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“This excessive concern for little weasels is a sickness.”

Jill

…so does that mean that Rudy will be leaving the Republican party?

A lot of you have probably seen this, but some background for those who have missed out: As mayor of New York, Rudy Giuliani hosted a call-in radio show where concerned New Yorkers could chat with him. A ferret-o-phile phoned in one day to take issue with a New York City law outlawing ferret ownership. That call wasn’t recorded and didn’t make it on the air, so he called back some time later. Giuliani, per usual, is a complete asshole. This is the audio of the phone call, with animation by Slate:

If Rudy loses the Presidential race, perhaps he can take over for Dr. Phil.

Thanks to Mike for the video.

31 thoughts on “This excessive concern for little weasels is a sickness.”

  1. Holy mother of crap, I think my Asshole Meter just exploded in a hail of high-velocity shrapnel. What the SHIT?

    I could hardly understand what the caller was trying to say, so I can’t tell if he is a bit weird or not, BUT FOR PETE’S SAKE. Was it completely necessary to end the call and then insult him for a whole minute straight while the guy is now unable to defend himself?

    Even the most assholish of radio jocks know where to laugh and move on already.

  2. So if Giuliani becomes president, will his first move be to outlaw ferrets?

    In all seriousness though..what an idiot.

  3. So concern for animals is pointless? Interesting. I can just hear him lamenting that Michael Vick got a bum rap for his dogfighting charges. Except that wouldn’t happen, because Vick is black and Giuliani is a closet racist.

  5. I think there are a disturbingly large number of Americans who will not see Giuliani as an asshole, even in this exchange. I’m also a bit puzzled as to the selection of an animation which basically substantiates Giuliani’s POV in the call and makes the caller seem like a loon.

  6. Charlie-
    With Guiliani’s response to Diallo and Louima, just how is his racism closeted? Or is it just not covered appropriately by the media? Aaarghhh. Not questioning you, must the MSM coverage.

  7. wow fuck him.

    besides the fact that the caller’s concern had less to do with ferrets than it did with state and city law conflict (then again i’m drunk so i might not have understood it that well i don’t know).

  8. I think you got the crux of it Lorelei, so you must not be that drunk. And don’t tell Guiliani that you’re drunk as I’m sure he’ll never stop giving you an earful about your obsession and how its damaging you and you need to see a therapist.

    What a arrogant jerk. He simply didn’t want to deal with the legal conflict that the caller brought up, plain and simple.

    “So President Guiliani, when will you lift the national state of emergency, the people can’t even go outside after dark without facing arrest.”

    “What’s your problem? That people can’t go outside after dark? Do you know how dangerous that is? You know, we’ve got bigger issues as stake here and frankly, its past 8 o’clock, you should be at home now, so go home and stop obsessing about the people. They’re just people, understand? You have a problem, you should see a therapist, we’ve got work to do protecting this country and all you care about is the people! You really need some help and I’m here to tell you what people close to you won’t….”

    He should have had a stint as Georgie’s press secretary.

  9. So, what is Rudy’s problem w/ ferrets? Some sort of childhood pet store trauma that leads him to ban the critters and viciously attack anyone who admits to liking ’em? I would like to know what state law the ban violates…

  10. Well, to be fair, I don’t think Giuliani banned ferrets. It’s a city law that has something to do with a fear of them escaping and turning into rabid rat-like creatures who will eat babies or something. The caller wants to be able to have a ferret and live in NYC.

    All that said, Giuliani is still an asshole, and didn’t have to be so unnecessarily mean.

  11. There’s more information on the ban on ferrets on this website which I think might be the site of the caller. I had no idea ferrets were illegal here, and I know people who have them a pets elsewhere. Ironically, I remember when I was a kid everyone started wanting a pet ferret because of this book Zucchini, about a boy and his ferrett, which is set in NYC. That book was from the 80s, and I guess they’ve only been illegal here since 1999; I can see being mad if I had a pet ferret since before then who became an outlaw.

  12. Oh, and it looks like a City Council member tried to get the ban overturned, and almost succeeded in passing the bill, except for a Giuliani veto. That’s probably why the ferret owners don’t like him.

