"Dismayed by Trump, Bloomberg will endorse Clinton" by Alexander Burns New York Times July 24, 2016
Think Lieberman endorsing McCain.
How did that work out?
NEW YORK — Michael R. Bloomberg, who bypassed his own run for the presidency this election cycle, will endorse Hillary Clinton in a prime-time address at the Democratic convention and make the case for Clinton as the best choice for moderate voters in 2016, an adviser to Bloomberg said.
The decision is an unexpected move from Bloomberg, who has not been a member of the Democratic Party since 2000; was elected mayor of New York City as a Republican; and later became an independent.
What is unexpected is the Clinton's agreed, and it is just one more boot to the back of pwoggwessives!
But it reflects Bloomberg’s increasing dismay about the rise of Donald Trump and a determination to see that the Republican nominee is defeated.
Clinton is seeking to reach out to middle-of-the-road swing voters and even moderate Republicans uneasy about Trump. Polls show that significant numbers of Republicans remain wary of Trump and question his fitness for the presidency.
Bloomberg will vouch for Clinton “from the perspective of a business leader and an independent,” said Howard Wolfson, an adviser to Bloomberg.
“As the nation’s leading independent and a pragmatic business leader, Mike has supported candidates from both sides of the aisle,” Wolfson said. “This week in Philadelphia he will make a strong case that the clear choice in this election is Hillary Clinton.”
Bloomberg may fortify Clinton’s appeal to the political center, and with the Republican nominee basing his campaign on his background as a businessman, Bloomberg, a billionaire media executive and philanthropist, may help counter the Trump sales pitch.
Maybe not. Could backfire.
It is unusual, but not unheard of, for a speaker who is not a member of a political party to address that party’s convention. Bloomberg is expected to speak Wednesday, the same evening as President Obama and Vice President Joe Biden.
See: Clinton's Convention for list of speakers.
Bloomberg, 74, is the founder and majority owner of Bloomberg LP, the parent company of Bloomberg News.
Bloomberg and Clinton are not personally close but had a positive working relationship when he served as mayor and she as a senator from New York.
Wolfson said the Clinton campaign had contacted Bloomberg several weeks ago to ask if he would be willing to address the convention. Bloomberg, he said, mulled over the idea and ultimately agreed to speak, after drafting a speech that reflected his distinctive set of political views.
Wolfson also said Bloomberg was pleased by the selection of Senator Tim Kaine, a former mayor of Richmond and a strong supporter of gun control, as Clinton’s running mate.
I was not.
Bloomberg is not an entirely natural fit for the Democratic Party of 2016: Though he has been an energetic advocate on issues related to guns, immigration, and climate change, he has also been a vocal ally of the financial services industry and has defended the strict policing tactics his administration employed in New York.
Uh-oh.
Is he worth it?
Jennifer Palmieri, Clinton’s communications director, said Bloomberg would bring to the convention “a unique and important voice that lays out the choice in this election.”
“As a business leader and philanthropist, Michael Bloomberg has lived his values and fought to make a difference for others,” Palmieri said.
In the past, Bloomberg has rebuked Democrats for attacking Wall Street, a part of his record that may sit uneasily with liberal Democrats, and especially with the supporters of Senator Bernie Sanders of Vermont, who are already smarting from his defeat.
Bloomberg has been quiet about the presidential race in recent months. But in the past he has criticized Trump in stark terms, describing him as a threat to American security.
When he decided late last winter not to run for the White House, Bloomberg explained that he could not take the risk of running an independent campaign that might inadvertently ease Trump’s path to power.
In April, he warned in a commencement address at the University of Michigan that the country faced an unprecedented political threat from “demagogues” in both parties.
I hope he kept it short, or did he not get the memo?
Takes one to know one.
Bloomberg, who served for 12 years as the mayor of New York, has never addressed a political convention in a partisan capacity. He appeared at the 2004 Republican convention in New York in his role as mayor of the host city....
Homelessness skyrocketed under his regime.
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I got an advanced look at tonight's speech:
"Michael Bloomberg assesses White House bid" by Jonathan Lemire and Lisa Lerer Associated Press January 23, 2016
NEW YORK — Former New York mayor Michael Bloomberg is taking early steps toward launching an independent campaign for president, seeing a potential path to the White House amid the rise of Republican Donald Trump and Democrat Bernie Sanders.
Bloomberg has retained advisers and plans to conduct a poll after the Feb. 9 New Hampshire primary to assess the state of the race and judge whether there is an opening for him to mount an independent campaign, according to three people familiar with his thinking. They spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak publicly about his plans, which were first reported Saturday by The New York Times.
Bloomberg has set a March deadline to decide on whether to enter the race, to ensure his access to the ballot in all 50 states.
