Mr NYC Ahead of His Time

The 2025 NYC Democratic Mayoral primary will end on June 24th and it will go down in history as one of the most befuddling in our fair city. The leading candidates are a former NY State governor (Andrew Cuomo) who resigned in disgrace four years ago and a Muslim Socialist Assemblyman (Zohran Mamdani). 

Once upon a time -- let's say, ten years ago -- the idea that either person could win a primary and maybe get elected mayor seemed unthinkable. Yet here we are. Of course once upon a time we never imagined that a bankrupt conman convicted felon and adjudicated rapist who was twice impeached and tried to violently destroy democracy could be elected -- and re-elected -- President. Yet here we are. 

Dark times. Weird times. Take your pick.

But staying closer to home, one really has to wonder how Cuomo and Mandami became the mayoral frontrunners. This article posits that it's due to the withering of the political clubs in NYC. Tammany Hall is long gone, and the remaining clubs no longer have the power to "deliver" votes that carry mayors to victory. Instead, individualized campaigns took over from the clubs, public financing meant that clubs couldn't throw around money in quite the same way. Clubs can canvas and help turn out voters but they don't have the patronage power of jobs that they used to, they don't have the neighborhood-to-neighborhood power that they used to. And obviously television and social media and outright fame can deliver vastly more voters than a party boss.  

The article also revives the memory of a mayor that I blogged about in 2007: Vincent Impelliteri (called Impy) who was handpicked by Tammany Hall to run for City Council President in 1945 because he was an Italian from Manhattan ;they needed to balance the citywide slate (Mayor, William O'Dwyer; Comptroller, Lazarus Joseph; City Council, Impelliteri) with an Irishman, a Jew, and an Italian. When O'Dywer resigned in 1950 Impy became mayor. This is held up as an example of how clubs, the political "machines", made mayors back then.

But one thing the article gets somewhat wrong is that while the political clubs and machines can't "make mayors" these days, they can still make members of the city council, State Assembly and State Senate. No, they can't make another Impy -- or Robert Wagner or (going even farther back) Jimmy Walker, but the clubs/machines still wield a lot of power in NYC under the radar. 

So here we are, less than a week before the primary, and the most likely winners are a guy running on huge name-recognition and another on social media savvy. 

Tammany Hall could never have imagined that.

If you want to know more about where Zohran came from, read this article by three-time Mr NYC interviewee Ross Barkan about Zohran when Ross ran for State Senate in 2018 and Zohran worked for him. It's interesting to see where this possibly transformative political figure came from and who he is.

And remember, I was blogging about all of these people -- Cuomo, Zohran, Ross, even  Impy! -- several YEARS before this current moment. 

And yet again Mr NYC is ahead of his time while the rest of NYC is catching up!

The Eric Adams Saga Takes Another Bizarre Turn

Whoever said "May you live in interesting times" was an asshole.

Actually, it was/is an old Japanese proverb and was in fact meant as a curse. The flip side to that is another Japanese proverb that states "May you have a boring life" and that was meant as a blessing.

As I get older, I see the wisdom in both sayings. 

Here in NYC, we're living in the "interesting times" of Mayor Eric Adams -- the criminal who runs the city. Only now he's technically not a criminal any more -- the corruption charges against him were dropped -- with prejudice, meaning they can't be brought against him again -- and now Adams says he's running for re-election as an Independent.

I hope to heck he loses but who knows? These days the vox populi est imbecile. 

Then again, in the 19th century there was Fernando Wood, in the 20th century there was Jimmy Walker -- so now, in the 21st century, we have Eric Adams. 

Still, the whole thing is rotten and weird and depressing. New York City deserves so much better than this.

Mr NYC Ahead of His Time

As the legal inferno involving Mayor Eric Adams continues to burn, some NYC scribes are rememebering other mayors from times gone by that also got into trouble.

The two mayors mostly commonly remembered for getting into big trouble are Jimmy Walker and William O'Dwyer, both of whom resigned in 1932 and 1950, respectively, and then fled the country. Also there was Fernando Wood, the 19th mayor who was vastly more corrupt than either Adams, Walker or O'Dywer -- and never got into trouble at all.

