Ray Kelly is no longer just New York’s popular police commissioner. He is also the straw stirring the drink in next year’s mayoral race.
Despite a growing chorus for him to join the campaign, Kelly has made no move that suggests he will. He says often he has no plans to seek office, though he did say once he was “contemplating” it.
That was enough. The mere chance that he might run has set many New York hearts aflutter, and is now causing concern among top Democrats.
One of the Dems certain to enter the fray, former Comptroller Bill Thompson, who narrowly lost to Mayor Bloomberg in 2009, seized on the “contemplating” remark to demand that Kelly make a decision one way or the other.
“Ray needs to decide whether he is or isn’t going to run,” Thompson told me. “He can’t wear a campaign button and a badge at the same time.”
Thompson insists he’s not afraid of a Kelly candidacy, saying he welcomes it. Rather, he argues that a top cop needs to be above politics, lest any decision be seen as “political instead of on the merits.” He cited police precinct staffing as an area that “might be viewed as tainted” if Kelly considers running.
Thompson’s demand is so premature and illogical that I can only conclude that the talk of a Kelly campaign is freezing potential donors and supporters. That would make sense because there is a fear among many New Yorkers that the winner of the Democratic primary, which is shaping up as an auction for the endorsement of municipal unions, will turn back the clock on Gotham. Polls show voters of all parties want a real choice in the general election, and are open to a Kelly campaign.
The heart of Kelly’s appeal is clear. Murders have fallen 75 percent over the last 18 years under Rudy Giuliani and Bloomberg, both of whom ran on Republican and an additional ballot line. Their five consecutive victories are unprecedented in the modern era, but now Dems are salivating at the prospect of reclaiming City Hall.
Kelly, the longest serving police commissioner in city history, is registered as an independent. But among those courting him are the five county GOP leaders, who last week put out a “help wanted” letter for a candidate, and said they hoped to talk to Kelly about their ballot line. Others, including financier types, want to create a campaign apparatus he could step into the minute he resigns.
As for Thompson’s complaint, I asked him why single out Kelly in terms of the “taint” of politics when the Dem field consists mostly of elected officials with the power of the purse, led by Council Speaker Christine Quinn. Besides, Kelly works for the mayor, who presumably would not tolerate police decisions not made for public safety reasons.
Thompson’s answer — that the police commissioner is different from any other job — is technically true, but irrelevant. There is no law that says Kelly can’t keep his options open and listen to potential supporters.
If he openly commits to running, he will probably step down as commissioner. Until then, he’s free to think, talk and listen.
He should also take his time. If nothing else, watching the Dems squirm makes the wait a pleasure.
Osama plots from the grave
President George W. Bush’s decision to put America on offense after 9/11 was costly and remains controversial. President Obama, once a critic, adopted and even expanded the policy, though now declares the “tide of war is receding” and is speeding troop withdrawals.
But before we close the book on the “war on terror,” it’s worth considering how Osama bin Laden saw things. Unlikely as it may seem, documents seized in his Pakistan compound afford Bush a measure of vindication. Our military might frustrated the terrorist leader’s plans for Mideast dominance and provoked nonstop whining.
“America, the guardian of the West, is by far the most influential country in the region,” bin Laden wrote in one of the documents released by the Combating Terrorism Center at West Point. “America is the lifeblood … America is strong enough to have toppled the Iraqi regime, and the Islamic government in Afghanistan.”
He repeated his complaint that our forces were thwarting an Islamic caliphate. He likened the United States to “a wicked tree” that “has many branches.” The trunk represents America while “the branches of the tree represent countries, like NATO members, and countries in the Arab World.”
Al Qaeda could succeed only by attacking the trunk. “Say a branch represents the United Kingdom,” bin Laden wrote. “We should ignore that opportunity, and to go back to sawing the trunk of the tree.”
He said jihadists should ignore other targets. “We must then aim every bow and arrow and every land mine at the Americans. Only the Americans,” he wrote.
He talked of a “war of attrition,” which the United States would quit because of costs and “disadvantage,” leaving jihadists free to topple Arab governments and establish their own state.
Signing off in one letter, he predicted “America will have to withdraw during the next few years because of many reasons, the most important of which is America’s high deficit.”
Bin Laden is dead, but Bin Ladenism lives. We are about to find out whether he was right about what will happen when America withdraws from the battlefield.
Times, They Aren’t a-Changin’
There they go again. Just when it seemed The New York Times was trying to go straight in political news coverage, the paper plasters a hit job on Mitt Romney on the front page.
The Thursday headline, “Romney Camp Stirred Storm Over Gay Aide,” promised to deliver the goods on how insiders forced a high-profile aide into resigning. It didn’t come close.
The 1,600-word piece, despite excessive hand-wringing about the aide’s symbolic significance to gays, actually showed the Romney campaign tried to keep Richard Grenell from quitting despite outsider calls for his resignation. But Grenell quit almost as soon as he went on the payroll because he felt slighted.
While the headline writer had a conclusion in search of a story, the piece itself wasn’t as nasty as the one four years ago that accused John McCain of having an affair with a lobbyist. So in the heart of liberal la la land, this is what passes for progress.
Still, it’s worth noting what the paper’s public editor, Arthur Brisbane, wrote last month: “The Times needs to offer an aggressive look at the president’s record, policy promises and campaign operation to answer the question: Who is the real Barack Obama?”
At this rate, we’re not likely to get the answer in The Times.
Bunny’s got some nerve!
The demand by the Mellon heiress that John Edwards pay for his own mistress was a bummer. There’s no point in being a liberal if you can’t spend other people’s money.
It’s strictly business, Biden
Did you see the report that Joe Biden isn’t invited to Team Obama’s campaign-strategy meetings? The daffy veep might want to take a hint and remember that Obama’s favorite movie is “The Godfather.”
Bye-bye, Fredo