The billionaire media executive, who served three terms as mayor of New York, is said to be concerned by Trump’s lasting hold on the Republican field and is worried about the impact of Sanders’ campaign on Hillary Clinton’s bid for the Democratic nomination.
Bloomberg’s efforts underscore the unsettled nature of the presidential race a little more than a week before the first round of primary voting. The months-long rise of Sanders and Trump has shaken up the political establishment in both parties and on Wall Street, who’ve struggled to combat their climb in primary polls.
A longtime Democrat who became a Republican to run for mayor in 2001 and later switched to be an independent, Bloomberg would strongly consider a bid if the general election looked like it could turn into a contest between Sanders and Trump or Texas Senator Ted Cruz.
He is not ruling out a bid if Clinton is ahead on the Democratic side, though people familiar with his plans believe it is not particularly likely Bloomberg would challenge Clinton in a general election. But they said Bloomberg has expressed concern about the damage caused by revelations she used a private e-mail address and server while serving as secretary of state, and he fears she may emerge atop the Democratic field as a weakened nominee.
The two New Yorkers have a cordial relationship, people close to them say. They met privately at Bloomberg’s offices a few months before Clinton announced her campaign last April, before an event announcing a philanthropic initiative to measure and track data about issues affecting women and girls. Bloomberg has also spoken at events hosted by the Clinton Foundation.
To prepare for a potential run, Bloomberg has also instructed aides to research previous third-party runs and is said to be willing to spend up to $1 billion of his own fortune, estimated to be about $37 billion, to finance his campaign.
Bloomberg, 73, has no personal animus toward Trump — he believes the real estate developer is ‘‘a nice guy,’’ according to one of the people familiar with his plans— and knows him from New York’s social circuit and from dealings with Trump when Bloomberg was mayor. But he strongly disagrees with Trump’s political positions, particularly his stance on immigration, the person said.
One of the richest people in the United States, Bloomberg has previously toyed with presidential runs, but concluded ahead of the 2008 and 2012 campaigns he could not win. He delivered a powerful late endorsement of President Obama’s reelection effort, though he’s been known to criticize the president personally in private conversations.
The founder of the financial news and information provider Bloomberg LP, he was a political novice when he launched an unlikely bid for mayor in 2001.
He was trailing badly in the polls before the 9/11 attacks, but then received the endorsement of the popular then-Mayor Rudy Giuliani. Bloomberg played up his business expertise and campaigned as the candidate best able to help steady New York’s economy in the aftermath of the attacks.
Why did you destroy a crime scene and send the evidence to be melted down in China, Rudy?
And Bloomy benefited from 9/11, huh?
He won a narrow victory and was reelected handily four years later. He then spearheaded a change to the city’s charter to allow him to win a third term in 2009. He oversaw a gilded age in the nation’s largest city.
Third time a steal.
Manhattan shed its gritty image to become the sparkling star of film and television. Record numbers of tourists arrived. So did young professionals seeking their future. But critics noted the growing gap between the city’s rich and poor.
Bloomberg, who grew up in Medford, Mass., is largely a social liberal — he fought for same-sex marriage in New York and supports abortion rights — and implemented a number of health reforms in New York City, banning smoking in public places and instituting calorie counts on menus.
He has also became arguably the nation’s most vocal proponent of gun control, using his fortune to bankroll candidates across the country who clash with the National Rifle Association.
But liberals have found fault with his cozy ties to Wall Street and his unquestioned support for the New York Police Department, which drove down crime during his tenure but engaged in tactics that a federal judge later ruled discriminated against minorities.
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"Former New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg sees an opportunity emerging in presidential politics after Hillary Clinton’s blowout defeat in New Hampshire combined with Donald Trump’s ascension in the tumultuous Republican race. But those surrounding the billionaire centrist caution that he’s not rushing to join the fray. Bloomberg — widely considered a fiscal conservative but social liberal — has taken the first steps to mount an independent campaign. If he runs, he'd be looking to tap interest among middle-of-the-road voters in an election year dominated by candidates rousing support from their parties’ fringes. But even as Trump and self-described democratic socialist Bernie Sanders emerged victorious in New Hampshire on Tuesday, Bloomberg’s aides suggested that Clinton’s shortfall may not be enough to compel his third-party run. They point to the upcoming voting states — including South Carolina, Nevada, and the bulk of southern states voting on Super Tuesday, March 1 — which could give the former secretary of state a chance to wage a strong comeback. If the contest between Sanders and Clinton becomes a drawn-out affair, Bloomberg likely won’t have enough clarity on its direction in time for his self-imposed March deadline to make a decision. Against that murky backdrop, his team will this week commission a new poll gauging Bloomberg’s chances and research ballot access rights in the event of a third-party run, according to a series of interviews with Bloomberg aides and political consultants. Bloomberg, a Democrat-turned-Republican-turned-independent worth $37 billion, said himself this week that he was ‘‘looking at all the options’’ as he lamented the current condition of the campaign. ‘‘I find the level of discourse and discussion distressingly banal and an outrage and an insult to the voters,’’ he told The Financial Times on Monday."