I recently came upon a few articles (here, here and here) about these men, comparing their stories to the predicament that Eric Adams finds himself in (sadly two of these articles are behind a paywall).

But Mr NYC, yours truly, was blogging about these naughty mayors long ago, before any of this meshugas (read about them here and here) -- and remember, Mr NYC is always ahead of his time.

Adams Indicted

So it finally happened, even faster than I imagined. Eric Adams is the first NYC mayor to be indicted while in office.

For more on the complete bizarre saga of NYC 21st-century version of Mayor Jimmy Walker, go here. 

And here's what might happen next. 

As always, Mr NYC pointed out the oddness and possible criminality of Mayor Adams well before most of the media -- once again, Mr NYC being ahead of his time. 

Uninteresting Interesting Times

So the FBI just raided the homes of the First Deputy Mayor, the Schools Chancellor (on the first day of school no less!), the Deputy Mayor for Public Safety, and, oh, the police commissioner!

This is, uh, not good. But, if you've been following this blog and its musings on Hizzoner, it's not exactly a surprise. At this rate, Adams heading to be another Jimmy Walker or William O'Dwyer.

We live in interestinging times ... and it's so boring!

Remembering Fernando Wood, NYC's "Scoundrel" Mayor

Imagine a politician who built his wealth in real estate, was a racist demagogue who supported the Confederacy, incited a riot, married and fathered multiple children with multiple women, tried to undermine democracy and the law to make himself a dictator, and used his executive public office to enrich himself ...

Of course I'm talking about the mid-19th Century NYC Mayor Fernando Wood.

Born in Philadelphia in 1812, Wood migrated to NYC and worked as a laborer, got involved in Tammany Hall politics, and was eventually elected to Congress in 1840. After one term he left and got into real estate, accumulating a fortune but remaining involved in politics until he finally was elected mayor in 1854.

His administration was basically a giant shakedown and bribery operation but he did notch some significant achievements: rebuilding the city harbor, overseeing the approval and eventual creation of Central Park, and implementing the grid system. He also attempted to change the city charter to essentially make the city government the extension of one man – him – so he could act as a dictator. When he ran for re-election in 1856, he furloughed the police department and got a band of thugs to menace and beat up voters in order to get reelected. He was never prosecuted for this. 

Defeated for a third-term, Wood eventually got elected mayor again in 1860 – just as the Civil War was breaking out. He supported slavery and the Confederacy, and called for NYC to secede from New York State so it could keep trading with the south.

So did Fernando Wood ever face public disgrace or jail for his corruption and crimes?

Oh no. In 1862, he returned to Congress and opposed abolition. And he remained in Congress, becoming chairman of the powerful House Ways and Means Committee, until he died in 1881, a very wealthy man with a mansion on West 77th Street.

He also had three wives and fathered 16 children. The man was forever busy.

Today we live in an era of aspiring dictators and corrupt chief executives with a love of racism and violence and money. So while history has not been kind to Fernando Wood's memory, in some ways, he'd be right at home in our era.

But he's been condemned, at least, by popular culture: see the 2012 Steven Spielberg movie Lincoln and listen to the 2011 Bowery Boys episode.

In many ways, Fernando Wood makes later NYC mayors Jimmy Walker and Eric Adams look like pillars of virtue.

Norman Lear & Ralph Cirella RIP

Death is a complex thing.

Everyone dies eventually but not in the same way. Some people live long lives and die peacefully at a ripe old age. Other people live for a much shorter period of time and die suddenly. There are no good deaths but some deaths are much better or worse than others.

And some people leave huge legacies while others leave some something short of greatness but are otherwise notable. 

Two people whose lives and legacies couldn't be more different just died, and I'm surprised how sad I am about both.

Norman Lear is one of the most important contributors to American culture of the last 50 years. In the 1970s he created the sitcoms All in the Family, Maude, The Jeffersons, Good Times, One Day at a Time, and others. His shows, many set in NYC, were hilarious -- he gave us Archie Bunker's "YOU ... are ... a MEATHEAD!" and Jimmy Walker's "Dyn-o-mite!" -- but they also forced Americans to look at uncomfortable truths like racism, sexism, single motherhood, broken families, and poor communities. He changed not only American television but American culture, and the legacy of his shows reverberate to this day.

