I'm shocked about Rudy. I really thought he was going to make it all the way.

People told me I was crazy. They said, "Jake, he's done no campaigning in any state outside of Florida, they're going to understand he's pretty much using them with all the skill of a four-year-old wielding a jackhammer," but I stood by him, because Rudy was my man.

Some folks thought I was just plain hypnotized. That the constant barrage of fear mongering and "9/11, 9/11, 9/11" had destroyed my fragile little brain, but I didn't care. Rudy was my man, and that was all there was to it.

It didn't matter that all of New York hated him. As a New Yorker, I knew that the country rarely followed our fashions anyway. And the fact that he'd effectively killed the New York City Fire Fighters by splitting the radio frequencies, so when the cops heard that the building was coming down the fire fighters didn't--that barely phased me at all. Rudy was a hero. The newspapers had told me so.

How is it that such a brilliant plan--only campaigning in one state on one issue on one lie--can go awry? Why is it that Rudy couldn't make it? I don't understand. Maybe... maybe I never will.