor, but the lieutenant governor!!!  Not gonna happen. I left thinking classic Peter Powers; haughty and imperious, he thinks as deputy mayor he’s too good to meet with the lieutenant governor of another state even if it is Arkansas. Oh well. The meeting was now two weeks away.

By the time the day rolled around I had pretty much forgotten about it. City Hall life is pretty hectic and you take each day as it comes. I’m sure the Tweed Courthouse - behind City Hall where my office was located - was a big letdown to  Lieutenant Governor and Mrs. Huckabee and their guest. The difference between Lt. Gov. Huckabee and Mrs. Huckabee was that he was politician enough to hide it.

She could barely contain the loathing and seething contempt at how insulted she felt at the slight she perceived was directed at her and her husband; presumably by me and the mayor. She daggered me with her eyes for the next hour. Mike Huckabee could not have been more pleasant. He was a portly man but so were the Hardings so who was I to throw stones. It was the cheap light blue suit that called attention to himself here in New York, however. I was soon to learn why he was being so nice in the face of this perceived slight. He wanted something.

I thought that Mrs. Huckabee could have taken lessons from Liz Harding, my mother, on how to be a good political wife. If your husband wants something this badly then you suck up the slight yourself and make nice for the next hour. For all you know I’m your ally and fought for your meeting with the mayor. That’s what Liz Harding would have done, but she’s a pro at this after forty years.

After the initial chat we got to the point of all this. He named a Taiwanese organization with which he was deeply involved. “I’m here in New York for their function at the Marriott Marquis. I’ve been associated with this organization for some time,” he said.

The man who attended the meeting with him had some official relationship with this Taiwanese group, although he was not Taiwanese. Huckabee explained further, “We wanted to meet with Mayor Giuliani to invite him to speak to the group and welcome them to New York.” He went on to say that it was in fact an honor to have this meeting in New York and it was going to be a large turnout. While Huckabee seemed a fairly genuine sort of fellow, and the Mrs. continued to shoot me laser beams of hate, his friend seemed unctuous. Or an Arkansan misguidedly trying to attain unctuousness; smiling at me way too much.

Anyway, this Taiwan thing seemed a little fishy. Maybe I was imposing a New York sense of skepticism to something perfectly fine. But if he was a New York pol I would definitely say this group was funding him big time. It reeked of that.

They gave me the invitation and it seemed like it might be a well attended event. I had a feel for that after having attended political functions since I was six years old.  But why was the lieutenant governor of Arkansas mixed up with this major Taiwanese group?  Hmmmmmm.  Why Taiwan?  Was Huckabee a big anti-communist?  Was there a religious affiliation to this group?  Maybe a Baptist nexus - Huckabee is a Baptist minister.

“Well,” I said, “I will have to talk to Rudy and get back to you. I can tell you his schedule would make it nearly impossible to accommodate a drop-by on this short notice.  I wish you had given me some idea before now that this was the point of the meeting and I could have pitched this. But this event is tomorrow.” He apologized and explained that he wanted to make the presentation in person. He thanked me for the meeting and I asked them if they wanted to go over to City Hall for a tour. Mrs. Huckabee’s mood seemed to warm up a little when we got to City Hall. I left them alone for a moment and poked my head into the Mayor’s office to see if he’d shake hands with him.  But no go.

After the tour we parted and I went back to my office to figure out what to do. Blow him off? Make a pitch to Rudy to go to the event? Ask Peter to go?

I slept on it and the next day decided I’d ask Rudy to stop by this thing and say hello as a gesture to Huckabee. Beth got me time. I took along a slew of documents that needed signing. While he signed I said, “Mayor, I met with the lieutenant governor of Arkansas. You turned down the meeting.”  “I passed that on to Peter,” he interrupted. “Right,” I said. “He passed on it.” “Oh, OK,” Rudy said. “His purpose for the meeting”, I began, “was to invite you to an organization he’s affiliated with that’s having an event at the Marriott tonight for a drop-by. It’s some sort of Chinese group he has a long-standing association with. Not sure who they are I haven’t checked them out. But he’s vouching for them. I’ve checked him out thoroughly with D.C. and everyone asks that you be accommodating to him. Says he’s gonna be governor or senator. I checked your schedule and you can do this for fifteen minutes. The party in D.C is asking you to be nice to this guy. They say he’s a comer.”

