Rudy's First TV Ad - "Tested"

Former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani will begin advertising this week in New Hampshire with a commercial that presents him as the man who turned around a crime-ridden and unmanageable city in spite of typical human foibles:

The spot features gritty, black-and-white images of New York — a Harlem movie house marquee and the words, “Sex World;” riot police struggling with an unseen perpetrator — as Mr. Giuliani describes a mess that he inherited: “They used to call it unmanageable, ungovernable. A large majority of New Yorkers wanted to leave and live somewhere else. It was a city that was in financial crisis, a city that was the crime capital of America.”

Then the screen floods with color and brilliant images of New York City — a new-model Volvo cruising along Park Avenue with virtually no traffic and a light-filled and crowd-free Grand Central Terminal — and the music becomes decidedly upbeat.

“By the time I left office, New York City was being proclaimed as the best example of conservative government in the country,” Mr. Giuliani says, adding,

“We turned it into the safest large city in America, the welfare-to-work capital of America, and most importantly, the spirit of the people of the city had changed. Instead of being hopeless, the large majority of people had hope.”

The New York Times finds "Tested" reminiscent of the famous 1984 Reagan reelection ad “Morning in America,” which featured a flag being raised into a blue sky and inspirational music.