He didn't do well in the poll.
"By wide margins, Americans of all ideologies say they have no interest in voting former New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg into the White House, suggesting that the billionaire media mogul would have significant headwinds should he mount a third-party bid for president. Just 7 percent of registered voters say they definitely would vote for him, while 29 percent say they'd consider it, according to a new Associated Press-GfK poll. ‘‘Isn’t he the one who wanted to restrict the size of soda drinks?’’ asked Patricia Kowal, a 66-year-old Democrat from Lublin, Wis. ‘‘I think that’s intruding on people’s personal choices. It’s none of the government’s business.’’ A court blocked Bloomberg’s attempt to ban supersize takeout soda in 2014. Six in 10 Democrats and Republicans alike say they would not consider voting for Bloomberg in a general election, according to the poll. The total saying they wouldn’t vote for him is the highest level for any candidate in the field.
Hey, what do you know, we all agree on something.
Bloomberg has indicated that he will decide next month whether to jump in the race. His aides say the rise of the parties’ fringes has opened a centrist, pragmatic path that the fiscal conservative and social liberal could fill, but that he would only try if he saw a reasonable chance to win. One of the richest people in the United States, Bloomberg has decried the 2016 campaign as ‘‘a race to the extremes’’ and suggested he might run if Bernie Sanders led the Democratic field and either Donald Trump or Ted Cruz led the Republicans."
No wonder Clinton want's him to $peak.
Also see:
Trump's Road to the Republican Nomination
Clinton's Freeway to Philly
Time to pan the crowd for reaction:
****************
"Bloomberg should put up or shut up" February 08, 2016
One man who will be watching today’s results from the New Hampshire presidential primary with particular interest is Michael Bloomberg, the former mayor of New York City, who is mulling a third-party bid. Bloomberg launched yet another trial balloon last month, with supporters hinting to The New York Times that he might jump into the race if the Republicans pick Donald Trump or Ted Cruz and the Democrats back Bernie Sanders. He told the Financial Times Monday that he’s “looking at all the options” when asked about a run. “I find the level of discourse and discussion distressingly banal and an outrage and an insult to the voters,” Bloomberg said.
Bloomberg would make a credible candidate, and could potentially succeed where other third-party candidates have failed. But the deck is stacked against any independent candidate, no matter how wealthy, and Bloomberg will need to make up his mind soon if he intends to be taken seriously.
The founder of his own media company, Bloomberg has been a Democrat, Republican, and independent. In the eyes of his admirers, it’s precisely his lack of partisan attachments that makes him so appealing. He represents a particular kind of nonideological, technocratic politics that has a foothold in both parties, but a stranglehold on neither.
Thus, he’s a champion of stricter gun control and fighting climate change — with a stronger stance than many Democrats — but he’s also a backer of harsh policing. He’s a cheerleader for Wall Street, more blatantly than the Republicans, but was also a leading, and lonely, critic of the fast-food industry. He championed bike lanes before it was cool, and also broke New York’s bus-drivers union. There’s no way to categorize him on the conventional left-right spectrum.
In theory, that’s just what Americans say they want in a divided Washington. The problem is that partisan politics, for all its sordidness, is what Americans actually want, as a string of elections going back 200 years demonstrates. Ideology may be a dirty word to businessmen like Bloomberg, but many voters seem to want that quality in their politicians. The exceptions, like Jesse Ventura in Minnesota, get so much attention because they are precisely that — exceptions.
The practical barriers to independent candidates are also daunting: Getting on the ballot in all 50 states takes Herculean effort, and third-party candidates don’t get an automatic invitation to the presidential debates. Social media — and the old-fashioned, paid kind of media — mean Bloomberg wouldn’t necessarily have trouble communicating directly to voters, but assembling a political operation also takes time.
The ordeal of running in primaries is itself an advantage for the party candidates. The candidates the Globe has endorsed for president, Hillary Clinton for the Democrats and John Kasich for the Republicans, have spent the last year listening to voters and honing their campaign platform.
Donald Trump has certainly shown that a candidate willing to spend the money can grab the attention of the voters; Bloomberg, in his reluctance to definitively enter the race now, casts doubt on his seriousness as a candidate. As both a practical and political matter, if Bloomberg really wants to win — and to convince Americans he’s the real deal, and not just a spoiler — he’ll need to jump in soon. The longer he waits, the more it will appear that he’s trying to take a rich man’s shortcut to the White House. By the beginning of March, the field in both parties should be reasonably clear; if Bloomberg is to run to win, he’ll need to decide by then.
