City of Power

So former Mayor Mike Bloomberg is running for president and just about everyone in the media  and public at large thinks he has no chance of winning. He probably doesn't except for one thing -- he's so mind-bogglingly rich, worth around $60 billion, that he can definitely make an impact on the election -- win, lose or draw.

Bloomberg has the kind of power that no elected office can give.

No mayor of NYC has ever become president. It's kind of amazing to think that being the CEO of the country's biggest city has never been a stepping stone to being the CEO of the country. The current British PM used to be the mayor of London. Former French Presidents have been mayors of Paris. But in these United States we have (until recently) mostly elected Governors and Senators to the presidency. Running a big city -- even the biggest! -- just hasn't been a route to the Oval Office.

If you think about it, there's a reason for this -- this is a country that worships the "heartland", the Norman Rockwell-ish concept of the "small town" (never mind that most Americans don't live in small towns and Norman Rockwell himself was from NYC). Americans like the idea of their presidents representing the "real America." One of our Founding Fathers, and our nation's third President, Mr. Thomas Jefferson, lionized the idea of America being full of "gentlemen farmers", his idea of the rural life being inherently superior to the urban one -- the country was for saints, the city for sinners. The "real" Americans, the saintly Americans, were too be found tilling the soil and plowing fields, not engaging in trade and making money in the streets. 

In NYC, we know what people mean by the "real America" -- it means white America. Racism is basically why no NYC mayor has ever been president.

For most Americans, cities are too Jewish, too black, too Hispanic, overall too brown and swarthy, to be, you know, "real." Any NYC mayor running for president carries that kind of "baggage" -- the baggage of being from a place that is majority non-white, that is decidedly non-rural, that has a whiff of sin and sordidness, etc. etc. etc. Even though the current Prez might be from NYC, he presents himself as being a champion of the heartland, a virtual enemy of the very city where he made his name. Yes, he's as big a sinner as this city has ever produced but he's white and a self-proclaimed champion of all white people, sinner and saints alike -- so the "real" America gives him a pass.

But even though NYC is not the nation's capital, even though no NYC mayor has ever ascended to the presidency, this is and always will be a city of power -- financial power, cultural power, media power, and people power. DC might make and enforce our nation's laws but it's NYC that makes our country's magic, that captures and powers the country's information and imagination -- and money. 

We New Yorkers love our power. We love our comic-book superheroes and supervillians like Spiderman and the Joker. And we love the power behind the power, people like Robert Moses, currently being resurrected as a fictional character in the movie version of Motherless Brooklyn.

NYC is a city of power. 

We might not be the "real" America but we possess the "real" American power -- power that comes not from the government but from the imagination, power that comes from money and not from laws, power that comes from culture and not from elections. We are the most important and dominate city in the country, and we weild a power over the vox populi that no president ever will. 

... you know it ain't easy

Challenging power isn't easy -- power, after all, is called power for a reason: it's the ability to direct or influence the behavior of others and the course of events. It's the ability "to do" vs. "to want." We all "want" but few of us can "do" because we lack the ability. 

To challenge that ability, to try and take that ability away from someone, is brutally difficult and often fails. Power armors itself, ready to defend and strike its challengers at all times -- but sometimes, just sometimes, challengers find a chink in that armor, then defeat and capture it.

Such is what Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez did last month. Such is what Elizabeth Holtzman did in 1972 (Ocasio-Cortez beat a twenty-year incumbent and Holtzman beat a fifty-year incumbent). Such is what Julia Salazar is trying to do in September. Finding the chink, defeating the power, taking it over -- power doesn't yield without a fight but it can be beaten ... sometimes. Cynthia Nixon is trying to do it to Andrew Cuomo but it'll hard.

And what are the results from who has power vs. who doesn't?

Take for example, the "arc tunnel" that Governor Christie killed back in 2010 and that President Trump is trying to kill today. They don't want it for political reasons and used and are using their power to stop it. They people who do want it don't have the power -- or not enough. And so nothing gets done (for now). 

Same with the "pied-a-terre" tax that would apply to rich people who own but don't live in their NYC real estate as their primary residence. This tax would generate massive revenue for the city to fund affordable housing. But rich people, powerful people, don't want it so it's not happening (not now, at least).

That's why it's very important for us not only to give power to people we believe in but also to people who have the ability (that buzz word again) to find the chink in the armor of those other powerful people who impede progress and the common good.

Power isn't just about winning elections -- it's about having the ability to see where you can find it or steal it and, most of all, use it. What else is power for?

The Mighty New York Times -- and Its Future

If you watch the TV show Game of Thrones (or have even read the books its based on) then you know all about Lord Tywin Lannister. He's the richest man in the "Seven Kingdoms", has served as "Hand" to two insane kings (one of them his own grandson), has won many battles and crushed many rivals, and who also controls the most feared family in the fantastical realm of Westeros.

In season one of the show, King Robert Baratheon, supposedly the most powerful man in Westeros, constantly moans about how much in debt (both literally and otherwise) he is to Lord Tywin. Tywin helped make Robert king and Robert is married to Tywin's daughter, Cersei, creating what has become a miserable alliance between Houses Lannister and Baratheon. At one point, a drunk and resentful King Robert calls his menacing father-in-law "the mighty Tywin."

Tywin is the ultimate "power behind the thrown", someone who supposedly does not wield the real power in the land but who controls the kings that do. He is in fact more powerful than the kings he's supposed to serve. He can make kings -- and destroy them -- like Tywin did to Robert's predecessor. Power brokers like Tywin do not get any glory but are deeply, deeply feared by those who do. And, as Machiavelli said, "'tis better to be feared than loved."

In New York City & State, and in the country at large, we elect governments to represent and rule us. Democracy is supposedly about the people controlling those who have power over them, but, as we know, a political system awash with money means that those with money really control our government. There are also "bosses" who can throw the weight of a political party apparatus behind selected candidates -- thereby choosing who gets elected and who gets shafted. But there is one thing more powerful than money and bosses -- the media. The people who "buy ink by the barrel", who broadcast and broadband to hundred of millions of eyeballs and ears around the country, who are the ones who really control the leaders we supposedly elect to rule us. They can make and break reputations and thereby empower or destroy the careers of our rulers. And in this town and country, no media outlet wields more power and influence over our governments than The New York Times. 