Lear has just died at the awesome age of 101, and it's amazing to realize that he didn't create his most important work until he was nearly 50 years old -- and then got to live another 50 years to see how lasting it was. An amazing man, an amazing life, an amazing impact, he was an American original.

Ralph Cirella is someone you'd only know if you are, like me, a huge fan of radio icon Howard Stern. Ralph was his stylist, his friend, his flunkie, and a lot of people loved to hate him because he had a great talent of pissing of just about everyone. But Ralph was a colorful, interesting character who created some great moments for the show. And he was on the show for almost 40 years! I grew up listening to him on Howard so Ralph's death feels like the death of a friend I never knew.

While Ralph didn't leave some kind of huge cultural legacy he was a part of something, a supporting player, for someone who did. The show wouldn't have been the same without him. Sadly, Ralph died suddenly at age 58 after his heart gave out during a procedure to treat a rare lymphoma. It's a tragedy, and great loss.

So one guy lived until 101 and left a huge legacy while another lived much less long and basically left a dent. But they led interesting, impactful lives -- and we should all be so lucky.

Mr NYC Ahead of His Time -- Also, Mr NYC Corrects the Record

Currently there is a swirl of buzz in the NYC media world about the corruption investigation into Mayor Eric Adams -- and whether or not it might lead to his resignation (including the idea that former Governor Andrew Cuomo might run to replace him, that'd be wild).

Anyway, this morning I came across this article from City and State NY with this headline: "No NYC mayor has resigned Since 1932. But here's what would happen if they did."

Now let's not get to hung up on the grammer of this headline ("No mayor" is singular, "they" is plural), and the article does a fine job explaining how the line of succession works per the city charter --- but the headline is just flat-out, historically wrong.

While a mayor, Jimmy Walker, did resign in 1932 another mayor also resigned in 1950 -- William O'Dwyer. I even did a blog post in 2019 about the special election of 1950. I even wrote a blog post about the mayor who was elected in that special election -- Vincent Impelliteri -- all the way back in 2007!  

So the record now stands corrected!

Review: "Big City Blues" (1932)

I love old movies that give you a real-time window on the past -- of a world both distant and familiar.

Such an example is the 1932 B-movie Big City Blues. It's about a young man named Bud who leaves small town Indiana to start an exciting life in NYC. He connects with his con-man cousin Gibby and a dame named Vida who lead him to a party where things get out of control and someone gets killed -- making Bud hightail it back to Indiana but never giving up his dreams of living and making it in NYC.

This movie has to be seen to be believed -- it's a perfect example of early 1930s pre-code Hollywood with lots of fast-talking characters and hammy acting. It's only an hour long and doesn't have much of a plot but it's a fun short movie that's all about how NYC is a great place to live -- but also with dangers lurking around every corner.

There's a few interesting things about this movie, especially in retrospect.

First, as mentioned, it was made in the early '30s just before Prohibition was repealed so there's a lot of stuff about bootleggers and speakeasies in it.

Second, the cast: it stars a young man named Eric Linden whose acting career was short-lived although he later on had a small role in Gone With the Wind. The "dame", Vida, is played by Joan Blondell who had a long career afterwards -- one of her last movies was Grease in 1978. And in a small part as a guest at the party where everything goes wrong is a young, smart talking Humphrey Bogart -- then just an up-and-coming actor before being lifted to cinematic greatness in the 1940s.

Third, it was directed by a man named Mervyn Le Roy who a few years later would produce a little flick called The Wizard of Oz. 

Fourth, there's a lot of references to the then-Mayor of NYC, Jimmy Walker who had managed to become something of a national celebrity of that time. Much like our current mayor, Eric Adams, Walker was a notoriously corrupt party-hound incompetent. Funnily enough Big City Blues was released on September 10, 1932 just nine days after Jimmy Walker had resigned and fled the country due to corruption charges headed his way. Just two months later New York-native Franklin Roosevelt would be elected president.

