Coal in the Stocking for Bill de Blasio: Point by Point Case How His DOE is as Heartless as Any Reformy Mayor

How different is Bill from Mike?

De Blasio: which side are you on? Your education record shows that you are on the same side as Bloomberg, Cuomo, Tisch and Coleman

De Blasio to sick and injured teachers: Drop dead

FACT:

The New York City Department of Education is still as heartless as ever, denying injured people their due days off. People with iron-clad doctor's documentation of valid sick claims are being denied their days off. After their return to work, the DOE comes after them for AWOL issues. Yet, the DOE is at fault, its modus operandi is to drag its feet on medical claims, and then after the injured teachers exceed their ten annual sick days, it targets them.
The NYC DOE is suddenly finding fault in the teaching acumen of a veteran teacher. He so happened to have taken a medical leave, yet in a likely case of retaliation for disputes over his leave and for his years of activism he is being targeted with repeat observations.

Interpretation: the DOE is being very tight-fisted with its budgeting, and that's why it is nickel and dime denying granting sick time to the injured or chronically ill.

De Blasio to teachers exercising free speech: our Stasi is still active

FACT:

The DOE still has people dedicated to monitoring teachers' use of social media, such as Facebook. The DOE still has an alphabet soup of agencies with trench-coat men that administrators use against teachers over the flimsiest of accusations. From the number of 3020a's that the city is pursuing, it is doubtful that the city has dismissed its huge posse of attorneys in its teacher performance unit. The TPU works hand in glove with vindictive principals to target teachers on the most spurious of charges. This is continuing unabated under de Blasio/Farina.

De Blasio to teachers: we're coming after your pensions

FACT:

As the Chaz School Daze and the NYC Rubber Room Reporter have been documenting for years, the DOE has particularly set its sights on terminating senior teachers. (See previous section for the TPU's role here.) This is continuing at full strength and it includes the DOE's program to “thin the herd,” and terminate ATR's.

Harassment until teachers quit serves the same tight-fisted budget mentality: when the administrators harass teachers until they quit the DOE will be spared paying unemployment pay to these teachers.

Interpretation:

Bill de Blasio is just as much dedicated to prematurely ending careers as the previous mayor.

De Blasio to teachers: we could care less as to whether technology distracts students

FACT:

De Blasio and chancellor Carmen Farina lifted the cell phone ban and they lifted the DOE filters on YouTube videos and other highly distracting sites. It is very ironic that one cannot do certain legitimate searches on DOE computers (yet, in continuation from the Bloomberg/Klein/Walcott years, the DOE allows floods of commercial spam on DOE emails); and meanwhile filters on certain searches in place four years ago have vanished. Students are using the cell phones in schools and in class rampantly. Police are suspecting that gangs at the Lehman high school complex are using them to coordinate fights and in the Westchester Square section of the Bronx this has led to weeks of mayhem, jeopardizing the neighborhood's commercial viability.

Interpretation:

On distractive technology Bloomberg actually had the better policy than de Blasio. Either the new mayor is just coddling the students or he is intentionally adding to factors that will distract students and thus bring down teachers' productivity.

De Blasio to teachers: just dare to evade Common Core and you'll be sanctioned for defying its mandate
FACT:

Common Core was drafted by people with no K-12 teaching experience; it fits perfectly into plans for standardized testing. These tests had alienated students across the country as hundreds of thousands refused to cooperate.
Common Core channels narrow interpretation of texts. It conceives of limited interpretations of text. Its methods mitigate against critical thinking. It demands the marginalization of literature. Its mathematical methods are highly unusual and profoundly alienate parents, thus disenfranchising parents from helping with their children's homework.
In contrast to de Blasio's public fights with New York governor Andrew Cuomo, he has said nothing on Common Core. As of this December 28, 2015 writing Common Core has virtual force of law in New York State and New York City. Administrators continue to insist that teachers follow it. 
Thus, it is inappropriate that the media have interpreted recent federal ESEA legislation and NYSED Common Core pronouncements as meaning there is a New York state shift away from Common Core. As any NYS or NYC teacher will tell you, administrators are still using Common Core to evaluate lessons.

The New York City Department of Education's own house sub-agency of standards refinement continues to adopt and enthusiastically refine New York state's version of Common Core. The NYC DOE, despite the widespread popular rejection of Common Core still cooperates with plans to further impose Common Core's focus on textual analysis on science, social studies and even physical education, dislodging the conventional agendas of those subjects. It continues to indoctrinate and train administrators and teachers in the methods of Common Core. 

Teachers have cited the CCSS-related tests' inappropriateness and their negative emotional impacts on many students. Parents have objected to the CCSS-based high stakes tests fundamental purpose in stack-ranking evaluations of teachers. Parents, and some teachers, have created a massive statewide movement against these tests, citing cooperating with the tests as educationally inappropriate and morally compromising. 

Your morals or you job:
NYC imposes a gag order on teachers and principals, forcing them to not advocate opting out; this mirrors NYS mandates that these professionals cannot even quote questions or answer choices from the tests. The NYC DOE under de Blasio and Farina is sticking by these stances against test opt-out just as tenaciously as the DOE under Bloomberg and Walcott, and just as tenaciously as the NYS under Cuomo and state regents chancellor Merryl Tisch.

Interpretation:
NYC mayor Bill de Blasio is cooperating with the most insidious aspect of the education reform movement: the turning education into an experience restrained from critical reflection and centered around teaching for standardized tests. NYC mayor by his complete cooperation with Cuomo and his perpetuation of the Bloomberg Common Core commitment is on the wrong side of the education's central conflict in our era; he is on the same side as David Coleman, Arne Duncan, John King and so on.

