Rudy could never win the GOP nomination. I don't know why the Republicans here like him when he's way more liberal than Arlen Specter who they loathe so much.
It is partly his persona.
He carries himself like a leader. He LED on 9/11. He LED New York City out of the toilet. Specter on the other hand is a Senator, and Senators (probably unfairly) are hard to like because they just vote and never get a chance to lead.
It is also partly his opponents.
People like Sharpton and Sarandon protested Rudy's actions to clean up NYC and we view him as the opposite of those people because they were his highest profile opponents. But Specter's opponents have been Robert Bork and Pat Toomey, people we tend to like.
It is also partly his emphasis.
Rudy emphasized his tough-on-crime postions and his opposition to pornography on street corners. Much like Nixon, he was liked by blue-collar social conservtives because he emphasized things like fighting crime instead of his more liberal social policies. Specter on the other hand, seem to emphasize the areas where he is not one of us. He emphasizes abortion. He emphasizes high taxes. If he highlighted his more conservative side, we'd like him more. It is similar to McCain. If McCain emphasized his hawkish and pro-life side, we'd like him more. But he tied himself in our eyes to opposing a tax cut and pushing McCain-Feingold.
Finally, it is expectations.
We never expect to win things like New York mayor, because it is such a Demcoratic town. We EXPECT to win Senate races in PA, and when Specter sits next to Santorum, he looks like a drug dealer who performs gay marriages in his spare time to most Republicans. However, Rudy was more conservative than anything we expected to get, so he seems great. It looks even better when we compare him to Bloomberg, the Arlen Specter of New York.
