Buh-bye, de Blasio
Don’t let the door hit you on the way out.
Before I read this article on de Blasio’s leavetaking, I had forgotten that he got his big break in 2013 when frontrunner Anthony Weiner imploded in a sexting scandal. That may help a little to explain how New Yorkers elected de Blasio, but why they re-elected him is a bigger mystery. And yes, I know it’s a deep blue city. But still.
When I read this sentence – “During his first inauguration speech, de Blasio pledged a ‘dramatic new approach’ to running the world’s greatest city” – I misread it briefly as “de Blasio pledged a “traumatic new approach'”, which I think fits a lot better.
The article goes on to list de Blasio’s failures.
Let’s see what new mayor Eric Adams will do.
… re-elected him a bigger mystery.
Not when you reflect that New Yorkers love living in “shirt.” They got their little leftist manipulated democracy good and hard. They deserve and they will get more..
Chicago’s Lori Lightfoot (recent celebrator of Kwanzaa, created by a psychopath-turned-“professor”) now acquires the coveted title of the most egregiously incompetent mayor of a major American city. There exists little reason for optimism about Adams, except that it will be nearly a Herculean task to prove even worse than Comrade W Wilhelm, whose worthlessness as an official is exceeded only by his sense of self-worth.
Maybe Caraccas needs a new mayor? He turned NYC into a roting carcass.
I lived in Manhattan from 2014 through the middle of 2020. Despite the political demographics, I was astounded he was reelected in 2017. By then (and really right out of the gate) his incompetence, lack of common sense and disinterest in actually running the city was obvious to anyone paying the least bit of attention.
Rumor has it that he will run for Governor. Oh what fun to live in NY.
Over the years I’ve tried to figure out why big cities elect these incompetent corrupt dopes and ultimately came to the conclusion that the vote is determined by the municipal workers and unions. It guarantees that the mayor and his gang will ensure their pay and benefits plus plenty of graft for everyone. An example is the recently added NYC subway tunnel that employed seven thousand men a day but paid for eight. A famous earlier one was the skating rink that Trump completed in a few months for $400,000 when the city had been at it for several years and six million dollars with the end nowhere in sight.
The most promising thing I’ve read about the new mayor is his appointment of David Banks to run the schools. Banks has funded several schools for mostly African American boys whose test scores and graduation rates are way above the abysmal city average. Banks says he’s going directly after the education bureaucracy. Good luck to him.
https://nypost.com/2021/12/09/eric-adams-names-david-banks-as-new-doe-chancellor/
On the other hand, Adams has just announced he’ll keep De Blasio’s vaccine mandates in effect.
What Herr Wilhelm said; “During his first inauguration speech, de Blasio pledged a ‘dramatic new approach’ to running the world’s greatest city”
What he was actually thinking; “During his first inauguration speech, de Blasio pledged a ‘traumatic new approach’ to ruining the world’s greatest city”
He succeeded in that goal beyond all expectations.
T-Rex,
“I was astounded he was reelected in 2017. By then (and really right out of the gate) his incompetence, lack of common sense and disinterest in actually running the city was obvious to anyone paying the least bit of attention.”
Viewed from afar, his reelection indicates that the majority of NYC voters are themselves incompetent, utterly lacking in common sense and are completely disinterested in how the city is run. Clearly, they’re not paying the least bit of attention.
Paul in Boston,
I’m surprised that the municipal workers and unions in big cities comprise a majority of those city’s voters. Bloomburg demonstrated that money only talks if people are both gullible and disinterested in the truth.
Kate,
In the linked Post article, every person surrounding the new Mayor is black. So much for diversity.
“traumatic new approach”
Reminds me of the time I was browsing and glanced upon this link:
https://www.theancientconnection.com/the-anti-seismic-megalithic-walls/
My first thought was You go, Oggmeister! 😀
Geoffrey Britain, I don’t much care about “diversity” if the new school chancellor will actually improve the schools. If he were to make improvements only for majority-black schools and not others, then we’d have a problem.
Kate,
Count on it. It’s time they got theirs!
“Eric Adams, who takes office as NYC mayor tomorrow night, confirms he will KEEP Mayor Bill de Blasio’s private sector vaccine mandate…”
Given DeBlasio’s history, Managua seems more appropriate.