De Blasio to students of color and low income students: we're a Jim Crow system and we're not going to sincerely move to correct it -- Teachers, we'll punish you if you openly criticize it

FACT:

New York City as of Spring, 2014, ranked as the most segregated school system in thecountry. In just two years it moved from position of being reported as the third most segregated school system, behind Chicago.  Yet, not only does the city maintain different standards of school tone, curriculum offerings, sports offerings, library, P.E. resources for different ethnic populations, it maintains this by a class dynamic as well. Note that it was under de Blasio that the citytargeted a Bronx teacher for daring to speak out on behalf of student-athletes, on how their options were inferior to those in more privileged schools. 

Driving the caste system that the DOE maintains is a competitive application system. Students not only have to apply and compete for a high school slot, they must apply to intermediate and other lower level schools. Sickeningly, parents must apply to have their child enroll in pre-Kindergarten programs. As the subway ads emphasize, there are deadlines, much as colleges have deadlines. And the program itself is plagued by problems of failing to adequately serve the neediest populations.

The Atlantic wrote of de Blasio's program:

What Fuller and his team found is that the preschool seats are more prevalent in the city’s most affluent neighborhoods than they are in the poorest ones. Whereas 41 percent of the slots are located in the most affluent one-fifth of the city’s zip codes, just 30 percent of them are in the poorest one-fifth—a dynamic that researchers in part attribute to New York’s real-estate limitations. Upper-middle-class areas appear to have gotten about as many new pre-k seats as have the poorest ones. And roughly 11,000 4-year-olds living in those poorest neighborhoods aren’t even enrolled in the program, according Fuller.

 .   .   .

But the study finds that, though de Blasio’s office insists that the new program is benefitting lower-income parts of the city, that claim fails to take into account the much higher numbers of 4-year-olds living in poor neighborhoods than in more affluent ones. Following up on the administration's response, Fuller said the percentages reveal that de Blasio is "evenly spreading new seats across the city, rich and poor ... and this fails to move the system toward equitable access."

The high school placement program, in fact, was developed by the same developer that developed a medical school resident placement program. 

With the new competitive school choice model, the system concentrates level 1 (in English Language Arts or Math) students into “troubled schools,” and it concentrates levels 3 and 4 into “successful schools.” Thus, it is no wonder that the city's underperforming students are concentrated in the city's most segregated schools. Even the New York Post recognizes this fact. Yet, de Blasio, who is supposed to be a better, more compassionate mayor than Bloomberg cannot recognize this fact.

Also, as a New School study documents in great detail, with accessible maps to illustrate the point, New York City's school placement process actually creates schools that are far more segregated than the neighborhoods where they are located.

The fraud of school choice leading to school excellence has a huge infrastructure toll as well. In a city that is already strained to the limit with high population and a growing number of public transit users, school choice has forced thousands of students to commute, exacerbating the great

Gone are the days when a student could go to the school of his or her neighborhood, “school choice” means that students apply and that they are sent all over the city. This erodes the neighborhood-school connection for students to identify with. Also, if students must spend an hour on multiple transportation modes getting to school, you can be sure that parents have as hard a time getting to parent engagement nights.

Interpretation:

Bloomberg transposed the competitive model for education with his demolition of the traditional zone system in favor of school choice. Schools often realized their potential as spaces for social heterogeneity. Now, with the competitive model, the separation means that inequality worsens. De Blasio has perpetuated Bloomberg's caste-school system with no significant changes to eradicate the inequalities of opportunity.

Summative interpretation:

Bloomberg was on a mission to transform the teacher from a respectful profession to one which is demeaned and harassed. This means that this teaching force would be a transient one that did not know its rights. De Blasio has done hardly anything to lessen the severity of how the DOE despised teachers. 

The Bloomberg changes did not produce educational improvement. The proof of this is the widespread de facto policy of "just pass everybody," the credit recovery programs that give a semester's worth of credit for merely completing a single assignment. This is blatant cheating, used to desperately cover a tremendously failed record. This has given a poor lesson to New York City students: that they can pass, regardless of taking personal responsibility. This has meant that New York City students are poorly prepared for even CUNY community colleges. This has meant that the scholastic worth of a New York City diploma is rather contestable, particularly if the school is one that practices the intellectually dishonest practices just mentioned. Yet, all the trends of administrator lax standards, as documented on the Chaz School Daze blog, are continuing under de Blasio-Farina with no apparent change from the Bloomberg years.

If the 2013 mayoral election were to mean anything it would have meant correction of the many ways that the DOE had taken a wrong course since 2002. Yet, Farina failed to clean house and replace the principals that fostered a climate of fear. Farina and de Blasio failed to appoint Tweed (DOE headquarters) officials that would part from the destructive ways of the Bloomberg administration. 

De Blasio's Betrayal, the Mendacity of Two Tales or de Blasio as the Manchurian Candidate

*Self-dubbed fiscal conservative *Bloomberg Education Policy 2.0 under a chancellor Suransky?

We must hold politicians to the actions that they take, their relationships with the powerful and how they follow through on their pledges or pretensions.

De Blasio: a Tale of two political faces: a leftish one to the public, a rightist one to the elite media and business class
Progressives of the electoral-oriented stripe, this writer included, put enthusiasm into boosting the candidacy of New York City public advocate Bill de Blasio. We were enthusiastic over his defense of hospitals and his opposition to co-locations to benefit charter schools.

