Giuliani aide says foes copied, leaked playbook

WASHINGTON – A playbook for Rudolph Giuliani’s possible presidential run – with an embarrassing assessment of his roller-coaster romantic life – was filched from an aide, copied and leaked by his enemies, Giuliani’s camp charged Tuesday.

A spokeswoman for the former mayor said “dirty tricks” were behind a Tuesday report in the New York Daily News detailing a 140-page briefing book that included the statement that “insurmountable” political and personal challenges might force Giuliani to abandon a 2008 bid. Prostate cancer forced Giuliani to quit the 2000 Senate contest against Hillary Rodham Clinton.

Giuliani spokeswoman Sunny Mindel alleged that the book, which had been tucked in an aide’s bag, had mysteriously disappeared from a private jet during one of Giuliani’s cross-country trips for GOP candidates last year.

But she wouldn’t identify any suspects or even the victim of the alleged theft. She would not say whether Giuliani, a former prosecutor, would call for a criminal probe.

Among the possible problems the briefing book said candidate Giuliani might face: his divorce from second wife Donna Hanover, unspecified issues with third wife Judith Nathan Giuliani, conflicts posed by his businesses, and his liberal social positions.

The analysis was “simply someone’s ideas … committed to paper over three months ago” and not an official campaign plan, Mindel said.

Giuliani never saw the book, according to a source familiar with the situation. It was annotated by Giuliani aide Anthony Carbonetti and fundraiser Anne Dickerson, who penned a section calling for a $100 million fundraising blitz in 2007, according to the Daily News.

“It’s amazing it wasn’t locked up in the headquarters. … It was sort of naive,” said an adviser to one of Giuliani’s possible Republican opponents.