The mayor of New York was born several months after Pearl Harbor. He is ten years older than me. His net worth is around $19 billion dollars making him the 30th wealthiest man in the world. It’s amazing what a difference those ten years make for one’s fortune.
Wikipedia has listed Bloomberg as a business magnate, politician, and philanthropist. The three-time mayor was also born in Boston. I have never seen him in a Red Sox cap. That betrayal of roots said a lot about the man as well as his never having given a bum a dime.
Philanthropy in his book is never one-on-one, although Bloomberg has donated millions to seemingly good causes.
His money seemed clean, but no one has earned a fortune without one good crime.
The ambassador last night asked in the kitchen of the residence why I hated the mayor.
“I lived in New York under him. It was a good time for the city.” We had been together on 9/11. My following years had been spent in Thailand. I hated living under the GOP.
“If you were living in Lower Manhattan. He also used his money to change the third term rule. His re-election campaign was not on his merits, but on the unlikelihood on his opponent beating him. Bloomberg won by 4% points. $100 million to convince voters to stay home. He spent almost the same amount of his own money to win his first election.”
“There’s no crime in that.”
“No crime, but it’s not right either, but the mayor has never had trouble pretending a non-crime was a crime. He had the police arrest nearly 2000 demonstrators at the GOP presidential convention in 2004. 90% of those arrests were thrown out of court and his campaign against marijuana led to the illegal search and seizure of over a million New Yorkers.”
“It couldn’t be a million.” The ambassador liked to dispute numbers.
“Okay, they stopped a million and arrested tens of thousands.” A nugget of data dislodged from the purgatory of my memory. “350,000 since he was elected and more than 50,000 in 2010.”
“The police are just doing their job.”
“No, they are stopping young men on the street illegally and searching them for drugs. If they don’t find them, then they are asked, if they have drugs. if they say yes, then the crime is upgraded to a felony. And no one in New York talks about this, because the Mayor has paid off the media. And he has made a mess of the school system by placing his unqualified cronies into position of power to enforce his beliefs of the system.”
“But isn’t he a liberal.”
“Only on the surface, but he’s thinking about running for the nomination of GOP candidate for president and this week wants to show he’s tough on crime he is by threatening to break the Occupy Wall Street movement. He even went so far as to blame Congress for the financial debacle caused by the greed of the banks. Is he a bad man? No, because he does good things, but he’s also done a lot of bad and he could do a lot worse if he hits the number 271.”
“271?”
“The number of electoral votes GW Bush received in 2000. Bloomberg has figured it will cost him $500 million to buy his way into the White House. The first Jewish president, unless you count FDR.”
“FDR wasn’t Jewish.”
“He was for Hitler and that is good enough for the GOP. Bloomberg could never get the nomination from either party, but if he does run he’ll do so as a 3rd party. Just wait and watch. It should be interesting.”
The ambassador had heard enough of my rant and went upstairs in the residence to watch the BBC News. It had no commercials. I stayed in the kitchen to cook my dinner. Cous-cous with pork, carrots, and apples tasted good on a cold rainy night. I poured myself a glass of Cote du Rhone and lifted my glass. I was all alone, but I had a toast.
“Fuck Off Mr. Bloomberg.”
It felt good saying it aloud.
Even better then second and best the third, because I meant it.
“Fuck off Mr. Bloomberg. You’re no Rodney Dangerfield.”