IMO.

This [link|http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/01/02/AR2007010200557.html|Washington Post] story mentions his campaign's claim that the document was pilfered from some luggage that was missing for a few days. If that turns out to be true, it may backfire on whoever took it.

All of the stuff in that document would have come out anyway. It coming out now lets him claim that it's "old news" when he gets asked about it.

Rudy has a lot of skeletons, but so did Bush. Whether he has a chance depends on his competition and how nasty the campaign is.

It's still way too early for something like this to have much of an impact on the real campaign for 2008. And you don't really think that Bush (or any other president) personally carries the [link|http://www.globalsecurity.org/wmd/systems/nuclear-football.htm|Football] around with them, do you? ;-)

Cheers,
Scott.

Rudy has ridden the 9/11 train pretty far, but I agree that it's not going to take him to the White House (as things stand now). It's strange that his actions in the last few weeks before he left office have come to dominate his media persona.

I think any Republican is going to have a really tough time winning the Presidency in 2008. The liberal and moderate parts of the party have been decimated since ~ 1980, and the "conservatives" have made such a mess of things that it would be very difficult for them to overcome the bias against them in the electorate at large. A sensible Democrat should win by a large margin.

But, <begin mantra> it depends on who the other candidates are </mantra>.

Cheers,
Scott.