There are three certainties about life in the United States: death, taxes, and the predictably explosive reaction of Americans to the mistreatment of dogs. With the latest revelations that New York residents paid the NYPD to walk the dog of Giuliani mistress-turned-third wife Judith Nathan, the mushrooming scandal surrounding Rudy's Tryst Fund is about to go to the dogs.
As Talking Points Memo highlighted this morning, Giuliani's surreptitious taxpayer-funded Hampton frolics weren't limited to those 11 trips to Judith Nathan's Hampton love-nest. As it turns out, New York's Finest were in essence deployed as Nathan's domestic servants, all on the taxpayer's nickel:

• It paid for hotel and other expenses for mayoral aides -- in addition to the security detail -- who also went with the mayor to the Hamptons on the tryst weekends.
• Nathan's NYPD-chauffeured trips (without Rudy) to visit her parents in Pennsylvania, 130 miles outside the city.
• NYPD detectives and city-owned undercover Dodge to drive Nathan around the city.
• NYPD detectives and city-owned undercover Dodge to drive Nathan's friends and family around the city even when she wasn't in the car.
• NYPD security detail for Nathan, personally approved by Bernard Kerik.
• NYPD cops to walk Nathan's dog.

But the story Rudy's dog day afternoon doesn't end there. As it turns out, Judith Nathan's has a sordid history of mistreating of dogs for fun and profit. As the New York Post reported in April:

Judith Giuliani once demonstrated surgical products for a controversial medical-supply company that used dogs - which were later killed - in operations whose only purpose was to sell equipment to doctors.

That kind of animal cruelty far surpasses Mitt Romney's rooftop canine waterboarding or even Michael Vick's notorious dog fighting rings. (There, the dogs at least had a theoretical chance of surviving.) No, the butchery of the third Mrs. Giuliani puts her in the same terroritory as physician and former Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist. As you'll recall, Frist was a frequent visitor to animal shelters where the future Doctor adopted stray cats only to dissect them later as part of his learn-at-home medical studies. (Should Rudy win the White House, Judith Nathan may well be known by the new title, "Frist Lady.")
Of course, Giuliani's efforts to conceal his NYPD-financed romps with Nathan remain at the heart of the scandal. But once man's best friend, whether overlap pampered or viciously brutalized, enter the picture, Americans will be sure to take notice. And his chances of his surviving the imbroglio may indeed be going to the dogs.