However, much as Barack Obama disappointed progressives, prompting the strong critique of his early presidency, the Mendacity of Hope, de Blasio, is on the way to greatly disappointing the progressive and attentive sections of organized labor. In an important breakthrough post, Perdido Street School has relayed the report that de Blasio has met with city's business elite including the two-headed diablo of local media, the New York Post and the Daily News. But worse, and far more significantly for the relationship with municipal labor in the city he has sold out even before he was elected. Namely, he has told local business leaders that he is a fiscal conservative. The crowning blow is that he has been rumored to have considered a chief perpetuator of contestable education truths and mouthpiece for Bloomberg dictates.

The grand significance here is that the abstract phrase of fiscal conservative, and budget balancing that he professed to, translates into austerity, and in practical terms this means tight-fistedness with the municipal unions. For several years workers in the municipal unions have been patient as Bloomberg balked at a contract. Across various municipal sectors workers have been patient enough and are all demanding retroactive pay. They have been living with an economy that is making people scream. This is perhaps why the Lhota and media scare machine of the young de Blasio's flirtation with the left is so far losing no votes for de Blasio. Yet, as argued before in this blog, the city has resources to make that compensation: Wall Street / the stock market has had some record years in recent months. Also, for many of the years that Bloomberg cried empty municipal piggy bank the city actually had healthy positive ledger revenues.

Just as with Nixon in China and the achievement of the politically unpalatable and "impossible," and Obama's continued violations of civil liberties and expanded number of countries that we are poring military money into, rather than building a safety net and living wage economy at home, the danger is that a progressives' darling could create grand onerous impositions on city workers' working and living conditions.
De Blasio, has deftly dodged contract questions with the discussion-terminating response, "I will not negotiate in public," echoing his general principle that he stated to this city this spring, "You don't negotiate in public." Fiscal conservatism can have profound negative portents for teachers, (and other union members in a similar way): no full retroactive pay, raises that fail to make parity with those that already did get recent raises, higher co-pays, higher prescription prices, etc. The danger is strong as other places have similar austerity moves. Witness super-wealthy Nassau County; as Newsday reports, it is having a wage freeze.

Young left flirtations/ Neo-liberal executives
Like Obama's chumming with Bill Ayers, the de Blasio candidacy has given us grist for leftists to think he's one of us, and for rightists to spin hysteria backlash against him, de Blasio has fooled many leftists into thinking he's one of us by sticking with his contra-wars era position on Nicaragua.

These past few weeks have been inspirational to those hopeful of progressive politics pursued at the ballot box, reading that de Blasio won the primary out-right, that Letitia James beat Daniel Squadron with a final spread of 20 points.  Finally, the Chief-Leader has reported in its latest editions that the city council candidate Daneek Miller in SE Queens with solid labor union backing from TWU, UFT and others, won the primary vote. Thus labor would have a direct voice with a union local president in the city council. All the stuff of heady days in city politics. But the news in the last 48 hours on de Blasio is sobering and it is depressing.

Lastly we must address the Shael Polakow Suransky (Walcott/Bloomberg 2.0) matter:
Suransky was so high up in Bloomberg's Tweed administration that he collaborated on some of the worst practices of Bloomberg's war on education from Suransky's signing off on lies that subject teachers the like of Francesco Portelos to bogus charges and no due process, to his adamant declaration to back up Bloomberg's move for a state waiver of regulation to allow the closing of school libraries, contending that modern technology obviates the need for such libraries and librarians, the latter which he wrote off as extraneous "curators" of media. Book lovers appreciative of school libraries listen in disgust to his interview this August with Brian Lehrer. Gotham Schools published a story claiming that the school library busting Suransky was rumored to be on the short list to replace city schools chancellor Dennis Walcott. The appointment of Suransky would signal that unions had better trash any remaining illusions that he is a progressive on labor issues. The often corporate reform-validating Gotham Schools conceded that he is a loyal defender of Bloomberg's policies. Suransky has been a gentle public face for apologism in fealty to lords Bloomberg and Coleman/Duncan. Here are more references to Suransky's Orwell-worthy mouthing of the (highly contestable) truths of Common Core and plugging for the soon to be infamous April Common Core testing --they deserve our cooperation because they have arrived. Yeah, real implementation of critical thinking.

And if the hints of a grand Bill de Blasio betrayal of organized labor turn out to be true, as all this indicators suggest, we hope that Letitia James or John Liu launch a strong, principaled challenge from the left in 2017 (albeit, James herself has her own moral/political compromise in accepting Coca-Cola money, many charge, to oppose Bloomberg's soda ban). The same might be said for the city council candidacy of Miller: True you got union backing in the primary. Now, you need to demonstrate your true worth to the labor community.

As for right now, the fiscal conservative declaration are grounds enough to say bye-bye, Bill. Vote Green: vote for Anthony Gronowicz for New York City mayor.

Postscript: an update, Nov. 4, analyzing Bill de Blasio's disappointments:
"The Square", Casinos' UFT friends and the On-Going Mendacity of de Blasio
*More disturbing gestures by Bill de Blasio

After Oiling Anti-de Blasio Fire, NY Times Columnist Back-Pedals

<IMPORTANT: the Public Advocate is essentially the vice-mayor, ready to step in when the mayor cannot perform his/her duties or to succeed the mayor if tragedy strikes. See this post on the profound education and libraries issues contrasts between candidates Letitia James and Daniel Squadron. The Democratic run-off is Tuesday, 10/1. This blog enthusiastically supports James.>

Now, here's an "about face:"

After the New York Times pioneered the red scare against mayoral front runner public advocate Bill de Blasio, a Times columnist wrote a column softening the issue, and going as far as to debunk some mistaken notions about de Blasio.