Oh, the mighty New York Times. The "newspaper of record" is easily the most feared news outlet in NYC and one of the most feared in the country. It wields enormous power and influence. 

Just some examples: In 2003, it published story after story saying that Saddam Hussein had weapons of mass destruction. The result? It gave mainstream, respectable legitimacy to the Iraq War which, of course, turned out to be one of the biggest foreign policy blunders in American history. (The stories turned out to be bogus, the Times later acknowledged, but the damage was done). Another example: the Times' power can directly affect the fortunes of politicians, especially in NYC. It can endorse candidates for office and make (or unmake) political careers. I recall seeing a TV interview with Scott Stringer in 2005 when he was running for Manhattan Borough President. He had just gotten the Times endorsement for his run that year and he looked like a guy who had just lost his virginity to a supermodel while being spoon-fed Beluga caviar from a crystal goblet. He won the borough presidency that year, he is now the Comptroller of NYC, and he very well may become mayor one day. Such is the power of the "mighty" New York Times.

So who controls the newspaper that controls NYC?

For over a century, the Times has been ruled by the Sulzberger family. Sons and grandsons of its founder, Adolph Ochs, have been running it for 119 years. The position of Executive Editor at the paper is the ultimate designation for the Power Behind the Throne of New York and American power. The current "mighty" Sulzberger is Executive Editor Arthur Sulzberger Jr. who is now in his 60s and is beginning to think about who might replace him when he retires. As this article points out, there are currently three leading candidates, all members of House Sulzberger, who might very well one day become the next Executive Editor. Currently, America is in the madness of a yet another protracted presidential election which will culminate in November 2016. However, something that will be less noticed by the populi but is no less in important is who will become the Times' next EE. Whoever that is will have tremendous power over our city and country for years to come -- as many mayors, governors, and presidents come and go.

Right now the Times is using its power and influence to unmake one potential president -- former US Senator and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton. They have been writing creepy, oddly-sourced stories about how she "might" be a criminal, about her complex marriage to former president Bill Clinton, about any controversy, real or imagined, concerning her life and presidential campaign. Anyone reading the Times' nasty coverage of Hillary Clinton can only reasonably conclude that "the paper of record" wants to prevent a potential Hillary Clinton presidency and destroy her and her family's reputation. The paper tried and, uncharacteristically, failed to destroy Bill Clinton's presidency. When he was in office, in the 1990s, as this article points out, the paper issued story after story, editorial after editorial, slamming the Clintons and their administration. Of course, Bill Clinton wound up becoming an incredibly popular two-term president still much admired to this day. But the Times' tried to stop that and they are trying to prevent what might become yet another incredibly popular two-term Clinton presidency. Many quoted in this article believe, quite rightly, that the paper has had a twenty-year plus vendetta against the Clintons, that they are the Times' White Whale, that to destroy the Clintons will be the ultimate demonstration of the Times' power. Of course, those currently leading the paper protest, way to much, that this is not so. But anyone rational person knows that it is.

So as we look forward to a change in leadership both in America and at the "paper of record", the question is simply put: will The New York Times remain mighty or has it, like American power itself, started a slow, long decline? 

Cy Vance and the Fear of Power

Why aren't Harvey Weinstein and Donald Trump's daughter and husband in jail?

After all, there's overwhelming evidence that both committed crimes (in Harvey Weinstein's case, against women; in Donald Trump's kids case, for fraud, since they mislead buyers of the Trump Soho building about how many units were actually sold). 

Thanks Manhattan DA Cy Vance for not prosecuting these miscreants. Not only did the lawyers of these people contribute heavily to his campaign, but Vance apparently has an MO for vigorously prosecuting low level offenses committed by poor and powerless people but letting the rich and powerful skate. 

The reason is easy to see: it's scary to prosecute people who have money and connections. They will fight you with everything they have, they will smear you in the press, they will sue you personally and try to get you disbarred, they will prevent family members and people who work for you from getting jobs, they will hire private investigators to terrorize your life, they will do whatever it takes to stop you and stay out of jail. So why bother? The fear of that is enough.

Part of me is angry at Vance for letting these people get away with their crimes but another part of me understands. It's all about power. That's what power is, after all -- literally getting people to do, or not do, what you want. This is something that the Harvey Weinsteins and the Trumps of this world fully understand. 

Like the character Varys says in Game of Thrones: "Power is a trick, a shadow on the wall." And the big question is, where does the power come from? Who performs the trick, who casts the shadow? Every few years we go to the polls and elect to give certain people "power" over our lives for certain periods of time. But let's face it -- when people have power over those people, when the supposedly powerful and accountable are at the mercy, perceived or real, of the even more powerful and unaccountable, what hope is there for the rest of us? How can justice truly prevail?

In the case of Cy Vance, not often. The fear of power, the real power, is too great. 

     

The Kingdoms of NYC

If you watched the great Netflix show The Crown, about the late British Queen Elizabeth II, it was all about how a country's monarchy survives in a world where most countries are now republics. 

For most of human history, most of the world lived under monarchies -- but the last hundred-plus years has seen a reversal with monarchies falling and republics surging (see the brilliant 1974 series Fall of Eagles for more about why this happened).

As a study of history and politics, I'm fascinated by the diference between monarchies and republics. In short, a monarchy is a country ruled by one person and his or her family while a republic is a country ruled by the people. Most revolutions throughout history have been of countries overthrowing their monarchies and becoming republics -- although sometimes, like in Ancient Rome or 19th century France, it goes the other way (more than once). 

Today, of course, these things are much more complicated.

In the United Kingdom and some other counties, they have the concept of constitutional monarchies where the people elect a government but the monarch remains a powerless national figurehead. In some supposed republics, however, like North Korea or Russia, there is supposed rule by the people but really these countries are ruled by strongmen and their families -- these pseudo-republics being more authoritarian and monarchical than any real monarchy. 