Venezuala vs Nicaragua:
Six of one a half dozen of the other?
Is there still something left to destroy in Nicaragua? If so, send Comrade de Blasio!
de Blasio is the kind of extremist that gets into power when MOST people do not vote.
I tend to think the number of registered voters in some places is not all that accurate; therefore we can never really know the actual number of voters who are real people. However, it is still worth noting that somewhere around 20 percent of registered voters in New York City vote in Mayoral elections.
To me that is a low percent. With that kind of “voter disengagement” it really isn’t any wonder that someone not near the “middle of the road” gets into power.
Whether this explains any part of how de Blasio got in I am not sure. But, I think it is worth considering.
The company that I work for has pulled many of its workers from Manhattan (and closed all but the main office) to either Brooklyn or New Jersey. Thank goodness I will never have to step foot in the place again!
DiBlasio put his wife in charge of a city program concerning mental health issues.. Did they ever find the millions of dollars that disappeared?
‘…dramatic new approach’ sounds (looks and smells) like ‘fundamental transformation’….
Is it fair to say that people who don’t vote get what they voted for–speaking metaphorically?
Manhattan Contrarian has an interesting article on Mayor Bill.
This sums up Bull de Buckethead perfectly.
https://nypost.com/2021/12/30/good-riddance-to-nycs-worst-mayor-ever-de-blasio-goodwin/
“Eric Adams, who takes office as NYC mayor tomorrow night, confirms he will KEEP Mayor Bill de Blasio’s private sector vaccine mandate…”
I’m going to wager that if you consulted the relevant law codes in New York, the City government lacks the authority to make such a mandate. They’ve mistreated their police force so that I’m also going to wager that the modal response to expectations from politicians that they’ll enforce these mandates will be to grab a doughnut and coffee. Fried cakes and sour cream are the best, of course.
He was reelected because of the municipal unions, and I have to say the politically ignorant people who live in the inner city, and the clueless millennials who moved to New York City when it was a well run city under Rudy Giuliani and Mike Bloomberg. However I never voted for him and I also noticed that very few people actually voted in the two elections that he won.
now acquires the coveted title of the most egregiously incompetent mayor of a major American city.
Been quite a bit of competition for the title over many decades. Consult the register of those who’ve been Mayor of Detroit, Washington, Baltimore, Rochester, Minneapolis… And supplemented with an all star cast of DAs: Krasner, Gascon, Boudin, Foxx, Gardner, Mosby… The sheer fecklessness of the voters who put them in office is stupefying. (Then again, they put a dementia patient in the White House).
However, it is still worth noting that somewhere around 20 percent of registered voters in New York City vote in Mayoral elections.
That, and the fact that times were good in 2017, and, thankfully, DeBlasio is sufficiently lazy that he hadn’t done much of what he threatened to do–yet. A lot of the damage was in his second term, and not just from Covid. And, of course, Republicans could not manage to put up a credible candidate, either in 2017 or 2021.
Adams ran as a moderate, but on anything but policing issues he’ll be as bad as his predecessor.
So, as if more evidence of hypocrisy was required:
Warren Wilhelm Jr. changes his name (twice, IIRC) to de Blasio.
Jonathan Stuart Leibowitz changes his name to John Stewart.
Yet DJT’s *grandfather* changing his surname from Drumpf to Trump is a source of mockery of DJT. It is a puzzlement…
Yet DJT’s *grandfather* changing his surname from Drumpf to Trump is a source of mockery of DJT. It is a puzzlement…
Friedrich Trump was married in Kallstadt, Bavarian Palatinate, in 1902, 17 years after arriving in the US. He was married in a Lutheran congregation and listed his father as ‘Johannes Trump’ and his mother as ‘Kathar. Kober’. There was in Kallstadt a ‘Konrad Trump’ baptised on 17 November 1867, son of Johannes Trump and Katharina Kober.It’s the right vintage to be the brother of Friedrich Trump, who was born in 1869. There are several other baptismal and burial records on their children. Kallstadt as we speak has about 1,200 residents. What’s the contention, here? That, in a village that size, he appropriated the names of some other local couple and listed them as his parents?
DeBlasio is another individual that never held a real job in his entire life; just like Obama.
DeBlasio’s entire adult life has been “working” for politicians, political campaigns or govt. agencies.