“Did you say Chinese?”  Rudy asked, “Yes, Taiwanese,” I clarified. “I don’t want to do anything to piss off the Chinese. They just bought that building and moved their consulate. I don’t want to do anything to upset them,” Rudy said.

“The Red Chinese? You don’t want to piss off the communists?” I asked sotto voce. I was actually confused. I knew what he was talking about - the Government of China had recently purchased a large building and had consolidated most of their various official and consular offices on the far west side of Manhattan. What I didn’t understand was why he thought this mattered and why he cared about Red China. I kind of assumed that like me, Rudy Giuliani had been a fierce anti-communist most of his life.

“Yes, the communists,” he responded. “OK,” I said. “Would you mind if Peter went?” You can ask him,” Rudy said, closing his Mont Blanc fountain pen. “Thank you, Mayor”, I said, gathering my documents before I left.

At a scheduling meeting with Peter later that afternoon I approached him about repping Rudy. Again the answer was a firm no. Although he never said the words, it was obvious he was thinking “yahoo”, not “serious pol”, when I said, “Lieutenant Governor Huckabee of Arkansas.” We agreed after looking at the invite that this Chinese group seemed fishy but Peter didn’t mind me having pitched the event to Rudy. I had explained D.C.’s interest in Huckabee’s future and that they viewed this as a request of Rudy. Peter and I both understood we could use all the good grace from the national party we could get. We did our other business and I went back to my office to call Huckabee.

“Governor, the Mayor won’t be able to fit this in on such short notice, I’m very sorry, I did try,” I told him. He was very gracious but threw me for a loop. “I appreciate all your efforts, Russell, I really do. Could we get a letter or a proclamation from the Mayor to the group welcoming them? Could you arrange that?”  He asked. The short answer is, of course. I’ve worked tougher miracles than that before for friends in a jam. But what were my instructions exactly from Rudy about this Chinese business?

What’s his obsession with Red China? Was I precluded from further assistance in his name? “I’m afraid I can’t do anymore on this with the time allowed. We have a whole process here for that. I’m very sorry, Governor,” I told him. “Would you come and say a few words to the group on behalf of the Mayor yourself, as my guest?” He asked. OH MY GOD, I thought. How do I get off this call?  “I’d be honored, Governor, but again, had I only known, I have a previous commitment this evening,” I lied, “I’m very sorry. I hope your event is a great success.”

I regret not going that night. He was gracious to invite me. He was clearly in a jam. He had promised Rudy to the group and I could have gotten him out of some of this difficulty without any harm to my principal.   I know, I know first rule: always check out the group before involving your principal.  But I don’t think much harm would have been done had Rudy went.  And certainly not for the reason he was espousing.  Pissing off the Red Chinese?  I was also really interested to see how deep Huckabee was with this group.  There was some connection there that has never been mentioned publicly, to my knowledge. 

POSTSCRIPT:

This was still the period, more or less, of easy going Rudy.  As time went on Rudy would get more and more difficult about doing anything.  He always needed more information before doing most things.  It became exasperating when after providing him with tons of background he would say, “I need more information on this”, and you would explain there was no more info on this group, person or event.  I can’t even count the number of times I would encounter this either alone or with Peter.

Governor Huckabee and I met on one other occasion in New York and after that always stayed in touch at Christmas. Governor Huckabee sent me all of his published Christian themed books with very nice letters attached. When I went to work at the NYC Housing Development Corporation I became a member of the National Council of State Housing Finance Agencies. Through my counterpart in the Arkansas state HFA, a close friend of Huckabee, I stayed in touch with the Governor. He was always decent to me and I tried after that initial meeting to make up for the snub he received from Rudy that I was clearly part and parcel of.

ADDENDUM:

Prior to going to a Little Rock fundraising event for the short-lived 2000 senate race, Tony Carbonetti mentioned that the Governor would be there. I told him to make sure that he said hello for me. Tony asked incredulously, “You know the Governor of Arkansas?”  He had completely forgotten the story and moreover didn’t really believe me when I recounted it.

When he returned from the trip he called me first thing and said when he and Rudy went up to Huckabee to introduce themselves at the country club where the fundraiser was being held, the first words out of the Governor’s mouth were “Mayor, how’s my good friend Russell Harding?”  Tony said he and Rudy were both blown away. That story always makes me laugh.