But what exists in both monarchies and republics are dynasties -- families that build wealth and power and then exercise it over the people.

In America, a republic, we have and have had many dynasties: the Adamses, Harrisons, Roosevelts, Kennedies, Tafts, Clintons and Bushes all reaching not only the presidency but other high offices (like Congressional and Senate seats plus Governorships). First they dominate their political parties, then their states, then the country. 

Closer to home, we've had multiple New York Governors named Roosevelt and Cuomo (although, in NYC, we've had never had mayors of the same family). However, in super-local politics, we've had many dynasties in the state legislature and various city offices: the Boylans in Brooklyn, the Vallones in Queens, the Diazes in the Bronx, the Molinari's in Staten Island, and others. 

Dynasties in NYC politics are as powerful as ever. 

That's why I was interested to read about how the former Harlem Assemblyman Keith Wright's son Jordan is running for his old seat, seeking to continue a family's power in Harlem and state government. This is how dynasties are made.

Even though NYC is a democracy existing under the framework of state and federal law, it has its own charter divvying up power between the mayor and city council as well as the borough presidents, Comptroller and Public Advocate. And even though this city has multiple dynasties, NYC is not a some kind of 16-century Medici-like Italian city-state under dictatorial rule of one person or family. However, Mayor Adams has just appointed a charter commission charter commission to try to rein in the council's power and increase the mayor's (i.e. his) power. It's a cynical move to become less accountable (where else have we seen this?).

What's interesting to me about the perennial existance of dynasties in democracies, and of power-grabbing politicians like Adams (and other aspiring American tyrants who shall not be named), is that the concept of rule by the people with divided, limited powers, is and forever shall be a boulder being shoved up hill.

By their very nature, people are greedy and family-oriented, and they want to accumulate as much wealth and power as possible for themselves and, when they age or die out, want their families to retain it. That's why great dynasties like the Plantagenets in England or the Habsburgs in Austria or the Romanovs in Russia held power for centuries and were only overthrown through violence and war.

It doesn't matter what high ideals we may claim to have, whether we've had revolutions to get rids of monarches and establish republican rule -- the hunger for power by people and their families remains and overwhelms.

Especially in NYC.

Review: "Motherless Brooklyn" (2019)

Private corruption leads to public corruption -- the personal venality of those in power is inflicted upon the masses in terrible ways. We are seeing this in extremis with the morally rotten and massively corrupt presidency of Donald Trump. Although this reality horror show will end a week from today, its stench will linger over us for a long time afterwards.

And that's the overarching problem -- even when bad powerful men go away, we the people remain stuck with their corrupt works for years and decades to come.

If you've ever read The Power Broker, Robert Caro's biography of NYC "master builder" Robert Moses, or seen the movie Chinatown, a fictional retelling of engineer William Mulholland bringing water to Los Angeles, the central concept within both is that the personal corruption of these powerful men fueled and warped the development of our nation's two biggest cities -- and, even now, decades after their deaths, we are literally living in the crime scenes i.e. the cities they made. 

And that's the basic idea behind Edward Norton's 2019 movie Motherless Brooklyn: the city is a crime.

A very liberal adaptation of Jonathan Lethem's 1999 novel, Motherless Brooklyn is Norton's attempt to take the basic framework of Chinatown (a private detective investigating a weird crime) and marry it with the facts in The Power Broker (an unelected master planner who builds in NYC with dictatorial power) to make a 21st-century fable about the corrupt shaping of our city. 

A thumbnail of the plot: a private detective with Tourette's syndrome named Lionel Essrog investigates the murder of one his partners. His investigation leads him to Harlem where he meets a woman named Laura Rose who works with someone named Gabby Horowitz (based on Jane Jacobs) who is fighting the redevelopment plans of city commisioner Moses Randolph (based on you-know-who). Essrog eventually meets up with a man named Paul, another brilliant but failed city planner, who turns out to be Randolph's brother and who knows a dark secret that could bring him down. Essrog discovers that Randolph's redevelopment plan is just a scam to kick poor black people out of their homes and sell their property to private developers. Paul explains to Essrog how Randolph's power is beyond anyone else's in government and how, as the head of an unelected public authority, he is totally unaccountable to anyone. Events ensue and Essrog comes to realize that Laura's life is in danger -- unless he can somehow get to Randolph and blackmail him with his secret. There's lots of double-crossing and complexity that makes this a very noirish yarn. 

It's a story about the power behind the power, the secret history of NYC, and the darkness behind it all. Also, it's a tale about the basic evils of gentrification and how the "public good" is often a cover for private greed.

The cast is excellent: Norton is compelling as Essrog, Alec Baldwin is ominous as Randolph, and Willem Dafoe is the standout as the tortured Paul. The cast includes Michael K. Wiliams, Bobby Cannavale, a cameo by Bruce Willis, Cherry Jones as Gabby, and a very good actress named Gugu Mbatha-Raw plays Laura. 

Norton is a fine director and the movie holds your attention to a point but, ultimately, the story feels slight in relation to the heights of its ambition. You can tell, in a way, that Norton is suffering from the classic "anxiety of influence" -- he is cleary in awe of, and has great reverence for, Chinatown and The Power Broker and the original novel, that his efforts with this film feel stunted, as much as influenced, by them. Also, I think there's an inherit problem when you're trying to make a movie that's partly inspired by a novel but also trying to incorporate plot lines and factoids from another movie and another book. It's just too much -- and while a noble attempt it makes the story and its themes feel more jumbled than inspired.

Still, it's an interesting concept for a movie -- and it's more of a concept than a movie in my opinion -- but that's why I recommend people see Motherless Brooklyn along with enjoying it's wonderful cast.  

Gotta NOT love these New Yorkers

Election 2012 was one of the biggest progressive victories in American politics since the LBJ landslide of 1964. Americans not only re-elected its first black Democratic president, increased the Democratic majority in the US Senate, and reduced the Republican majority in the US House, but Democrats gained state legislatures, and liberal ballot initiatives -- pot legalization, marriage equality, tax increases to fund education -- passed in a number of states. 

