Bloomberg Is In.

On the other hand.....this makes it sound pretty bad:

https://www.cnn.com/2020/02/11/opinions/bloomberg-recording-racism-stop-and-frisk-filipovic/index.html

RealLindaL wrote:On the other hand.....this makes it sound pretty bad:

https://www.cnn.com/2020/02/11/opinions/bloomberg-recording-racism-stop-and-frisk-filipovic/index.html

If he get's support from black people it's because they know a good thing when they see it. I don't recall NYC being so bad when Iron Mike was Mayor. If Dems want to go with Bernie or Amy that's okay but Mike can still use his money to flatten IPOTUS.

Just now on Morning Joe, Rev. Al Sharpton pointed out that every Dem candidate has some problem with black people. He said it's laughable that Trump calls Bloomberg racist while Trump himself still supports Stop And Frisk himself. He repeated feeb Trump's story about shooting someone on 5th Ave and his base will still vote for him. He added that if Trump healed someone on 5th Ave, black people STILL wouldn't vote for Trump. I guess black folks know a racist when then see one in the White House.

We're going to have a problem with minority turnout, anyway. We had two good black candidates, Kamala Harris (man, do I wish she'd stayed in longer, I think she'd be a front-runner now) and Corey Booker, and they got squeezed out mostly because of people buying into Bernie's ill-fated vanity run.

Biden gets the best Afican-American numbers, but he's not doin' so hot at the moment. That may perk up once he gets out of the all-white "mayonnaise is too spicy for me!" states like Iowa and New Hampshire... but, we'll see.

Bloomberg's comments and stop-and-frisk program are problematic, and yet he's still polling second highest with black voters.

I don't know why Warren's not doing better. She's got some of Bernie's still ill-conceived plans but articulates them better, and she could have wider minority appeal because she doesn't forget they're there, like some of the candidates do.

I like Mayor Pete and Klobuchar but they poll almost zero with minorities. That may be because they don't like them... but it's more likely because they just like someone else more or aren't as familiar with them. If they become the nominee, their minority support may bounce right back up, because a lot of minorities are like me -- they can't really pick a front-runner right now and are waiting to see who emerges and then they'll back 'em 100%. Or, at least that's what I'm hoping will happen.

Bloomberg's comments aren't good, but I doubt any person of color's going to look at Trump and think, "yeah, Trump would be a better bet for me." Trump is a bigot, full stop. He plays to bigots, he encourages bigotry. He can tout the numbers for African-American employment all he wants, but he can't point to a goddamn thing he did specifically to make those numbers go up. He inherited those trends from Obama and all he's doing is pointing out benchmarks as they pass by. Trump's done nothing for the economy. His tax cuts and deregulations (a.k.a. putting more toxins in your water) didn't boost the economy; it's slightly slower than it was under Obama, so, where's the proof of the efficacy of those cuts? There is none. Meanwhile, his tariffs have put farmers on the government teat. And if African-American employment is up, what exactly did Trump do to help that number? Nothing. He can't point to a thing. It's just a lucky benefit of Obama's continuing economic trends.

So, I doubt Bloomberg will lose in a "who's more racist?" face-off with Trump. Especially not while stuff like this is still going on:

Bloomberg picks up endorsements from 3 black lawmakers amid stop-and-frisk questions

Washington (CNN)Michael Bloomberg touted the endorsements of three members of the Congressional Black Caucus on Wednesday, a day after the former New York mayor again faced questions about his previous support for stop-and-frisk policing practices.

Reps. Lucy McBath of Georgia, Gregory Meeks of New York and Stacey Plaskett of the Virgin Islands made no mention of the controversial policing practice that took place during Bloomberg's mayoralty in their endorsement statements. But their support could help Bloomberg as he reaches out to the African American community, a critical bloc of the Democratic base that views the former New York mayor with scorn in large part due to his longtime support for stop and frisk.

Bloomberg apologized for his support for the practice when he entered the race late last year, but comments from 2015 that surfaced earlier this week in which he defended stop and frisk in stark terms renewed attention on the controversial part of his New York legacy.

"Mike gave grieving mothers like me a way to stand up and fight back," McBath, whose 17-year-old son Jordan Davis was shot and killed by a white man in 2012 after a dispute over loud music, said in a statement. "Nobody running for president has done more for the gun violence prevention movement than Mike."


https://www.cnn.com/2020/02/12/politics/michael-bloomberg-congressional-black-caucus-endorsements/index.html

Worthy New York Times piece by a three time Pulitzer prize-winning op-ed columnist.  Please consider reading, especially anyone still considering Bernie Sanders.  Registration on nytimes.com is easy and free, if you're not already registered.

