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Tag: mike bloomberg
New York City

Our Cities -- And Our Country -- Need 'Conservative Liberals'

The more people you pack in limited space, the more those people have to follow the rules. Law, order and good manners are essential to the healthy functioning of our towns and cities.

Democrat-run cities often have an unfair reputation as hotbeds of left-wing activists intent on letting miscreants run wild. That's because lefty activists have bigger megaphones through which they often shout ludicrous proposals, like cutting police forces in the middle of a crime wave.

In reality, these cities usually have two political factions — progressive Democrats and moderate Democrats. As the disruptions caused by COVID shutdowns unleashed disorder, electorates in these cities started moving toward the moderates. That's happening from San Francisco to Chicago to New York.

Their voters are jettisoning many of their fringe politicians. San Franciscans famously recalled their uber-progressive district attorney, Chesa Boudin. Who can forget former Seattle Mayor Jenny Durkan who created the outrageous no-go zones for police during the 2020 protests?

Durkan was replaced by Bruce Harrell, whom Fox News called a "pro-police candidate." And New York's mayor is former police captain Eric Adams, a law-and-order guy along the lines of Mike Bloomberg and Rudy Giuliani in his sane days.

In Portland, Oregon, left-wing excess let homeless encampments spread and trash pile up. The city is suffering economically and psychologically from the departure of the REI sporting goods store. REI cited thefts and break-ins in its decision to leave. Moderates are fighting back.

Before going on, let's recognize that though most big cities are Democrat-run, those with Republicans in charge have problems as bad or worse. For all the handwringing over the crime surge in San Francisco, violent crime is worse in Miami, whose mayor, Francis Suarez, is a Republican candidate for president.

Nor are these cities as monolithically Democratic as many think. Giuliani and Bloomberg were elected mayor as Republicans. And San Francisco has the highest percentage of independent voters of any county in California.

In New York City's outer boroughs, local officeholders are being challenged by candidates to their right who happen to be other Democrats. Public safety is a major issue.

One of the most interesting races involves Queens District Attorney Melinda Katz. Two years ago, Katz barely won the Democratic primary against lefty Tiffany Caban, who was endorsed by Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and Sen. Bernie Sanders. Now Katz is being primaried by a Democrat who is accusing her (unfairly) of being soft on crime.

Ocasio-Cortez has not been endorsing candidates for city council of late, and, as it's becoming clear, they don't want her endorsement. As Jeff Leb, who runs super PACs that champion moderates, put it, "A lot of the luster of AOC's endorsement has really gone out the window. The more she endorses candidates, and loses, it devalues her."

The pandemic hurt cities in several ways, but those downward trends have begun to reverse. Tourist dollars disappeared for a while, but the visitors are returning even to troubled San Francisco. In New York, they're back big time.

Downtown office towers may not soon enjoy their previous high occupancy rates, but more employers are calling their workers back to the office. Transforming some of these office spaces into residences could lower some high rents as well as repopulate business districts.

In the big cities, rare is the successful politician who rails against gay marriage. And anyone who portrayed drag queens as a threat to America would get laughed off the podium. There's also no bashing of immigrants, who, in fact, make up a large part of the electorate.

Call them conservative liberals, if you want. They are really moderates. The cities need their pragmatism to keep the gears turning. Actually, the country does as well.

Follow Froma Harrop on Twitter @FromaHarrop. She can be reached at fharrop@gmail.com. To find out more about Froma Harrop and read features by other Creators writers and cartoonists, visit the Creators webpage at www.creators.com.

Reprinted with permission from Creators.

Experience Sanders Couldn’t Buy — Even With Bloomberg’s Money

Experience Sanders Couldn’t Buy — Even With Bloomberg’s Money

Mike Bloomberg was elected New York mayor two months after the outrage of Sept. 11, 2001. He took over a city reeling with grief and suffering economic losses tied to the terrorist attacks. Rather than lay off public workers who had performed gallantly in the crisis, he raised taxes on the well-to-do.

The conservative media beat him up with their usual argument that tax hikes kill off business. The opposite happened. The city grew new veins. Bloomberg led this revival with grit and smarts, not his personal wealth.

That’s what Bloomberg should be talking about and everyone else should be hearing. Bloomberg must explain that he brings to the table an experience and success in public service unmatched by any other candidate.

A New York mayor must manage the nation’s largest city, a cauldron of races and ethnicities. That’s why it is called the second toughest job in America. Bloomberg was elected to it three times.

There is something perverse about Bernie Sanders accusing Bloomberg of racism. The ’60s was a time of rising crime, racial tension and white flight (followed by black middle-class flight) out of the cities. In 1968, Sanders joined a liberal white flight to the whitest state, Vermont.