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"Bloomberg run would break up the two-party tyranny" by Ralph Nader February 09, 2016
If you think Bernie Sanders and Donald Trump are shaking up the 2016 presidential campaign, imagine the jolt that could come from a third-party run by megabillionaire, and former mayor of New York City, Michael Bloomberg.
As Ross Perot did in 1992, when he ran as an independent, receiving 19 million votes, a Bloomberg candidacy would instantly produce a three-way race. Rich candidates get instant mass-media coverage and polls, creating widespread name recognition in only a matter of days.
The restless, ambitious, supremely self-confident former three-term mayor of the nation’s largest city has been more than just thinking about becoming president for a decade. He’s done the surveys and solicited the advice of historians and political analysts about his chances. He’ll only run if he thinks he can win.
So what does he bring to a campaign? His mayoral reign steeped him in urban issues and needs, which he has long believed are not given even minimal coverage in presidential campaigns. His contacts with the urban political scene in many cities is unmatched. He can forge an immediate network of movers and shakers in the business, philanthropic, and political arenas. As a protector of Wall Street and a law-and-order mayor who backed police and their stop-and-frisk practices, he reassures the nervous plutocracy and oligarchy, who fear loss of their usual control over elections.
He has told associates that he would run if the likely Republican and Democratic nominees are either too extreme (Donald Trump, Ted Cruz, and Bernie Sanders, in his mind) or faltering (Hillary Clinton). The time for decision is rapidly nearing for meeting different state deadlines for ballot access. Even though Bloomberg is reportedly ready to spend a billion dollars on his campaign, and can get the necessary petition signatures in record time, Richard Winger, publisher of Ballot Access News, says he has got to get started early next month.
As I learned when I ran for president, some state officials can use tricky or vague language to trip up candidates who have more than the required signatures. Taking them to court eats up valuable time.
How about the electoral college? Perot didn’t get one electoral vote from this embarrassing vestige of yesterday, which allows candidates who win the popular vote to still lose in the national election. However, with winner-take-all pluralities in a multiparty race, the electoral college could work in Bloomberg’s favor if he could excite the voters.
Therein lies the rub. What excitement could come out of his announcement day? He’ll emphasize his ability to get things done — starting with founding the giant Bloomberg News Company on a shoestring investment 35 years ago. He’ll recount his mayoral achievements and the absence of any personal scandals in the snakepit known as New York City politics. But his Wall Street boosterism may not go down well with many potentially defecting voters.
He’ll reassure independent and partisan voters that he is the heavyweight in the race who can fix broken politics in Washington. After all, he has been a registered Democrat and Republican, and is presently an independent — the ultimate hybrid candidate who knows how to bring people together, as he often did in fractious New York City.
Will it work to meet his bottom line — that he has a chance to win and avoid being stereotyped with that politically-bigoted word “spoiler”? His biggest procedural problem is time. The outcomes of the Republican and Democratic party race may not be known until well beyond March, as many had expected.
In addition, it is difficult to perceive what bundle of goals, what exciting horizons, can emanate from a noncharismatic personality who projects a dutiful managerial image but is not about to start shifting power and freedom from the few to the many.
Were Bloomberg to run, regardless of his prospects of winning, he would help break up the two-party tyranny that believes it owns all the voters in this country. He would convey that a competitive election should mean more choices of candidates and agendas. The rigged presidential debates, especially if he were included as Ross Perot was in 1996, would receive much needed public scrutiny.
But such contributions by themselves won’t move Michael Bloomberg. To run, he has to believe he’s going to prevail. My guess is that his poll-driven answer to this recurring interest in the White House will be once again to stay put as a full-time, bold advocacy philanthropist and official adviser to favored institutions.
Ralph Nader is author of “Unstoppable: The Emerging Left-Right Alliance to Dismantle the Corporate State’’ and a four-time presidential candidate.
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Is it sweet or sour music coming from Ralph, and why is he not running?
The New Hampshire delegation likes him.
"Michael Bloomberg is the real winner in N.H." by Alex Kingsbury February 10, 2016
After a solid 100-year effort, the New Hampshire primaries have finally jumped the shark.
Ma$$ media did a long time ago.
Members of that wise, often taciturn tribe of New England Yankees were long renowned for their uncanny ability to sort the presidential wheat from the chaff, to pick the pretenders from the contenders.
But when the ideologically rudderless Donald Trump and democratic socialist Bernie Sanders run away with the top prizes, and lifelong centrist pols get sent home with trophies for participation, the contest has finally lost whatever political gravitas it may once have had.