Highly recommended reading:

https://www.nytimes.com/2020/02/11/opinion/bloomberg-president-2020.html?referringSource=articleShare

RealLindaL wrote:Worthy New York Times piece by a three time Pulitzer prize-winning op-ed columnist.  Please consider reading, especially anyone still considering Bernie Sanders.  Registration on nytimes.com is easy and free, if you're not already registered.

Highly recommended reading:

https://www.nytimes.com/2020/02/11/opinion/bloomberg-president-2020.html?referringSource=articleShare

I don't want to register on the "Gray Lady" page. Could you cut and paste the highlights?

A new Florida Poll has Bloomberg over Biden in the Sunshine state. Good, maybe Bloomberg can convince the Florida geezers to vote true Blue instead of Dead Red.

https://www.abcactionnews.com/news/political/michael-bloomberg-leading-floridas-democratic-primary-race-new-poll-says



Meanwhile, who will pop the big question to Iron Mike? Will Mike open his returns to America the way IPOTUS refuses to do? If Mike says he won't, what is he hiding?

Telstar wrote:A new Florida Poll has Bloomberg over Biden in the Sunshine state. Good, maybe Bloomberg can convince the Florida geezers to vote true Blue instead of Dead Red.

Meanwhile, who will pop the big question to Iron Mike? Will Mike open his returns to America the way IPOTUS refuses to do? If Mike says he won't, what is he hiding?

There are more Democrats in Florida than Republicans, shouldn't even be an issue, right? Unless there are some REAL thinking voters and not political party hacks.

Who cares about tax returns???? Bloomberg is wealthy, good for him. End of story. You won't even sign on to the NYT's - what are you hiding? Care to publish your tax return? I didn't think so.

gatorfan wrote:

Telstar wrote:A new Florida Poll has Bloomberg over Biden in the Sunshine state. Good, maybe Bloomberg can convince the Florida geezers to vote true Blue instead of Dead Red.

Meanwhile, who will pop the big question to Iron Mike? Will Mike open his returns to America the way IPOTUS refuses to do? If Mike says he won't, what is he hiding?

There are more Democrats in Florida than Republicans, shouldn't even be an issue, right? Unless there are some REAL thinking voters and not political party hacks.

Who cares about tax returns???? Bloomberg is wealthy, good for him. End of story. You won't even sign on to the NYT's - what are you hiding? Care to publish your tax return? I didn't think so.

Good. Hopefully Florida Dems will get it right this time and vote for a Dem POTUS instead of an IPOTUS this time. Real Americans ( something you will never be ) want to see his returns, just like they want to see the returns of the scumbag we have now. Don't worry about what I'm hiding cracker boy.

Telstar wrote:I don't want to register on the "Gray Lady" page. Could you cut and paste the highlights?

One person's highlights are not another's.   Here's the whole piece by Thomas A. Friedman, and I don't hesitate to suggest everyone read it all, if you can possibly spare a little time:


My fellow Americans, we face a national emergency. Never before have we had a president so utterly lacking in personal integrity, so able to lie and abuse his powers with such impunity and so blindly backed by an amoral party, an unscrupulous attorney general and a media-fund-raising juggernaut. It is an engine of raw power that will cram anything the president says or does right down your throat.

James Carville had it exactly right when he noted on “Morning Joe” the other day that the only thing standing in the way of lasting damage by this machine to all that makes America unique and great is the Democrats’ nominating the right person to defeat Donald Trump.

We have to get this right. This is no ordinary time, no ordinary Republican Party, no ordinary incumbent, and it will require an extraordinary Democratic machine to triumph.

Because, without doubt, Russia and China also will be “voting” Trump 2020 — for three reasons: (1) Trump keeps America in turmoil and unable to focus on building the infrastructure we need to dominate the 21st century the way we did the 20th. (2) Both Beijing and Moscow know that Trump is so disliked by America’s key allies that he can never galvanize a global coalition against China or Russia. And (3) both Russia and China know that Trump is utterly transactional and will never challenge them on human rights abuses. Trump is their chump, and they will not let him go easily.

So who is the right Democratic candidate? Well, for starters I will tell you who it is not. It is not Bernie Sanders. On which planet in the Milky Way galaxy is an avowed “socialist” — who wants to take away the private health care coverage of some 150 million Americans and replace it with a gigantic, untested Medicare-for-All program, which he’d also extend to illegal immigrants — going to defeat the Trump machine this year? It will cast Sanders as Che Guevara — and it won’t even be that hard.

Yes, the failures of American capitalism to deliver inclusive growth, which have propelled the Sanders campaign and animated his followers, require urgent attention by our next president. But Sanders, in key cases, has the wrong solutions to the right problems. He’s the wrong candidate to take down Trump.
Debatable
Agree to disagree, or disagree better? Broaden your perspective with sharp arguments on the most pressing issues of the week. Sign up here.