So this movie captures NYC at a turning point in history, when the anything-goes, criminal culture of the 1920s was slowly being crushed under the heels of the Great Depression and the New Deal. 

P.S. There's a great monologue at the beginning of this movie by the Indiana train station master. I can't post a clip of it here but look for it here on You Tube -- it's brilliant. 

Remembering Polly Adler

Every so often there will be a "scandal" when a prostitution ring gets busted. And while sex always sells, the media goes especially nuts when the ring in question turns out to have been run by a woman.

Back in the 1980s, there was the Mayflower Madam, Sydney Biddle Barrows, a lady with a distinguished pedigree (private schools, good jobs in the legit world, a descendant of the Mayflower passengers). More recently there was Kirsten Davis, the ridiculous character whose agency was involved in the Spitzer scandal back in 2008.

New York City has always produced eccentric characters doing weird, fascinating, and sometimes illegal things -- so it's no surprise that our madams are equally colorful.

But perhaps the most colorful of madam in NYC history was Polly Adler. Born a Jew in Russia in 1900, her family sent her to Massachusetts to live with relatives so she could avoid the horrible, state sanctioned anti-Semitic pogroms. After growing up, she moved to NYC and opened her first brothel near Columbia University. Her establishment became the best in the business, the most popular brothel in town. She had to turn away clients and woman who wanted to work for her, the demand was so high. She would get busted every so often -- and then went right back to work. Her clients included the powerful columnist Walter Winchell, Mayor Jimmy Walker, a soon-to-be famous singer named Desi Arnez. Polly even became personal friends with the famous writer and notorious wit Dorothy Parker.

And yet it wasn't the law that was Polly's most formiddable enemy -- it was the mob. Shakedowns, violence, and an unending stream of threats put her life in perpetual danger. Eventually she went to jail and finally quit the business in the 1940s, moving to Los Angeles, writing a book about her life, and dying in 1962 -- at age 62.

Polly Adler was a denizen of another age, another NYC. Her life was one of glamour and danger, of excitement and pain. She had an amazing life -- just one that I don't think any of us would ever really want to live ourselves.

Where have you gone, Tammany Hall?

In American politics today, the most common complaint is, why can't politicians get anything done?

Of course, our political system of checks and balances was intentionally set up to make it difficult to govern, lest we slide into tyranny. However, in recent years, it seems like our politicians have gone from governing and legislating into simply engaging in deliberate gridlock. It does "We the people" no good.

The people, of course, are at the heart of any democracy -- because here the people rule. At least, in theory. In practice, of course, people powered government is rough and messy business, much like the people themselves. That is why political parties came into existence, as a way for people and groups with similar interests to organize and claim power. It's always why the engines of political parties, i.e. "machines", became so vital in the 19th and 20th centuries: they helped people claim power and use the government to improve their lives.

A machine works like this: the people who work and vote for or finance the dominate political party in their respective city or state get benefits when the politicians they support get into the power. This can be a job or social services or various government favors. It's very much a transactional, back scratching way of governing. It is the "business" side of politics and government. 

Political machines, of course, have long been derided as sources of corruption since they can warp the machinery and priorities of government and leads to bad policies. Government ceases to function properly when instead of being used an instrument to help the population at large it is used simply to benefit the people who run and support it. However, political machines were not always sources of patronage and corruption. Instead, they were mechanisms to help the poor and dispossessed grab away the levers of government from the rich and connected. 

Here in NYC, from the early nineteenth to the mid-twentieth centuries, Tammany Hall was the most powerful and notorious political machine in America. Tammany Hall ran NYC like the Vatican runs the Catholic Church: absolutely. The "bosses" of Tammany, like the infamous Boss Tweed and later people like Carmine DeSapio, would handpick candidates for mayor and other municipal offices and they were almost guarenteed victory on election day. At its height, Tammany's power reached to Albany, with even governors needed the backing of the powerful organization to get elected. But Tammany was not just a cease pool of power and corruption. In its early days, before the government granted social services, it was also a place where poor people and immigrants could go to get a job, food, shelter, even winter clothes. It helped the people at a time when the government and the wealthy didn't, and all it wanted in exchange was a vote. For many New Yorkers at the time, this was a great deal. 