Indeed, the biggest winner from the first-in-the-nation fracas this year wasn’t even on the ballot: Michael Bloomberg.
Will Americans join hands to applaud a candidate who wants to ban Big Gulps, lauds “stop-and-frisk,” and built both his name and his fortune on Wall Street? Only if the other options on the ballot are as noxious as they are unqualified to assume the most powerful and consequential job on the planet.
Bloomberg told the Financial Times recently that he found the campaign’s “level of discourse and discussion distressingly banal and an outrage and an insult to the voters.” That’s a sentiment shared by those who bleed red or blue.
While Bloomberg’s media empire made him a household name, his adept management of the country’s most powerful metropolis could make him a White House contender. He could position himself as a national mechanic — perhaps the campaign that Tom Menino might have run, had he aspired to national office. It would be a supremely patriotic gesture.
In a year when conventions have been shattered and rule books tossed out the window of Trump’s 757, why not a candidate who has marched to a different drum his entire career? Bloomberg has run as a Republican, a Democrat, and an independent over the years. This time, perhaps it is safer to run as a “none.”
If Mayor Mike can pick up supporters from the middling moderates Jeb Bush and John Kasich, along with some lukewarm Clinton supporters, he could make a serious centrist run and leave Trump and Sanders with only their furious fringes.
Ideologically, Bloomberg can pluck a la carte. His opposition to early withdrawal from Iraq will appeal to hawks, while his work (with Tom Menino) on gun control will endear him to, well, people who don’t believe in a constitutional right to own arsenals.
Supporting stop-and-frisk policing wins him law-and-order voters, while his staunchly pro-abortion-rights views win him a key part of the Democratic constituency. He’s tussled with teachers in New York and in favor of drug reform. Ever smoke pot? “You bet I did,” he famously said, “and I enjoyed it.”
While his three terms in New York weren’t without the rough-and-tumble that comes with running the country’s biggest city, they were remarkably free from scandal. That’s something even conservatives would like to see linger from the Obama years. Even Ralph Nader has some nice things to say about one of the country’s megabillionaires.
Bloomberg has hinted that he might be interested in a White House run. That’s an easy call for any reasonable man, if Trump wins the GOP nomination or Clinton gets in disqualifying legal trouble. Fate favors the well-prepared, as they say. But it also favors the bold. There’s little time for dithering in a run for the presidency, unless you want to get stuck with just a trophy for participation.
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"Bloomberg possible in theory rather than fact" by Michael A. Cohen Globe Columnist February 11, 2016
One of the major takeaways from Tuesday night’s results in the New Hampshire primary is that it was a good night for Michael Bloomberg, the billionaire former mayor of New York who is considering an independent presidential bid.
Allow me to offer a note of caution on this. First, it’s highly doubtful that Bloomberg will decide to run. The only likely scenario where this could happen is if the nominees appear to be Donald Trump and Bernie Sanders, an outcome that looks increasingly likely on the GOP side and still a longshot on the Democratic side.
But even if Bloomberg does choose to run, it’s far from clear that he will do well. In fact, the outcome likely would be the opposite.
Indeed, Bloomberg is a unique candidate, in that he probably alienates more single-issue voters — from both sides of the aisle — than any other politician in America.
He is pro-abortion-rights, pro-gun control (and has become the face of the gun control movement), pro-immigration, pro-same sex marriage, anti-Islamaphobia, and pro-tolerance. With a profile like that, it’s hard to imagine how he could win a single predominately red state.
Now granted, in a three-way race, he could take enough Democratic votes to succeed, but then he runs into his other problem — how is the guy who is well-known for stop-and-frisk policies as mayor of New York, which disproportionately affected minority New Yorkers, going to win over black and Hispanic voters nationwide? How would Bloomberg, who is a billionaire plutocrat, a booster of New York’s financial community, and a big fan of Wall Street, win over the voters who have been gravitating to populist candidates like Sanders and, the people’s billionaire, Trump?
In a campaign in which voters are responding to anger at the status quo and to grandiose promises from Trump to “Make America Great Again,’’ or exhortations from Sanders to start a political revolution, how does a technocratic moderate from New York, with no logical political base, win a presidential election? If anything, the profile of an effective third-party candidate would be someone like Trump, a populist who has never been involved in politics, pledging to shake up the system. That’s not Bloomberg.
As mayor of New York, Bloomberg was primarily a problem solver and decidedly nonideological. He wasn’t the kind of candidate who would get voters’ juices flowing by his stirring oratory. He was a manager, a guy with a record of governmental executive achievement — the opposite of the men who won the New Hampshire primary, particularly in comparison to the key campaign themes of their opponents. To be honest, he’d probably be a very good president. But he’d have to get there first.
