Bloomie

Posted by: The Iceman | Nov 8, 2005 9:27:33 AM

Sadly the NYC mayoral election has been a lack luster campaign with no issues ...

From the polls it looks like Mayor Mike will win (has bought) another four year term in office.

Now is the time to call for campaign finanace laws/regulation in both NYC and in New Jersey.

Carpe Diem!

Posted by: Franklin | Nov 8, 2005 9:59:07 AM

Bloomberg's gonna win, so what's the point?

If all Republicans had Mike's pragmatism and lack of ideological hallucination, it would not be half bad being "led" by them. And, it sure would be easier to have civil discourse.

Posted by: aviewfrompinestreet | Nov 8, 2005 10:00:03 AM

John Vliet Lindsay, about whom one of my heroes, W.F. Buckley, said:

"I don't know what John Lindsay has against the State of Connecticut except, perhaps, that he was educated there and he is entirely dissatisfied with the results."

Posted by: Conan the Grammarian | Nov 8, 2005 10:26:43 AM

I guess it would be easier to have a civil discourse with someone you agree with, you wouldn't get angry and call them names.

Posted by: Eddie Shore | Nov 8, 2005 10:28:31 AM

Don't forget, Bloomberg was a lifelong Dem before going elephant to benefit from Rudy's popularity. As a very recent NYC to Baristaville transplant, I have to say I feel Bloomberg has been doing a fine and solid job during a difficult time and has earned his next four.

Posted by: Captain Vegetable | Nov 8, 2005 10:30:40 AM

Who's calling anyone names?

And, to be sure, as Eddie so insightfully observe, when we agree, we're less likely to disagree.

Now go forth and prosper. Civilly.

Posted by: anonymous | Nov 8, 2005 10:39:37 AM

Bloomberg is the best thing that has happened to NYC is my lifetime. Yes, he has spent a lot of money on the re-election campaign. And I'm sure that has hardly swayed the vote at all. He is an independent thinker, beholden to no one, and no group, and has been an unbelievable breath of fresh air (to smokers and nonsmokers alike). I have not agreed with him on all the positions he's taken, but I he is a great fiscal manager and has none of Rudy's bombast and macho bravado. He has done an awesome job. I sincerely doubt that his is going to win the vote -- including quite possibly the Hispanic and Black vote - because of his ads. No. It's because NY is hitting on all cylinders only a few short years after 9/11. Bravo Mayor Mike. If only we had half a good a choice here in the Garden State.

Posted by: montclair_is_crazy | Nov 8, 2005 10:53:07 AM

Ferrer started strong (and clean) with the latino vote, but then divided everyone with his mainstream negative campaign.

Codey was the best choice for NJ.

Posted by: Jim | Nov 8, 2005 11:01:47 AM

Does anyone rember the Republican Armed Occupation of Midtown? And the folks who were whisked to the oil hangar and the Critical Mass cyclists arrested? Bloomberg is all teflon when it comes to the really blatant abuses the police have done under his tenure. At least under Guliani (and I still use his name as an expletive), the police actions were connected to him.

Posted by: UppuhMuhnclrrr (Through Clenched Teeth) and living la vida noisy on Valley Rd | Nov 8, 2005 3:45:02 PM

Yeah, the police abuses in Manhattan under Bloomberg have been shocking. Truly outrageous. Reminds me of Mexico City or Bogata. I'm afraid to leave my office and walk to Penn Station this evening as a matter of fact.

Posted by: montclair_is_crazy | Nov 8, 2005 5:58:30 PM

NYC is not Bogota, but it's not Washington DC either. DC police don't arrest protesters and anyone who looks like a protester and then fudge the evidence against them.

Here's what I'm talking about:

Protest a "Privilege," Says NYC Mayor Bloomberg

by Glenn Thrush, New York Newsday
August 17th, 2004

Mayor Michael Bloomberg, already under fire for his tough stance against anti-GOP protest groups, yesterday suggested that First Amendment rights of free speech and free assembly are "privileges" that could be lost if abused.

Bloomberg, speaking to Republican National Convention volunteers in Manhattan, was trying to downplay concerns that protesters will disrupt this month's convention - when he began articulating a broader constitutional vision.

"People who avail themselves of the opportunity to express themselves ... they will not abuse that privilege," he said at the John Jay College of Criminal Justice. "Because if we start to abuse our privileges, then we lose them, and nobody wants that."

The mayor's comments drew immediate criticism from protest groups and came amid reports that federal agents and city police have been questioning activists, monitoring Web sites and dropping in unannounced on organizational meetings.

"The right to protest is not nor has it ever been a privilege - it is a constitutionally protected right that everybody in this country enjoys," said Leslie Cagan, head of United for Peace and Justice, which has locked horns with the city over its attempt to stage a 250,000-person protest in Central Park. "I have no idea what he's talking about. I'm completely flabbergasted."

article continues: http://www.unitedforpeace.org/article.php?id=2557

Citizen Video Undoes RNC Protest Prosecutions | Emily Gertz

Last summer, New York City police arrested nearly two thousand people during the Republican National Convention. Day after day, the mayor and the chief of police got on the tv and radio news, condemning protestors for "rioting," "resisting arrest," and generally causing mayhem that dimmed the event's sheen before the nation. Meanwhile, arrestees began emerging from the the city's detention center at Pier 57, on the far west side of Manhattan, often denying that they'd done anything confrontational--some saying they were not protesting at all, and only guilty only of being in the wrong place at the wrong time.

Now, the participatory panopticon is rendering the events of those days more transparent. Thanks to citizen video efforts, often organized by free speech activists such as I Witness Video, visual records are proving that people were swept up without cause and didn't resist, that police officers have misrepresented the events at trial, and that prosecutors have selectively edited the video record to prove their cases.

continues here: http://www.worldchanging.com/archives/002519.html

"The more we do to you, the less you seem to believe we are doing it." -- Dr. Joseph Mengele

Posted by: UppuhMuhnclrrr (Through Clenched Teeth) and living la vida noisy on Valley Rd | Nov 8, 2005 6:57:14 PM

I hope more independent businessmen and women choose to run for public office. It is a breath of fresh air to hear from someone who speaks their own mind, like it or not.

Posted by: voted for Perot | Nov 8, 2005 8:03:53 PM

Boy, do I love when millionaires run for office and get to turn down public funding just to blow their not so well-heeled opponents out of the water. It's like having our own 16th-century aristocracy right here in the new millenium.

Soon, we won't have to worry about silly things like Democracy at all. The landed gentry will go about their business, paying their way out of trouble, while the serfs toil away and grumble about uprisngs that never come to pass. Hey, maybe with the success of the "Kill Bill " series, some of the new artistocrats can start hiring samurai again -- just like in the good ol' days. Oh for joy and rapture!!!

Thank you, oh wealthy gentlemen of the colonies, for relieving me of the burden of having to vote for some poor slob like myself. Surely you know better than I what the needs of my and others like me are, for you have amassed much more money and are therefore wiser. Truly it is the people's interest for which you speak when you speak your own mind, and not your own. For that's how you amassed such a fortune, by always putting the needs of others ahead of yourself.

Welcome to power, my corporate overlords... I await the succulent crumbs that fall from your bountiful table.

Posted by: notteham | Nov 10, 2005 3:54:45 AM