Please, Democrats, don’t tell me you need Sanders’s big, ill-thought-through, revolutionary grand schemes to get inspired and mobilized for this election. You want a revolution? I’ll give you a revolution: four more years of Donald Trump, unencumbered by the need to get re-elected. That will be a revolution! And it will do permanent damage to the institutions and norms that have sustained this country since its founding, not to mention our environment, which Trump has been selling off to oil, gas and mining companies at an alarming pace.

So, who is the right candidate and what is the right strategy?

On strategy, we know the formula that works, because it already has: Appeal to independents, moderate Republicans and suburban women. These are the constituencies that did not like Hillary Clinton and were ready to give Trump a chance in 2016 — but abandoned him in 2018 and delivered the House of Representatives to the Democrats, and then also two governorships in red states.
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If Democrats can choose a candidate who can hold the core Democratic base and also appeal to these same independents, moderate Republicans and suburban women in the key swing states, they can absolutely defeat Trump.

How do you do that as a candidate?

For starters, by stressing national unity, personal integrity and a willingness to pursue bipartisanship whenever the other side is ready. A lot of Americans are worried sick that Trump is tearing the country in half.

As Larry Diamond, editor of The Journal of Democracy, pointed out to me, several studies he’s been publishing show that the best way to defeat illiberal populism is not by trying to out-polarize the polarizer in chief but rather through broad, inclusive electoral strategies that pragmatically address the economic and social concerns of voters, including those who had previously voted for the populist.

That was the approach that enabled the secular opposition to defeat the party of Turkey’s autocratic president, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, in municipal elections last year in Istanbul and other cities. A similar depolarizing approach powered the victory of Greece’s liberal-centrist New Democracy party over the ruling left-wing populist Syriza in national elections last year.

You also do it by repeating every hour every day — with evidence — that Trump is out to destroy Obamacare through the courts, which means eliminating its coverage for pre-existing conditions, and only the Democrats will save it and improve it.

You do it by not only talking about how to redivide the pie — which we need to do — but by also talking about how to grow the pie, how to create more taxpayers and how to inspire more innovators. Ours is a capitalist country. Americans admire successful entrepreneurs. Let’s praise job creators and risk-takers — as long as they and their companies pay their taxes. You want more and better jobs, you need more Steve Jobs.

You do it by celebrating the growing economy that Barack Obama reignited and Trump continued, while making clear that it still needs work. Too much of the Trump tax cuts have gone to companies and the most wealthy, with virtually nothing invested in infrastructure — roads, ports, schools, bandwidth, scientific research — or affordable housing, which we must have for inclusive prosperity.

You do it by hitting Trump hard on the environment, but not focusing just on “climate change,” which is an abstraction for most people. Trump is unfit to serve four more years because of how he has removed so many protections for the water and air America’s kids drink and breathe every day.

And you do it by supporting a balanced approach to immigration reform — a high wall, with a big gate.

I was glad to see candidates with this kind of message, like Amy Klobuchar and Pete Buttigieg, trending better in Iowa and New Hampshire. It showed that lots of Democrats are searching in this direction.

But there is one candidate on the Democratic side who not only has a track record of supporting all those issues but also has the resources to build a machine big enough to take on the Trump machine.

This candidate also has the toughness to take on Trump, because while Trump was pretending to be a C.E.O. on the show “The Apprentice,” this candidate was actually building one of the most admired global companies as a real C.E.O.

This candidate is not cuddly, he is not always politically correct and he will not always tell you what you want to hear — or try to outbid you on how many free services he’ll give away. He’s made mistakes, especially around stop-and-frisk policing in New York City, which disproportionately targeted black and brown men and for which he recently apologized.

His mistakes, though, have to be weighed against a record of courageously speaking out and devoting enormous personal resources to virtually every progressive cause — gun control, abortion rights, climate change, Planned Parenthood, education reform for predominantly minority schools, affordable housing, income inequality and tax reform. And he has vowed as president to focus on building black wealth, not just ending poverty.

And this candidate knows how to get stuff done — he can fight this fire at the scale of the fire. His team has for years used social networks to promote progressive issues to centrist and conservative audiences. He won’t cede the internet/Facebook/Twitter battlefield to Trump’s team, who are killers in that space.

And this candidate is now rising steadily in the polls. This candidate is Michael Bloomberg. This candidate has Trump very worried.

Yes, Sanders is also polling well against Trump, but the Trump machine has not begun to focus on him yet — it hasn’t begun bombing Facebook with ads about how Sanders honeymooned in the Soviet Union.

Sitting here today, Bloomberg — paired with a progressive vice-presidential candidate who can appeal to Sanders’s voters — has the best chance to carry the day.