Historically, voters have, over the years, flirted with a third-party candidate and then, inevitably, voted for one of the two-party nominees. Today, in a highly polarized environment, as Democrats and Republicans have increasingly become firmly ensconced in their political homes, and there are fewer swing voters, it’s hard to imagine a third-party candidate who can undo those party allegiances. It’s even harder to imagine that Mike Bloomberg is that guy.
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"Bloomberg, put those presidential dreams to bed" by Yvonne Abraham Globe Columnist February 11, 2016
Just say no, Michael Bloomberg.
I know you’re more likely than ever to attempt an independent run for president after Tuesday night. You’re horrified at the prospect of either winner becoming president.
As to Donald Trump, who can argue your point? Right now he looks as unstoppable as he is unbearable. His giant win in New Hampshire (the word “huge” is ruined forever) was a victory for small-mindedness, for the pull of bombastic celebrity, no matter what it says.
The night before the primary, Trump gleefully repeated an audience member’s vulgar insult, calling Ted Cruz a word I won’t repeat here, for not being gung-ho enough about torturing terrorism suspects (mere waterboarding is insufficiently medieval for tough-guy Trump). A whopping 100,000 Granite Staters voted for him anyway, undeterred by the fact that his State of the Union addresses would require parental advisory warnings.
You already get this, but if ever you’ve any doubt that Trump’s cynical, racist, misogynistic candidacy is fueled by a sea of haters and their enablers, I can take you for a spin around my inbox. It’s a real treat this week, since I suggested that Muslim Americans be spared the despicable attacks he has helped lead. (“They all need to leave our country, be interned or die,” wrote one of my many charmers. God bless America!)
You’re worried, I know, about Democrat Bernie Sanders, too. You’re put off by his calls for revolution and higher taxes, his fire-and-brimstone vows to come after rich folks like you. And maybe, too, you’re worried that if it comes down to him and Trump, Sanders can’t best him. I admit, I worry about that, too.
But you’re not going to help things by getting into this race, Mr. Bloomberg.
Third-party candidates never succeed. Like it or not, only the two major parties have the resources to mobilize voters in 50 states. Even your billions won’t bridge that gap, according to Hans Noel, an associate professor of government at Georgetown University, and an expert on political parties.
“Doing politics is more than swiping your card and buying stuff,” Noel said.
A fractured nation is not going to magically unite behind Mike Bloomberg, the Medford boy who grew up to build a vast empire and run New York City for 12 impressive years.
There is plenty to love about you. But conservative voters will hate you for your support for abortion rights, your war on Big Gulps, and especially for your courageous battle to bring sanity to a nation gripped by Second Amendment absolutists. Liberals will hate you for your aggressive policing policy, and for your extreme coziness with Wall Street.
You can’t win, Mike. But you can do serious damage, a la Ralph Nader in 2000. Nader wrote a Globe op-ed this week arguing that your candidacy would be a good thing, that your mere presence in the race would put pressure on the two-party duopoly.
Nader’s is not the endorsement you want here. If you get into a race you can’t win, all you’ll do is pull votes from somebody, possibly handing victory to one side, as Nader did.
He gave us W. Do you really want to risk giving us Mr. T?
The fascinating thing is — and maybe this is a testament to your centrism, or the craziness of this cycle — the experts I spoke to couldn’t say which candidate in a contest between Sanders and Trump, or Sanders and Cruz, would lose more votes to you. Pushed to decide, Seth Masket, chairman of the political science department at the University of Denver, said you’d probably draw more voters from the Democrat, given your moderate views on social issues. Noel was equally reluctant to predict your draw, but if he had to put money on it, guessed you’d pull more votes from the Republican.
Are you OK with tipping the election to any of these characters, Mr. Mayor? Do you really want to be that guy?
Walk away. Please.
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She tells the same false lie about Nader spoiler, so I am walking away.
He took the advice:
"Michael Bloomberg says he’s not running for president" by Jonathan Lemire Associated Press March 08, 2016
WASHINGTON — Michael Bloomberg, the billionaire former three-term mayor of New York City, had believed the dominance of Donald Trump among Republicans and the rise of Bernie Sanders amid Democrats had opened a centrist lane for a nonideological campaign.
But Hillary Clinton’s string of recent victories has given her a firm grip on the lead for the Democratic nomination and is blocking Bloomberg’s possible path, aides to the mayor said.
The decision concludes Bloomberg’s third and likely final flirtation with a White House run, a possibility that had grown popular among New York’s business class and, the mayor’s aides had believed, could have resonated with moderates and independents across the nation dissatisfied with the polarization in Washington and the rise of the political parties’ fringes.
Aides to Bloomberg, the 74-year-old Democrat-turned-Republican-turned-Democrat-turned independent, have said their own polling suggested that Bloomberg had a viable path to the needed 270 electoral votes if Trump, whom had disgusted the ex-mayor with his inflammatory rhetoric, and Sanders were the nominees.