It was a great progressive victory.

This included New York State. Obama won the state, our junior senator was re-elected in a record landslide, Democrats gained congressional seats, and also won control of the New York State Senate.

For decades, literally, through gerrymandering, Republicans maintained control of the state senate. They cut a deal with the Assembly Democrats to draw district lines where the Republicans had a virtually unbreakable lock on the state senate while Democrats had a similar lock on the state assembly. It was a sleazy bi-partisan disgrace and it kept our state government dysfunctional and, more importantly, our laws behind the times. 

But times changed. 

New York is more liberal and Democratic today. The Republican party is all but finished here. It hasn't won a state-wide race since 2002 when Governor Pataki won his last term. We haven't had a Republican senator or Attorney General since 1998 or a Republican comptroller since 1993. The New York State Congressional Delegation is overwhelmingly Democratic and our few Republican Congresspeople are way more liberal than Republican congresspeople from the rest of the country. The one last bastion of Republican power in this state was the State Senate and, despite gerrymandering the hell out of it, the Democratic tidal wave broke through in 2012 and Democrats won control of the chamber -- 33 to 30.

Until they didn't.

Last week, six so-called Democratic State Senators broke away from the Democratic caucus and agreed to create a "coalition" with the Republicans. These means that even though voters in this state went the polls and voted for a Democratic state senate, six "Democrats" cut a deal with the GOP to keep that party in power while also getting some power for themselves. 

Banana Republic time in Albany. 

This cabal -- sorry, coalition -- is absolutely breathtaking in its arrogance, venality, and dishonesty. It is undemocratic and wrong. Voters voted one way and the people they elected decided to go the other way. These six people presented themselves as Democrats, got the party to nominate them, got people to donate to and vote for their campaigns as Democrats -- and then gave power of the state senate to Republicans. Wow.

Of course, the leaders of this "coalition" see it differently. They talk about the glories of "bipartisanship" and "reform" and "putting politics aside" -- all a bunch of cynical, dishonest crap. They don't mean a word of it. They have put together a complicated, idiotic "power sharing" agreement where they will share control of the state senate and its agenda. They claim they will pursue progressive legislation like hiking the minimum wage and campaign finance reform. 

Well, if they want a progressive agenda, why not create a progressive caucus in the state senate? It defies logic because, of course, there is no logic there. Only greed and power.

The GOP and these six "Democrats" have warped the desires of the New York State electorate and continued the corrupt practices of Albany. They are unfit to serve. This is an attempt by a dying political party and six state senators to cling to power that the people of this state do not want them to have. Sick.

Let's hope that one day they will pay a heavy price for this.

Memo from NYC

In the body politic -- in this city, state, and country, as well as in countries around the world -- there is a constant internal struggle between stability and change. Between wanting to Change vs. wanting to Conserve.

This internal struggle, perhaps, is true of every single individual who makes up any particular body politic.

The People, those sainted masses, say they want change, say they are unhappy with the status quo, say they want things to "get better", say that they want the world to become a better place, and yet, at the same time, have a sentimental attachment to the past -- both real and imagined  -- as well as a strong belief that things were better "then" before "those people" ruined everything and that we just need to "get back" to the way things were through the power of old-fashioned "common sense."

We see this in our politics today.

Since the election of the first black Democratic president, Republicans have yelled and screamed about wanting to "take our country" back from this socialist who wants to destroy America. Democrats don't get it. They wonder, what was so great about the past? What was so great about the time when there was legal segregation, gays were closeted, women died from back alley abortions, and old and sick people died in poverty? Republicans, of course, still wish we lived in that world. Democrats don't. But Democrats also wonder what happened to the middle class, that wonderful post-WW2 institution, which has been dying a slow death for the last three decades. Democrats want to take the middle class back. Republicans, however, are very glad that it is dead.

In short, Democrats always want to improve things, to "change" things or to bring the country back to a certain mythic point in time when the benefits of society were more widely distributed, while Republicans want things to stay the same or take the country back to another mythic point in time when they were huge divisions between rich and poor.

Wanting to change things vs. wanting to keep things the same is the constant ying and yang of our politics. When it comes to elections and the wielding of political power, the burden is higher on Democrats. It is less so on Republicans. Democrats want to win elections so that they can do thing with the power they gain. Republicans want to win elections so that they can keep that same power away from Democrats. When Democrats win power, they think, "Great, let's create policies that help people" and Republicans completely freak out because this is their worse fear realized. When Republicans win power, they think, "Great, how can we keep power out of the hands of Democrats" and who cares about policy?

This internal struggle causes distortions in our politics and public policies. Democrats, liberals, view politics as a means to an end. For Republicans, conservatives, politics is an end unto itself. So Republicans are, for the most part, better practitioners of politics than Democrats (not always but usually).

This article by a former liberal Canadian politician sheds some light on the problem why, as the most recent elections show, people who care more about pure politics as opposed to crafting policy will always have the upper hand. In short, he concedes that the big problem with liberals in politics is that, because they care more about policy than politics, they are ill-suited to the nasty, vicious, ugly realities of political combat. Liberals look down on it. They think it's vile. Conservatives, meanwhile, love it. After all, it's why they're in politics to begin with! His advice to liberals:

"It doesn’t pay ... to pretend to be better than the business you’re in. You can’t succeed in politics if you give too much appearance of despising the low arts by which we govern ourselves. Fastidious distaste for the roughness and meanness of political life may work in a seminar room, but it’s fatal on the campaign trail."

My advice to Democrats after these most recent elections: play rough. Play hard. Go after the Republicans full blast. These are nasty, vicious people and anything less than full on confrontation with them won't work. Don't retreat, don't surrender, don't concede an inch. Don't compromise with them, don't make deals, don't try to get them to like you. Fight, fight, and fight some more. Never stop. Exhaust them. Harass them. Embarrass them at every chance. Most of all, embrace the "dark arts" of politics. Beat them at their own game.

