Don Giuliani

摘要

THROUGHOUT October, as Rudy Giuliani was revealed to be the linchpin in President Donald Trump's shadow campaign to convince Ukraine to investigate Joe Biden, the former New York mayor never stopped defending the president. He likened the impeachment inquiry to the Salem witch trials and, on Fox, attempted to pin the Ukraine fiasco on the State Department, the "idiot press," George Soros, and something called "Obamaland." The press proposed various theories to explain how this once-revered eminence had become a maladroit Kent to Trump's deranged King Lear. Some said Giuliani had a misguided sense of loyalty, others that he had been off his rocker since the death of his political consigliere Peter Powers in 2016. In reality, he has been practicing for his role as Trump's chief conspiracist for decades. His entire career has been conducted in shout-driven, near-paranoiac overdrive. As a federal prosecutor in the 1980s, he courted the tabloids, donning a leather jacket to conduct a fake drug deal. He also designed the "perp walk" to parade arrested Wall Street executives before the press. In 2000, he held a somber press conference to announce his divorce even before he told his wife.