Although As Crimes Go, Domestic Violence Is Bad Enough, The Coverup Is Clearly Worse

Isn’t a domestic violence charge against an aide the thing that finally did in Governor Paterson? I can’t remember — and besides, the political establishment was ready to use any pretext to prevent Paterson from running. Bloomberg’s case may be worse, seeing that they were intent on covering it up not to investigators but rather the entire city; one is witness tampering while the other moves into the realm of a wholesale fraud against history. You see a highly disturbing example of Bloombergian hubris in the way he did nothing to dissuade everyone from believing it was all about the snowstorm and the mayor’s own superior managerial instincts rather than just a tacky deal to allow Goldsmith to resign on his own terms.

How do you know they’re being squirrely? The Thursday afternoon before Labor Day weekend isn’t a bad time to let bad news squeak out:

Furious city officials yesterday blasted Mayor Bloomberg for hiding former Deputy Mayor Stephen Goldsmith’s ugly secret — that he resigned because he’d been busted for allegedly attacking his wife in their luxurious Washington home.

But instead of coming clean on why he had kept his mouth shut last month, Bloomberg ran for cover, spending the day ducking reporters who wanted to ask about The Post’s bombshell revelation that Goldsmith was done in by his temper, not by his poor performance during the Christmas blizzard.

Last night, Bloomberg abruptly canceled an event on the Circle Line with a German-American friendship group, where an organizer announced the mayor would be absent because of an “emergency.”

As behaviorists will tell you, if you allow a child to disrespect you, he will quickly start falling into some very bad patterns.