Perhaps the most annoying part of Rudy Giuliani's Presidential campaign is the candidate's insistent flogging of 9/11, of the dead of that day and of the heroism of others. Giuliani has managed, with remarkably little public questioning, to clutch at the heartstrings of the nation, and to channel grief and horror into a narrative that places his aspirations to advancement squarely in the center of the national consciousness.

If you think you've seen this before, you have: Giuliani's maneuvering recalls nothing so much as George Bush's 2000 positioning as 'a uniter, not a divider', a branding effort born out of a deliberate misrepresentation of his record in Texas. Of course, then as now, the press disseminated the glowing falsehoods and drowned out any facts that might sow discord with the comfortable storyline. Then as now, the actual record of a republican candidate is one of cronyism and incompetence.

This time around, however, there are some uncomfortable questions occasioned by a pile of corpses sitting squarely on the former mayor's doorstep. These are, of course, the firefighters that rushed into the burning towers on 9/11 with malfunctioning radios, to be killed in their hundreds.

The Real Rudy is taking on the history and asking some questions that the former mayor's speechifying and truthiness have failed to address.

The Albany Project sums up:

Do you remember Franz Kafta's haunting very short story "The Hunger Artist?" (Click here for an etext). I thought of it while Queens Council Member
Eric Gioia tried to live for a week on an average food stamp allotment of $28. Was it a publicity stunt? Well yes, but in a good cause. The cause, however, is in danger of getting lost.

As it turns out, the way food stamp allotments calculated has not changed in a long while leaving their value diminished and recipients on line at the food pantry. The progressive Fiscal Policy Institute has issued

If you missed it, and want to review live blogging of the DMI meeting on congestion-pricing click here The live blog isn’t a transcript, but it catches most of the highlights. The brightest spot: NYC Central Labor Council Director Ed Ott compares good sex with good outcomes of the congestion pricing debate: No one agrees on what it is but it’s what you do up front that counts. He wants mass transit improvements especially many more buses up front.

Deputy Mayor Nicky Gavron’s presentation seemed clear, but curiously flat. In the question period, she pointed to my personal bugbear – the potential unfairness of the fees on lower income people. She said that, in London, some of the fee proceeds were used to provide free public transit for young, old and, perhaps in the future the poor. In that, all of the panelist agreed: we’re at the beginning of needed discussion and that the Mayor’s plaNYC 2030 is a first step. I'm convinced.

Mr. Ott and Council Member Eric Gioia made, to my mind, the most important point -- and one that I previously didn't get: we are already paying for congestion but in insane and unplanned ways.

Discussion about Mayor Bloomberg’s congestion pricing proposal has been clogging the pipes of the internet for days now. Have you registered to attend the Drum Major Institute’s morning forum at NYU’s Kimmel Center? It features London Deputy Mayor
Nicky Gavron and a home-team of thoughtful New Yorkers: Kathryn Wylde, Partnership for NYC, President; Ed Ott of the Central Labor Council; and Queens NYC Council Members Eric Gioia and (Transportation Committee Chair) John C. Liu

FRIDAY, MAY 18, 2007 8:30 a.m. - 10:30 a.m.
Kimmel Center at New York University
Rosenthal Pavilion
60 Washington Square South, 10th Floor
New York, NY 10012

RSVP required: dmi@drummajorinstitute.org

There's also a Queens meeting Tues. night with Bruce Schaller long after the jump. Those of you who want to prepare have time to read studies, polls and commentaries by the dozen.