In many ways, Tammany became a victim of its own success and power. By the mid-twentieth century, many of the politicians it had supported, like Governor Al Smith, had instituted social welfare programs in New York State that made the services Tammany used to provide people irrelevant. In the 1930s, the New Deal and the election of Fiorello LaGuardia as mayor made Tammany both irrellevant and, for the first time, politically weak. And, of course, corruption went from the "honest graft" of the 19th century, when politicians and bosses helped the people and themselves, into the vile corruption of Mayor Jimmy Walker -- who spent his days and nights drinking and chasing women while his city fell apart, thanks to the Great Depression and incompetency of City Hall. 

By the 1960s, Tammany Hall was dead. Many said and would say today good riddance. But is the city better off because of it? At its height, Tammany Hall was a strong advocate for New Yorkers who had no other. It truly cared and helped everyone. Today, who does that? Unions? The rich? Ha! And when you see ineffective the city, state and federal governments have became at truly improving the lives of ordinary people, Tammany Hall in its glory years seems truly glorious indeed. 

There is a new book that looks to reexamine the legacy of Tammany Hall. Perhaps, it argues, Tammany Hall has been unfairly condemned. And perhaps the people of our city would do better if another Tammany Hall could rise, a political organization that simply looked out for everyone without regards to wealth or connections. 

P.S. Where was Tammany Hall? It was originally located right off Union Square on East 14th street. The original building was demolished in 1927 but then moved to East 17th. 

The Ghosts of NYC

Did you know we live in a ghost town?

Yes, NYC is a place where ghosts live. Not literally of course -- ghosts don't exist -- but the lives of past New Yorkers have shaped our city, literally and figuratively, and the spirit of New Yorkers past still haunt our collective memories.

And, to find them, all you have to do is a take a walk.

First, go to West 44th Street. This one block of Manhattan is one of the most fascinating in this or any part of any city in this country. This is where the Algonquin Hotel once existed, and in its restaurant, Dorothy Parker and Robert Benchley and Edna Ferber and George Kaufman and all sorts of literary legends formed the Round Table -- perhaps the most famous American salon in history. West 44th Street is also where the Harvard Club is located, a place where New Yorkers at the pinnacle of wealth and power came and still do come to congregate. It's where The New Yorker used to have its offices. Under the decades long leadership of William Shawn, this magazine launched the careers of countless legendary writers, including JD Salinger and John Updike. And, much more recently, West 44th Street is the location of the Sofitel Hotel, where a certain former IMF chief got nasty with a maid and thus upended French politics. 

This long, fascinating article from Vanity Fair gives a general and personal history of West 44th Street and how the people who worked, drank, and screwed there formed our city's cultural and political history forever.

Second, walk up to Fifth Avenue and 72nd street and pop into Central Park. And stare at Rumsey Playground and then close your eyes. Then open your mind and imagine a gorgeous Beaux Arts building standing right there. And imagine it's nighttime, and men and women in beautiful suits and dresses are getting out of limos and going inside into what used to be casino. Yes, such a place used to exist right there. It was a building designed by Calvert Vaux in 1859, one of the original architects of Central Park, that was originally called the Ladies Refreshment Salon. By the turn of the century it became a music hall and then, in 1929, under the infamous Mayor Jimmy Walker, it was turned into a Casino -- a sign of the wretched excess of Roaring Twenties New York. Walker's corruption, and the casino he helped build, became hated symbols after the Great Depression began. Walker was forced to resign in 1932 and Robert Moses, in a rash act of thoughtless anti-Walkerism, tore this beautiful historic building down. The ghosts of Walker and Mosesstill  exist in this empty space -- a symbol of the price of corruption and zealous self-righteousness. (If you ever read The Power Broker, Robert Caro writes a lot about this.)

So today, people who visit Central Park, never know that such a building used to exist there. But the ghosts still do.

The Ed Bridge

You read that right. Believe it or not, the city has decided to name something after a mayor not named LaGuardia -- in this case, a bridge bearing the name of Mayor Edward I Koch (1978-1989). 