  13. Wild animals are banned within city limits, IIRC, and ferrets may fit under that ban.

    Oh, God, Giuliani and the ferret guy. And that’s not even the worst of his obsessions. When New York Magazine bought ads on the sides of buses that said something like, “New York Magazine: Possibly the only good thing in the city Rudy hasn’t taken credit for,” he had them taken off the buses. And then the city lost the subsequent lawsuit. He also sued the Brooklyn Museum over the Chris Ofili Blessed Virgin Mary painting (which, contrary to popular belief — a belief that was due in large part to Giuliani’s lies — was not “smeared” with elephant dung; the dung was rolled into balls and lacquered and affixed to the painting). He lost that one, too. Side benefit — that little escapade launched Bill Donohue’s career as a professional scold.

    Then there was his crackdown on nightlife, accomplished in large part by yanking the liquor license of any bar that didn’t have a cabaret license where anyone danced at all.

    And if you’re going to talk about Louima and Diallo, you shouldn’t leave out mention of Patrick Dorismond, who was approached by narcotics officers offering to sell him something. He refused, they persisted, there was an altercation, and the officers killed Dorismond. Giuliani, in an effort to smear Dorismond, held a press conference in which he released information from Dorismond’s sealed juvenile record (Dorismond had no record as an adult), and, if I’m not mistaken, said that this was no altar boy. Which turned out to be false, since he had in fact been an altar boy.

  14. NYC: home of infamous rats.
    Ferrets: bold, and cute, hunters of rats.

    I’m not seeing why ferrets are a problem here.

  15. Wow. I never liked Rudy til now. Haha that was awesome!!!! So cool that a politician can talk to people like that without kissing ass like most do.

  16. Wow. I never liked Rudy til now. Haha that was awesome!!!! So cool that a politician can talk to people like that without kissing ass like most do.

    And in the process, Rudy became like most politicians who forget that as mayor, his job is to work for all New Yorkers….not only those among his supporters or the like-minded.

    Then there was his crackdown on nightlife, accomplished in large part by yanking the liquor license of any bar that didn’t have a cabaret license where anyone danced at all.

    Zuzu,

    A similar thing happened in the Boston area in the late 1990’s due to a city-wide crackdown on bars serving alcohol to underaged college students. Several bars that used to be fixtures across the street from a friend’s campus quad were completely shut down by the city government for that very reason. I also noticed that the campus police searching college-aged students carrying duffel bags to see if they were carrying alcohol inside. This was a complete change from the time I last visited in the mid-1990’s.

  17. “And in the process, Rudy became like most politicians who forget that as mayor, his job is to work for all New Yorkers….not only those among his supporters or the like-minded.”

    I’ve never really understood statements like this. Isn’t the point of democracy that people are elected who represent the majority’s interest? If he does a bad job at that, they un-elect him. Does a politician have to “work for” the Ku Klux Klan or less extremely anti-affirmative action people even though he was elected on a platform of racial justice? If not, how would you distinguish that from what happened here? It’s phony if a politician pretends to represent more than the interests that elected him.

  19. Zuzu: can’t respond to logical argumentation or ….. well I guess there isn’t really any other plausible explanation.

  20. Oh, right, you’re being “logical” when you disingenuously argue that elected officials are only accountable to the people who voted for them rather than the entire electorate, or that they can ignore the interests of an oppressed minority if they represent the interests of the majority. So discrimination is just A-OK if it benefits the white majority.

    Please, show me the support for that position. Because the framers who were concerned about the tyranny of the majority wouldn’t give you a whole lot to point to.

    BTW, the logical result of your position would be that, because women make up more than half of the population, only politicians who represented women’s issues should be elected.

  21. BTW, Awesome, I ran a search for past comments of yours, and I came up with the following names that you’ve used:

    Awesome
    JuniorPartner
    Travis
    Yup
    OhNo
    Jamie’sCryin’
    Timmy

    And this is just since November 8. Any particular reason why you change handles so often? Because that’s rather frowned on here, and will get you banned.

  22. Awesome,

    There was a reason why many framers of the Constitution likened democracy to “mobocracy”. It was precisely because they feared the possibility of tyranny by the majority in power that they chose the Constitutional Republic system of government rather than a democratic one as an attempted check against that.