Until the Republicans are fully defeated, Democratic policy goals won't have a chance. Only then will the middle class arise again.

"The Power Broker" @ 40

Several years ago I wrote about Robert Caro's 1974 classic book "The Power Broker: Robert Moses and The Fall of New York."

Clocking in at around 1,200 pages, "The Power Broker" won the Pulitzer Prize for Non-Fiction and is generally considered the greatest book ever written about NYC. It tells the story of the long, complicated, and fascinating career of Robert Moses, the "master builder" who constructed roads, bridges, highways, parks, beaches, playgrounds, public housing, and huge structures like Lincoln Center and the United Nations. From the mid-1920s until the late 1960s, he was the most powerful man in New York City and New York State, a more consequential figure than any mayor or governor during that time -- or since. Because of Moses, the city's waterfront was cut off from the people, islands were bolted together, neighborhoods were destroyed, public transportation wasn't built, and over half-a-million people were evicted from their homes. The city was, as Caro writes, "flooded with cars" due to Moses' works, and our city's physical landscape changed forever. 

Most shockingly, even though Moses wielded more power and had a greater effect on this city than anyone else in the 20th century, he was never elected to anything.

The story behind "The Power Broker" is equally fascinating: how the young reporter Robert Caro wrote a series of stories about Suffolk County and how it got him a grant to write a book about Moses -- a project that Caro thought would only last a year. How, instead, Caro spent seven years chronicling this incredible story and he and his wife almost went broke, living a total hand-to-mouth existence. How Caro interviewed Moses several times before the great man cut off communication with him. How interest for the book, prior to publication, was generated by serialization in The New Yorker. And how, today, on the 40th anniversary of its publication, "The Power Broker" stands as a classic that has never gone out of print. This article tells the story of how "The Power Broker" came into existence and is a must read like the book itself. 

P.S. This article uses the word "archipelago" i.e. a group of islands, to describe NYC. That is, obviously, an apt description, and I feel deep shame that I have never, in almost a decade of blogging about NYC, never referred to this city as an archipelago. After all, not only is that a neat and proper word to call our fair city, but it's a really cool one. So expect me to throw around the word "archipelago" a lot on this blog going forward. I'll start now: archipelago, archipelago, archipelago, archipelago, archipelago ... archipelago.

Power in NYC

Due to life happenings, I haven't been able to blog much lately (in case you hadn't noticed) but I would be remiss if I didn't direct you to New York magazine's Who Runs New York? feature from last week (in case you missed it).

Obviously the most powerful people in NYC are Mayor Bloomberg and other politicians -- along with the powerful financial, real estate, and media interests that support them. But, as this insightful report indicates, it's more complicated than that. The days of the old moneyed Wall Street establishment are over, the days of The New York Times and their erstwhile newspaper competitors controlling the daily new agenda are waning, and there is a new generation of real estate moguls who have a different idea of what should and shouldn't be built in this town.

The power in NYC fragmented like never before. Chaos reigns.

For example, take the media. Those who own big the media in this town are no longer the most powerful people (think Sulzberger, Zuckerman and Murdoch). Instead, you have folks like Nick Denton, an irascible Brit, who founded the snarky Gawker site. Ten years ago this guy didn't even live here -- and now he's as important a media figure in this city as Jimmy Breslin ever was.

Or politics. Mayor Bloomberg still may run NYC with as close to absolute power as any mayor in history but his days in office are waning. Soon he'll be just a billionaire instead of the mayor/billionaire. So who will take his place? That will depend, largely, on the new political kingmakers in this town. We're a long way from the days of Tammany Hall bosses like Carmine De Sapio and from labor union leaders like Mike Quill and Albert Shanker. But if you want to find their successors, look no further than Dan Kantor of the Working Families Party, the third-party organization that has succeeded in getting lots of up-and-coming politicians like John Liu and Bill DeBlasio elected. The effectiveness of the WFP turn out operations on election day are becoming famous. In 2009, while Bloomberg spent $100 million on his third term, the WFP was able to get out enough voters to reduce Bloomberg's margin of victory to an embarrassing four points. Kantor may be the most powerful person in NYC you haven't heard of -- but you will.

And then there's the likes of Lauren Santo Domingo who may be in the running for become the city's new Social doyenne, the new Mrs. Astor.

As you can see, in this era of the niche, power in New York is getting more diffuse even as wealth is getting more concentrated. It's an interesting, almost absurd paradigm -- one that is powered as much by new technology as anything.

Even this blog could be considered, in it's small, small way, a part of the new power game in NYC. For example, here am I, a regular guy, a simple blogger, who has been able to publish interviews with the likes of Kurt Anderson and Michael Musto, who has been asked by various business to advertise and plug their products, who has been invited to parties and events because of this blog, and who has gotten more than one person (including a prominent newspaper editor) extremely angry by some of the stuff I published on here. None of this would have happened if not for this blog and the small, tiny bit of power it has in the huge NYC media universe. (By the way, with one exception, I've turned all the invites and requests to plug stuff down. I ain't that kinda guy.)

So who runs New York? Who has the power? We do, my friends, you and me.

The NYC Seats of Power

One of the most interesting parts of traveling to any city, especially capital cities, is to see the various government buildings it contains -- specifically the seats of power like city or town halls, legislative buildings, palaces or executive mansions, etc. to get a literal look at the places where these cities, states, and countries are ruled or governed from. 

Think of the White House and US Capitol in Washington DC, think of Buckingham Palace and the Houses of Parliament in London, think of Versailles (near) Paris or the Forbidden City in Beijing, think of the Vatican in Rome, think of the Kremlin in Moscow!

These great, grand structures are built to say "Here the power resides, ready to strike. Don't question it."

New York City doesn't rule a country or even a state but, as the largest municipality in the country, it certainly has its own important seats of power. City Hall where the council meets and the mayor works is the best known along with Gracie Mansion where the mayor lives and entertains VIPs. 

But there are other seats of power scattered around the city as well, other points from where the city is governed: the offices of the borough presidents.

Five boroughs means five borough presidents and five borough president offices. What's interesting is that borough president offices exist in different kinds of buildings, each tethered to the history of their particular boroughs. 

