2008: Let the Games Begin

Former NYC Mayor Rudy Giuliani has formed his Presidential Exploratory Committee. On Sunday, Arizona Sen. John McCain said he was taking the initial step in that direction.

Under federal election law, an exploratory committee allows an individual to travel and gauge the level of support for a candidacy without formally declaring themselves a candidate and adhering to all the federal rules of fundraising. An individual who spends money only to test the waters -- but not to campaign for office -- does not have to register as a candidate under the election law.

The GOP field is expected to grow with other presidential hopefuls, among them Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney, Sen. Bill Frist of Tennessee, Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee and New York Gov. George Pataki.

Democratic Gov. Tom Vilsack of Iowa has filed to establish a full-blown campaign committee and will make a more formal announcement of his candidacy later this month.

Giuliani has said for months that he would wait until after the 2006 elections to decide whether to embark on a White House bid. The former mayor is a moderate who supports gun control, same-sex civil unions, embryonic stem-cell research and abortion rights -- stands that would put him at odds with the majority of the GOP conservative base.

In 2006, the Giuliani brand remained strong. He headlined fundraisers for Republican candidates nationwide, and his travel has done little to deny 2008 ambitions.

Naturally, the media immediately seeks to divide the GOP by citing Giuliani's stance on certain issues, as noted above. Indeed, those positions would be difficult to overcome when it's the base who votes in primaries. Still, you can throw out any notion of George Pataki and Bill Frist.

Pataki was inept in his final term as New York Governor -- the NY GOP is in shambles -- and Frist was rolled time and again by Democrats in his stint as Senate Majority Leader.

Huckabee is an unknown quantity from my view in the Northeast, but I will say I like many of the qualities both Mitt Romney and Newt Gingrich bring to the field.

Still, at this extremely early juncture, I do not see a dream candidate that would electrify the GOP.

Getting back to Giuliani, however, none of his moderate or even liberal stances on some issues overrides the chief concern of our times -- national security -- without which nothing else even matters.

The media and the Left can chirp all they want about gay marriage, gun control and abortion, their most sacrosanct of all issues, but in the big picture, those issues are insignificant.

I'd like to know any thoughts people have and who they would prefer at this point in time.