In ordinary times, the sudden departure of a top aide is a sign that a rookie mayor is shaking up a disorganized City Hall. But when the mayor is Bill de Blasio, the resignation of key players is a sign that chaos rules the roost.
The shocking resignation of Deputy Mayor Lilliam Barrios-Paoli, who oversees the sprawling health and human service agencies, stunned advocates for the homeless. But apart from obligatory statements of mutual praise, neither the mayor nor Barrios-Paoli shed any light on why she is leaving so soon, and in the middle of a raging crisis.
With the mayor and Police Commissioner Bill Bratton dealing daily with reports about aggressive panhandlers and vagrant encampments, the timing is so odd that it’s hard to believe the parting was amicable.
Yet the details aren’t as important as the big picture, which remains decidedly messy. The problem is what it has been since de Blasio took office. He governs from two fixed points, ideological and political. Pragmatic problem-solving isn’t for him.
Until he changes, nothing can change. Aides come and go, but the boss is the problem.
Insiders report that the mayor, though a slacker in personal habits, is disciplined to a fault about his goals. Any idea presented to him must pass a litmus test summed up this way: “How does it fit into our agenda?”
That agenda, as the mayor never tires of repeating, is a progressive one. That means an idea is good only if it combats income inequality or leads to more affordable housing. Anything else gets the back burner, or the back of his hand.
That focus might work for a short time, but the city is too complex and dynamic for a narrow, limited approach. Public safety, improving schools, putting out fires and picking up the garbage don’t lend themselves to rigid ideology. Getting the job done day in and day out is what counts, and what the public deserves.
The second litmus test I’m hearing involves a raw political calculation. A former campaign operative, de Blasio reportedly assesses all criticism based on its source. A complaint from a supporter gets action, while the same complaint from a critic or opponent gets deep-sixed.
Sadly, the political calculation includes a racial element. Because de Blasio believes he owes his election to Al Sharpton and nonwhite voters, he often asserts that “I don’t need whites to win,” an insider tells me.
It’s a reprehensible attitude that reflects a divide-and-conquer strategy waged along race and class fault lines. Unfortunately, the mayor’s assumption may be right.
Taking into account changing demographics and the city’s lopsided liberalism, along with his care and feeding of the unions, the mayor could be invincible from his right.
The only obvious danger in 2017 is that he would be outflanked on the left. Seen that way, keeping Sharpton and the unions inside the tent goes a long way toward securing his re-election, and, therefore, it matters most.
The downside to the mayor’s litmus tests are obvious everywhere. Broad measurements of the quality of life show that most New Yorkers see it declining, and fear it is growing steadily worse. A gloomy view of the future, then, will be a defining characteristic of the next two years.
Unless de Blasio changes course. For that to happen, he’ll probably need to conclude that he’ll be a one-termer otherwise.
But even facing defeat, I’m not sure he would be able to change. The amiable back-bencher of years past is drunk with power and so comfortable in his bubble that he probably believes his own hyperbole about what great things he is doing and that he is important nationally. He seems ready to sacrifice incremental progress for wild-eyed fantasies of a socialist Utopia.
In that case, buckle up, New York. Life is likely to get much worse before it gets better.
Hill may not be ‘first’ lady for long
Based on national polls, Hillary Clinton is the front-runner in the race for the Democratic nomination. But important early-state measurements tell a different story.
A new survey shows Sen. Bernie Sanders has narrowed Clinton’s lead in Iowa to seven points, down from 34 points. With 37 percent of likely caucus-goers saying they support Clinton, against 30 percent for Sanders, he is within striking distance five months before voters have their first say in the 2016 campaign.
The situation is even more intriguing in New Hampshire, which holds its primary eight days after Iowa. There Sanders grabbed a seven-point lead in the two most recent polls, with Clinton again topping out at 37 percent.
The upshot: If she loses Iowa and New Hampshire, is Clinton still the front-runner?
The question is hypothetical, but the trend is real and there is no relief in sight for her. The latest emails released under court order show again she had highly sensitive information on her homebrew server. Her defense, that nothing was marked classified when she sent it or received it, is a non sequitur.
As secretary of state, Clinton had to know she was dealing in secret information and had to keep it secret. She also had to know it would not be safe from hackers or foreign espionage on her private server, yet she recklessly failed to safeguard the contents.
Even before the FBI finishes its criminal probe, Clinton faces a hostile public. Surveys of swing states, including New Hampshire and Iowa, show that 60 percent or more of voters already think she is not honest or trustworthy.
Two assumptions seem safe: There will be more unflattering stories about her emails and family foundation, and they will cut deeper into her support.
Front-runner? Yes, temporarily.
Numbing numbers on crime
The New York Times story on skyrocketing murders around the country had startling figures. Milwaukee’s body count is up 76 percent over last year, St. Louis’ is up 60 percent, and Washington, DC’s, 44 percent.
Baltimore, with a population of 622,000 people, has had 215 murders, against 208 in New York, which has 8.4 million people. And Chicago, with a population of 2.7 million, has had 294 murders already.
In the vast majority of cases, the victims and killers are nonwhite young men. Wasn’t the first black president going to do something about that?
Give appease a chance? No!
The most important thing said or written in the last week was in a Wall Street Journal op-ed by former veep Dick Cheney and his daughter Liz. Noting that the appeasement of Hitler led to World War II, they wrote of the Iran deal:
“The Obama agreement will lead to a nuclear-armed Iran, a nuclear-arms race in the Middle East and, more than likely, the first use of a nuclear weapon since Hiroshima and Nagasaki.”
And still most Democrats line up like lemmings to support it.