HOME, SWEET HOME

In the fall of 2007, Vanity Fair magazine ran a fairly withering profile of Judith Giuliani outlining her rise from obscurity to her place beside the man at the top of the national polls for president. The author of the article, Judy Bachrach, was extremely detailed in her research going back through Judith Nathan’s childhood, marriages, jobs, romances, and her living arrangements.

Noticeably absent, at least to me, was any mention of where Judith Nathan was domiciled for the years 1999-2002. Ms. Bachrach made no mention in the article of where Mrs. Nathan lived prior to the Madison Avenue apartment where she and Mayor Giuliani presently reside.

In the fall of 1999, Donna Hanover lived in Gracie Mansion. Mayor Giuliani lived there too before decamping to an apartment with Howard Koeppel and Mark Hsiao on E. 57th St. I knew them both well and they lived just a few blocks from me. But where was Judith Nathan, the Mayor’s then current girlfriend residing? The Vanity Fair piece could possibly have mentioned Mrs. Nathan’s physical address, but only five people knew the circumstances surrounding how she obtained that apartment. None of whom would have spoken about them to Judy Bachrach.

This then, is how I became involved in securing subsidized housing for Mrs. Nathan.

Shortly after Mayor Giuliani began seriously dating Mrs. Nathan, but before it was public knowledge, I received a phone call from Tony Carbonetti, the Mayor’s Chief of Staff and my closest friend.

After working on both his losing 1989 campaign and his winning 1993 campaign, and holding a senior position at City Hall in his first term, I was at the time of the phone call President of the New York City Housing Development Corporation (HDC) - a pseudo city commissioner. In short, HDC financed most of the low and all of the city’s subsidized middle-income housing. I had relations with all the major developers in the affordable housing industry, which included luxury housing developers.

Tony said he needed an apartment for someone. “Whose it for?” I asked. “Judith.”, he said. “Oh, ok.. . does he know you’re calling me?” I asked referring to the Mayor. “Yup, he knows,” Tony replied. “What does she need?” I wanted to know. “She wants a two-bedroom, two-bath, doorman, on the Upper East Side. Preferably, near Gracie,” Tony outlined for me. “What’s she willing to pay?” I asked. “No more than $1,800 but she’d prefer $1,500,” he responded.

WHOA! I took a very long pause. I then repeated back the specs he had just given me -with dripping sarcasm - to be clear that I understood him correctly. “Are you out of your fucking mind? That apartment you just described costs $3200-3700 a month. A developer would be taking a hit (I paused to think) of around $25 thousand a year. With a multi-year lease — my God — these are cheap bastards,” I said.

He completely ignored my point and came back with, “Oh yea, and she wants a choice.” “What do you mean?” I asked. “She wants to choose from a few different apartments and buildings, so you have to give her a selection,” Tony explained. “Jesus fucking Christ! For $1500???” I shot back.

Again ignoring me, he asked, “Can you do this? Do you know someone?” I thought for a long minute before saying, “Yes, I think I do know someone who’ll do this, but there’s one thing; I’ve never asked any developer here for anything like this, for myself or anyone else. I need to say this request comes from ‘On High’ or from City Hall. I won’t say Rudy or you. I’ll be vague, but I need to say ‘You over there.’ Is that OK?” I asked. Tony was fine with the arrangement. I told him the person I had in mind, if he could deliver, would be very discreet.

The person I reached out to was Jeff Blau, President of the Related Companies. HDC and Related had together produced a number of buildings as part of the federal government’s 80/20 housing program.

In exchange for receiving lucrative triple tax-exempt financing, the developer of an 80/20 sets aside 20% of his newly constructed luxury building’s units for low-income tenants. Manhattan is dotted with these buildings and almost no market-rate tenant knows that their neighbor is low-income and is paying a fraction of their market-rate rent.

I placed a call to Jeff and explained what I needed and where the request had come from within the parameters I had promised Tony. Within a day, Judith had a contact person at Related who showed her a selection of apartments and buildings and she selected one. I was required to stay involved and midwife this matter with phone calls back and forth between Related and City Hall until the lease was signed. Although I was incredibly busy Tony requested this of me because Judith would not be bothered dealing with the building or Related directly. The Mayor had to be kept informed at every step to make sure Judith was satisfied.

The difficulty for me with her living arrangement was that she had probably wound up living in a Related 80/20 building possibly financed with HDC bonds and even likely with a mortgage held by HDC. I never asked the address of where she lived just in case a reporter ever questioned any possible HDC connection. I could honestly say I had no idea where Judith Nathan lived.  Having the Mayor’s girlfriend living in a government-sponsored building paid for with triple tax-exempt bonds, at a sub, sub market rate rent, having been negotiated by his appointee, would have been a scandal.

