That's what Rudy Giuliani wants you to believe:

Rudy reaches deep into his bag of terrorism tactics to pull this one out, but Rudy is desperate to take the public's mind off of his health, and make them fearful of their own well-being instead.

Moving on from the subject of his health to yours, former New York Mayor Rudy Giuliani will launch his first national TV ad tomorrow, an ad featuring TIME Magainze's 2001 Man of the Year discussing terrorism and invoking the Sept. 11 attacks.

The ad was cut and distributed to the morning TV shows before an explosion took the life of former Pakistani Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto. Polls indicate that Republicans trust Giuliani to handle terrorism more than any other candidate -- even here in Iowa where Giuliani is in a four-way dead heat for third place.

"The Islamic terrorists would make a terrible mistake if they confuse our democracy for weakness," Giuliani says in the ad, in a close-up of his face interspersed with images of World War II, Iowa Jima, jesse Owens, and 9/11.. "Our democracy means we disagree with each other, but when you come and try and take away from us our freedom, when you try and come here and kill our people, we're one and we're going to stand up to you and we're going to prevail."

The ad will run on Fox News Channel nationally, starting Friday, and on local TV in New Hampshire and South Carolina. As of now it will not run in Iowa, where the caucuses will be held in seven days.

It's just more of the standard scare tactics used by the GOP in the 2004 elections, and Rudy is using his (unearned and false) public position as a tough on terrorism candidate to terrorize Americans into voting for him.

The American victims hardest hit by the terrorist tactics of al-Qaeda et al. are those who will quiver at the "they're coming to kill you" message conveyed by Rudy - but this will hurt Rudy's position with moderates who correctly see the War on Terror as a farce. In the end, I predict, this ad will do nothing to move Rudy forward and if anything may give McCain a boost.

The ad is aimed at Giuliani's base, and in attempting to preach to the Giuliani choir Rudy is showing desperation - he's trying to hold onto voters who were firmly in his camp until the recent scare over his health.

"If you don't vote for me you'll die" is about as desperate a message as you could convey, but leave it to the Republicans...