Kill the King (ok, ok, just end his reign)

Better than you

This past Wednesday was the debut of the NY Post's newest columnist, Michael Goodwin. This is the first time I have read anything by him, but he did give me a glimmer of hope (or maybe false hope) that Mike Bloomberg can be defeated this election.

He bases it on 3 different factors that I wholeheartedly agree with him on. Some of which made me move out of Manhattan years ago.

The first one, which was one of his major reasons for enforcing term limits on The Greatest Mayor Ever, Rudy Giuliani, was Mayor Mike's business acumen. His campaign reasoned the financial hole created by 9/11 proved the need for such a savvy businessman to save the city. However, he did nothing extraordinary. Any liberal politician would have taken the same, easy way out that he did. As Goodwin explains:

Much of the pain is driven by City Hall, with spending under Bloomberg about 25 percent above inflation. Real-estate taxes are climbing even as market values fall, and virtually every levy and fee has gone up sharply since 2002, and still it’s not enough to satisfy the government beast. The businessman mayor, who promised to guard the buck, has been too quick to spend it.

The second reason is one that give me the headaches that plague me when I am beyond furious and helpless to prevent the reason. This arrogant "I know what's better for you than you do" attitude was on full display in his shameless display of self-aggrandization in overturning term limits. This was voted on TWICE by the citizens of New York. The fact that it came up a second time was a feckless attempt by those in power to overturn the will of their constituents. Yet, the man who would not have been elected in the first place without term limits managed to keep them for himself. And, don't you dare question that!

The second factor in Thompson’s favor is Bloomberg’s cheesy maneuver to eliminate term limits. He was for them until they hit home, so POOF, he made them vanish. Doing the dirty deed with a scandal-scarred City Council further tarnished the mayor’s reputation.

Lastly, the one thing the Mayor touts as his most significant accomplishment actually falls short of a real, quantifiable success. The Education Mayor, the one who the schools would be accountable to has a pretty questionable record. The biggest joke was the Department of Education's progress report that gave A's to 85% of NYC's schools!!! Are you kidding me??? What standard is that based on? That they are still standing? They have running water and electricity? 85%??? Only in Mayor Mike's world, I tell ya!

Compelling evidence shows many of the gains Bloomberg touts are suspect because tests and standards were dumbed down. He has doubled education spending to $22 billion a year, but with 74 percent of city grads who enroll at City University community colleges still needing remediation, the smell of a scam is in the air.

All that and his Nanny Statism on smoking, trans fats and proposed soda taxes are the icing on the cake for me with this guy. Obviously, the man has such a high self-regard that he cannot even allow FREE AMERICANS to make their own decisions for their own lives! No, his reasoning to continue his rule is he-is-smarter-than-you-peasant-and-knows-what's-best-for-you, so don't you get in the way of his ego-feeding!