It turns out Rudy Giuliani was in town Friday. I had heard, though only unofficially, that he was coming for a fundraiser. But there was no media advisory or advance information to local media about Friday's event at a private home.

There was, though, a hastily arranged media availability. I wasn't invited. But I won't take it personally. Maybe signals got crossed. But I would have liked to cover Giuliani. Every other presidential candidate who has come to the Seattle area organized at least brief meetings with local reporters.;

But some people got the message. Stefan Sharkansky apparently did and has what looks to be the most indepth report of Giuliani's comments. The partial transcript Sharkansky provides includes this analysis of the race by the former New York mayor.

The other reason I'm running is I think I have the best chance of any of the Republicans to win. Because Republicans cannot go into the next election like we have the last two or three, giving away New York, California, Washington, Oregon, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Michigan, Illinois. These are all states which the Republicans haven't won for the last two or three elections and we virtually give them away in a strategy of appealing only to what we think of as our base. So then what happens? It comes down to a single-state election. One state gets to decide who the President is. And if that goes wrong you have Al Gore or Kerry [citing Florida 2000 and Ohio 2004, neither of which will necessarily be Republican in 2008.] We need a Republican who can put in play some of the other states that we give away in order to have a chance to win. And I need to convince the Republican Party, particularly those who disagree with me in the Republican Party, that Ronald Reagan is correct - that your 80% friend is not your 20% enemy. And we may not agree on everything but we sure agree on the critical things and I believe the critical things are what I said at the very beginning, are the two big things: what are we going to do against the terrorists. Are we going to get that right or wrong? and what are we going to do about our economy, domestic and foreign. Are we going to get that right or wrong? Because the rest of the things we can kind of work out. But if we get those wrong, we're in really bad shape.

Stefan says he talked to the candidate at the private fundraiser.

CLARIFICATION: No, I was incorrect. Stefan says he listened to the candidate's remarks at the fundraiser.