He and other ex-New Yorkers could hang around Burlington coffee shops and plan a socialist utopia without having to deal with angry black people. (Cameo appearances at civil rights marches did not hide that fact.)

Bloomberg’s stop-and-frisk policy — for which he has apologized — was a great mistake because it mostly swept up black and Latino men simply going about their business. But it was intended to take guns off the streets in a city where up to 96 percent of the shooting victims were black or Latino.

Sanders voted against the Brady bill five times. Consider the racial implications of his saying that he opposed gun control because guns weren’t a problem in Vermont.

Bloomberg’s activism in this area has won him the endorsement of prominent African Americans. One is Rep. Lucy McBath (D-GA), who lost her 17-year-old son to gun violence. A Democrat, McBath made headlines in 2018 by flipping the suburban Atlanta seat once occupied by Newt Gingrich. Hers is the sort of district that would be imperiled were Sanders at the top of the ticket.

I happen to think that mass extinction as the Earth burns up is a bigger issue than some boneheaded comments Bloomberg may have made in the pre-“Me Too” era. When President Donald Trump said he’d pull the United States out of the Paris climate agreement, Bloomberg was the American voice assuring our allies that American cities, states and businesses would take over from Washington and meet the goals. He has helped lead that effort.

Sanders is the only Democrat to oppose a tax on carbon, widely considered one of the essential tools for reducing emissions. Canada, Western Europe and all of Scandinavia have put prices on carbon. So have California and nine states in the Northeast.

Bloomberg is right that he’s the only candidate to have started a business, actually a good thing. His fortune made selling data to the financial industry, Bloomberg knows where the money comes from and how to tax it. Wall Street has expressed shock at his proposals to tax financial transactions, toughen stress tests for banks and so on.

Bloomberg’s bottom line is that he left moneymaking to pursue a life of doing the really hard stuff in public service. Populist ranting can be entertaining, and Sanders is good at it. But his bottom line is having accomplished almost nothing in his 29 years as a professional politician in Washington.

Clearly, Bloomberg has strengths that Sanders couldn’t buy, even with Bloomberg’s money.

Follow Froma Harrop on Twitter @FromaHarrop. She can be reached at fharrop@gmail.com. To find out more about Froma Harrop and read features by other Creators writers and cartoonists, visit the Creators webpage at www.creators.com.

How To Lose 50 States

How To Lose 50 States

Easy. Nominate Bernie Sanders. I’ve been through my share of blowouts. I was a kid when George McGovern won Massachusetts — and nowhere else. I was in Florida working for Jimmy Carter (on loan from Ted Kennedy’s office) when we lost not only the White House but also the Senate majority in Ronald Reagan’s first landslide. I was in Minnesota waiting to see if Fritz Mondale would carry any states. Two weeks before the 1988 election we were going to lose, with the help of then-Gov. Jim Hunt from North Carolina, I spread money all over the country for down-ticket races so Michael Dukakis didn’t carry down the Democratic Party when he lost 40 states. I was on television looking at the exit polls from Ohio when I realized they were all wrong, and that John Kerry would lose. I canceled my law and politics class in 2016, the day before the election, because I didn’t want to lie to my students and tell them that I thought Hillary Clinton was going to win.

I understand why Democratic ideologues are voting for Bernie Sanders. I used to be one myself. But losing one election after another, two to Reagan, one to George H.W. Bush, two to George W. Bush and, of course, one to Donald Trump, is painfully instructive. This is not horseshoes. This is not a battle for the heart and soul of the Democratic Party. It is a battle to beat a dangerous president.

And the truth is that the only Democrat with a chance of doing that is Mike Bloomberg.

I never thought I’d say this, but I will: I will do anything to help Bloomberg win. Which is to say, I will do anything to beat Trump.

Bernie Sanders would lose in a landslide. So would Elizabeth Warren — if a senator from Massachusetts runs fourth in neighboring New Hampshire, he or she will do even worse in a general election. Her candidacy is all but over.

Pete Buttigieg is the brightest star on the Democratic side. If he were 10 years older and didn’t look like Beaver Cleaver, I’d be ringing doorbells. Of course there are folks who would not vote for a gay man with a wonderful husband and a brilliant military record. That’s not my problem. I’ll vote for him in the future. I believe he will be president someday. But not in 2020.

And then there’s Joe Biden, who lost to Amy Klobuchar, a senator who is known on Capitol Hill as the most impossible person to work for. She might get away with it if she were a man (see, e.g., Donald Trump), but a woman who talks about which bills she has passed on the stage with Donald Trump, with billions against her? I don’t think so. Actually, I’ve yet to hear a pundit or a columnist or an independent pollster even make the case.

Former Vice President Biden is a fine man. I have always liked him. He has survived hardships that I could not endure. He would be a fine president. But he has always been a terrible candidate, and this year is no exception.