The further difficulty for me was that HDC was constantly involved in negotiating new 80/20 projects with Related. The inherent conflict in any 80/20 relationship is that the developer wants to devote as little of his building to the low-income tenants as possible. While the law states that 20% of the building’s units must be dedicated to low-income tenants, the developer can design the floor plans of the apartments to give the market-rate tenants, say 85% of the square footage, while the low-income tenants receive 15%. That is exactly what Jeff Blau was trying to do. The law is silent on that point. It is perfectly legal as long as 20% of the total units are dedicated low-income even if they are shoeboxes. That is of course if I were stupid enough to sign off on such plans.

Related was the most aggressive developer in trying to minimize square footage for low- income tenants. It was getting harder and harder to drive bargains with Related while they were playing landlord to the Mayor’s girlfriend. I knew if Blau went to Carbonetti, a friendship I had subsequently brokered, I would lose.

Fortunately, we stuck by our guns on all matters. We never caved on any square footage issues and always made sure that the amenities in Related’s 80/20 properties were up to the same standards as our other developers. Nevertheless, I always knew we could lose the battle should Blau or Related’s Chairman, Steve Ross, decide to pick up the phone. Rudy would never, ever side with us over Judy’s landlord.

Less than a year after she signed the lease, I was called out of a meeting in our boardroom to take an urgent call from Jeff Blau. We were currently working on another 80/20 deal so I was naturally concerned that he was dragging me out of a meeting. Our Judith Nathan business having concluded the previous year, my stomach dropped when Jeff said that he was sorry that he had to call me about a new Judith matter. God, I thought, what now?

Although I did not inform Jeff Blau of the identity of the tenant during our original phone call the year before, when the NY Post ran their famous picture of Rudy walking Judith home after a dinner date on the Upper East Side, I called him to let him know his tenant and that woman were one in the same.

He was calling to say that unbeknownst to me, or him apparently, Judith had wrangled a parking space in the building along with her apartment in the original lease. Related leased the concession for that garage; they did not control it directly. Somehow, Judith had not been paying anything for that space or a very, very nominal rate. In either case, the company that controlled the garage had asked her to start paying the full monthly rate. Well, Jeff explained, when the manager discussed the matter with Judith she threw a fit and became highly belligerent. She said she had no intention of paying for the space and made quite a scene.

The matter made its way up to Blau. He asked me what I would like him to do. “What are my options?” I asked. “I can tell them to eat this or tell her to pay. I can do what you want,” Jeff offered me. This whole thing was stupid and awkward for both of us. We were in negotiations about real issues and having to discuss Judith Nathan bullshit pissed me off. Tony had been telling me regularly how abusive she was to her NYPD INTEL detail and how they hated working for her. She treated them like flunkies. She had no class. She made them hold packages and her purse. Tony had told me repeatedly that INTEL perceived her as low-class.

I told Jeff Blau, “I’ll have to get back to you. I need instructions, as you can imagine. I’m sorry about this, Jeff.” “It’s no problem,” he said. I called Tony and explained the situation. “God Damn it!” he screamed. “I didn’t know anything about this. I’ll have to talk to Rudy right away. Let me call you back.” Sure enough, fifteen minutes later Tony called back. He had actually pulled Rudy out of a meeting for this.

“You’re not going to believe this. I can’t believe I’m telling you this. Will they really eat the cost? That’s what he wants. If Jeff offered, have them do it. It’s crazy, I know.” Tony said.

“This is really fucked up, Tony. I know he offered, but I did not think we would take him up on it. I thought we would do the decent thing here and start paying. None of us knew about this free space in the first place. This is really piggish. Is this really what YOU want me to do?” I asked. “No, it’s what HE wants you to do,” Tony said, referring to the Mayor.

“OK,” I said. “It’s just I’m in the middle of negotiations with this guy and you’re putting me in a really shitty spot; asking me to have him pick up the cost of this thing. It’s totally fucked up.”

Tony responded, “I know. He’s completely unreasonable when it comes to her. There’s no talking to him. You have no idea the shit I put up with on a daily basis because of her. I couldn’t even begin to try to make a reasonable argument to him for why this looks terrible. We’re stuck, I’m sorry. Let’s have dinner tonight. I gotta go, call me later.” He was off.