But the problem with this is that the Times had already established the paranoid tone in the campaign. For two or three days, the media repeated the red-scare campaign narrative. The original Times article did contain this qualifying information:

[He] went to Nicaragua to help distribute food and medicine in the middle of a war between left and right. But he returned with something else entirely: a vision of the possibilities of an unfettered leftist government.

As I noted in my first post on the matter, the article states his purpose:

The article says that he went there to deliver food and medicine. This was through a Catholic charity organization, the Quixote Center (not the Sandinist government); below the scare headlines the Times concedes that the center did not side with the Sandinistas.

Never mind the details, the Times set out the canvas and the rhetoric to paint de Blasio as a leftist. The Times should know full well that there is less understanding of the nuances of left terms in the U.S., and that casting enabled the Post/FoxNews/FrontPage to paint him as red; that the right is able to make this formulation (with no challenge in the mainstream media or even liberals in the political class): anyone to the left of Howard Dean = communist, as democratic socialist = Marxist = communist = supporting the gulags and the Katyn massacres. Thus, the Times really committed political arson with this one.
The Times' story was perfectly made for the Joe Lhota campaign playbook. Make no mistake-- the goal of this immature distraction is to steer attention away from real issue contrasts, such as on education. Here's my analysis and reposting of another blog that assesses the de Blasio/Lhota contrasts on schooling issues.

So here's the Times' minor attempt to correct the damage, a column by one of the Times' major columnists for municipal politics, Michael Powell:

He once self-identified as a democratic socialist, which would put him in the same ideological column as Golda Meir, Moishe Dayan, Willie Brandt and François Mitterrand.

And more or less all of those social democrats stood up to and argued vociferously with the hard left, including Communists.

Thus, akin to my post on the red scare, they noted how conventional democratic socialism can be, although they stopped short of pointing out the wartime mayor Fiorello LaGuardia parallel, which would really his the point home for New Yorkers. Powell continued:

Lastly, as to those Sandinistas: This was a complicated revolutionary movement. A remarkably diverse coalition at first, it overthrew a cruel dictator. The leadership included some Communists, as well as social democrats and priests.

Some of its key leaders harbored unfortunate authoritarian tendencies. They stood – a touch reluctantly – for two elections deemed fair by many foreign observers. After it was defeated in that second election, in 1990, the movement shifted into the democratic opposition. Whatever their failings, the Sandinistas did not impose a repressive regime on their impoverished Central American nation. There was no mass jailing of opponents nor mass execution of opposing soldiers.

Quite a few liberal-left students and young people in the 1980s supported revolutionary movements in Central America. They may have been more than a touch naïve about the nature of these movements, but they at least realized that these nations had suffered terribly at the hands of United States-supported dictators.

But this qualification is too late. Instantaneously the right-wing paranoia politics machine predictably snatched the Times's story and went into action. The column was published online on Wednesday, 10:23 am, long enough after it had let the Fox machine as well as mainstream outfits like CBS or Christian Science Monitor own the news cycle as, de Blasio, the leftist. For at least two full media days, the public was exposed this "scandal," and the media essentially echoed Lhota's insistence that de Blasio answer for this. The Times in the final analysis of the vote breakdown should be credited with shaving down de Blasio's 40 point lead and losses in swing neighborhoods of the city.

De Blasio Begins Gen. Election w/ 65-22 Lead Over His Republican Challenger

Bill De Blasio Begins The General Election With A Gigantic Lead Over His Republican Challenger

In a 43 point lead, New York City public advocate Bill de Blasio's leading former MTA chair and Rudy Giuliani deputy mayor Joe Lhota, in the race for the mayoralty, 65-22.

A new Wall Street Journal/NBC New York/Marist poll showed Lhota's steep climb ahead. Brett LoGiurato in Business Insider opined that

Indeed, the poll contains a number of troubling signs for Lhota. Only 13% of likely Democratic voters support Lhota in a city where Democrats outnumber Republicans by a 6-to-1 margin. Moreover, Lhota loses 22% of Republicans. De Blasio also leads by 26 points among unaffiliated voters. Perhaps the biggest problem for Lhota is that a majority of the electorate views him unfavorably. Only 29% have a favorable view of Lhota, compared with 41% who view him unfavorably. About two-thirds of voters, on the other hand, have a favorable impression of de Blasio, compared with only 19% who view him unfavorably.

And de Blasio reminds us that de Blasio won every major demographic group. If you have any doubts as to de Blasio's wide popularity, see the interactive map at the New York Times' site, which highlights (ethnic, income) demographic data against election district maps. The sting of the chasm of the super-haves and everyone else captured New Yorkers, as de Blasio won broadly. Note that it was mainly in the cushy neighbs that city council speaker Christine Quinn did well: Upper East Side; pockets of Midtown; Riverdale; Forest Hills Gardens; Douglaston.

Read more: http://www.businessinsider.com/bill-de-blasio-joe-lhota-nyc-mayor-poll-2013-9#ixzz2fCBGVZZc

DeBlasio into run-off in mayor? Why UFT will be last to concede

*UPDATE: Thompson is supported by Madoff supporter - Did not return donations he said he would after Daily News expose (scroll to end)

IT'S A RUN-OFF:

MAYOR:

Bill DeBlasio

Bill Thompson

News here: watch for further UFT leadership alienation from rank and file with United Federation of Teachers president Michael Mulgrew's delusional pledge to put Thompson over the top. Might this persistent effort foster rank and file push to withdraw from COPE, especially with UFT & NYSUT's anticipated support for New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo's re-election in 2014?
[UPDATE: deBlasio's clearly at 40%, yet with Thompson supporters bailing, UFT & Thompson cling to wish that some 1% remaining votes, in paper ballots will skew different from all the trends (deBlasio winning every demographic and every borough. See chart below.]

