Today Your Lame Duck, Tomorrow The World

He has his own army and state department and legacy, too:

With more than two years to go on his third term, Bloomberg is beginning to wind down his administration by assigning staffers at city agencies to begin compiling lists of accomplishments, The Post has learned.

Hizzoner has also tasked those staffers with collecting official “business records” like contracts, strategy memos and communications plans that will form the official account of Bloomberg’s years.

“They’re spending a lot of time putting this together,” one ranking administration official told The Post.

Nothing Distracts More/Than Quirky DOT Signs/’Cause Bad Haikus Stink

Janette Sadik-Khan/Has some ideas about bikes/But haikus are strange:

Paid for with a state grant from DWI funds, the 216 signs feature 12 designs with haiku — Japanese-style short poems that will deliver critical safety messages. The city first unveiled Curbside Haiku on Tuesday in Harlem.

“Adding curbside haiku is really just adding another level of safety to high-crash sites,” DOT Commissioner Janette Sadik-Khan said.

She said the colorful signs wouldn’t distract drivers because they are small — 8-by-8 inches.

In one, a silhouette of “Walking Man” is paired with the haiku:

“Too averse to risk

To chance the lottery, yet

Steps into traffic.”

The Cheekiness Of The Perpetrators Is Troubling Indeed

It’s an interesting theory but I’m not sure I accept the basic premise that mooning is a sort of criminal gateway leading eventually to sexual assault:

A spike in criminal incidents in Astoria, ranging from gropings to smashed car windows to attempted rape, has led three elected officials representing the neighborhood to introduce legislation to prevent crime in the area.

“We’re here to say … we’re going to do whatever in our power to make sure that it’s stopped,” state Sen. Michael Gianaris (D-Astoria) said last week.

. . .

“If we don’t put a stop to it now, things are going to get worse and worse,” the senator said. “Today’s groper, today’s mooner can be tomorrow’s rapist.”

. . .

Democratic District Leader Costa Costantinides said the uptick in crime “has been deeply troubling.”

“When you have students running down 23rd Avenue mooning shop owners, that’s serious,” he said.

Stay Classy, Wodka!

“Struck some as anti-Semitic” is a bit of an understatement:

A Manhattan-based liquor manufacturer kicked off the holidays on a sour note with a billboard along the West Side Highway that struck some as anti-Semitic and got the attention of Anti-Defamation League.

The Wódka brand vodka ad featured two dogs, a Chihuahua dressed in a Santa Claus hat and an Afghan hound in a yarmulke, with a message that read: “Christmas Quality. Hanukkah Pricing. Great Vodka. Priced Right.”

The company, based in the Flatiron District, yanked its billboard overlooking the busy road by 4 p.m., less than 24 hours after erecting it.

If There Weren’t Al Qaeda Bombmakers, We’d Have To Invent Them

The guy the NYPD picked up was perhaps stoned on weed when he made incriminating remarks:

But it was the informer’s role, and that of his police handlers, that have now been cited as among the reasons the F.B.I., which had its own parallel investigation of Mr. Pimentel, did not pursue the case, which was announced on Sunday night in a news conference at City Hall. Terrorism cases are generally handled by federal authorities.

There was concern that the informer might have played too active a role in helping Mr. Pimentel, said several people who were briefed on the case, who all spoke on the condition of anonymity, either because of the tense relations between the Intelligence Division and the F.B.I. or because the case was continuing.

. . .

Mr. Pimentel, 27, who lived with his uncle in the Hamilton Heights neighborhood after his mother threw him out recently, appears to be unstable, according to several of the people briefed on the case, three of whom said he had tried to circumcise himself.

And Mr. Pimentel, several of the people said, also smoked marijuana with the confidential informant, and some recordings in which he makes incriminating statements were made after the men had done so. His lawyer, Joseph Zablocki, did not return a call on Monday seeking comment.

. . .

As late as Saturday, after Mr. Pimentel was arrested, the Intelligence Division invited the task force to interview Mr. Pimentel and view the partially constructed incendiary device, a person briefed on the investigation said.

In the task force, investigators were concerned that the case raised some entrapment questions, two people said. They added that some investigators wondered whether Mr. Pimentel had the even small amount of money or technical know-how necessary to produce a pipe bomb on his own, had he not received help from the informer.

Entrapment is a word that has come up before in these high-profile busts.

Murray Weiss’ piece is also instructive, and a little more to the point: “The problem can be simply put: How much of Pimentel’s interest in bomb making and attacking New York targets was of his own making, and how much was facilitated by an NYPD informant keeping tabs on him?”