In Manhattan, the BP works out of the huge Municipal Building in Lower Manhattan on Centre Street along with the NYC Public Advocate, Comptroller and various city agencies like Finance, Landmarks, Veterans Services, Technology, Environmental Protection, and others. An enormous building, it's the very heart of the original, post-1898 consolidation of NYC power of which the BP was, and is, just another part. 

In Staten Island, the BP is located in Staten Island Borough Hall right across from the St. George ferry terminal; it also contains city agencies like Buildings and Transportation and is right next to the county courthouse. Similarly, in Queens, the BP works out of Queens Borough Hall in Kew Gardens which also houses the county courthouse as does the Bronx County Courthouse where that BP works from too. What separates these three borough presidents' borough halls from Manhattan is that, prior to consolidation, these boroughs were something else entirely -- Queens and Staten Island where simply counties without a central authority or any links to the city, and the Bronx was part of New York County i.e. Manhattan before becoming a separate county -- and finally a borough of NYC. 

Which is what makes Brooklyn Borough Hall so unique. Located in Downtown Brooklyn, it's the only borough hall that used to be a city hall -- for the City of Brooklyn until 1898. It's really the only borough hall that's only that -- it doesn't share space with any other government agencies nor is it part of a courthouse. It's the only legacy left of the former City of Brooklyn, a concession to the past.

So those are the NYC seats of power, the places where a city of nearly 9 million have their futures decided.  

Notes from Undervelt

Like many who lived through the twenty-teens, I was a huge Game of Thrones fan.

Set in a fictional world of seven kingdoms living tenuously under one ruler, the entire premise of the show was that a once great family, a once powerful dynasty (the Targaryens) that had united the kingdoms and ruled for 300 years, have been overthrown -- and the new rulers are still grappling with the problems left in its wake. While the various remaining would-be kings are battling it out for power, the last Targaryen left alive is prowling around distant lands, scheming to return.

The prequel show, House of the Dragon, flashes back to a time when the Targaryens were in power, fighting amongst themselves, their fall distant yet becoming more and more inevitable.

What's brilliant about each show, what draws so many people in, is that both shows are haunted. Both series have a shadow over them, an extra dimension of drama and meaning. In one we are haunted by the now-gone years of power; in the other, we see their power, knowing that it's going away. 

The Targaryens are ghosts as much as people -- and they live forever in a kind of mythical world inside a mythical world.

In GOT, even though the Targaryens are almost completely gone, they haunt the show -- people keep talking about them and obsessing over their impact on the seven kingdoms (gone but not forgotten). They may no longer have literal power but they still have power over the minds and souls of the people. And in House, we can't help but watch with a sense of dread that this family, this dynasty, at the height of its power, no matter what's going on or what they're doing, is inevitably doomeed, destined for ignominy.

In short, the Targaryens are doomed but they are forever present in peoples' minds and still meddling, in one way or another, in the kingdoms' business -- even after their doom. 

Doom seems to be on a lot of people's minds these days. Our democracy and our environment are in a precarious place, a downward slide. But doom is not final -- it is simply, in many respects, a new way of being, a new normal called the "undervelt." 

The "undervelt": an undergroud or underworld where (if I can be gauche enough to quote myself), "defines itself in opposition to the above ground, the outside world. It is in constant friction, a perennial resistance. Like ... trash -- we want to forget it, we want it out of our lives, but it never goes away."

Woody Allen used to be one of America, and especially NYC's, most acclaimed filmmakers. For over fifty years, he made fifty movies, some much more successful than others, many getting nominated for and winning multiple Academy Awards (Woody himself won four). But he's been dogged by controversy about his personal life. In the USA and NYC, he's been "cancelled" -- actors won't work with him, financiers won't pay for his movies, and he can't (or barely can) get them distributed in this country. He's been making his last several movies in Europe but in America and NYC he's a pariah.

And yet ...

He's not gone. And even though his latest movie, Coupe de Chance, hasn't been released in NYC or elsewhere in America (at least not yet), apparently there are secret screenings of it around town that have become quite popular. 

In short, Woody's career now exists in the "undervelt."

Woody is no longer a mighty, acclaimed filmmaker. He's fallen hard. But now he's a figure of rebellion, someone people want to ignore but can't -- a perfect denizen of the undervelt. And it shows that his impact and his importance to cinema is so profound that, even though everyone in respectable society says they hate him, they obviously still care enough about his work to go see it -- albeit in secret.

Woody's work is now like the last Targaryen, rattling around in exile but forever messing with the heads of its antagonists.   

I know there are many who bemoan "cancel culture" (I've done so myself in the past). Reading about how the work of a decades-long, Oscar-winning auteur is now being consumed like Western media in North Korea or pre-Internet porn is sad, whatever you think about him. 

However, I view this whole "cancel culture" thing in another perspective.

First, no filmmaker is guarenteed or promised massive distribution. Most movies never get seen, many directors get their movies dumped into barely enough theaters to cover the movie's catering bill. No director, not even a formerly big-time one like Woody, is promised a big audience. A big career is not a right -- it's a privilege, a privilege few get and most eventually lose, one way or another. I really don't feel sorry for him or any of these "cancelled" people. 

Second, even if you become hated, even if you're "cancelled" or ignored, if you do good work, no matter under what conditions or in what environment, it will last. People can try to "cancel" it, suppress it, censor it, belittle it, ignore it, whatever -- but it doesn't matter. It stands firm like the rock of Gibralter. It leaves the haters in the dust. It cannot be erased or ignored. It lives. It thrives. It stands the test of time and, eventually, inevitably, leaves the haters in the dust. The work rides high, even if its creator does not. 

Third, I know what it's like to labor in the shadows, to have your work ignored, to live in the undervelt. But I persist. Because my work has impact and, most importantly, exists. This blog has been read nearly a million times. It's never gotten any kind of big outside attention or attention from the media, but it gets readers -- and always will. 