PUBLIC ADVOCATE, going to run-off:

Letitia James

Daniel Squadron

--but the top four candidates were women, and perhaps the Saujami and Guerrero votes will shift to James.

BORO PRESIDENTS:

Manhattan:   [UPDATE: Brewer wins outright]

Gale Brewer

Jessica Lappin –Brewer will nail this. Lappin's base is too much of the Upper East Side

PRIMARY VICTORIES:

BIG NEWS OF THE NIGHT:

Charles Hynes, who held DA position for a generation, insulating himself from up-start opposition, via his solidifying support with community machine pols, yet plagued by many corruption reports indicated flawed, unjust convictions.

CLEAR WINNER:

Joe Lhota –the candidate for the apologists of Bloomberg, and those unfazed by inconsistent MTA bus service, regular fare hikes and legends of double books, heading a public agency (under confused combination of Albany and City Hall leadership) with no popular control. An interesting contrast indeed.

COMPTROLLER:

Scott Stringer, clearing the need for a run-off campaign.

BORO PRESIDENT:
Queens:

Melinda Katz

UPDATE: WHAT DOESN'T UFT/THOMPSON GET?

Look at these numbers. Across every borough, it is clear, deBlasio won. As you read the press, he won in every demographic. And how clueless is the Unity UFT leadership with numbers? The above deBlasio/Thomspon/Quinn vote chart of 2013 mayoral primary results is from Huffington Post is based on 99 percent of the precincts reporting. Note, as apparent by the New York Times site dating, that this 99 % reporting figure is from 5:23 pm, so this looks like recent data. The 40.3% deBlasio figure is higher than the 40.13% that the Daily News reported that the Board of Elections reported at 5:20 am. Obviously, the movement at this point is only movement up for deBlasio.
Labor will hold a labor solidarity rally Thursday for Bill deBlasio- noticeably absent will be the UFT.
In stark contrast to ally Merryl Tisch (chairwoman of Thompson's campaign), 32BJ, UFCW and RWDSU, which had all originally endorsed Thompson or Quinn, and have all endorsed deBlasio in the last 24 hours, the United Federation of Teachers is clinging to its dream of a Thompson win. He is so symbolically important to them, as the Unity faction of UFT's view of politics (in addition to their election interim --between elections--political view of politics as lobbying power, not people power) is to glom onto the powerful, no matter how bad their politics (Obama, 2012, Cuomo, 2010, Thompson, 2013 -yet not 2009, when he would have made a difference vs. Bloomberg), to attach themselves not only with endorsements, but many of us suspect, socially. The connections between the establishment Unity caucus with Thompson run deep. Notice how as the anti-teacher turns of president Obama and governor Cuomo get worse and worse, the UFT sticks with their every move, in principle, never critical of their policies, such as Race to the Top, Common Core, APPR or the King-imposed Advance teacher evaluation system.
Thus, a Thompson loss to deBlasio deeply hurts them.

UPDATE: Tainted money alert
From http://www.nydailynews.com/news/election/madoff-tainted-financier-bill-thompson-campaign-article-1.1392510#commentpostform">the Daily News, July 7, 2013:

EXCLUSIVE: Bill Thompson received $4,000 from Bernie Madoff-tainted financier in current bid for mayor

Thompson’s donor, Seymour Zises, also gave in $4,950 in 2009 – which the former controller promised to donate to charity after it was revealed that Zises had invested clients’ money with Ponzi schemer Bernie Madoff. But Thompson has yet to make the charitable contribution.

The last time William Thompson ran for mayor, he promised to donate thousands of dollars from his campaign war chest to charity after the Daily News discovered that one of his biggest longtime donors was linked to Bernie Madoff.

But four years later, Thompson not only hasn’t donated the money — he’s also pocketed even more campaign contributions from the Madoff-tainted financier Seymour Zises.

Zises — who was sued by victims of the Ponzi schemer for secretly investing the majority of their money with Madoff — has given more than $21,000 to Thompson’s various campaigns over the years. When The News uncovered Zises’ link to Madoff four years ago, Thompson promised to give $4,950 from his campaign coffers to charity.

RELATED: WILLIAM THOMPSON ON CITYTIME SCANDAL: 'WISH I HAD DONE MORE'

That’s the amount Zises donated to Thompson’s 2009 mayoral run.

But despite the vow — given four months after the reviled Madoff was sentenced to 150 years in prison — Thompson has not doled out the money.

Meanwhile, two years later, Thompson — with his eyes still on City Hall — accepted the first of what would be four donations from Zises for his 2013 run.

RELATED: WILLIAM THOMPSON STOOD BY AS CITYTIME SCANDAL UNFOLDED
Read more:  style="border: 0px; color: #003399; font-family: inherit; font-style: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none !important; vertical-align: baseline;">http://www.nydailynews.com/news/election/madoff-tainted-financier-bill-thompson-campaign-article-1.1392510#ixzz2el4TIwyz [Emphasis by this blogger.]

