“They Have A Lot Of Time On Their Hands”

Campaigning For A Third Term On Just $100 Million 101 teaches us that if you can either lock up or neutralize every possible interest group or constituency with massive amounts of time or money you will probably win:

Even as Bloomberg campaign aides worked to shore up GOP support, they have been quietly meeting with leaders of the [Working Families Party] and key union officials whose votes will be crucial to landing the party’s endorsement.

Or, at the very least, they aim to block a Democrat from getting it.

One labor leader said Bloomberg’s campaign has been “diligently working” the WFP’s executive committee and “relentless” in its pursuit of union support. They’ve dispatched multiple emissaries to woo labor leaders.

“They come from the school of ‘leave no stone unturned,'” said Bob Master, political director for the Communications Workers of America and a WFP co-chairman.

“These guys are relentless. [Bloomberg’s] got a high-caliber team. They have a lot of time on their hands, and they have ample staff resources.

No Spurious Claim Of Success Left Behind

It might very well be a good idea on its own so don’t fib, stretch the truth, unleash a barrage of subway ads produced by a quasi-public agency that can be easily mistaken for campaigning or cook the books:

The graduation rate is another area in which progress has been overstated. The city says the rate climbed to 62 percent from 53 percent between 2003 and 2007; the state’s Department of Education, which uses a different formula, says the city’s rose to 52 percent, from 44 percent. Either way, the city’s graduation rate is no better than that of Mississippi, which spends about a third of what New York City spends per pupil.

. . .

To further raise the graduation rate, the city does not include as dropouts any of the students who were “discharged” during their high-school years. Some discharges are legitimate, like students who moved to another school district. But many others are so-called push-outs, students who were ejected from school even though they had a legal right to be there, often because their grades and test scores were bringing down their schools’ averages. The Department of Education refuses to disclose how many students are in each of these categories. We do know, however, that more than one-fifth of the members of the class of 2007, or 18,524 students, were discharged and not counted as dropouts.

Chekhov’s Gun Applied To Budget Threats

As the playwright said, “One must not put a loaded rifle on the stage if no one is thinking of firing it.” Otherwise, you’ll look like a manipulative third-tier politician destined for nothing better than chief executive of some sclerotic town somewhere between Boston and D.C.

They Need To Suspend Term Limits For This?

If it’s common to ask questions composed by interest groups during hearings then elected officials are obviously interchangeable, and we don’t really need them there for another term:

Nearly half the members of a City Council committee who got cue-card questions from the teachers union at a heated charter school hearing got campaign cash from the labor group.

Eight of the 17 members of the Council’s Education Committee collected $25,650 from the UFT’s political arm in the last three years, campaign records show.

The totals ranged from $1,600 to $4,950 each for Council members Bill de Blasio (D-Brooklyn), Melinda Katz (D-Queens) and John Liu (D-Queens).

. . .

“In the past, I have asked questions recommended by the UFT — as well as dozens of other organizations participating in hearings,” Liu said.

Gothamschools.org posted images of the cards with questions like “Doesn’t the Department have a clear legal and moral responsibility to provide every family in the city guaranteed seats for their children in a neighborhood elementary school?”

Several Council members said it is routine for constituents or groups to suggest questions for them to ask during hearings, but they had never seen such an organized effort.

The Mother Of All School Library Threats

Yesterday it was “appearing to set the stage” . . . today, the stage is set (that was quick!):

Mayor Bloomberg is threatening to lay off up to 7,000 city workers, saying municipal unions and state officials haven’t done enough to help New York balance its budget.

Budget Director Mark Page told agency heads Wednesday to cut $350 million from their budgets, saying previous cuts of $3.1 billion starting July 1 weren’t enough.

“This next step would most likely rely heavily on additional headcount reductions, whether through attrition, or, as is more likely, through layoffs,” Page wrote them in a letter.

“It is expected that these savings could result in a reduction of as many as 7,000 positions citywide.”

. . .

The mayor has asked municipal unions to pay for 10% of their health care costs and find additional health cost reductions to save $557 million, in order to avoid layoffs.

“This is a ploy to get more money from Albany, and he really deserves it,” said Harry Nespoli, head of the Municipal Labor Committee, which negotiates for city unions.

“We’re still at the table. He just made it more difficult to negotiate.”

While Bloomberg’s request for $350 million in savings won’t plug the $1.6 billion gap in next year’s budget, Nespoli said he would tell the city’s 310,000 employees that the threat is real.

“I’m going to tell my workers there’s a possibility of layoffs in the city of New York. I’m not going to lie to them,” said Nespoli, who heads the sanitation workers’ union.

“In this crazy world today, nobody can eliminate layoffs.”