Are Criminals Getting Dumber Or Are Their Crimes Just Getting Dumber?

A buffalo wing riot in Brooklyn last week (“Councilwoman Letitia James [. . .] pointed the finger at the management of the sports bar for recklessly promoting its 50-cent ‘Wing Tuesdays’ to students”), and now video game characters jacking cabbies:

The cabbie beat up by thugs dressed as Super Mario Brothers spoke out about his ordeal Sunday and demanded tougher laws against assaults on taxi drivers.

“I was really scared. . . . At the time, I really think I’m going to die,” said Ndiaye Serigne, 48, of Harlem, who was robbed and pummeled by four men dressed as Mario, Luigi and other characters at a gas station.

The Bloomberg Era: Flashy Initiatives, Little Followthrough

Apparently the mayor’s ambitious GreeNYC plan — the initiative that, among other things, encourages office workers to be more environmentally aware by “re-purposing used sheets into scrap paper” or “shredding it to serve as packing material” — the initiative so efficient that it actually uses fewer “Ns”! — was just window dressing, as thousands of pounds of recycling is set to be discarded on Broadway:

For seven years, legal secretary Joanie Kissell has been collecting hole punchings at her job at Kenyon & Kenyon along the Canyon of Heroes.

The 58-year-old from Queens began gathering the little bits of paper even before she scored a job at a firm on the parade route.

Co-workers thought she was crazy. She says she was optimistic.

“They think I’m nuts,” Kissell said. “I’d say to them, ‘Wait! Don’t throw that out!'”

They’ll be grateful today when they can all look to her jar labeled “New York Yankees. 2009” to join in showering paper onto the Yankees to celebrate their 27th world championship.

. . .

At the Downtown Alliance’s transportation division, sanitation workers were busy yesterday bagging up a half-ton of shredded paper donated by a Red Hook recycling facility.

They planned to drop off about 400 bags of the stuff at buildings along Broadway between 4a.m. and 5 a.m. on Friday.

Less Technocrat Than Technorat

Bloomberg’s grand campaign promise to install Coca-Cola in the city’s drinking fountains meets reality, and the newly minted third termer reverts to vague pledges to use “technology” in some shape or form to fix stuff:

A day after winning reelection, Mayor Bloomberg on Thursday seemed to step back from a campaign proposal to have free crosstown bus service.

The “real issue” at the core of the no-fare proposal was speeding bus travel by reducing time spent boarding passengers, Bloomberg noted.

That goal might be achieved through technology, Bloomberg said after touring the city’s 311 call center with MTA Chairman Jay Walder.

Some Of Your Friends Are Probably Already This Fucked

It will cost $1 billion to replace the Kosciuszko Bridge:

The pricetag for a state plan to replace the crumbling Kosciuszko Bridge by 2017 has ballooned to more than a billion bucks to accommodate the eight-year inflation expected during the long-awaited and long-needed replacement.

For that price, we might get something truly stunning — a concrete cable-stayed straight out of a science fiction movie (or the downtowns of many other cities). In layman’s terms, the futuristic bridge resembles two space-turkey wishbones standing upright with diagonal connection cables.

Last month, the Kosciuszko Bridge Stakeholders Advisory Council — a Department of Transportation-appointed panel of local activists — chose three final designs for the new 1.1-mile span.

In addition to the front-runner [. . .] were a simple box girder design and a crescent arch similar to the Bayonne Bridge.

They would all cost a lot, but Adam Levine, spokesman of the state Department of Transportation, said the cost was expected.

“For a bridge that is a mile long in New York City, $1 billion is the going rate,” he said.

Next Time Your Well-Intentioned Goo-Goo “Politically Aware” Buddy Reminds You To Go Out And Vote, Maybe You Should Actually Listen To Him

Nice to see John Liu settling into his old ways of vacuous grandstanding after the fact:

Signs of an altered landscape quickly emerged as Mr. Bloomberg, never known for his humility, made an elaborate show of deference. His staff hastily arranged a highly visible meeting, at a Manhattan restaurant, with the city’s public advocate-elect, Bill de Blasio, a Democrat. Just a few weeks ago, the mayor said the citywide office was “a waste of everyone’s money,” and called for its abolition.