I called Blau and told him of the decision. He took it well and said he would handle it. As a businessman these were small costs that helped him in the long run with City Hall, I realized. Rudy would deny Related nothing now. They were bidding on lots of projects all over the city, including the massive Columbus Circle site. Most of those projects required mayoral approval directly or through a City agency.

That ended my involvement with Judith and her living situation.  Jeff was very discreet and never mentioned it to anyone, so far as I know.  I don’t think we ever discussed it again.  My parents went to a small party in that apartment given by Judith Nathan and said it was an average upper east side apartment – nothing special.

Judith Nathan lived in that Related 80/20, 200 E. 94th St., until she and Mayor Giuliani moved into their Madison Avenue apartment. She paid the reduced rent and it never increased during her tenancy.

Rudy Giuliani and the MTA went on to select Related as the developer for the billion dollar redevelopment of Columbus Circle and the Time Warner project.

ADDENDUM:

Shortly before leaving prison I listened to Rudy on ‘Meet the Press.’ A local radio station had a delayed broadcast which was a godsend since no TV was ever tuned to Sunday talk shows.

On the program, Rudy, in response to some Bernie Kerik and Judith questions, said that a security analysis had been performed by the NYPD prior to Judith receiving round-the-clock police protection. This was during the period in which he was still married and she was his girlfriend, prior to it being known publicly.

Russert rightly asks, “What could the threat be if no one knew of her existence?” Rudy says emphatically that the PD executed a security review that resulted in her receiving protection. That he had nothing to do with it and never ordered it.

That is a total fabrication. Rudy ordered her to receive that protection and Tony told me that Denny Young, the Mayor’s Counsel and main liaison to the PD, was not happy about it. No security review exists since none was ever performed. Rudy ordered the PD to provide round-the-clock protection for his then girlfriend – end of story.

Why?  My guess is that he knew that it makes relationships run much smoother if your INTEL people can coordinate your schedules amongst themselves, saving you the hassle. He always knew where she was and it made life much simpler to have the cops rendezvous her detail with his wherever he happened to be.

I would say it just came down to logistics. I do not think it was to provide her with any regal trappings at that point. It just made his life easier to have her delivered whenever and wherever he happened to be. But these are cops we’re talking about and there has to be some security nexus to provide that level of protection. But there never was any.

If you know Rudy it’s easy to tell when he’s lying - his facial expression plus his habit of asking the questioner if he’s asking about something that he clearly is not. It’s a form of distraction and to buy him time to think of an answer. Watch that Russert interview, he does it a few times.  Rudy is in fact a very bad liar. Which, on the one hand, is a great thing. But on the other, if you’re that bad at it, you should not attempt it with the frequency with which he does.

Last Judith point.  During 2002 and 2003 when Rudy was out of office but giving 100K+ speeches around the country, Tony told me that serious problems developed surrounding Judith's participation at these events.  It seems that not content with receiving the fee,the lavish hotel and accoutrement, plus the private Gulfstreams, Judith was charging thousands of dollars worth of items to the hotel and the sponsors of Rudy's speeches.

The sponsors were getting royally pissed at shelling out all this money for his appearance and then discovering in their wake huge bills for clothing and other items that Judith had charged.  Tony said Rudy wasn't aware of this but neither of us believed that.  Judith never stopped going to the speeches but Tony told me she had been made to stop the practice.

VEGAS, BABY, VEGAS

Just a few short days after the strangest presidential election in U.S. history I was as far away as you could get from the seriousness of vote counting on the east coast. I was walking along the ‘The Strip’ in Las Vegas with Mayoral Chief of Staff Tony Carbonetti, his girl Carol Dorian, and my Senior V.P Luke Cusack. We were doing some afternoon casino hopping when Tony’s cell phone rang. “Hey John, what’s up,” Tony said. “It’s Weaver,” he whispered to Carol.

Without much difficulty I now knew it was Sen. John McCain’s chief political operative, John Weaver. Weaver was someone Tony had grown to know as Rudy and Tony had gotten close to McCain. “Well tell him I’m in Vegas. Tell him to come over. Bring Cindy. I’ll take care of everything at the Bellagio. Not to worry about anything. Weaver, tell him to come. Carol wants to see him. Tell him that. OK. Let me know.”

