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Bloomberg Will Seek Third Term

by: robert.harding

Thu Oct 02, 2008 at 13:30:24 PM EDT

Phillip was on top of the term limits story involving New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg yesterday. Today, Bloomberg announced that he would seek a third term.

From Liz:

Shortly after noon, Mayor Bloomberg officially reserved himself on term limits, declaring that he will sign a bill to extend the current limit from two, four-year terms to three if the Council passes it and will then run for re-election next fall.
As a rationale, he cited the Wall Street mess and a generalized "crisis of confidence" in the economy, adding:
"I can tell you the enormity of the challenges ahead cannot be underestimated...This is not the time for fantasy. That's what helped get our nation into the mess that we now confront."
"...It's a challenge I want to take on for the people of New York."
Bloomberg said he will ask the voters to look at his "record of independent leadership and decide whether I've earned another term."

That is an interesting rationale considering Bloomberg, as mayor, didn't exactly do nothing to save New York City from such an economic crisis (not that he did anything to necessarily cause it either) so he is really grasping at straws there. But if that's his rationale, it looks like he is going to run with it.

This was the most interesting quote (again from Liz):

The mayor refused to answer questions about whether he intends to run as an independent in 2009 ("This is not a time for politics," he said), and also insisted: "This has nothing to do with keeping me occupied."

Not a time for politics? When you run for mayor, that is a political decision. So this whole "I'm running and ignoring the term limits" thing is political.

I have always admired New York City because of their term limits. In my rural county, Republicans could get elected at a young age and stay in power until they die if they wanted. We don't have term limits here.

I don't really have an opinion on Bloomberg because I haven't had to live under his rule. I do have an opinion about term limits and I believe that they are good for democracy. There is a reason why we have term limits for the presidency. Obviously that's a much higher seat than Bloomberg's, but the goal is still the same. If New York City has term limits in place (which they do), they should be followed. They shouldn't be ignored because a politician feels that he has done a good enough job to bypass term limits and run for a third time.

robert.harding :: Bloomberg Will Seek Third Term

Tags: Michael Bloomberg, New York City, New York City Mayor, 2009 Elections, Term Limits, (All Tags)

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Bloomberg Will Seek Third Term | 1 comments

Bloomberg is wrong on this one (0.00 / 0)

Argument #1:

It's generally believed that Mayor of New York City is the second toughest job around. Given the difficulties, the best judgment a Mayor can usually hope for is "mixed." Certainly Mayor Bloomberg deserves that judgment as well; he has done some things extremely well, and other things pretty badly.

His attempt to get the City Council to grant him a third term, in violation of the twice-expressed will of the people, is one of those things he's doing badly. As the 2001 election neared, and everything was about 9/11, many people opined that then-Mayor Giuliani should remain in office past the Dec. 31 deadline. Fortunately, that desecration of the rule of law didn't happen, so we don't have such a disgusting precedent.

In fact, we have an excellent precedent. The ashes of the World Trade Center were still smouldering, and the odor could be sensed around much of the city. We were facing what amounted to a $6 billion deficit. Everything was in turmoil. And we got new people in all three citywide offices, four of five borough presidencies, and 38 of 51 city council seats.

The city survived.

Next year, the time will come for Mayor Bloomberg to step aside and respect the will of the people and the rule of law.

Argument #2:

In June, the City Council will pass a budget for FY 2010. By the end of the year, our city government will either have dealt with the fiscal troubles or they won't. If they do, then we will be able to put new people in without trouble. If they don't, then we will desperately need new people to straighten out the mess they left.

I'm betting on the former; this is essentially the group that worked out solutions to the problems they faced the day they took office, and this time they have years of experience they didn't have before. Either way, however, there is no call for them to stay in office past their term limits.

Argument #3:

With one exception, every one of the 51 council members, 5 borough presidents and 3 citywide officeholders is in office only because of term limits. How dare they close the door through which they entered! (The one exception is Councilmember Thomas White, who was term-limited out in 2001, and then came back in 2005.)

by: Dan Jacoby @ Thu Oct 02, 2008 at 19:49:26 PM UTC