Rudy Giuliani has been having a bad month.

First, his longtime buddy and protege Bernard Kerik, who he made police commissioner of New York, gave a job in his firm, and nominated for the top job in the Department of Homeland Security, was indicted on 16 counts of "bribery, tax fraud, and obstruction of justice."

Kerik's sleaziness is old news, but now Giuliani is being forced to ask other cronies to keep him from calling up the "old crowd" in his defense, which might be tough considering this photographic gem:

Have you ever seen a two men kiss a baby less convincingly? I think they could give Lord Voldemort and Wormtail a run for their money.

As if that weren't enough, then we found out that Giuliani is a compulsive liar. Michael Cooper of the New York Times reports,

Discussing his crime-fighting success as mayor, Mr. Giuliani told a television interviewer that New York was “the only city in America that has reduced crime every single year since 1994.” In New Hampshire this week, he told a public forum that when he became mayor in 1994, New York “had been averaging like 1,800, 1,900 murders for almost 30 years”…

All of these statements are incomplete, exaggerated or just plain wrong… For instance, another major American city claims to have reduced crime every year since 1994: Chicago. New York averaged 1,514 murders a year during the three decades before Mr. Giuliani took office; it did not record more than 1,800 homicides until 1980…

An examination of many of his statements by The New York Times, other news organizations and independent groups have turned up a variety of misstatements, virtually all of which cast Mr. Giuliani or his arguments in a better light. “He’s given us a lot of work up until now,” said Brooks Jackson, the director of Annenberg Political Fact Check, which… correct[s] statements by candidates in both parties.

Lest you think Giuliani is only unreliable on crime statistics, a quick survey of FactCheck.org reveals that he's just as disingenous on tort reform, socialized health care, taxes, and every aspect of his record of NYC mayor. As Mitt Romney, who has all but taken Giuliani's place as GOP heir apparent, noted, "[Giuliani] has now done this time and again, making up facts that just happen to be wrong, and facts are stubborn things."

But Giuliani's month still managed to get a heckuva lot worse this Wednesday, when Politico.org revealed that he paid for security details while visiting his mistress-turned-third-wife by hiding them in the accounts of obscure city agencies.

The mayoral costs had nothing to do with the functions of the little-known city offices that defrayed his tabs, including agencies responsible for regulating loft apartments, aiding the disabled and providing lawyers for indigent defendants.

Receipts show him in Southampton [where Judith lived] every weekend in August and the first weekend in September of 2001, before the terror attacks of Sept. 11 disrupted the routines of his city.

It is impossible to say which of the 11 Long Island trips indicated by credit card receipts were to visit Nathan and which were for other purposes. Eight of those trips, however, were not noted on Giuliani's official schedule.

The billing practices... drew formal attention [when] the city comptroller wrote [to the newly elected mayor, Michael Bloomberg.

One of his auditors... had stumbled upon the unexplained travel expenses during a routine audit of the Loft Board, a tiny branch of city government that regulates certain apartments. Broadening the inquiry, the comptroller wrote, auditors found similar expenses at a range of other unlikely agencies: $10,054 billed to the Office for People With Disabilities and $29,757 to the Procurement Policy Board.

The next year, yet another obscure department, the Assigned Counsel Administrative Office, was billed around $400,000 for travel.

[Before] Thomson took office in 2002, "The Comptroller's Office made repeated requests for the information in 2001 and 2002 but was informed that, due to security concerns, the information could not be provided," said a spokesman for the comptroller.

Why aren't the other candidates taking notice? The Republicans, now focused on Romney and Huckabee, have no time to kick their old ringleader while he's down; the Democrats don't see him as a threat (and probably hope that Republican primary voters' misguided notions about his "electability" will cause them to offer him up to Hillary Clinton, like a lamb to slaughter). This is a story that just occasionally comes up with new developments, instead of being condensed into the single damning account that it really is.

Maybe that's a good thing. As long as voters know what a dangerous (yet patently ridiculous) figure Giuliani is, I would personally be thrilled to see him on the Republican ticket next November. But if they don't -- well -- "Anything But Bush" might not apply here, because I suspect Rudy will be worse. Anyone up for Canada?