“What’s the deal?” I asked. “It seems he’s in Sedona, bored and was looking for me. He should come. We’d have a blast. Let’s go back to the hotel I want to go to the VIP Office, just in case,” Tony said. We were all in Las Vegas for the annual COMDEX Convention. HDC, the corporation I ran had a heavy IT component to it. Luke was in charge of that department. I talked Tony into coming because part of his domain at City Hall was Administration. And MIS (management information systems) fell under him.

It was a junket, no two ways about that, but at least we could rationalize it. He loved gambling and while I didn’t gamble much he and I had a routine developed over years of hanging for hours at the blackjack table where he played for hundreds often thousands a hand and I watched. He and I had been to Atlantic City together dozens of times and the Bahamas for vacation on half a dozen occasions. As Tony didn’t drive I was always driver on the Atlantic City trips until he got a city car and driver. From then on, Eddie, his city driver, would provide his travel to Atlantic City in his official tricked out Ford Expedition with a complete police package. I was always concerned there would be a story about that considering how often he went, but there never was.

On our way back to Tony’s hotel, McCain called and said that he and Cindy would be arriving the next day. Tony and Carol were both very excited as they had spent time with the McCains before. I thought this could be a fun and potentially interesting two days being as this was happening smack in the middle of the Florida recall madness. We were still spending what free time we had watching Ashley Banfield explain new military vote counts and Tim Russert wiping down tiny white boards. What kind of mood would McCain be in amidst all this? After all, it might have been him. Many thought, should have been him.

It was Luke’s last night and we had a great steak dinner at the Venetian. He was heading home for his birthday. We had toured COMDEX but mostly we enjoyed being in Vegas; me, more than Luke. Vegas was not Luke’s town. But we always had a good time together and had been traveling together for business for nearly five years. We met up with Tony and Carol for a performance of ‘0’ at the Bellagio and Tony checked one last time at the VIP Office to confirm that all was OK with McCain’ s reservations.

The next day after spending the morning doing office work on the phone and computer, I met up with Tony in his room at his hotel. “Where’s Carol?”  I asked. “She’s shooting craps with McCain,” he told me. I laughed. “Really?”  “Oh Yea,” he said. “They’ve done this before. He loves for her to throw the dice. He keeps her there for hours.”

Carol Dorian was a very lovely blonde with a fun-loving, good time, easy-going, good-natured, attitude about life. She was going to make Tony an excellent political wife if he ever asked her, which she wanted desperately. She had one small annoying habit which was that she always called him “Baby”. It was less annoying coming from her than from another woman, but she said it a lot. I remained a huge Carol Dorian fan. If he could bring himself to propose and stop cheating on her theirs might be one great political marriage.

I had been with him through a string of terrible girlfriends; including the Whitney disaster. Whitney Todd was Gov. Christie Todd Whitman’s niece for whom he had purchased a ring and proposed. She of course declined.  What a cheating bitch she turned out to be. We all hated her. She cheated on him and lied and did it again. And he kept going back. She had him on a string for two years.

He dated one girl named Meredith. He dated her for two weeks and yet had forgotten or never knew her last name. He was of course now embarrassed to ask. Naturally, I proposed an idea. I had not yet met her. He would introduce me. Everyone knew I did not abide these new informal ways; I always introduce myself by my full name. I would do so with Meredith and she would be forced to reciprocate. He said great idea. We rushed out of his apartment and walked down Fifth Ave to Benetton, where she worked.

We walked in and Tony said, "Meredith this is my friend, Russell.” In a loud voice, enunciating clearly, I said, “Russell Harding, great to meet you.” She responded weakly, “Hi, I’m Meredith.” I even followed with, “I didn’t catch your last name.” But she had moved on from me and was on to Tony. Oh well.

We found Carol at the craps table shooting for McCain. It was sure a funny sight. He was calmly urging her on and the other gamblers were calling her by name telling her which point to hit. She was hitting it too. Tony told me that McCain really believed that Carol was lucky.

After a few minutes of this Tony said, “John, Carol’s gotta go with us for the day.” The crowd groaned. I laughed. It was a surreal thing. “No, no.  She has to stay and roll for me,” McCain pleaded. “No John, I have to go with the boys,” Carol told him. At this point Tony introduced me. We left shortly thereafter.

