Money For Nothin'?

In a inconspicuously placed story in today's NY Times, Jim Rutenberg wraps us (almost) the final details on the mayor's record election splurge. We say almost because there are still some additional expenditures that remain unaccounted for in the $84 million number that was released to the press.

What is now needed is for the Times to do an in-depth analysis of the impact that the mayor's spending on his "landslide" re-election. You know, a story that has the same kind of analytical probing that the press used in their deconstruction of the failures of the Ferrer campaign.

An addition to this needed review should be a comprehensive cataloguing of the mayor's so-called charitable donations, ones that in many cases were thinly disguised campaign expenditures (contrast the press oversight of this with the media furor over the Corzine mess in New Jersey). The Times has already done a campaign piece but we're already hearing noise that Bloomberg isn't really a lame duck because his ability to donate-post his tenure in office-will create a climate of obeisance.

What we should be able to avoid is another Times editorial suggesting that the mayor lead the charge for campaign finance reform. There is still, however, a strong need for someone with cleaner hands to worry about the negative impact of the mayor's store-bought lack of political accountability.