I’m quoted in the Bismarck Tribune today in an article by Jon Rivoli about bloggers and access to presidential campaigns.  Jon called me and asked me a few questions about a request I made to have a brief one-on-one interview with Rudy Giuliani while he was in the state recently for a fund raiser. 

In the article, Rivoli makes it sound like the Giuliani campaign told me I couldn’t come to the entire event.  He quotes me as saying “I would definitely have taken a day off to go down there.” And that’s true, I would have taken a day off to go to the event if I’d landed an interview with Giuliani.  But that didn’t work out (the campaign told me they couldn’t do it, which I took to mean that they didn’t have enough time for it), so I decided just going to the event itself wasn’t worth a trip all the way down to Fargo and back.

Which, frankly, is like eight hours of driving for me.

I didn’t find Giuliani’s decision not to do an interview with me all that surprising.  He’s the Republican Presidential front-runner.  I’m a blogger who, to be perfectly honest, isn’t all that thrilled at the idea of a Giuliani presidency.  If I were him, I’m not sure I’d have done the interview either.  Being me, I of course think he should have absolutely done it.  But then I’m not blind to the practical realities of the situation either.