Thus my message from the undervelt -- don't worry, don't get crazy about "cancel culture". Just do the work. Do it well. No matter what happens to you, good or bad, whether you deserve it or not, your work will last. The impact of your work and your life will outlast everyone and everything else.

So get to work -- there's no time to lose. And, hey, I can tell you first hand, the undervelt ain't that bad.

NYC Leads an American Spring

Like many great things in America, it began right here in NYC. 

A month ago, Wall Street was quiet. The streets of America were quiet. For the American power elite, everything was as it should be. Things were looking up! The political parties they had bought and the government they controlled were duly bending to their will. The hated President Obama's approval ratings were tanking and it seemed like only a matter of time before he would be replaced by their favorite whore, Mitt Romney. The richest 1% and their conservative Tea Party allies -- who only have contempt for the poor, the unemployed, the young, the dispossessed, the unlucky, basically anyone who isn't them -- were on the ascendant and these hated "others" seemed to be withering away. The country was going the power elite's way -- with them owning and controlling everything and the rest of us literally and metaphorically dying. Good times were here again! 

Then the streets of NYC came alive and America soon followed.

And the American power elite is freaking out!

It's impossible to guess what the Occupy Wall Street movement will lead to. The American left has a poor track record of grabbing and holding onto political power for very long and affecting huge change. The American right is better at it since they're better financed, better organized, and, in many ways, better motivated. It's easier to get motivated when your afraid of losing something concrete (namely, huge wealth and a privledged position in society) then it is to get motivated about gaining something abstractly better (namely, closing the gap between the rich and poor and a better job). Machiavelli wrote about how the enemies of reform will attack more fiercely than the advocates of reform will fight for their cause since the enemies have a clearer idea of what they'll lose than the advocates have of what they'll gain. This is largely what the power game throughout time has been all about.

But at the moment the other 99% are striking back. The advocates of reform are on the march! They're organizing, making noise, and drawing attention to the grotesque economic disparities in our country and how our government is owned by and operated by the rich few instead of by and for the regular many. The poor and the middle class have done something that they usually have a huge problem doing -- changing the national dialogue, forcing the media to take notice, and scaring the heck out of our bought and paid for government. Right now it's called Occupy Wall Street but it's turning into an American Spring.

Oh, and is the power elite scared! The right wing/Tea Party/Republican Party/Big Media are having a conniption. They're swinging wildly, saying stupid things, unable to comprehend the power of the sleeping giant that's been awoken. 

For example, the loathsome Republican Congressman Peter King recently said, "It's a ragtag mob." It even reminds him of protests in the 1960s which he didn't like since "it ended up shaping policy. We can't allow that to happen." I guess Peter King thinks civil rights and ending the Vietnam war were bad things! Such stupid, thoughtful statements are pure gold for Occupy Wall Street and makes Mr. King the epitome of a useful idiot. Keep up the good work Congressman!

The right wing counter attack has already began and hopefully Occupy Wall Street will ready the counter-counter attack -- and hang their opponents with their own words. Mr. King's words are a good start. So are those of pathetic presidential hopeful Herman Cain who said that if people are unemployed and not rich then it's "your fault." Yeah, try running for president saying that. See how many votes you get. Also wonderful is scumbag Congressman Eric Cantor who has called these protestors as "growing mobs" -- mobs that hopefully will turn into voters and will throw the likes of Eric Cantor out of office.

Mayor Bloomberg -- that billionaire-best-friend-of-the working stiff -- has called the protests "ridiculous." He thinks that people being upset about how their government and society is screwed up is just pure silliness. Yes, tell an unemployed person that he or she is silly -- and then count yourself lucky to walk away without a bloody nose.

Even worse is Bloomberg's girlfriend, the supremely arrogant Diana Taylor. Oh, this is one screwy broad. She recently said in an interview that President Obama has "a lot to learn," apparently because he doesn't completely (only mostly) sell his soul to business and has the temerity (again, only somewhat) to care about people who aren't multimillionaires like her. And Ms. Taylor says that she would have run against and beaten Senator Gillibrand last year but just didn't feel like it. See, she didn't just want to be one of 100 senators, that wouldn't be any fun. This kind of elititest, arrogant, "I'm rich so I know better," screw everyone else kind of stuff goes on and on in this interview. And in the end, Ms. Taylor thinks that what's wrong with America is that most Americans are morons. As the brilliant Alex Pareene of Salon writes: "Mayor Bloomberg, partner diagnose what's wrong with America: You." 

Yes, you, me, and those Americans outside of the rich elite, those of us without powerful connections, those of us who just want to work for a living and live a nice life without killing our souls, yes -- we're the problem! Someone all of us blew up the economy in 2008 -- not the bankers on Wall Street or their employees in the government who let it happen. And these people wonder why Americans are pissed and what Occupy Wall Street gets bigger and more powerful everyday. 

As I've said, I have no idea how Occupy Wall Street will play out politically or if it will change anything. Sadly, big money has a way of shutting down even the most forceful people powered organizations. But hope springs eternal. 

In June of this year, I wrote about how happy I was that gay marriage was legalized in New York and how unthinkable this was just a few short years ago. But I also wrote about how the next front in the war for social justice, now that the war on gay people in New York was won, was ending the war on the middle class and the poor. I held out hope then that something might happen on this front, I just didn't know what it might be. Sadly, I had no good ideas myself. 

But Occupy Wall Street was just the spark I was looking for, and hopefully it will only continue to get more powerful and, a year from now, affect the elections and government policy. Hopefully something good for the middle class and the poor is coming and enemies of reform will be crushed. The tide is turning on the power elite's war on the rest of us.


Here in the streets of NYC, the battle has been joined.

Review: “The Power Broker: Robert Moses and the Fall of New York”

In 1974, the historian Robert Caro published The Power Broker, his masterful biography of Robert Moses. It won the Pulitzer Prize and, in 1999, was chosen by the Modern Library as one of the 100 greatest works of nonfiction written in the 20th century (it ranked at #92).