In an age when political extremists go all the way, and moderates tend to just go away, Bloomberg has the right stuff — a moderate progressive with a heart of gold but the toughness of a rattlesnake — for what is going to be an incredibly big, brutal task: making Donald Trump a one-term president.

(Disclosure: Bloomberg Philanthropies has donated to Planet Word, the museum my wife is building in Washington, to promote reading and literacy.)

RealLindaL wrote:

Telstar wrote:I don't want to register on the "Gray Lady" page. Could you cut and paste the highlights?

One person's highlights are not another's.   Here's the whole piece by Thomas A. Friedman, and I don't hesitate to suggest everyone read it all, if you can possibly spare a little time:


My fellow Americans, we face a national emergency. Never before have we had a president so utterly lacking in personal integrity, so able to lie and abuse his powers with such impunity and so blindly backed by an amoral party, an unscrupulous attorney general and a media-fund-raising juggernaut. It is an engine of raw power that will cram anything the president says or does right down your throat.

James Carville had it exactly right when he noted on “Morning Joe” the other day that the only thing standing in the way of lasting damage by this machine to all that makes America unique and great is the Democrats’ nominating the right person to defeat Donald Trump.

We have to get this right. This is no ordinary time, no ordinary Republican Party, no ordinary incumbent, and it will require an extraordinary Democratic machine to triumph.

Because, without doubt, Russia and China also will be “voting” Trump 2020 — for three reasons: (1) Trump keeps America in turmoil and unable to focus on building the infrastructure we need to dominate the 21st century the way we did the 20th. (2) Both Beijing and Moscow know that Trump is so disliked by America’s key allies that he can never galvanize a global coalition against China or Russia. And (3) both Russia and China know that Trump is utterly transactional and will never challenge them on human rights abuses. Trump is their chump, and they will not let him go easily.

So who is the right Democratic candidate? Well, for starters I will tell you who it is not. It is not Bernie Sanders. On which planet in the Milky Way galaxy is an avowed “socialist” — who wants to take away the private health care coverage of some 150 million Americans and replace it with a gigantic, untested Medicare-for-All program, which he’d also extend to illegal immigrants — going to defeat the Trump machine this year? It will cast Sanders as Che Guevara — and it won’t even be that hard.

Yes, the failures of American capitalism to deliver inclusive growth, which have propelled the Sanders campaign and animated his followers, require urgent attention by our next president. But Sanders, in key cases, has the wrong solutions to the right problems. He’s the wrong candidate to take down Trump.
Debatable
Agree to disagree, or disagree better? Broaden your perspective with sharp arguments on the most pressing issues of the week. Sign up here.

Please, Democrats, don’t tell me you need Sanders’s big, ill-thought-through, revolutionary grand schemes to get inspired and mobilized for this election. You want a revolution? I’ll give you a revolution: four more years of Donald Trump, unencumbered by the need to get re-elected. That will be a revolution! And it will do permanent damage to the institutions and norms that have sustained this country since its founding, not to mention our environment, which Trump has been selling off to oil, gas and mining companies at an alarming pace.

So, who is the right candidate and what is the right strategy?

On strategy, we know the formula that works, because it already has: Appeal to independents, moderate Republicans and suburban women. These are the constituencies that did not like Hillary Clinton and were ready to give Trump a chance in 2016 — but abandoned him in 2018 and delivered the House of Representatives to the Democrats, and then also two governorships in red states.
Editors’ Picks
‘The Scream’ Is Fading. New Research Reveals Why.
‘In Italy I Kept Meeting Guys’: The Black Women Who Travel for Love
Tina Brown on the Future of the Royal Family

If Democrats can choose a candidate who can hold the core Democratic base and also appeal to these same independents, moderate Republicans and suburban women in the key swing states, they can absolutely defeat Trump.

How do you do that as a candidate?

For starters, by stressing national unity, personal integrity and a willingness to pursue bipartisanship whenever the other side is ready. A lot of Americans are worried sick that Trump is tearing the country in half.

As Larry Diamond, editor of The Journal of Democracy, pointed out to me, several studies he’s been publishing show that the best way to defeat illiberal populism is not by trying to out-polarize the polarizer in chief but rather through broad, inclusive electoral strategies that pragmatically address the economic and social concerns of voters, including those who had previously voted for the populist.

That was the approach that enabled the secular opposition to defeat the party of Turkey’s autocratic president, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, in municipal elections last year in Istanbul and other cities. A similar depolarizing approach powered the victory of Greece’s liberal-centrist New Democracy party over the ruling left-wing populist Syriza in national elections last year.

You also do it by repeating every hour every day — with evidence — that Trump is out to destroy Obamacare through the courts, which means eliminating its coverage for pre-existing conditions, and only the Democrats will save it and improve it.