DeBlasio's history making bid to be 1st liberal Democratic mayor since Dinkins

*Update: deBlasio possibly heading into run-off. Determination of whether passed 40 percent cut-off late this week.
We will see some weird UFT attempts to justify Thompson as better leader. But this stance will further make cement how out of touch leaders are from the rank and file. As noted at end of last post on topic, UFT members posted strong pro-deBlasio comments on UFT's Facebook entries re their nominee. Could inspire some members to vote opposite of UFT suggestion, as in Bloomberg's clear preference for Quinn.

The progressive site, AlterNet ran a favorable summary of Bill deBlasio's campaign.

Summarizing the highlights of Don Hazen's September 8, 2013 article:
How Bill de Blasio is Making History in the New York Mayoral Race
NYC Democratic Primary voters appear to be taking the steps to make de Blasio the first Democratic mayor in New York in 20 years.

Hazen emphasized how the public advocate has called attention to the two New Yorks of New York City, something that has been largely unmentionable in the last 20 years as the income gap has yawned.

But along the way he got in some barbs against mayor Michael Bloomberg's ally, city council speaker Christine Quinn. He referenced Ginia Bellafonte's analysis in the Times, suggesting that Christine Quinn let her liberal Greenwich Village base get away, an analysis that makes hefty reference to Quinn's role in the closing of St. Vincent's Hospital. (That article noted that Quinn's negatives have reached Anthony Weiner territory at 45 percent, a figure that neared 60 percent among union voters).

The AlterNet writer calls this the most important race for progressives since Elizabeth Warren's Senate race last year. He says that the final mix of votes, from the impact of various demographic groups puts the numbers in flux. In fact, few commentators are discussing the other major factor complicating election outcomes, in contrast to the polls: polls are based on landline phones. Growing numbers of people are going without the landline, relying only on cellphones. The pollsters are missing these voters.
So, we could be ready for some surprises Tuesday.

As the article suggests, several factors played in deBlasio's surge:
*Inequality: in New York City there are approximately 25,000 individuals in the city making more than $20,000 per week, and another 2 million making less than that figure a year. The reality of the disparity has begun to hit home.
(If there is a face-off between deBlasio and former comptroller Bill Thompson, who will emphasize that gap as an outrage? Not Reagan coattails senator Alphonse D'Amato-financed Thompson. He's actually campaigned with D'Amato in the last few days.)
*Paid Sick Days and Stop and Frisk. Quinn steadfastly echoed the Republican "jobs creators" argument and argued against these bills until the chorus of opposition grew too loud.
*Bloomberg Fatigue Syndrom
*Public Financing of Elections - Hazen argued that the candidates have about the same amount of money. Implicitly, this is in contrast to Bloomberg who showered New Yorkers with ads in the last election cycles. However, the AlterNet writer skipped over the need to have only public financing of elections: in the absence of that, all of the top three mayoral contenders have received handsome donations from the city's business elite.
*DeBlasio Stuck to His Guns - He argued over and over for a modest tax on the ultra rich of the city making $40,000 or more a week, towards financing early childhood education.

And touching a nerve among voters in the post-Occupy Wall Street crackdown era (Zuccotti Park is named for one of Bill Thompson's benefactors that gained $22.3 million rent breaks on his Battery Park condos after he and his company's associates made campaign contributions to Thompson) has been deBlasio's platform. Hazen wrote:

De Blasio’s “Tale of Two Cities” has found a very receptive audience – the specter of a city where middle class slides further down the economic ladder, unemployment stays high, and a very small number of people reap the benefits--while banks and corporations squeeze the population—and a feeble economic recovery produces  mostly low wage job. This is a powerful and accurate analysis put in play during Occupy Protests and still rings true to many.

De Blasio’s vision is strong. “Without a dramatic change of direction—an economic policy that combats inequality and rebuilds our middle class—generations to come will see New York as little more than a playground for the rich...a gilded city where the privileged few prosper, and millions upon millions of New Yorkers struggle each and every day to keep their heads above water,” de Blasio said in a May 30 address. 

And messaging has an impact. Hazen noted that the deBlasio children go to public school, and do so unchauferred. On both points, that writer and others are saying that hardly anyone can recall when a mayor last had children attending public schools. This can only strike a chord in an era in which the mass of New Yorkers can identify with this lifestyle, but are subjected to seeing the city transformed for the benefit of the super-rich.

But probably the most astute analysis of the race comes from Perdido Street School blog, for the blogger's chronicalling the dramatic race shifting from Quinn in front, to Weiner in front, to a free for all, then a deBlasio surge (once many left-leaning voters abandoned Weiner and Liu).

DeBlasio has raised what appears to be increasing among New York's elite in recent weeks. Hazen gave this link from the Nation: Mike Bloomberg and the 'Fortunate Ones' Versus Bill de Blasio.

Granted, deBlasio has received money from developers and has been short on education details for many city bloggers, including this one, but given the Merryl Tisch and Al D'Amato backing of Thompson, we have had enough of collaboration of the elite with the UFT or its favorite pols. Many of us are viewing deBlasio as progressives best shot for a kinder, gentler City Hall.

How Quinn & Thompson Worse on Health, Tenant, Wage, Other Issues Than deBlasio

*UPDATE analysis on Bloomberg's racist double-standard against deBlasio *Quinn, Thompson, Jenny, Johnny come latelies *Your last minute cheat sheet for making the case that deBlasio has been progressive on these issues since before the 2013 campaign really got underway this spring, and so deserves to win the September 10 Democratic primary in the 2013 race for New York City mayor. *Celeb endorsements. Incorporating Capital New York reportage, which this blog was following since ca. 2009 in its earlier incarnation.
         *Scroll to end for analysis and response on double-standard regarding Bloomberg's position regarding deBlasio's family, including video of family's response to Bloomberg's attacks
New York City Council Speaker Christine Quinn has been criticized as being mayor Michael Bloomberg's ally in the city council. You can surmise this perspective in these stories: Amid Backlash, Quinn Supports Bloomberg’s Term Limits Plan, Bloomberg Ally Won't Call for Bloomberg Investigation, Mayor Making It No Secret: He’ll Endorse Quinn in 2013. Yet, there are other specific issues at which Quinn and former city comptroller Bill Thompson have fallen short on some major progressive issues. Essential sketches of these issues follow, as well as links so that you can check out the stories for yourself.