But tellingly, when the mayor tried to meet with John C. Liu, the Democratic comptroller-elect, Mr. Liu said he could not find time on his schedule, a highly unusual slight.

Later, Mr. Liu told a reporter: “A long time ago, the people of New York decided there would be no king nor a monarch in New York City.”

It wasn’t just the media who were fundamentally incurious about the polls but also the Democratic Party itself:

As the cheering dies down over at William C. Thompson Jr.’s headquarters, where close almost passed for victory on Tuesday evening, New York’s Democrats are left to consider a colder reality:

This was a race most Democrats now believe they could have won. Numbering among the co-conspirators in the Democrats’ defeat, in the view of some party leaders and activists, are Democratic grandees, from President Obama — who did not campaign for Mr. Thompson — to the City Council speaker, whose support could not have been softer, to two powerful labor unions that remained studiously neutral.

. . .

Barbara Fife, a deputy mayor under David N. Dinkins, acknowledged many ills, from an honorable but lackluster candidate to a too-quick willingness of many prominent Democrats to write off Mr. Thompson’s campaign as stillborn.

But she wondered at a Democratic president who could barely bring himself to utter the mayoral candidate’s name, much less to make a swing through New York. “He made people feel this was not winnable; Bill got lumped in with Paterson in many minds,” Ms. Fife said. “Obama had lists he could have given, and support. But he never said boo.”

And back in that first article there’s an important lesson to take away — specifically, feel free not to fall for campaign bullshit, because they’re probably just making it all up:

Behind the scenes, the close margin had set off second-guessing and soul-searching among some of the aides, who privately questioned the heavily negative advertising efforts.

As the city’s political establishment tried to understand the huge gulf between the cocksure rhetoric of the mayor’s campaign and his showing at the polls, Bloomberg aides said that they had relentlessly promoted the mayor as invulnerable in the race when they knew differently, saying it was the only way they for them to keep the Democratic establishment from rallying behind Mr. Thompson.

Said one top Bloomberg campaign adviser, who spoke on condition of anonymity to protect internal discussions: “If a poll had come out showing that the race was within five points, Barack Obama would have swung into town, the United Federation of Teachers would break for Thompson and Mike Bloomberg would not be mayor today.”

On Election Day, this adviser said, “everybody woke up and saw what we saw. We are lucky to have seen it first.”

And here’s where it leaves you:

Mark Radichio, 42, who owns a landscaping company, said that he has been a lifelong Democrat, but that he voted for Mr. Bloomberg in 2001 and 2005.

“I liked his style, his independence, and I’ve always liked the fact that he doesn’t take campaign money from anyone,” Mr. Radichio said.

Then two things happened that made him change his mind about the mayor. “First, it was term limits. The guy just wants to be mayor for life, and I don’t like that,” said Mr. Radichio, who lives in Bensonhurst, Brooklyn. “Then, it was all this money he spent on his campaign. People are unemployed, they’re losing their homes, and you’re spending tens of millions of dollars on a political campaign? There’s something wrong with this picture.”

Mr. Radichio thought it over and decided he would vote for Mr. Thompson, whom he confessed knowing little about, but who he thought would be a better choice, given Mr. Bloomberg’s “baggage,” as he put it.

“I’m ashamed to say that I didn’t vote,” Mr. Radichio said. “I just assumed Bloomberg was going to crush the other guy. I’ll tell you, I’m never going to sit out an election again.”

Speaking of people not showing up when it counts, an e-mailer passes along this conversation that took place this morning in a Midtown office building:

Girl in Yankees shirt in coffee room at [Midtown office]: Yeah!

Guy in business casual: Awesome, I know!

Girl: Did you watch the game?

Guy: Nah, I knew they were going to win. I went out with my boys instead, and they’re Mets fans, so . . .

Girl: Yeah, I only watched the one game. So awesome!

See also: Bloomberg For Mayor 2009.