You do it by not only talking about how to redivide the pie — which we need to do — but by also talking about how to grow the pie, how to create more taxpayers and how to inspire more innovators. Ours is a capitalist country. Americans admire successful entrepreneurs. Let’s praise job creators and risk-takers — as long as they and their companies pay their taxes. You want more and better jobs, you need more Steve Jobs.

You do it by celebrating the growing economy that Barack Obama reignited and Trump continued, while making clear that it still needs work. Too much of the Trump tax cuts have gone to companies and the most wealthy, with virtually nothing invested in infrastructure — roads, ports, schools, bandwidth, scientific research — or affordable housing, which we must have for inclusive prosperity.

You do it by hitting Trump hard on the environment, but not focusing just on “climate change,” which is an abstraction for most people. Trump is unfit to serve four more years because of how he has removed so many protections for the water and air America’s kids drink and breathe every day.

And you do it by supporting a balanced approach to immigration reform — a high wall, with a big gate.

I was glad to see candidates with this kind of message, like Amy Klobuchar and Pete Buttigieg, trending better in Iowa and New Hampshire. It showed that lots of Democrats are searching in this direction.

But there is one candidate on the Democratic side who not only has a track record of supporting all those issues but also has the resources to build a machine big enough to take on the Trump machine.

This candidate also has the toughness to take on Trump, because while Trump was pretending to be a C.E.O. on the show “The Apprentice,” this candidate was actually building one of the most admired global companies as a real C.E.O.

This candidate is not cuddly, he is not always politically correct and he will not always tell you what you want to hear — or try to outbid you on how many free services he’ll give away. He’s made mistakes, especially around stop-and-frisk policing in New York City, which disproportionately targeted black and brown men and for which he recently apologized.

His mistakes, though, have to be weighed against a record of courageously speaking out and devoting enormous personal resources to virtually every progressive cause — gun control, abortion rights, climate change, Planned Parenthood, education reform for predominantly minority schools, affordable housing, income inequality and tax reform. And he has vowed as president to focus on building black wealth, not just ending poverty.

And this candidate knows how to get stuff done — he can fight this fire at the scale of the fire. His team has for years used social networks to promote progressive issues to centrist and conservative audiences. He won’t cede the internet/Facebook/Twitter battlefield to Trump’s team, who are killers in that space.

And this candidate is now rising steadily in the polls. This candidate is Michael Bloomberg. This candidate has Trump very worried.

Yes, Sanders is also polling well against Trump, but the Trump machine has not begun to focus on him yet — it hasn’t begun bombing Facebook with ads about how Sanders honeymooned in the Soviet Union.

Sitting here today, Bloomberg — paired with a progressive vice-presidential candidate who can appeal to Sanders’s voters — has the best chance to carry the day.

In an age when political extremists go all the way, and moderates tend to just go away, Bloomberg has the right stuff — a moderate progressive with a heart of gold but the toughness of a rattlesnake — for what is going to be an incredibly big, brutal task: making Donald Trump a one-term president.

(Disclosure: Bloomberg Philanthropies has donated to Planet Word, the museum my wife is building in Washington, to promote reading and literacy.)

Thanks Linda.

A favorite phrase I've heard lately that totally describes some of the angst Democrats are feeling right now is "Clutching his/her pearls"! Everyone is so freaked out by DJT and rightly so, that we're afraid of not nominating the right person. Great article in the NYT's defending Bloomberg.

The other side of the coin, to which I am NOT subscribing, is to point out Mike's shortcomings or past transgressions that make him, in their eyes, unfit for office. One article points out his use of money to support mayors around the country and the other shines a light on claims he's made over the years re his sexual behavior. I say this is no time to clutch our pearls for damn sure.

I think Mike is the only one who will attract many voters in the middle. He is rapidly gaining support across the black community, which is really close to all we need to know, he's tech savvy and knows Donald (I love how he refers to DJT as Donald in a very soft tone too; must really get under the orange skin! Anyway, here are two opinion pieces pointing out why Dems should definitely not nominate Mike. I disagree with them both but it is always good to know the arguments.

A Republican Plutocrat Tries To Buy The Democratic Nomination
No Democrat should consider Michael Bloomberg as a candidate.

https://www.currentaffairs.org/2020/02/a-republican-plutocrat-tries-to-buy-the-democratic-nomination/?link_id=4&can_id=7ac7f29811a186c5ae63a6abf479abdc&source=email-mike-bloomberg-gives-elizabeth-warren-a-very-narrow-path-to-victory-2&email_referrer=email_725622___from_970011___subject_970009&email_subject=mike-bloomberg-gives-elizabeth-warren-a-very-narrow-path-to-victory-trump-destroyed-gops-values-bloomberg-would-do-the-same-for-democrats-sanders-is-the-least-weak-of-a-suddenly-weak-field


From GQ. On this topic, I'm thinking, show me almost any man who grew up in the 20th century in America who didn't at least harbor these types of attitudes and behaviors toward women, I mean, really?  

