Every time I think this guy can’t possibly seem any worse, he opens his mouth and proves he’s not only an arrogant plutocrat, but also a dangerous one:
New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg said the New York Police Department was like his own personal military force during a speech at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, according to PolitickerNY. “I have my own army in the NYPD, which is the seventh biggest army in the world,” he said. More here.
I share Robert Reich’s opinion of the corporate kingpins who are trying to drive a stake through the ailing heart of our democracy:
A funny thing happened to the First Amendment on its way to the public forum. According to the Supreme Court, money is now speech and corporations are now people. But when real people without money assemble to express their dissatisfaction with the political consequences of this, they’re treated as public nuisances and evicted…
However, Reich’s suggestion for undoing the harm done by Michael Bloomberg, the Koch brothers and other corporatists sounds hazy at best:
… If Occupiers are expelled from specific geographic locations the Occupier movement can shift to broad-based organizing around the simple idea at the core of the movement: It’s time to occupy our democracy.
It would be a big mistake to give up on the encampments around the country that have made the Occupy movement a genuine force for change.
Ezra Klein thinks the mayor did the movement a favor by attacking the OWS encampment, because the attack reinvigorated the occupiers. More here.
Here’s all you have to know about the integrity of the billionaire mayor from Wall Street:
After ordering the eviction of protesters from Zuccotti Park, New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg on Tuesday explained that the park would temporarily remain closed due to a court order that restrained the city from closing the park.
A ruling issued by [Manhattan Supreme Court Justice] Lucy Billings… said that the city is “prohibited from: “(a) Evicting protesters from Zuccotti Park and/or (b) Enforcing the “rules” published after the occupation began or otherwise preventing protesters from re-entering the park with tents and other property previously utilized,” the ruling said.
At a press conference Tuesday morning, Bloomberg said that protesters had only been “temporarily” asked to leave the park “to reduce the risk of confrontation and to minimize destruction in the surrounding neighborhood.”
How long will this smooth-talking, well-groomed little monster allow the Zuccotti Park protesters to persist like a shadow on the people who wrecked the economy, and to remind Americans that he, the “independent” Mike Bloomberg, condones and defends what they did? More here.