TENANT ISSUES
Tenants group endorsing New York City public advocate Bill deBlasio for mayor:
David Howard King on Monday, 29 July 2013
The Eye-Opener:
Tenants PAC Endorses De Blasio, Never Considered Weiner

Bill de Blasio gets our endorsement for his commitment (in his words) to “re-set the agenda” for a genuine progressive city government, to “de-program the Bloomberg years”; for his opposition to privatization of city services and to government as a handmaiden to private profit takers; for his support for mandatory inclusionary zoning requiring developers to include affordable apartments in all new buildings; and for addressing the economic inequality that is driving more New Yorkers into hardship and poverty.

Crain's Insider reported in "Real estate puts money on Quinn" that she took in the share of real estate donations: $800,000, about 14.2% of her campaign total. The site also reported that of the top 100 corporations active in making political contributions 67% of the donations went to Quinn.

The Observer:
De Blasio Blasts Quinn’s Affordable Housing Plan as ‘Multi-Billion Dollar Giveaway’ to Developers By Stephen Jacob Smith 2/14 5:20pm

MASSIVE THOMPSON CONFLICT OF INTERESTS WHILE BATTERY CITY CHAIR - PARALLEL TO DEALS QUINN DONOR DEVELOPERS GOT WITH ST. VINCENT'S
 Actions reek of pay-to-play scandals or kick-backs; donation from John "Zuccotti Park" Zuccotti
While deBlasio did accept a $4,900 donation from the Rent Stabilization Association, that donation can be seen as dwarfed by the donations that Thompson received from interests that stood to benefit from his actions while chairing a state land authority. As Nathaniel Herz in Crain's Insider, "Thompson’s $300 million Battery Park City bill, Mayoral candidate approved big breaks for donors", May 16, 2012, reported, the owner of Milstein Properties, which owns over 500 Battery Park condos gave Thompson the $4,900 legal contribution limit on January 11, 2012. His wife and son gave donations totaling $14,850 on the same day. This was while Thompson was the chair of the Battery Park Authority, the landlord for the land upon which the condo buildings sit. Appointed in 2010 by then governor David Paterson, Thompson only resigned as chair on the week of May 6, 2012, but not after several lucrative authority favors given to Thompson benefactors.

The same Crain's Insider article reported that Thompson helped Brookfield Properties, another company affected by the Battery Park City Authority's decisions:

Mayoral candidate Bill Thompson voluntarily left his post as chairman of the Battery Park City Authority last week – unlike predecessor James Gill, who exited in shame after the authority spent hundreds of thousands of dollars on parties and meals on his watch.
But Thompson’s stewardship will cost the city much more, thanks to two deals that he and his board of directors approved on behalf of the mayoral candidate’s campaign contributors.
Last year, the board unanimously agreed to roll back a scheduled increase in fees paid by Battery Park City condominium owners by nearly $280 million.
. . .
Also taking a bite out of future Battery Park City funding to the city are millions of dollars in rent reductions that Thompson and the board unanimously approved in March to help Brookfield Properties pay for a glitzy overhaul of its retail space at the World Financial Center.

And Thompson has been paid handsomely by Brookfield: the vote by Thompson and the rest of the Battery Park authority board came after Thompson received over $15,000 from lobbyists and others with ties to Brookfield Properties. The authority board gave a $22.3 million tax break a few months after donations to the Thompson campaign.

Crain's Insider reported that one Thompson bundler and Brookfield lobbyist, Albany lawyer Jerry Weiss, bundled $15,400 from six different donors to the Thompson campaign on one day this winter. Two other Brookfield related persons, one a lobbyist, another a lawyer, gave donations totaling $3,200. These are the only donations from these individuals in the city campaign finance board’s database, which has records going back more than two decades. The Crain's Insider article closed with a clincher:

Thompson’s campaign listed Eagan’s [James Eagan, another Brookfield-associated personality] donation—and the five others initially tied to Weiss—as coming on December 5. On that same day, Brookfield chairman John Zuccotti and his wife Susan each gave Thompson their own $4,950 contributions. Three months later, the Battery Park City Authority’s board voted unanimously to approve the resolution to deliver Brookfield its $22.3 million rent break.

The Daily News ran a story with parallel details. While the story was pulled in short order from its website, another site, BatteryPark.TV, has the article archived at "Why did Bill Thompson abruptly leave BPCA?"
(Yes, that Zuccotti, the real estate magnate for whom Zuccotti Park, the site of the Occupy Wall Street occupation, was named. How ironic: the UFT gives money to the Occupy protesters, and their man for mayor, Thompson, has received money from John Zuccotti. Might be embarrassing to the UFT higher-ups if word got out.)
Moreover, the Battery authority under Thompson hired the high-powered Gibson Dunn firm's lead litigation attorney (and Rudy Giuliani era deputy mayor) Randy Mastro to secretly renegotiate the authority's contract with Asphalt Green. Mastro, who's famous for defending Chevron in a case pursued by Ecuador over poisoning of the Ecuadoran Amazon, has been the largest fundraiser for Bill Thompson. Read "More conflicts of interest from the Bill Thompson era BPCA."