Why Is Bloomberg's Long History of Egregious Sexism Getting a Pass?

https://www.gq.com/story/bloomberg-sexism?link_id=3&can_id=7ac7f29811a186c5ae63a6abf479abdc&source=email-mike-bloomberg-gives-elizabeth-warren-a-very-narrow-path-to-victory-2&email_referrer=email_725622___from_970011___subject_970009&email_subject=mike-bloomberg-gives-elizabeth-warren-a-very-narrow-path-to-victory-trump-destroyed-gops-values-bloomberg-would-do-the-same-for-democrats-sanders-is-the-least-weak-of-a-suddenly-weak-field

othershoe1030 wrote:From GQ. On this topic, I'm thinking, show me almost any man who grew up in the 20th century in America who didn't at least harbor these types of attitudes and behaviors toward women, I mean, really?  

I hear you, other -- BUT this is presently the MeToo age, and guys are not getting much of a pass (if any) for past bad behavior, no matter if all the other guys were doing it.  Oh, except for Trump, of course, the untouchable pussy grabber.

Look, I'm just saying Bloomberg has baggage, but, as others have pointed out, so does everyone else, of one sort or another.  And at least most of Bloomberg's peccadillos pale in comparison to similar failings of Trump's.

RealLindaL wrote:

othershoe1030 wrote:From GQ. On this topic, I'm thinking, show me almost any man who grew up in the 20th century in America who didn't at least harbor these types of attitudes and behaviors toward women, I mean, really?  

I hear you, other -- BUT this is presently the MeToo age, and guys are not getting much of a pass (if any) for past bad behavior, no matter if all the other guys were doing it.  Oh, except for Trump, of course, the untouchable pussy grabber.

Look, I'm just saying Bloomberg has baggage, but, as others have pointed out, so does everyone else, of one sort or another.  And at least most of Bloomberg's peccadillos pale in comparison to similar failings of Trump's.

Jack the Rippers peccadillios pale in comparison to similar failings of Trump.

… [J]ust when you thought it was over, you’re forced to choose between an unabashed white supremacist and a billionaire fugitive slave catcher who submitted a sealed bid for the presidency of the United States.

First, you try to get free.

When all else fails, you vote for Michael Bloomberg…

Michael Bloomberg is a white quadrillionaire with infinitely deep pockets and a record of getting shit done. Even if the “shit” he got done came at the expense of our sons and daughters, defeating Donald Trump is the most important factor in a lot of people’s decisions on who they will vote for. Michael Bloomberg’s rise isn’t a condemnation of the other candidates as much as it is an example that black people know white people better than anything else in the universe.

One of the biggest factors in a large number of black people’s primary voting criterion is who they think white people will vote for when the curtain closes behind them in the voting booth. We know Bernie has better policy plans. We know Elizabeth Warren is a better communicator. We have seen Buttigieg’s Douglass plan.

But we also know white people.

Donald Trump is proof of what they will do.

For many black people, the prospect of an unchecked, second-term white supremacist outweighs the choice between Medicare for All and a public option. It’s heavier than student loan forgiveness or foreign policy. It’s bigger than all of the economic proposals and tax plans combined. It’s not even that people don’t think the other Democratic candidates can defeat Donald Trump. We just don’t know if they can defeat the overwhelming self-interests of white people.

https://www.theroot.com/i-cant-believe-black-people-might-actually-vote-for-mic-1841611802

Sal wrote:Michael Bloomberg’s rise isn’t a condemnation of the other candidates as much as it is an example that black people know white people better than anything else in the universe.

Very interesting perspective, Sal.  Thanks for sharing the piece.

Yikes, this is the most discouraging piece I've read all month, and I just hope Bloomberg's well prepared to battle this kind of fallout:

https://www.salon.com/2020/02/18/if-the-democrats-nominate-bloomberg-were-facing-four-more-years-of-trump/

I suppose one major factor may be Bloomberg's willingness (or not) to own up to his past faults and show commitment to change, whereas, of course, Trump never will.

If Bloomberg plays the Trump card ("It's all lies), his candidacy is doomed, as are we all.

RealLindaL wrote:Yikes, this is the most discouraging piece I've read all month, and I just hope Bloomberg's well prepared to battle this kind of fallout:



I suppose one major factor may be Bloomberg's willingness (or not) to own up to his past faults and show commitment to change, whereas, of course, Trump never will.

If Bloomberg plays the Trump card ("It's all lies), his candidacy is doomed, as are we all.