And which bridge will be forced to shed its identity for this new moniker? The victim is none other than the Queensboro bridge itself -- that gorgeous, amazing 101-year old structure spanning the East River, nailing together Long Island City and the Upper East Side, immortalized in The Great Gatsby, the movies Manhattan and Terms of Endearment, and by Simon and Garfunkel (in "The 59th Street Bridge" song). 

As Ed Koch himself might have said, I think naming this wonderful bridge after this repulsive man is "OUTRAGEOUS!" 

I hardly ever use foul language on here but, if this name change goes through, it should be dubbed "Monument to an Asshole" or perhaps "Monument to New York's Most Corrupt Mayor Since Jimmy Walker."

You heard that right. The Ed Koch administration was so corrupt that several people in his administration went to jail and a Queens borough president committed suicide. It even spawned a book by the great journalists Wayne Barrett and Jack Newfield, City for Sale: Ed Koch and the Betrayal of New York. When I was a kid in the 1980s, my parents used to listen to a news program on WQXR called "New York At 6." Ed Koch's administration was so corrupt that almost every night there was some sleazy revelation of corruption that old Ed always claimed to no nothing about. Eventually my parents started calling "New York At 6", "Who's Indicted Tonight?"

During Ed Koch's reign, the homeless population in the city surged, the squeeze on the middle class began, developers started building huge buildings with apartments no one could afford, and the AIDS crises began -- a crises that Ed Koch, himself a closeted homosexual, totally ignored. 

Not a really good legacy. The best thing Koch did as mayor was balance the budget in his first term. After that, his remaining two terms, it was all downhill -- or, when it came to crime, it was up and up. By the time Ed left office in 1989 (thrown out by the voters), the crime rate had spiked way the hell back up ... and for some reason, then and now, it was and is blamed on his successor David Dinkins. It was Dinkins who then dramatically expanded the size of the police force and was responsible for historic plunge in NYC's crime rate. Sadly, when it comes to history and the city's collective memory, its Dinkins who gets all the blame for the rising crime rate, not Koch, and its Rudy Giuliani who gets all the credit reducing crime when it was already falling under Dinkins.

So why don't we name the bridge after Dinkins? 

Do you think the fact that Dinkins is black is the reason he gets no credit for reducing crime? "Oh no, of course not," most people will say. (Sort of like a current black president who gets no credit for fixing the economic mess left to him by his white predecessor).

It's amazing to see, when it comes to Ed Koch, how the historical slate has been wiped clean. You never hear about the historic corruption in his administration, about the rising crime rate, about how the middle class in this city began its long, sad decline. Instead, when you hear about Ed Koch today, it's all about what a great "personality" he is, how "lively" he is, and how he saved NYC from fiscal disaster. 

It's all a bunch of crap. It was Governor Hugh Carey who saved this city. And, to be fair, Hugh Carey is getting his due -- they're going to name the Brooklyn-Battery Tunnel after him.

This just isn't right. A tunnel vs. a bridge. Which would you rather have named after you?

By the way, it's a total political payoff by Bloomberg to name the bridge after Koch, who supported the billionaire's three elections. Disgusting. Pathetic. And business as usual.

I hope to God the city council votes down this name change but you know they won't. After all, they all gave themselves an extra term -- there's no depth they won't sink to. 

So farewell beautiful bridge that connects two great boroughs. Your spirit will remain but sadly your identity will be gutted. Ed Koch deserves this city's contempt, not reverence.

When it comes to renaming the Queensboro bridge, Mr NYC is not feeling groovy.

Abuse of Power

If you listen to the media in this town, things have never been better in New York City government. Even in these tough times, the powers that be in this city are considered tops. The bad old days are gone and New York today is a new governmental nirvana. Sure, New York State government is corrupt and dysfunctional but not, so the pundits say, is city government. It's great! And all of this is thanks to our two "great" mayors, past and present, Rudy Giuliani and Mike Bloomberg.

Not so fast.

