In A State of the City address that was remarkable mostly for being unremarkable, Mayor de Blasio offered a new rationale for funding his pre-kindergarten program with a tax hike on upper incomes.
“Raising taxes on the rich makes our commitment to our kids more than just words,” he said. “It makes that commitment REAL. It makes that commitment FAIR. And it offers a promise to our kids that they can COUNT ON.”
Stop to unpack the layers of weirdness in that claim, including the all-caps wording in the official version of the speech. Apparently meant to convey seriousness, the theatrical emphasis conveys just the opposite. The only thing missing was an upside-down smiley face and LOL!
If the best argument de Blasio can make is that 4-year-old children won’t take their crayons seriously unless they’re paid for with a tax hike, the mayor already is running on empty.
Emphasis on “running,” with some fellow Democrats starting to wonder when de Blasio is going to shift from being a candidate to actually being mayor. It’s almost as though he doesn’t know how to let go of the campaign rhetoric and cheap applause lines.
“It looks like he had a political agenda, but not a governing agenda,” says one. “He won with that far-left campaign, but it’s stupid as mayor to scare the hell out of the business community and chase them to Florida.”
That view is especially relevant to the kindergarten campaign. Rejecting Gov. Cuomo’s offer that a tax hike isn’t necessary because the state will pay the costs, de Blasio is betting a staggering number of political chips on something with much more downside than upside.
He could take Cuomo’s yes for an answer, pocket the victory of getting universal pre-K started and move on to other issues to create a momentum for his agenda. And he could always revisit the tax issue next year.
Instead, he is setting up barricades and digging foxholes for a showdown with fellow Democrat Cuomo, a powerful governor likely headed to re-election. And de Blasio is alienating lawmakers with a heavy-handed demand that they give him what he wants, no questions asked.
As former Mayor Bloomberg learned the hard way, Albany never forgets an insult.
If the new mayor is aware of that dynamic, he’s not showing it. He’s got the City Council ready to occupy the Capitol, and held a rally yesterday to declare himself “miffed” and say it is “deeply distressing” that the tax may not come to a vote. He said all that standing beside Al Sharpton, a man he said cares “about just basic fairness.”
Lawmakers from both parties are getting re-election threats from Dollar Bill’s union allies, who are eager to please him in hopes of a pay bonanza. Naturally, most Dems are folding, making Cuomo and Senate Republicans the firewall. Dean Skelos, the GOP half of that body’s power-sharing arrangement, says he won’t agree to a floor vote.
If he and Cuomo stand firm, which I believe they will, de Blasio will look foolish, his mayoralty committing a major unforced error. But even if he wins, what does he really gain?
Remember, the larger context is his claim that pre-K is essential to ending income inequality. If so, putting all the weight on the tax battle makes no sense, given that the kids who are 4 in September will only be in second grade at the end of his term. What great strike against income inequality could these tiny shock troops possibly demonstrate by 2017?
Another head-scratcher is that de Blasio is turning pre-K into the totem pole of his entire education agenda. He says the entire system is in “crisis,” yet is offering zilch for the 1 million kids in it now. All he wants to do is squeeze charters, as though that will help everybody else. It won’t help anybody.
Indeed, his obsession with pre-K also could hurt other students because so much of the bureaucracy’s time and energy will be spent on the huge logistics operation needed to get 54,000 4-year-olds into schools in September. Fixing classrooms, buying books, hiring teachers — none of it will happen overnight, or smoothly.
The prospect of that operation has insiders scoffing, saying there is no precedent for such a large mobilization being successful in such a short time.
But maybe real success isn’t de Blasio’s goal. After all, in a campaign, you get judged by what you say, not what you do.
Boehner hasn’t an O’Care in the world
For Republicans, ObamaCare is the gift they hope will keep giving all the way to Election Day. That largely explains House Speaker John Boehner’s decision to offer a “clean” bill to raise the debt ceiling.
Unable to muster 218 votes for a package of spending cuts and reforms in exchange for a hike in borrowing, Boehner’s move wisely takes away any brinksmanship that could lead to another shutdown.
In addition, ending the debt-ceiling drama before it begins should keep attention on the endless drama of ObamaCare. As an old newspaper ad put it, if you miss a day, you miss a lot.
Monday’s announcement that the mandate covering midsize employers has been delayed marks, by one count, the 27th significant change in the law by executive order or regulation. It’s as if Obama sees his namesake law as personal property, to fiddle with as he pleases.
Yet the president’s logic on the delay is similar to Boehner’s on the debt ceiling. Both want to clear the deck of obstacles before November, when Senate control is the prize. Republicans see a good chance to pick up the six net seats they need, and ObamaCare is the main reason.
Obama’s repeated lies that you can keep your plan and doctor if you like them will be hammered home in commercials against Dems. So, too, will last week’s embrace by the White House of provisions that encourage some able-bodied people to work fewer hours and keep subsidized insurance.
Maybe the GOP could have a little fun with that one. Something along the lines of, “If working less is such a good idea for some people, wouldn’t it be even better if every American just quit his job and took handouts?”
That ought to remind voters which party believes in the work ethic and which favors couch potatoes.
The arts and grafts of politics
When it comes to corruption, there’s nothing new under the sun. My favorite scene in the 1940 film “The Great McGinty” has a crooked government handler blasting the ignorance of reformers.
“They’re always talking about graft,” he says. “But they forget. If it wasn’t for graft, you’d get a very low type of people in politics. Men without ambition, jellyfish.”
Gone, for good
Who says there’s no good news? Attorney General Eric Holder tells The New Yorker he will step down this year. Let the countdown begin.