We spent the day casino hopping, gambling and shopping. When I dropped them back off at their hotel I had to retrieve something from their room. Making our way through the casino to the elevators, sure enough what should we see but Sen. McCain shooting dice. “Jesus Christ”, I said. “How can he do that? He’s been standing there for eight straight hours.” “That’s nothing,” Tony reminded me jokingly. “He was at the Hanoi Hilton for five years.” “Wow, that’s true,” I said somberly, remembering who I was with. Standing for eight hours must be nothing for him.  After going back to my hotel and changing, I returned to meet Cindy McCain and the rest. It was my first exposure to McCain with the larger public as we made our way through the crowds.

We were on our way to the Mirage to see Siegfried and Roy. As we made our way out of the hotel the reaction was the same, “Senator it should be you.” Or they would say “Next time, Senator.” That was the universal sentiment heard over and over again. McCain was very at peace outwardly about all this and seemed able to be analytical. He would say “My friends, we have to focus on this election.” Or if he were faced with a republican asking him a hostile Bush question, “My friend, we have to support the party.” If people asked about a particular state in the news, New Mexico for example, he would stop and give his best, honest appraisal. He would mention Bush if appropriate and didn’t seem overtly hostile. No bitterness came from him ‘publicly’. That would come privately and only briefly at dinner.

We had a very fine booth at the show and had our picture taken. It was all very cheesy. But even kitsch has its place – Hey it’s Vegas. McCain seemed taken afterward with how they achieved some of the tricks and we discussed it. When we got outside Tony approached a limo as the cab line was very long and Cindy was on a cane having recently undergone hip surgery. Tony flashed a wad of bills, mentioned McCain’s name (the money did more than the senator’s name) and we were off to dinner at Prime.

I enjoyed talking to him because I had worked in the Senate for two years. We discussed my old boss, Al D’Amato - he clearly did not care for Alfonse. I think he was holding that against me at the beginning of our dinner conversation. Then the subject turned to campaign finance. I tread very carefully here. Rudy supported McCain-Feingold although I had written him briefing memos when I worked at City Hall explaining why he should oppose it.

Campaign finance reform as McCain articulated it was a virulent form of restraint of speech.  Clearly unconstitutional as far as my understanding went and I had made an impassioned plea to Rudy against it when I had written his briefing memo for his first meeting with McCain. I had tried to win him over subsequently but Rudy like on so many issues of national and foreign policy importance with which he has no interest, just went along because somebody asked him a favor; in this case McCain during their first meeting at City Hall. He gave it no thought and said “Sure.” It was in no way in keeping with a larger Giuliani philosophy, if there were one.  But McCain asked and he said “No Problem.” A terrible way to make policy and so completely different than how he approached policymaking on local matters.

I asked McCain about the prospects for the legislation. I didn’t mention Sen. McConnell (R-KY), its chief opponent, but McCain launched into a vicious diatribe against him. He clearly hated the man. Had no respect, not only for his position on the issue, but for his intellect. “He’s an idiot,” McCain said. “His tactics are abhorrent.” McConnell was a hero to me. Anything he did to fight against this nonsense was ok by me. But I was being polite, so I said nothing provocative. We talked a lot about the election, Rudy issues, and Tony and McCain did some business.

The funniest part of the evening came at the end of dinner when Cindy McCain announced her hip was hurting her and she was going to skip desert and go upstairs. Carol said, “I have some really good painkillers upstairs, let me get them for you.” Tony and I shot each other looks. What could she be thinking asking her that? “No, no honey”, Cindy said. “I’m fine; I’m just going to bed. John, you stay here.” “No, really”, Carol persisted, “they’re really good painkillers. It’s no problem. I’ll walk out with you. I can get them.” I kicked Tony hard. “Honestly, Carol, I’m fine. Thank you,” Cindy said. She got up and walked out. McCain followed to use the men’s room.

Tony was always, at all times, patient with Carol. “Carol, during the campaign Cindy revealed she had had an addiction to painkillers. It became a big campaign issue,” he explained. “She actually stole them from a hospital she worked in to feed her habit at one point,” I added. “Oh my God,” Carol exclaimed. “I can’t believe I was pushing them on her.” Tony and I started cracking up. “God, you wouldn’t stop,” Tony said. Carol hit him in the arm. “Baby, stop. It’s not funny. I kept going on and on. I wouldn’t shut up.”  Tony and I just kept laughing.

McCain came back and we changed the subject. We spent the next hour sipping coffee, aperitifs and talking about the campaign just past. McCain finally opened up on his feelings about the Bush Campaign and the election albeit briefly and said, “I’d like to think I would have closed this deal without this God awful mess.” Although he considers himself first and last a patriot and it clearly saddened him to see the country go through this, I think he was absolutely bemused to watch these Bush people scramble around.