The story of how Rudy appointed corrupt people like Bernie Kerik to top positions in city government is well known (Kerik is the first NYC police commissioner to go to jail, something that didn't even happen during the good old bad days of Jimmy Walker). But Rudy's biggest sin is how woefully underprepared this city was when 9/11 hit -- the police and firefighters didn't have enough resources and Rudy arrogantly put the Office of Emergency Management in the World Trade Centers after he had been told to put it underground in Brooklyn after the 1993 attack on the WTC. And yet the myth persists that Rudy did a "great job" handling 9/11 -- he beacme "America's mayor" and his leadership a model to be replicated. Something tells me that if Rudy had been a Democrat, the story of his "leadership" would have been considered a much different thing by the media.

But that was then. Today, under Mayor Mike, we're told that city government has never been this clean and honest. BS! Last year I wrote about the bombshell story that the mob had essentially taken over the Department of Buildings. This story hit in the midst of the mayoral election -- when Bloomberg was running for this dubious third term. But how did the media pundits treat it? With a big yawn. And as I said then and I say again now, something tells me that if Mike had been a Democrat this would have been a much different story.

Mike's hypocrisy continues. Yesterday he came out in favor of the new ballot initiative that would restore the two-term limit for city office holders. Even the media is having a tough time swallowing this one. You gotta love these headlines (the toughest he's ever faced):

Bloomberg's Latest on Terms: 3 for Him, but Only 2 for Everyone Else
Bloomberg Zig Zagging on Term Limits

Ouch. But he's not the one getting the toughest headlines. Today it was revealed by a great website called nypdconfidential that Ray Kelly, our sainted Police Commissioner, has been having his drinks and meals and membership dues at the Harvard Club comped for years! Some "non-profit" called the New York Police Foundation has been picking up his tabs since 2002 in blatant violation of the rule that city employees can't accept any gift over $50. Something tells me that tabs at the Harvard Club over the years have come to something more than $50.

Even more outrageous: Kelly has accepted numerous free flights from Bloomberg on his private jet to his vacation home in Florida. Not billionaire Mike's place in Florida's -- Kelly's house in Florida! Isn't it interesting that a lifelong lawman like Kelly is able to afford a second home? And apparently Mike jetted Ray down to Florida six times in 2008 and five times in 2009. Wow! I wish I had been able to go on vacation five or six times in one year! Isn't our "amazing" police commissioner such a common man? And Commissioner Kelly has failed to report these gifts since 2002. Again, if a Democratic mayor was doing this stuff and his police commissioner was accepting free gifts and going on vacation multiple times per year, the media would be going crazy with what a big scandal this is. But no, in this situation, it's just a minor story.

And the police under Kelly have become needlessly aggressive in going after our citizens, violating the Constitution, and engaging in racial profiling. If readers to my blog stay tuned, in days to come, I will have an exclusive, first-hand story of police abuse that will make your skin crawl.

So even today, there's still plenty of corruption in NYC government. It's just that it's more insidious. If Jimmy Walker came back to life and saw what was going on, he'd probably feel that nothing had changed.

Meet Carl Berner

At 108, he's the oldest person in NYC. He lives in Queens in the same house he moved into 72 years ago -- back when FDR was president and LaGuardia was Mayor and the Empire State Building was only four years old.

He's an inspiring story. An immigrant from Germany, he came to our shores in 1928 (back when Calvin Coolidge was President and Mayor Jimmy Walker was in his first term) and moved into his current house at the age of 36 (I'm a few years younger than that and can't imagine that the house I might move into in a few years would be the same house I'd be living in for more than eight decades!).

Mr Berner is a former tool and toymaker and still has a wonderful relationship with his family. All of us can only hope that we'll be so lucky to live so long -- and so well.

General Election Endorsements

Next Tuesday we New Yorkers head to the polls for the final time this year to elect the officials who will run our city for the next four years.

It's almost pointless to care, and even more pointless to vote, since the results of this election season have been in the bag for months. Bloomberg will be re-elected to a shamefully acquired third term, John Liu and Bill De Blasio will be elected Comptroller and Public Advocate respectively, and almost all the Democratic nominees for City Council and Borough President will be either be elected or re-elected (to equally shameful third terms) -- except in Staten Island and parts of Queens where some Republicans are locks to win.

How depressing. This is the greatest city in the world and yet our elections have become dull exercises in pseudo-democracy where money and the political machines determine everything -- and not the people. All "we the people" do is re-affirm the power of money and the machine by voting for the same laughing-stocks again and again.

