Who's On Third?

In an incisive column in yesterday's NY Daily News, Michael Goodwin deconstructs the Mike Bloomberg third party fantasy: "In the end, Bloomberg looks doomed to suffer the fate of all independent White House runs. The vast bulk of voters abandon them to back a major party candidate with a chance of winning."

The problem here is that the Bloombergistas don't have a firm grip on just who Mayor Mike really is: "The logic is political. Bloomberg, a former Democrat and a former Republican, fancies himself a center-right moderate who, like McCain, could appeal to independents as well as most of the Republican base. But seen through the national prism, Bloomberg's self-image would be shredded by his gun-control, pro-gay marriage, tax-and-spend, big-government record as mayor. He's not only liberal. He's far more liberal than Clinton or Obama. Think Ralph Nader - with money."

As we've said before-John Lindsay with more money. Now $500 million dollars goes a long way in politics, and the susceptibility of the voters to these kinds of ad blitz appeals is obvious, given the Bloomberg success with the NYC electorate. Still, NYC isn't the rest of the country and Goodwin is right when he portrays Bloomberg as to the left of even Hillary.

Which makes some of the speculation that Liz refered to last Friday seem rather off key. Hotline founder Doug Baily had these observations: "To the contrary, Bailey said, the problem is not McCain, a friend of the mayor's who appeals to the same pool of independent voters whose support Bloomberg would need if he runs. The real problem is Barack Obama, with whom the mayor shared a highly-public breakfast in Midtown last month, and who enjoys his own degree of crossover appeal." Nah, the problem is Bloomberg himself, a man with no mass appeal beyond his considerable checks appeal.

Bloomberg is an elitest progressive who believes that we need to save the people from themselves; and he's just the man to do it. This belief, and the health and welfare policies that have gone with it for the last few years, underscores Jonah Goldberg's depiction of the fascist underpinning of a strain of liberalism-going back to the eugenics movement of the Progressive Era.

So the clock is running, and we're actually rooting for Mike to enact his electoral version of the economic stimulus package. But then again we're chaos theorists, and we welcome the mayor's ability to seriously muck things up-and make a fool of himself in the process.