We left Prime and McCain was as always wished well and encouraged to think about ‘O4’ by the crowds we passed.  He humbly spoke of the present when anyone mentioned the future.

We gathered the next morning for more craps. It became obvious that McCain did this often and had a real taste for dice. He also didn’t seem to win very often since they had landed in Vegas. He was right though. Only when Carol threw did he seem to make any money.

Tony reminded me that Cindy’s money came from her father’s beer distributorship in Arizona and John made use of that for gambling. He was not personally a wealthy man.

We had breakfast together and they were going home to Sedona to get back to the kids. The three of us weren’t staying much longer and were taking different flights back to New York. It had been a strange two days with Sen. McCain.

Caught in Las Vegas with a man who could have very easily been at that moment selecting cabinet members back east in D.C. Instead, he was opening up about the election, the candidate, and most scathingly the man who would one day become his majority leader.

How kitschy to sit with McCain and watch Roy put his head in a lion’s mouth or root for boxcars at the Bellagio. I did find it odd, however, that he never seemed concerned about who or how this was all being payed for.  I mean his room, meals and sundries.  Tony's room and the McCain suite were being paid for with my HDC credit card.  It was only because of Tony's gambling that the Bellagio ended up comping his $5,000 hotel bill.  But I believe McCain's charges were on that bill.  I worked in the senate.  There are rules about accepting such things, either from a friend (if that was Tony) or from the hotel if indeed Tony had arranged it with the VIP office so that the hotel would swallow the cost for McCain from the outset.  I thought it strange that these things never came up.

He and Rudy would one day find themselves in combat for the same nomination. But right then McCain was a welcome guest at City Hall. He was given a favored perk that few get and many asked for.

Whenever McCain visited NYC a police car escort would meet him at the airport and be available to him while he was in NYC. Few knew that but it was always available to him once Tony and Weaver cemented their relationship. Tony always made those arrangements. I was in his office on one occasion when he called INTEL (the NYPD unit assigned to protect the mayor) to confirm McCain’s flight and to make sure he was met. As head of Inter-Governmental Affairs in the first Giuliani Administration I received dozens of requests from visiting elected officials who assumed it was a matter of simply asking to have a police escort in NYC. I had to inform them that we did not do that ever, unless it was a matter of urgent security and then the PD would determine that.

It was a vanity thing, of course. But we didn’t do it. I know of no other official who received that kind of treatment.  But once McCain and Rudy became friendly and especially once Tony and Weaver started doing business regularly the police started showing up for McCain always.

I dined with Sen. McCain on one other occasion.  He was in NY and Rudy invited him to dinner.  Tony asked me to go along and I did so gladly.  We went to Da Nico.  One of Tony's favored restaurants.  The Senator was kind enough to remember me.

POSTSCRIPT:

During the Republican primaries of ‘08’ Rudy decided that he had been wrong about McCain-Feingold.  It wasn’t surprising to me since I knew first-hand that his original support was not based on anything substantive.  His reversal was not based on anything principled either other than a calculated decision that the conservative base in the early primary states was firmly opposed and no one in the party supported the legislation anyway, including those on the Supreme Court.

He had only supported it, like so much of his past support on national issues, as an off-hand gesture to a friend or supporter without any larger thought or research.  A bad precedent for a once hopeful nominee of a national party.

ADDENDUM: During the course of the federal investigation into my HDC expenses, this trip came under intense scrutiny. The prosecutor began a seperate investigation of Tony Carbonetti with the intent of indicting him for misuse of federal funds and conspiracy. Tony's room charges at the Bellagio (which I believe included McCain's) came to over $5,000. Tony ended up hiring Bob Morvillo of Martha Stewart fame to represent him. This dragged on for months. As much as the prosecutor desperately wanted to indict Tony, at the end of the day HDC hadn't been out any money since the Bellagio comped the bill. Tony and Morvillo convinced her that no monies had been misspent, since no monies had been expended, and Tony had every right given his job to be there, even at HDC expense. To my knowledge, and I could be mistaken, I do not believe the prosecution was ever aware of the McCain involvement. In any event, the prosecutor eventually backed off Tony and let the matter drop. Was it because there was no case, Rudy pressure to save his Chief of Staff or am I in fact mistaken and the McCain connection raised this to too high a level? On this, I cannot provide you with any answers, only questions.