Bloomberg terminals

An economics analyst, on NPR the other afternoon, noted that unless you have a Bloomberg Terminal -- basically computers that give you financial data, such as the now infamous "TED spread," you can't get most anywhere else -- you're in the dark about the planet's real financial situation.

Mayor Bloomberg, in case you haven't heard, feels he is personally just as indispensable to the City of New York.

Michael Weiner feels differently, and good for him.

So now Mr. Weiner is transforming his candidacy into a full-throated populist crusade against the billionaire Mr. Bloomberg’s proposal for a third term, hurling his thin frame in front a political locomotive roaring down the tracks.

In the process, Mr. Weiner said he had found his voice — and purpose — in the 2009 election for mayor: defending New York City’s ordinary, working people against the self-interested, back-room deals of its most powerful.

He has quickly become the most prominent and relentless of the mayor’s grass-roots opponents, who accuse Mr. Bloomberg and his wealthy friends in the business world of trying to circumvent the will of New York’s voters, who backed term limits twice, in 1993 and 1996.

I'm no fan of term limits. But when a politician supports them right up until the moment his term is up, and then changes his mind then I call him a hypocrite. And when he does it because he claims only he can lead the city through the current crisis -- as Giuliani tried to do in September 2001 -- then he needs to be ridden out of town on a rail.

The most amazing thing about this, and where Weiner could really gain traction, is how Bloomberg's wealthy brethren, such as Ronald Lauder (heir to the Estee Lauder fortune) -- a loud advocate of term limits -- have lined up behind their fellow Brahmin.

Nasty? No, just nasally

How much you wanna bet Mike Bloomberg is being heavily courted to be McCain's VP nominee? Two imperious guys on the same ticket would be interesting.

Biparti-zaniness

It wasn't so long ago that the Republican mayor of New York City, Rudolph Giuliani, endorsed Mario Cuomo over his Republican challenger for the state's governor. Why? Because any idiot knows that the state's democrats are more attuned to the needs of the city than are Republicans who have never made their hostility to the city a secret.

So much for that. And so much for the new kind of politics Bloomberg was so eager to usher in only a few weeks ago.

Several weeks ago, the mayor wrote a $500,000 check to help keep the dwindling and increasingly imperiled State Senate Republicans from losing their grip on power, according to an official with direct knowledge of the donation.

The Democrats are seeking to gain control of the Senate for the first time in 40 years, and the race is growing personal and bitter.

Moreover, Mr. Bloomberg has made clear to the Republicans that he is willing to personally campaign for G.O.P. senators.

The mayor’s efforts to buttress the party stand in sharp contrast to his message as he traveled the country flirting with a presidential bid during the past year. Mr. Bloomberg has promoted his independence, denouncing party politics and dramatically announcing his resignation from the Republican Party.

“The politics of partisanship and the resulting inaction and excuses have paralyzed decision-making, primarily at the federal level, and the big issues of the day are not being addressed, leaving our future in jeopardy,” the mayor said at a much-noted speech in June that set off presidential speculation. “We can accept this, or we can say, ‘Enough is enough!’ and together build a bright future for our country.”

Enough isn't so 'nough, I guess.

Bi-PARTISANship

Just in time, we have a reminder that for Mayor Michael Bloomberg, "bipartisanship" means only having to hear his whiny little voice.

After three years of litigation, the New York City Department of Parks and Recreation agreed on Tuesday to back away from the main part of a controversial regulation limiting public events on the Great Lawn, in the heart of Central Park, to 50,000 people.

The decision to temporarily rescind provisions in the rule — formally put in place, the city said, to protect the lawn, but used in an early form to deny permits to antiwar demonstrators — was hailed by its critics as a victory for the First Amendment and for the public use of public land.

“It’s an enormous victory for New Yorkers and for everyone who comes to New York City, not only for their free-speech rights, but for their rights to public space that belongs to the people,” said Mara Verheyden-Hilliard, a lawyer for the Partnership for Civil Justice, a public interest organization that challenged the regulation on behalf of two antiwar groups.

Full enforcement of the rule was temporarily set aside on Tuesday as part of a settlement agreement with the two antiwar groups, the National Council of Arab Americans and the Answer Coalition.

The groups sued the city in Federal District Court in Manhattan after they were denied a permit to hold a demonstration on the lawn days before the Republican National Convention in 2004. While the rule was not formally adopted until December 2005, officials said that the city had had an informal policy of protecting the lawn in place since 1997, when it spent $18.2 million to restore the area.

Eye of the needle

Just what we need, another messianic, self-obsessed, whining, millionaire/billionaire New York mayor who wants to "lead" on the national stage.

He offered one of his auto-pilot denials of interest (“I am not a candidate”), then tossed off one of his broadest critiques yet of the declared field just as the voting is finally about to get under way in Iowa, saying that none of the candidates had sufficiently explained how he or she would solve pressing domestic and international issues.

Mr. Bloomberg obliquely attacked potential rivals like Hillary Rodham Clinton (“Some people are in favor of free trade and then walk away from it”), Mitt Romney (“One guy had a plan that we don’t know if it will work, but then he walks away from his own plan,” referring to health care) and Rudolph W. Giuliani (“‘I’m going to be tougher than the next guy’ is not an answer to what you would do”). Then he cautioned against reading his comments as that sort of critique.

“Don’t say, ‘O.K., Bloomberg’s criticizing A, B or C on either side,’” he said. “It’s all of them.”

Like Krugman, I don't get it. His criticisms are about the Republican candidates. The issues on which he feels we need bipartisan (or tripartisan, I guess) agreement on -- health care, the deficit, trade -- are all areas in which a large majority of Americans say they trust Democrats more to address.

But I also don't get this fascination with Bloomberg. His time as mayor has been unspectacular, with his major accomplishment having erased the $5 billion budget deficit Giuliani left him by raising property taxes.