Tardiness In The Defense Of Equality Is No Vice

All that work recalibrating his image and he still manages to come off sounding like a dick:

And the famously tardy mayor, who arrived 35 minutes late to a midafternoon interview on Wednesday with The New York Times, declared that punctuality was sorely overrated.

“George W. Bush was punctual,” Mayor de Blasio said, reclining in an upholstered chair in his corner office at City Hall. “Unfortunately, he left the nation in worse shape than how he found it.”

In a wide-ranging conversation, punctuated by a trip to a nearby pizza parlor to silence the mayoral stomach, Mr. de Blasio portrayed his administration as having kept its pledge to combat inequality, an image he plans to emphasize in a speech at the Cooper Union on Thursday, his 100th day in office.

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And as for tardiness? The mayor is known for arriving anywhere from 15 to 60 minutes late to public events, often stranding reporters, supporters and other elected officials.

“I don’t think punctuality should be treated as a false idol; I think it’s the ideal state of affairs,” he said, as a young scheduler lurked nearby. “But the most important thing is to get it right.”

At that, Mr. de Blasio rose from his seat. “There you have it,” the mayor said, signaling that he had other business to attend to.