Which leaves the one candidate Trump is rightly afraid of. Trump claims to be a billionaire, even if it’s not actually money he made. Mike Bloomberg is THE real deal. He makes Trump look like a piker. Which, of course, drives Trump crazy.

There was a Bloomberg event in Los Angeles a few weeks ago. Hundreds of Clinton and Obama Democrats were there. People weren’t asked for money. For most of my friends, it was the first time attending such an event. They were not there because they are lifelong Bloomberg supporters. They were there because, as Vince Lombardi, the famous Green Bay Packers coach said, winning is the only thing.

And the only Democrat who can beat Trump is Mike Bloomberg. Bloomberg-Buttigieg — that’s my ticket. Trump has done enough damage. Given how strong the economy is, Trump should be a shoo-in. He isn’t because he’s Trump, a hopeless narcissist; a leader so unreliable and unpredictable that leaders across the world find him terrifying; a man who managed to escape impeachment when he shouldn’t have and is now busy punishing a war hero who dared to speak the truth.

We have exactly one choice. Or we lose. And if Sanders is at the top of the ticket, it won’t just be the presidency we lose.

Hillary Clinton is wrong: Plenty of people like Sanders. He has accomplished a great deal politically, energizing young people, strengthening the progressive movement, giving voice to concerns that millions share. But he can’t win a general election. I’m not even sure he could carry Massachusetts.

To find out more about Susan Estrich and read features by other Creators Syndicate writers and cartoonists, visit the Creators Syndicate website at www.creators.com.

Was Bloomberg As Awful As He Looked? Maybe Not

Was Bloomberg As Awful As He Looked? Maybe Not

Reprinted with permission from DCReport

Call me crazy, but the media could have it wrong about Michael Bloomberg.

The latest Democratic debate post-mortem came fast and furious – and from a prominent Op-Ed in The New York Times to the cover of The New York Post – the verdict was almost unanimous.

Bloomberg was “disastrous.” His campaign had “imploded.” He “bombed.” Get the hook for “timid,” “defensive” Mini Mike, the pundits said. “Bye, Felicia” might be the only headline missing from the gleeful media pile-on of Bloomberg after he made his presidential debate debut.

Bloomberg was about as likely to get the nomination as Amy “Who’s the president of Mexico?” Klobuchar.  Like it or not, many warned, Crazy Bernie just got another surge.

Who could doubt them? When has the media been wrong?  How soon we forget.

The Democratic candidates tried to out-Trump Trump with in-your-face name-calling, playing to the Roman gladiator tone set by Trump and fed by the media.

They got it wrong with Hillary Clinton. Many in the press were so out of sync with the country that the day before the 2016 election Huffington Post was still predicting a landslide of almost 98 percent for Clinton.

Maybe they’re wrong now.  On Wednesday night, the Democratic candidates tried to out-Trump Trump with in-your-face name-calling, especially Elizabeth Warren, Pete Buttigieg (“I speak five languages”) and Klobuchar. They were playing to the Roman gladiator tone set by Trump and fed by the media.

Only Trump Can Do Trump

Too bad that none of the Democratic candidates’ high-priced strategists understand a key point: Only Trump can do Trump. He’s a one-off, a natural-born disruptor whether you like it or not.

Elizabeth Warren’s attempt to burst out of the gate like Trump when she barked that Bloomberg had called women “fat broads and horse-faced lesbians” came across as both jarring – and warmed-over Trump.

In other words, fail.

Impeccable Citing Facts

Bloomberg, for all his deer-in-the-headlights look and defensiveness, was the only candidate who didn’t trash anyone.  He was impeccable when it came to citing facts and figures—both involving his coal plant charities as well as his record on employing women—that held up. No one expected him to present as a slick, charismatic debater.

You might not warm up to him, but he may have come off surprisingly well to an electorate turned off by more than three years of Trump’s harsh blustering and bullying.

“Bloomberg was the foremost loser,” intoned Politico. “To be blunt, he was terrible.”

Going High

But is that true in the real world? In fact, Bloomberg was doing what one-half of the two patron saints of the Democratic Party—Michelle Obama—has always said we should do. He went high when everyone else went low.

Americans may well be tired of politics as an ongoing World Championship Wrestling match. They could be sick and tired of the focus on wokeness and microaggressions that take up increasing space in both the press and politics—and be willing to overlook some misplaced jokes and even past mistakes like Bloomberg’s stop and frisk program.

They may want bland and boring, even if it comes with the racism and sexism not unknown to men of Bloomberg’s age, if it means a steady hand on the tiller for a change.

If I were Bloomberg’s strategists, I’d take the unlikely moniker of “underdog” that The New York Times gave him Thursday and run with it.

Only in this day and age could a billionaire underdog possibly be the country’s best chance of beating a smug top dog billionaire.