  23. Wild animals are banned within city limits, IIRC, and ferrets may fit under that ban

    I did find some references suggesting that this is so, but it doesn’t make any sense. The domestic ferret isn’t a newly domesticated critter. They’re not my favorite animals (I don’t like the characteristic odor) but the ferrets I have met were personable and well-behaved, and I have not as of yet been bitten by one (unlike mice, rabbits, guinea pigs, gerbils, cats, dogs, snakes, horses. . .).

  25. My sister just moved out of New York City after living there more than 30 years. She is honestly flabbergasted by the national interest in Giulianni, saying most New Yorkers considered him a clown before 9/11.

  26. Rudy Ghouliani versus ferrets. Now there’s another steel cage deathmatch where I’d be hoping for mutual annihilation…

  27. I looked at the website posted above, and the NYC Department of Health list included a number of animals that are commonly kept as pets outside New York City.

    I like animals, but I don’t think restrictions on ownership of certain pets in a city like New York is a bad idea. My understanding is that a ferret is an animal that can get into small spaces, and that means that if it gets loose in one person’s apartment, it’s likely to turn up in someone else’s apartment.

    Anyway, I felt a little bad for the guy, and didn’t think it was really very diplomatic of Rudy to hang up on him and then continue to lecture the guy on the air, but when you’re mayor of New York, you deal with a lot of people who are a obsessive or fixated on really minor issues, and on the whole, I’d rather have a leader who calls them out instead of one who caters to them. If I thought Rudy would give the same treatment to interests as narrow as the Ferret Society, but better funded, I’d be inclined to throw support behind him.

    Also, a number of his policies did a lot to make the city safer. I know a lot of New Yorkers who like to romanticize the city as it existed in the 70’s and I know a lot of people who complain about the Disney-fication of Times Square or whatever, but I really like that I feel safe in the city, and it is my understanding that Rudy’s policies have a lot to do with that.

    While some find the implications of Giuliani’s anti-crime philosophies to be offensive, and there were several unfortunate police-involved shootings which have been associated with his backing of a more aggressive police force, I think lower crime is good for New York, and even though I’ve never voted for a Republican, I am strongly considering supporting Rudy for president.

  28. My understanding is that a ferret is an animal that can get into small spaces, and that means that if it gets loose in one person’s apartment, it’s likely to turn up in someone else’s apartment

    So can mice (not banned) and domestic rats (not banned). And cats have been known to escape from their apartments as well. In the absence of evidence that feral ferrets (Feral ferrets. Feral ferrets. Say it five times fast) are attacking the unsuspecting in their beds, this ban doesn’t make a whole lot of sense. I know that, if faced with an unknown ferret and an unknown dog running loose, I’d take the ferret every time.
    What really strikes my eye is the comprehensiveness of the banned-animal list, and I am only kept from complete amusement at the notion that some New Yorker is keeping a capybara in their apartment by likewise complete belief that, in the absence of a ban, somebody would. I would not be surprised to find that somebody had.

  29. “Wild animals are banned within city limits, IIRC, and ferrets may fit under that ban.”

    Ferrets have been domesticated since at least classical Greece. They’ve been used for hunting in Europe for an extremely long time, and were once incredibly popular in US cities (like NYC) as ratters, because of the aforementioned prowess at getting into the small spaces where rats and mice like to hide. Giuliani’s pretty widely reviled in ferret-owning circles for his insane behavior regarding them. California’s about as bad; the stories that have come out of that state from ferret-owners are absolutely ridiculous.

    Considering the fact that something along the lines of 98%+ of American domestic ferrets are sold neutered–you have to go to a private breeder to get an intact kit–there’s pretty much zero chance of escaped or released domestics starting up a breeding population. They’ve also, much like mink, been bred to the point of having difficulty surviving on their own. A domestic ferret turned loose to fend for itself is running the same risks as a cat or dog left on its own. Since they’re sensitive to heat in a way cats and dogs aren’t, ferrets in warmer areas are even more people-dependent.

    If you’ve ever actually dealt with ferrets for any period of time, classing them as a wild animal or a threat to people makes about as much sense as doing the same to cats and dogs, and seizing and destroying them on those grounds just as horrific.

  31. Heh. Remember that guy who tried to keep a pet tiger in his NYC apartment? He also had a caiman

    You give ’em a ferret, next thing you know they have a tiger and then a panda and after that it’s anarchy, I tell ya, anarchy.

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