So who was Robert Moses? He was, unquestionably, the most important person ever in New York City history. His impact on this town was enormous, immense, reverberating. We are, for all intensive purposes, living in Robert Moses’ NYC. No one has ever held so much power in this town for so long – more than 44 years – and he was never elected to anything.

So what did he do? He was New York’s master builder. He developed the city we live in today. “Robert Moses shaped New York … He built the Major Deegan Expressway, the Van Wyck Expressway, the Sheridan Expressway and the Bruckner Expressway. He built the Gowanus Expressway, the Prospect Expressway, the Whitestone Expressway, the Clearview Expressway and the Throgs Neck Expressway. He built the Cross-Bronx Expressway, the Brooklyn-Queens Expressway, the Nassau Expressway, the Staten Island Expressway and the Long Island Expressway. He built the Harlem River Drive and the West Side Highway.” He also built the Triborough and Verrazano Bridges as well Jones Beach, Orchard Beach, Jacob Riis Park and other public parks out on Long Island and upstate. He constructed hundreds of playgrounds, tennis courts, boathouses and baseball diamonds. He also built public pools, including the Astoria Park Pool, one of his better accomplishments.

Oh, he built buildings too: housing developments like Stuyvesant Towns and Peter Cooper Village, as well as Co-Op City. He built some other buildings you might know about: Lincoln Center, the United Nations, Shea Stadium, the New York Coliseum (since demolished, the Time Warner Center sits there now). He also built three of Central Park’s notable structures: Tavern-on-the-Green, Wollman Rink and the Delacorte Theater and the 79th Street Boat Basin in Riverside Park. And he ran (badly) the 1964 World’s Fair.

You get the idea. He built everything. “And what Robert Moses built on was as lie.”

The lie was the image Moses cultivated and propagated for five decades: that he was a self-less servant of the people, above politics, only “doing good” for “the masses.” The reality was that he warped the city to serve the rich few and not the poor and middle class many.

The lie was that he was answerable to the Mayors and Governors who appointed him to head dozens of state and city agencies over the years when, in reality, these elected people deferred to Moses. This includes Franklin Roosevelt when he was Governor and President, as well as Fiorello LaGuardia. Moses was a bully supreme. There’s a great scene in the book where, when FDR was governor, Moses stormed into his office and screamed “You’re a liar Mr. Roosevelt!” Can you imagine anyone doing that? Moses called his supposed elected superiors by their first names: he addressed one letter to Mayor Vincent Impellitteri “Dear Vince.” And he called LaGuardia “that dago son of a bitch.” Nasty, nasty man, this master builder was.

So how did he do it? Moses created and ran a public authority called Triborough that raised money through toll-booths and public bonds and that gave Moses nearly a billion dollars that he could hand out (or not) to the public officials he supposedly served. Needless to say, money talks, or in this case, rules. And the unelected, unanswerable Robert Moses ruled this town for nearly half of the 20th century.

And while Moses certainly did some good for the city, the lie was that New York was better off because of Moses rather than the opposite.

“Robert Moses was America’s greatest builder,” Caro writes. “He was the shaper of the greatest city in the New World. But what did he build?” What did he do to construct the city we live in today? “By building his highways, Moses flooded the city with cars. By systematically starving the subways and the suburban commuter railroads, he swelled that flood to city-destroying dimensions.”

He “threw out of their homes 250,000 persons … He tore out the hearts of scores of neighborhoods, communities the size of small cities themselves, communities that had been lively, friendly places to live, the vital parts of the city that made New York a home to its people.” The Cross-Bronx Expressway gutted a pleasant neighborhood called East Tremont, wrecking the Bronx and turning it into a crime-ridden, poverty-stricken borough. The Gowanus Expressway similarly destroyed a lovely middle-class area in Brooklyn, burying it under shadow generating highway. And the public housing Moses built was ugly and depressing. He also built almost no playgrounds and public pools in Harlem or other black neighborhoods. The one public pool he built in Harlem wasn’t even heated – he didn’t think, for some reason, that black people could get cold.

If there are things about New York that drive you crazy today, you can thank Robert Moses for them.

Why aren’t there subway lines that go directly to La Guardia or JFK? Why aren’t there subway lines serving huge parts of Queens? Why can’t you take a subway to Red Hook? Why is there still no 2nd Avenue Subway? Because Moses didn’t believe in public transportation and had contempt for people who needed it and couldn't’t afford cars. From 1933 until 1968, Moses years in power, not one new subway line was built and New Yorkers had to, and still have to, pack themselves like sardines into the subway cars on the old, old tracks. It’s not exactly a secret that our city’s public transportation is inadequate and overcrowded. Moses was so convinced that cars were the future of New York, he even proposed a Lower Manhattan Expressway that would have run through and destroyed Soho and Greenwich Village! (Mercifully, that was stopped.) And the irony was that Robert Moses never drove a car a day in his 92 years of life.

In short, Caro writes, Moses “systematically defeated every attempt to create the master plan that might have enabled the city to develop on a rational, logical, unified pattern.” By destroying so many neighborhoods and making so many others inaccessible with little or no public transportation, Moses reduced the number of pleasant areas where New Yorkers can or want to live. That’s why it costs so much to live here today and why New Yorkers are paying so much for so little space.

Needless to say Moses’ legacy is what contributed to the subtitle “The Fall of New York” and, for the last few decades, Mayors and Governors have been trying to undo a lot of the problems he created. Bloomberg’s PlaNYC is basically an attempt to overturn and minimize the Moses mess.

So what about the book itself? The Power Broker is a long, exhausting, infuriating, and brilliant book. Caro is an absolutely masterful writer and the jaw drops when you read about all of the interviews he conducted and all of the documents he browsed through. Caro’s gift is explaining the details and decisions of public policy making and how they affect people’s lives. Ultimately, this book is really not a biography of Moses or a history of New York City or a sociological study of urban planning, but an examination of power (hence the book’s title): Caro brilliantly explains how Moses got power, used it, kept it, and eventually lost it.

Because of its length, The Power Broker is a door stopper and it takes a commitment to read it. It took me over a month! But I highly recommend it if you have any desire to understand how New York City changed and grew in the 20th century.