There should be a law that anybody seeking public office, at any level, must be above the age of 45 and whose work experience must have been in the private sector, never have been employed by or for a politician or political campaign , never have held any sort of public office and never have worked for any govt. agency at any level.
These requirements would have prevented about 50% of all people in public office from being in public office.
DeBlasio, like Obama, rose to high levels of public office because they are good bullshit artists and con men and are expert at sucking up to deep pocketed, influential movers and shakers.
Of course, if not for the stupidity of the voters, DeBlasio and Obama would never have been elected to anything.
Maybe there should also be some real restrictions on who can vote???
There should be a law that anybody seeking public office, at any level, must be above the age of 45 and whose work experience must have been in the private sector, never have been employed by or for a politician or political campaign , never have held any sort of public office and never have worked for any govt. agency at any level.
My father was employed as a mathematics instructor in the Air Force from 1948 to 1950. You think he should have been banned for life from running for town board in New York?
Art;
“My father was employed as a mathematics instructor in the Air Force from 1948 to 1950. You think he should have been banned for life from running for town board in New York?”
Yes, but only because he is related to you.
But in general, those who have served in the military, police, fire, etc. should not be banned from running for office.
Why?
Because in their line of work, they potentially have something to lose; their lives.
Contrast this to those, like DeBlasio, (or Obama) who, by virtue of the “work” they did, have ZERO to lose.
He will retire with nice benefits, etc. despite the horrible job he did as mayor. He, and people that have pursued careers like him, earn an income / benefits that are independent of their competence or accomplishments (or more precisely, lack of accomplishments).
Further, get ready to see him again in some political role or helping run another’s political campaign and get handsomely paid for this “work.”
Folks who work in the private sector, in general, have to “produce” to keep their jobs. They have to meet goals or they are out of a job and/or get stuck at the lowest rungs of their jobs. Their abilities and accomplishments will affect their income and economic success.
None of this applies to “public service” jobs, where length of service is all that matters and one’s incompetence does not place their employment at risk.
“… re-elected him a bigger mystery.
Not when you reflect that New Yorkers love living in “shirt.” They got their little leftist manipulated democracy good and hard. They deserve and they will get more..”
It’s no mystery. They’re morons.
The Starship Trooper qualification for voting raises it old hoary head, this time from John Tyler. So, General Mark Milley is more qualified than Senator Ted Cruz, or Senator Tom Cotton, John?
“Many forms of Government have been tried, and will be tried in this world of sin and woe. No one pretends that democracy is perfect or all-wise. Indeed it has been said that democracy is the worst form of Government except for all those other forms that have been tried from time to time.…”
Winston Churchill
There is no field of endeavor, level of education or experience that does not include very wise and responsible people as well as containing buffoons, incompetents, grifters and deceitful , power hungry individuals such as folks like DeBlasio and Obama.
By the way, I happen to like Cruz and Tom Cotton, and several other politicians as well.
There is no way that any set of rules can be 100% effective. Just because you must pass a test to obtain a drivers license does not mean there are not really bad drivers out there.
But removing the requirement of passing a driver’s test does not solve the problem of lousy drivers. It can only hope, perhaps, to minimize the problem; sort of, and not to effectively.
Requiring folks to have held real jobs in the private sector and being 45 years of age of older before they can take a public office position can only hope to somewhat minimize fraudsters like a Bernie Sanders (how many jobs has he ever created ?) or DeBlasio or an Obama – how many real jobs have the latter two ever created or even had? – from taking powerful positions within govt.
Recall that Obama , prior to becoming president, never held a real job in his entire adult life, but he certainly knew how to fling the bullshit right into the presidency.
It certainly could not prevent “bad drivers” from assuming powerful political positions and it would most certainly preclude very qualified, decent, really smart people from politically powerful positions, such as a Tom Cotton or Ted Cruz.
Of course, no rule at all would be necessary if voters, in general , would make wiser choices (DeBlasio was voted in as mayor TWICE !!) . Voters making bad choices was a problem that the founders of this nation worried about and was a central motivation in their establishing the electoral college.
Anyway, maybe some commentators on NEO’s blog can suggest some other way that DeBlasio types taking politically powerful positions can be minimized.
Or maybe it must be accepted that in a representative democracy, fraudsters will be able to elected to any political office, including the presidency.