But an Associated Press-GfK poll conducted last month suggested that six in 10 Republicans and Democrats alike said they would not consider backing Bloomberg.
The day before Mississippi’s primaries, Cruz stood on a table and spoke to more than 200 people at a restaurant in Florence, Miss., a blue-collar suburb of Jackson. A 110-foot cross dominates the parking lot of the restaurant.
Cruz won rowdy applause by saying he will protect gun owners’ rights, eliminate the US Department of Education, and nominate strict constitutionalists to the Supreme Court.
Ohio Governor John Kasich said at a Michigan rally Monday that he shouldn’t have answered a question in last week’s debate about whether he would support Trump if he wins the GOP presidential nomination.
Pushed by a self-identified Democratic voter to retract his potential support for Trump, Kasich said he ‘‘shouldn’t have even answered the question’’ because he plans on ‘‘being the GOP nominee.’’
Kasich said Trump sometimes ‘‘makes it difficult’’ to support him. Kasich declined to engage on the questioner’s comments that Trump and his supporters are racists and bigots.
This campaign narrative crap is funny in hindsight.
On the Democratic side, Sanders said Monday that rival Clinton has been mischaracterizing his position on the federal government’s 2008 bailout of the auto industry.
The Vermont senator said in Kalamazoo, Mich., that he voted in 2008 for the rescue of the auto industry in the Senate when it was a stand-alone issue and not included in a bailout for Wall Street.
Clinton accused Sanders of opposing the auto bailout during Sunday night’s presidential debate in Flint, Mich. The state is home to the US auto industry.
Clinton campaigned Monday in Grand Rapids, Mich., where she said that the FBI’s legal battle with Apple over an encrypted iPhone amounts to a difficult public policy dilemma.
Clinton told a small group at a technology company that there’s ‘‘got to be some way to protect the privacy of data information,’’ but also a way to ‘‘follow-up on criminal activity and prevent crimes of terrorism.’’
They got around it like Weiss got around Warren.
Federal authorities want Apple’s help in bypassing iPhone security features so they can attempt to unlock the encrypted phone. Apple and other tech companies have objected, arguing that the government essentially wants Apple to create a ‘‘back door’’ that could make all iPhones vulnerable to hacking.
Clinton said the ‘‘real mistrust between the tech companies and the government right now is a serious problem that has to somehow be worked through.’’
I think you have other trust issues based on certain tech companies and servers now, right?
Clinton also questioned if there was a way to get this information ‘‘without opening the door and causing more and worse consequences.’’
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Time to wrap it up:
($cattered applau$e)
"Go out and defeat the demagogues" by Michael R. Bloomberg May 03, 2016
Says a demagogue!
We have certainly seen such figures before, in both parties. In the 1930s, there was the despotic Huey Long in Louisiana and Father Coughlin in Michigan, who blamed “Jewish conspirators” for America’s troubles. Then came Charles Lindbergh in the ’40s, Joe McCarthy in the ’50s, George Wallace in the ’60s and Pat Buchanan in the ’90s. Every generation has had to confront its own demagogues. And every generation has stood up and kept them away from the White House. At least so far.
That's my Waterloo, and now there is Trump.
Huey Long, btw, was a threat to FDR and assassinated.
In this year’s presidential election, we’ve seen more demagoguery from both parties than I can remember in my lifetime. Our country is facing serious and difficult challenges. But rather than offering realistic solutions, candidates in both parties are blaming our problems on easy targets who breed resentment. For Republicans, it’s Mexicans here illegally and Muslims. And for Democrats, it’s the wealthy and Wall Street. The truth is: We cannot solve the problems we face by blaming anyone.
So why has it become so hard to find leaders who will lead from the front, rather than following from behind?
Here’s one reason, based on my experience: Today, elected officials who decide to support a controversial policy don’t just get angry letters, phone calls, and faxes. They also get millions of angry tweets and Facebook posts denouncing them in the harshest possible terms. This is democracy in action. But this kind of instant condemnation also makes elected officials afraid to do things that, in their heart of hearts, they know are right.
Democracy in action can actually produce a lot of inaction, which we see every day in Washington and other levels of government, too. When governments fail to address the needs of the people, voters in both parties get angry and some politicians exploit that anger by offering scapegoats instead of solutions.
Like you failed to address the needs of the homeless, Mike?
If we want to stop demagogues, we have to start governing again, and that requires us to be more civil, to support politicians who have the courage to take risks, and to reward those who reach across the aisle in search of compromise.
