Monday, July 25, 2011
The (Strong) Medicine Man
I just thought of another "hero". And this one, folks, IS a politician; former New York City mayor, Ed Koch. Koch, at least in my estimation, was EXACTLY what New York City needed in 1977. At a time when the city had such things as "snow days", when it paid its huge municipal workforce to stay home when it snowed and paid those that did come in time and a half, at a time when other politicians such as Mario Cuomo, Bella Abzug, and incumbent Mayor Abe Beam gave mealy-mouthed responses to the 1977 power outage rioting, Mr. Koch came along and kicked majorly some butt. Now, did this fellow eventually wear out his welcome/deserve to be "retired"? Sure, probably (you could say that about most U.S. politicians, no?). But for at least a fairly large chunk of his tenure, Ed Koch was a pretty damn good mayor, I think.
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14 comments:
You get scarier and scarier, dude. A politician as a hero?
I concur with Will, for sure.
What can I say, wd, I scare myself sometimes.............Snow-days, dmarks, can you even begin to believe that one?
If you want to get technical Rudy cleaned up New York even more when he was mayor although I wouldn't piss on the man now if he was on fire.
Ed Koch endorsed Eliot Spitzer for governnor of New York.
double b, Giuliani jumped the shark for me in 1999. It was when he made that big hullabaloo over that exhibit at the Brooklyn Museum of Art. By all accounts he knew about it in advance but only made a stink about it when he saw that he could score political points. Couple that with the fact that he DIDN'T make a big stink about "Piss Christ" simultaneously being at the Whitney Museum, its proprietor being a big money donor to Mr. Mayor.
we, I believe that he also endorsed George W. Bush in 2004. I don't hold that against him, either.
Wikipedia says... Koch took back his endorsement of Spitzer in the aftermath of the prostitution scandal. He has said, "At the time the prostitution episode emerged, I commented that nothing could explain his behavior other than the fact that he had a screw loose in his head. Probably several".
I say the same about anyone who voted for bush twice (once shows bad judgment, twice proves utter stupidity). And as far as Koch is concerned... When he endorsed Barack Obama in 2008 he said, "unlike in 2004... both sets of candidates would do their best to protect both the United States and Israel from terrorist attacks".
So in 2004 he endorsed bush over Kerry for national security reasons? And he stood by his endorsement of GWB to the very end? I think a lot of people would question his judgment over that one... me included.
Eliot Spitzer shouldn't have stepped down. Vitter didn't.
I said that Koch was a good MAYOR. I claimed nothing about his post-mayoral judgments/selections.
Will: I claimed nothing about his post-mayoral judgments/selections
Concerning his endorsement of GWB, you said, "I don't hold that against him". Sounds like you're claiming endorsing GWB was not the wisest of decisions? Otherwise why suggest it could be held against him? Or perhaps you believe it was a good endorsement...
WD said: "I say the same about anyone who voted for bush twice (once shows bad judgment, twice proves utter stupidity)"
Which says nothing about Bush, but says everything about your idea that those who do not share your exact political views are "stupid".
Like I said before, wd, some people are good at math. Some are good in English. Some make good decisions early in the week and lousy ones later in the week. My only point here was that, after the weak-kneed and idiotic tenure of his predecessor, Abe Beame, Ed Koch was an ace/damned good mayor for quite some time. What he did subsequent to that, I obviously have much less certainty over.
dmarks ...says everything about YOUR IDEA that those who do not share your exact political views are "stupid".
That isn't my idea. I didn't say people who don't "share [my] exact political views" are stupid... I said people who voted for bush a second time are. If you think I did (even after this clarification) then I think you're stupid.
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