Bloomberg can turn his back to the audience, drop his pants, and I still won't be thinking four more years of Trump. I don't see Bloomberg giving bloated tax cuts to his bloated 1% friends. Don't see Bloomberg pardoning convicted criminals. Don't see Bloomberg attending Russian NRA rallies no matter how many American kids get their brains blown out. Don't see Bloomberg turning his back on the planet so as not to insult his 1% scumbag Corporate friends. Don't see Bloomberg building walls and don't see Bloomberg shoving children into cages. I'm sure there is a lot more that I don't see in Bloomberg that reminds me of IPOTUS but I can't think of it right now.

I posted an erroneous link - sorry.   The discouraging article I read was:

https://www.salon.com/2020/02/18/if-the-democrats-nominate-bloomberg-were-facing-four-more-years-of-trump/

Will go back and edit my original post to try and fix this.

Bloomberg did a pretty poor job in the debates tonight. But then so did everyone -- I could barely stand to listen to any of them, truth be told. Very depressing. :-(

https://www.cnn.com/2020/02/22/opinions/bloomberg-needs-to-take-down-sanders-lockhart/index.html

I just don't see Bloomberg as a Democrat, and that's probably because he's not.

Bloomberg Serves Oligarchy and Patriarchy Before Any Party

In its zeal to unseat President Donald Trump without sacrificing one iota of its waning power and influence, the Democratic National Committee is now for a “moderate” savior for the party’s nomination. It appears to matter little to DNC operatives whether this late entry is a Democrat, a Republican, or simply a political opportunist whose loyalties or agendas, whatever they are, must be accepted.

Enter Michael Bloomberg. After five years of resistance to the candidacy of Sen. Bernie Sanders, the DNC uncritically embraces in Bloomberg a billionaire who once praised President George W. Bush and deployed his vast resources to help keep the Senate under Republican control. This, despite the fact that in Sanders, the Democratic Party can claim an independent who delivers a progressive and innovative policy platform, a huge wave of multi-generational popular support and even caucuses with the Democrats.

In stark contrast, former New York City mayor Bloomberg calls himself an environmentalist while investing in fracking, championing it politically (as he did at this week’s Democratic presidential debate), and donating to a notorious green-washing environmental organization, the Environmental Defense Fund, in an ongoing but doomed effort to make fracking safe. As just these kinds of research attempts served as the basis for Hillary Clinton’s 2016 proposed “safe energy policy,” which relied on discredited technology that sought to trap methane, I covered this unsuccessful agenda to manipulate science for Truthdig in 2016.

Nonetheless, Bloomberg remains committed to it. He even spent nearly $6 million to reelect a Senate Republican who sponsored a bill to prohibit any future president from banning fracking.

“Michael Bloomberg is often sold to people as a climate hero. Headlines that tout him as a green visionary adorn the pages of The New Yorker and Vanity Fair. He skips across the globe as the UN’s special envoy for climate action,” Derek Seidman wrote in Eyes on the Ties. “Bloomberg’s framing of fracking as the practical, common-sense option is a big obstacle to more far-reaching measures needed to curb carbon emissions now.”

At this week’s Democratic presidential debate in Las Vegas, Bloomberg reiterated his support for fracking, dismissing the Sanders-backed Green New Deal. Bloomberg also opposes plans to transition to renewables within the time frame dictated by reports issued by the United Nations’ Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change.

Bloomberg Money Played Pivotal Role in Keeping the Senate Red

Bloomberg’s support for both fossil fuels and Republicans may be connected. Consider this useful research provided by Alex Kotch of the Center for Media and Democracy:

Over the last decade, Bloomberg helped Republicans take and maintain control of the U.S. Senate, which, in the Trump era and under Mitch McConnell’s (R-Ky.) leadership, has confirmed scores of right-wing judges, blocked liberal legislation passed by the House, and shielded the president from any repercussions after seeking foreign election assistance, tampering with witnesses and defying congressional subpoenas.

For several decades up to and through 2018, Bloomberg, whose own party affiliation has changed repeatedly, “donated over $900,000 directly to Republican candidates’ campaigns, national GOP party committees and federal PACs of state Republican Party committees,” Kotch reported. Bloomberg added millions more through his two super PACs, one of which spent over $10 million “supporting Republican federal candidates from 2012-16.”

The Toomey Campaign

In what The Philadelphia Inquirer called a “pivotal” 2016 campaign that “many thought could decide control of the Senate,” Bloomberg “poured millions of dollars into the contest — to help Pennsylvania Republican Sen. Pat Toomey” gain reelection. Bloomberg’s $5.9 million donation, used to buy television ads in key Philadelphia suburbs, portrayed the pro-fracking Republican as a moderate centrist, helping him win by a narrow margin over Democrat Katie McGinty, an environmental policy expert.

