A fellow blogger wrote me angry that the NY Daily News is reporting that the leftist blogsphere is being soft on Bloomberg. If true, this disgusts me. Are we being soft on someone who donates $7 million to the RNC, thus supporting Bush, DeLay, Abu Graib torture and Karl Rove’s exploitation of 9/11? Is the liberal blogsphere dropping the ball on NYC? Those of you who aren’t in NYC (and even some who are but aren’t intimately connected with local politics) may not realize how the NYC political scene is drifting towards the red at an alarming rate. If we let this continue, NY State may no longer be blue. Are we failing to hold the line in NY?
Who is Bloomberg? He is a rich guy who has been doing all he can for rich developers, has taken control of the education sytem in NYC without actually improving it, has helped raise money for Bush and the RNC repeatedly, has allowed the Republicans to exploit 9/11 at will and has refused to give contracts to the cops, firefighters, nurses and teachers.
And to those who say the cops have a contract you are wrong. That terrible contract that currently makes it impossible to recruit new cops is NOT a current contract. It represents the contract that Bloomberg did NOT give the cops 2 years ago. He has yet to give the cops a current contract.
That is Bloomberg. Bloomberg circumvents local laws and wants to use eminent domain and give massive tax breaks to help friends who are rich developers while claiming that we can’t afford to build new classrooms, keep firehouses open or give cops a good contract. When Bush circumvents the law and threatens an abuse of power to help his rich Halliburton friends while refusing to fund New Orleans levees, we call it croynism and complain loudly. Why do we cut Bloomberg slack?
Plus Bloomberg is tied to Bush, Rove, DeLay and the whole corrupt Republican bunch! Why do we tolerate this? Why do we accept someone who openly and strongly supports Bush to be mayor of the largest city in the United States? I know Bloomberg isn’t as bad as Bush. I know he has a brain and he once was a Democrat. But there is no denying that he has BECOME a Republican and he has signaled this change by a massive donation to the Republican National Committee, an invitation to the Republicans to exploit 9/11 and hold their convention here, arresting all opposition and continued suppression of opposition in NYC, and by participating in several fundraisers for the RNC. In short, Bloomberg has become beholden to Bush’s corrupt, dictatorial Republican party.
Does the liberal blogsphere approve of this? Do we cut slack to a billionaire who favors his friends over his city and who does all he can to help Bush? Is the liberal blogsphere playing softball, as the daily news says, with Michael Bloomberg, Bush supporter?
I sure hope not! Howard Dean is campaigning quite actively for Freddy Ferrer against Republican Bloomberg. John Kerry and John Edwards are campaigning for Freddy Ferrer against Republican Bloomberg. Jesse Jackson is campaigning for Freddy Ferrer against Republican Bloomberg. Democracy for NYC and New Democratic Majority are campaigning for Freddy Ferrer against Republican Bloomberg. Norm Seigel, the adamantly pro-First Amendment rights activist who just ran for NYC Public Advocate and who was head of the NY Civil Liberties Union for 15 years says that “it is a no-brainer: we support Freddy Ferrer over Bloomberg.”
Is the NY Daily News correct? Is the leftist blogsphere being soft on the largest individual donor to the Republican party and ignoring Freddy Ferrer, the candidate enthusiastically endorsed by Howard Dean, John Kerry AND John Edwards?
Maybe we aren’t doing our job? How can we fight in Ohio, Virginia and Pennsylvania if we cede NYC to the biggest individual supporter of the RNC in the nation?
Can we prove the NY Daily News wrong? Can we counter the millions of dollars that Mike Bloomberg is spending to buy the NYC mayoral election? I was in Manhattan on 9/11 when those planes hit. I heard them hit. I breathed in the ashes of my fellow New Yorkers. I lost a friend that day. To see Bloomberg allow the Republican party to exploit my friend’s death to justify an unjust war in Iraq distusts me so much I would do almost anything to defeat Bloomberg. I also have a daughter in the public school system. To see the increasing class sizes and the declining infrastructure of our schools disgusts me so much that I would do almost anything to defeat Bloomberg. I, along with my 8 month’s pregnant wife, was a protester against the Republican Convention. We were called terrorists by Mike Bloomberg and risked arrest simply for exercising our Constitutional Rights. That disdain for our civil rights disgusts me, and makes me willing to work my ass off to defeat Bloomberg.
If I thought the leftist blogsphere wasn’t behind me in my fight against Bloomberg, my fight for our cops, our firefighters, our nurses and our teachers, my fight for our Constitutional Rights, my fight against Bush, I would be disgusted at the leftist blogsphere.
If you guys are not supporting the grassroots of NYC, aren’t supporting Howard Dean, John Kerry and John Edwards, aren’t supporting Democracy for NYC and New Democratic Majority, then what the HELL are you doing? Please tell me that the NY Daily News is wrong and please help us defeat Bush’s number one donor.