Dammit gimme Jimmy Walker! Now there was a cool Mayor.

But he's dead. We're not. We have to dance with them that's been brung us. So, even though it won't do a lick of a good or make any difference whatsoever, here are the first Mr NYC general election endorsements:

Mayor: Bill Thompson. This is a very reluctant endorsement since his campaign has been totally amateurish and his program for saving middle class New Yorkers is as clear as mud. Doesn't exactly inspire confidence about how good a mayor he'd be. But Bloomberg has become a monster, the Man Who's Bought New York, and he's drowning the city with his money while killing the middle class. How ridiculous has it gotten? In case you hadn't noticed, HE'S ADVERTISING ON MY BLOG EVEN THOUGH I'VE BEEN CONSISTENTLY BASHING HIM FOR THE LAST YEAR! He has spent so much money, he's even advertising on a blog that don't like him! Wuzzup wid dat? So vote for Thompson and, even though it won't feel great, when Bloomberg wins you can feel good that at least you didn't contribute to the bastardization of democracy.

Public Advocate: Bill De Blasio. I have almost no idea what the PA does, who Bill De Blasio is, and what he wants to accomplish. But Betsy Gotbaum has done nothing to hold Big Mike accountable over the last 8 years. Think a Republican in this job will? Hardly. So vote for Bill.

Comptroller: This is the only race that I'm even semi-excited about. John Liu has to be the hardest working man in NYC. He's been a great City Councilman, got cars out of Central Park during the summer, and has shown an aggressiveness to take on Bloomberg that we need in a good Comptroller. So vote for him -- and you actually will feel good about electing the first Asian to city-wide office.

I'm not getting into the Borough President or City Councilperson races, just sticking with the city-wide offices. However, if you live in Queens, please don't vote for BP Helen Marshall -- she's gunning for a third term and you know how I feel about that. And in Brooklyn, I'd even vote for a Republican over BP Marty Markowitz who is a blithering, annoying fool. He's also trying for a third term and seriously thinks he might be Mayor in 2013. PLEASE DO NOT LET THIS HAPPEN. DO NOT VOTE FOR THIS MORON. PLEASE!!!!! In Manhattan, I guess voting for Scott Stringer makes sense -- don't know who's running against him. And in Staten Island, the BP is a guy named James Molinaro. I think he's a Republican or a Conservative or both but, whatever, does it really matter who the BP of Staten Island is?

Live from the Met!

It's amazing that these broadcasts have lasted for almost 80 years, and just another example of what makes New York such a great city.

Kurt Baum sang "Addio alla madre" followed by the finale from Mascagni's "Cavalleria Rusticana."

The broadcasts start in December and go through May. You can listen to them here in NYC starting December 12 at 12:30 PM on WQXR 105.9 FM (this first opera is called Il Trittico)

Remembering Beau James:

As we all know, New York City and New York State has produced some colorful politicians. Spitzer, Giuliani, Koch, D'Amato, LaGuardia -- the Big Apple and Empire State has had its share of public servants with "personality." But they all pale in comparison to Jimmy Walker (no, not "DYNO-MITE!" Jimmy Walker) but James J Walker, "the Jazz Age Mayor" (1926 to 1932).

He was stylish, charming, debonair -- and corrupt as hell. According to this 1949 Time magazine book review, Beau James or Gentleman Jimmy (as he was alternatively known) didn't wake up until ten in the morning, didn't get to the office until noon, did two or three hours of work, then hit the nightclubs. Did he cheat on his wife? That's an understatement -- his affair with the actress Betty Compton was the talk and toast of the town (today I guess they'd be called "JamesBet" or something like that). Did this scandalous behavior make Mayor Walker unpopular? Uh huh. He was re-elected in 1929 in a landslide and only left office when forced to resign in a scandal.

No politician today would be so flagrantly corrupt or amoral as Beau James (not even Rudy) and that's probably a good thing. But he's sure fun to read about.

P.S. Bob Hope's only real dramatic role was the 1957 movie Beau James. If Jazz Age New York is your thing, you should check it out.