A Bloomberg spokesperson now claims the billionaire’s support for Toomey was based on the latter’s stance on gun control, even though Toomey’s challenger McGinty “supported far stronger gun measures, including bans on assault-style weapons.”

Raising further questions as to Bloomberg’s actual agenda in pushing Toomey, McGinty campaign adviser Mike Mikus noted that with the Senate secured by Republicans, no gun bills “would see any light as long as [McConnell] controlled the chamber. The Senate was up for grabs, and [Bloomberg] clearly sided with Mitch McConnell.”

Does Bloomberg Support Pat Toomey’s Pro-Fracking Resolution?

Whatever his purported motive in helping Toomey, Bloomberg spent considerable funds to reelect a fracking apologist who represented the environmentally devastated swing state of Pennsylvania, the second most important natural gas state after Texas. Fracking may represent a boon to investor-donors like Bloomberg and their vested politicians, but the practice poses a clear health hazard to Pennsylvania communities as well as climate hazards to the global community. A recent review of scientific literature found close correlations between “health impacts including cancer, infant mortality, depression, pneumonia, asthma, skin-related hospitalizations and other general health symptoms” and “living near unconventional oil and gas development [in] Pennsylvania.”

In November 2019, Toomey introduced federal legislation to unilaterally prevent future presidents from introducing a moratorium on fracking. The Pike County Courier reported that the measure squarely aims “at several Democratic presidential candidates” by thwarting their potential moves with regard to introducing fracking regulations.

Bloomberg’s intervention — supporting a pro-fracking senator and keeping the Senate under Republican-control — unleashed other serious consequences. One related outcome of that Senate race is that in preserving GOP control, the Senate was able to see through Brett Kavanaugh’s Supreme Court nomination. In Justice Kavanaugh, the nation’s top court gained an anti-choice ideologue who had faced credible charges of sexual predation.

The Kavanaugh Travesty

The problematic aspect of Bloomberg’s personal history vis-a-vis allegations of his own sexist remarks and actions was discussed at Wednesday night’s Democratic presidential debate. After being energetically challenged on the debate stage by Democratic rival Sen. Elizabeth Warren, Bloomberg explained that he had needed to sign non-disclosure agreements with several women in his professional milieu who he claimed were offended because “they did not like a joke I told.”

Aside from his highly suspect personal conduct, Bloomberg’s use of his financial resources also did women no favors. His hefty donations helped to preserve the Republican majority, giving Republicans judicial oversight over the 2018 Supreme Court nomination process — and of course, the attempted impeachment of Trump.

Both political conflicts would have played out differently under a judicial committee helmed by Democrats. In the Kavanaugh case, despite testimony that alleged he had assaulted a fellow student, Republican senators awarded the judge a lifetime seat on the Supreme Court. To add insult to injury, one of Bloomberg’s PACs also gave $486,000 to Republican Sen. Susan Collins.

Collins, to whom Bloomberg also made direct personal donations, most recently cast a key vote to acquit Trump on all impeachment charges. In 2018, she was widely criticized for her role in the Kavanaugh nomination, in which she also held a determining vote. Over the course of the hearings, Collins repeatedly hinted to advocates that she might vote against Kavanaugh.

Then, “during a nearly 50-minute speech on the Senate floor,” as the Cut’s Lisa Ryan reported,” Collins betrayed the interests of the women and sexual-assault survivors she professed to support.” Ryan asked, “How can one claim to be pro-choice and then allow herself to be played by a decidedly anti-choice nominee, whose record shows exactly how he will vote on abortion?”

Collins concealed her allegiances by professing one thing and doing another. As both parties have to different extents lost the trust of voters because of that kind of behavior, the last thing we can afford at this juncture is to jettison rare candidates of integrity for Bloomberg, “a figure without connections or the same value system as the party he seeks to represent, with racial and sexist skeletons in his closet, and a penchant for subverting democracy and showing contempt toward the rule of law,” as David Dayen wrote in the Prospect.

The exploitation of people, earthly resources and money cannot be ignored or dismissed. Bloomberg now poses a new danger by using his largesse to act, in turns, as either a kingmaker or candidate, thus threatening the nomination process and the will of American voters. Sanders, currently the clear Democratic front-runner, is the sole candidate who has pledged to rely only on donations from citizens rather than from the billionaires who fund nearly all the other candidates.

Through the campaign this year, Sanders has helped Americans to grasp what has been apparent but long denied: Billionaires like Bloomberg have been controlling the country, decimating the middle class, putting health care out of reach and destroying the environment for profit. Democrats can’t afford to anoint a candidate who uses his money and influence to rob them of their futures.

https://www.truthdig.com/articles/bloomberg-puts-oligarchy-and-patriarchy-above-any-party/

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