New York Mayor Bill de Blasio (D), “using his muscular perch to try to nudge the national Democratic Party to the left, next week will unveil a 13-point progressive agenda that he hopes will be the left’s answer to the ‘Contract with America,’ which helped propel Newt Gingrich and the Republican Revolution of 1994,” Politico reports.
Rolling Stone: “Bill de Blasio is trying to remake America’s biggest city — and he doesn’t plan to stop there.”
“Despite repeated claims to the contrary, Mayor Bill de Blasio is positioning himself to be the leftist ‘progressive’ alternative to Wall Street-friendly Hillary Clinton as the Democratic candidate for president,” a national party operative told the New York Post.
“De Blasio’s hope, the operative said, is a ‘Draft de Blasio’ movement will develop among progressive activists over the next several months that will lead to the mayor being able to defeat Clinton in the primary elections next year in much the same way leftist Sen. George McGovern successfully challenged the initially front-running establishment Democratic candidate, Sen. Edmund Muskie, more than 40 years ago.”
“For two straight weeks, New York City police officers have sharply cut back on making arrests and issuing summonses throughout the five boroughs, magnifying the growing divide between the city’s police force and its mayor, Bill de Blasio,” the New York Times reports.
“Officers made half as many arrests in the seven days through Sunday as in the same week a year ago. In the entire city, 347 criminal summonses were written, down from 4,077 a year ago, according to police statistics. Parking and traffic tickets also dropped by more than 90 percent.”
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“The mayor is not in any way to be treated with people turning their backs. It doesn’t matter whether you like the mayor or you don’t like the mayor, you have to respect the mayor’s position.”
— Rudy Giuliani, quoted by Newsday, after New York City police turned their backs to New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio (D) speaking at a police officer’s funeral.
“Bill de Blasio, like his progressive political idol Barack Obama, is finding out that you can’t do the New Politics if you don’t pay attention to the old politics,” Politico reports.
“In Obama’s case, it was a failure to recognize the threat posed to him by Republicans who didn’t buy into his calls for a post-partisan partnership with Congress. For New York’s ambitious liberal mayor, it was an inability to keep long-simmering tensions with the city’s traditionally powerful police department from boiling over in the last few days.”
“You can’t be big-city mayor and alienate the cops – and that’s just as true now as it was under three-term New York City Mayor Ed Koch, or even a century ago.”
New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio (D) said he had to warn his black son about the police, Gawker reports.
Said De Blasio: “Because Chirlane and I have had to talk to Dante for years about the dangers that he may face. A good young man, law-abiding young man who would never think to do anything wrong. And yet, because of a history that still hangs over us, the dangers he may face, we’ve had to literally train him—as families have all over this city for decades—in how to take special care in any encounter he has with the police officers who are there to protect him.”
New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio “said today he does not smoke marijuana and has not in many years, after he was asked point-blunt about the herb,” the New York Daily News reports.
Gawker: “We’re skeptical, to say the least. Have you—or someone you know—recently smoked pot with the Blaz? If so, send us an email or hop in below.”
Taegan Goddard is the founder of Political Wire, one of the earliest and most influential political web sites. He also runs Political Job Hunt, Electoral Vote Map and the Political Dictionary.
Goddard spent more than a decade as managing director and chief operating officer of a prominent investment firm in New York City. Previously, he was a policy adviser to a U.S. Senator and Governor.
Goddard is also co-author of You Won - Now What? (Scribner, 1998), a political management book hailed by prominent journalists and politicians from both parties. In addition, Goddard's essays on politics and public policy have appeared in dozens of newspapers across the country.
Goddard earned degrees from Vassar College and Harvard University. He lives in New York with his wife and three sons.
Goddard is the owner of Goddard Media LLC.
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