Doing this won’t be easy, and that’s partly because it’s not just social media that has changed the civic dialogue. The constant bombardment of news that we see on our phones, computers, and TVs gives us the impression we are acquiring knowledge. Yet many of the sources, facts and interpretations are either dubious or colored by partisanship, or outright lies.
I say that as the owner of a media company who has seen how the marketplace has shifted. Today, people choose cable TV channels and websites that affirm their own political beliefs rather than ones that inform and challenge their beliefs. As a result, we have grown more politically cloistered and more intolerant of those who hold different opinions.
PFFFFFFFFFTT!
So how many Iraq war lies made your papers?
Think about this: In 1960, only 4 to 5 percent of Democrats and Republicans said they would be upset if a member of their family married someone from the opposing party. In 2010, one in three Democrats and one in two Republicans said they would disapprove of such a marriage. In 1960, most people would never have believed that interparty marriage would attract such resistance, while interracial and same-sex marriage would gain such acceptance.
For all the progress we have made on cultural tolerance, when it comes to political tolerance, we are moving in the wrong direction — at campaign rallies that turn violent, on social media threads that turn vitriolic, and on college campuses, where students and faculty have attempted to censor political opponents.
What?
As durable as the American system of government has been, democracy is fragile — and demagogues are always lurking. Stopping them starts with placing a premium on open minds, voting, and demanding that politicians offer practical solutions, not scapegoats or pie-in-the-sky promises.
In 1928, Republicans promised a “chicken in every pot and a car in every backyard.” They won control of Congress and the White House, and a year later, instead of a chicken and a car, we got the Great Depression.
Today, when a populist candidate promises free college, free health care, and a pony, or another candidate promises to make other countries pay for our needs, remember: Those who promise you a free lunch will invariably eat you for breakfast.
Like a parasite.
--more--"
BOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!
Btw, Ben Affleck's speech was a joke.
Related:
"Taylor Swift is topping the charts again. This time she hit No. 1 on Forbes’ annual list of the world’s 100 highest-paid celebrities for having earned $170 million during the past year. Swift’s ex-boyfriend Calvin Harris landed at No. 21 with $63 million in earnings, but her current beau, Tom Hiddleston, did not make the list. Boston University alum Howard Stern came in at No. 7 with $85 million. Local favorite Matt Damon was in a four-way tie at No. 30 with $55 million (along with Ryan Seacrest, U2, and The Weeknd). Trailing behind at No. 58 was Ben Affleck, with $43 million. Tom Brady ranked No. 54 with $44 million, and his spouse, Gisele Bundchen, came in at No. 99 (in a tie with Britney Spears) with $30.5 million. But according to Forbes’ calculations, Tom and Gisele were not the highest-paid celebrity couple of 2016 — that honor goes to Beyoncé and Jay Z, who together pulled in $107.5 million over the past year. Kim Kardashian, who is featured on the magazine’s cover, ranked No. 42 on the list with $51 million. Forbes reported that 40 percent of her paycheck this year came from her mobile game ‘‘Kim Kardashian: Hollywood,” and the game’s maker, Glu Mobile, is scheduled to release an app starring Swift later this year."
Les see, the last time I saw her was.... at the MLB All-Star Game in San Diego!
NDUs:
Maybe honeymoon isn’t over for Affleck and Garner
They were seen together at the DNC.
Matt Damon says HBO has dropped ‘Project Greenlight’
They red-lighted it, so to speak, and it left Matt really deflated; however, not as deflated as I was when I saw tax loot all over Duxbury Beach.
"Former New York mayor Michael Bloomberg’s prime-time turn at the podium to endorse Clinton aimed to further underscore how far-reaching, ideologically speaking, the disquiet about Trump is. Bloomberg, a billionaire who made his fortune by founding a financial-information business, won two of his three terms as mayor by running as a Republican. Introducing himself “an outsider,” Bloomberg unleashed a blistering takedown of Trump, full of insults designed to needle the real estate mogul. “I’m a New Yorker, and New Yorkers know a con when we see one,” he said. “Truth be told, the richest thing about Donald Trump is his hypocrisy.”
So much for the culture of tolerance exposed by Bloomy!!!
But the essence of the critique delivered by one of the world’s wealthiest and most successful businessmen was that Trump would drive the US economy into a ditch. “I understand the appeal of a businessman president,” said Bloomberg. “But Trump’s business plan is a disaster in the making.”
It's already in a ditch, driven their by both parties, and it helped make Mike more wealthy as inequality soars by the second, minute, hour, day, month....
Bloomberg also sought to offer other independent and Republican voters turned off by Trump a way to come to terms with voting for Clinton. He doesn’t always agree with Clinton, he said more than once, but the former New York senator always listened to his point of view. And she’s not Trump. “We must unite around the candidate who can defeat a dangerous demagogue,” he urged."
You know who I would never vote for (wink)?