UPDATE: You know, it is a funny coincidence: his biggest campaign donation fundraiser is the Republican senator from the Reagan/Bush I years, Alphonse D'Amato. By 1992, D'Amato got hit with a slew of corruption charges, of giving generous favors to family and big campaign contributors. We look at Thompson's consistent pattern of sweetheart perks going to campaign contributors, and we wonder, how far back did his friendship with D'Amato start? Was he learning the wrong lessons from D'Amato? Forget about advocacy for increased wrap-around social services from him. He charged that president Bill Clinton wasn't aggressive enough in cutting welfare. We worry about Tisch's test agenda influencing Thompson. But what of D'Amato's agenda? He was a pioneer in advocating tax incentives for prison privatization. We worry over the prison pipeline; but Thompson's main financial backer has backed prison profiteering.

THOMPSON WORSE THAN QUINN ON RENT STABILIZATION: MISSING AMONG CANDIDATES CALLING FOR FREEZE ON RENTS IN RENT-STABILIZED UNITS
Quinn, deBlasio and city comptroller John Liu were the only Democratic Candidates on June 13, 2013 to call for freezes of rents at all rent-stabilized units.

THOMPSON THE STRAIGHT DEAL OR PAY-TO-PLAY WITH PENSION-FUND MIDDLEMEN WHILE COMPTROLLER?
The New York Daily News, reporting late (October 10) during Thompson's 2009 campaign, "Pension middlemen gave $158K to Bill Thompson's campaigns and got $2.2B in city business" reported that Thompson got more than $158,000 in campaign donations from pension fund middlemen who got over $2,2 billion in business from New York City, while Thompson was New York City comptroller. Los Angeles-based Wetherly Capital gave more than $40,000 to Thompson's campaign; at the same time, the company received $317.5 million in city pension benefits. Thompson also received more than $60,000 from persons with ties to Shelbourne Securities, which is run by a Thompson friend, William Howell, who was the placement agent of $315 million of New York City investments in 2008. Placement agents figured prominently in securities or political scandal probes that played into Andrew Cuomo's political rise as state attorney general. Disgraced Liberal Party boss Ray Harding had plead guilty in October 2009 to taking $500,000 from a Shelbourne affiliate in a pay-to-play scheme.
The story of Thompson giving deals to donors has received more recent attention in the NY Times: "As Pension Chief, Thompson Gave Work to Donors"

SICK PAY
Top News Today & NY Daily News De Blasio rips Quinn's sick-day bill | Politics ...
www.topnewstoday.org › Politics › De Blasio rips Quinn's sick-day bill‎
Mar 31, 2013 - Bill de Blasio hammered away at the paid sick days bill brokered by mayoral rival Christine Quinn — and vowed not to relinquish it as an issue on the increasingly contentious campaign trail.
DeBlasio ripped Thompson's bid to wait a year for paid sick leave bill 'pointless.'
DeBlasio has also pointed to Thompson's less-than-passionate stance towards the bill prior to March 2013. Crain's Insider reported February 25 on Thompson's tentative stance:

Former comptroller Bill Thompson has been quiet on the issue of paid sick leave, preferring to let fellow Democratic candidates Public Advocate Bill de Blasio and Comptroller John Liu take the lead in criticizing Ms. Quinn on the issue. His campaign says he supports the concept of paid sick leave, while preferring to stay on the sidelines until a final, presumably amended bill is introduced.
. . .
Like Ms. Quinn, Mr. Thompson has been criticized by his rivals for often failing to take a position on politically charged issues like paid sick leave and a living wage for workers on government subsidized construction projects. He initially opposed a living wage bill until changing his stance [NY Post, May 2, 2012: "Wage-bill foe puts it in reverse" after a compromise was reached by Ms. Quinn.

LIVING WAGE
From Capitol New York, May 1, 2012: Bill deBlasio rapid response to the Christine Quinn conniption
Though Public Advocate Bill de Blasio only came out in support of the Fair Wages for New Yorkers Act, "living wage" legislation in December [link to Dec. 18, 2011 Times story], he wasted little time capitalizing on Council Speaker's Christine Quinn's awkward defense of Michael Bloomberg's honor yesterday afternoon. Into late 2011 Quinn opposed allowing a council vote on the living wage bill, despite the fact that most members supported the bill.

HOSPITAL ISSUES
DeBlasio is well-known for his protest arrest in defense of Long Island College Hospital. Less known is his successful move to protect the hospital.
From the New York Times, July 22, 2013:

On Friday, as the State Health Department was in the process of approving important steps in the hospital’s closing, Mr. de Blasio successfully petitioned a State Supreme Court justice for a temporary restraining order, then delivered it by hand to the hospital’s administrators. On Monday, an appellate judge affirmed the temporary restraining order and ruled that the hospital had to restore the level of service that existed on Friday afternoon.

Next to Quinn's instrumental role in overturning the city term limits law which happened in a 29-22 vote in October 2008, enabling Bloomberg to have a third term as mayor, there is her controversial history with the closing of St. Vincent's Hospital in Greenwich Village, which then got slated for luxury condo development: Quinn received donations from six developers collectively gave $29,700 to her potential mayoral campaign fund, developers that stood to gain from the redevelopment of the plan. Some reporters have argued that Quinn was not "an unalloyed supporter" and that she sought to scale down the subsequent development project. I say, this is hedging and the Quinn still is suspect for taking the money and doing a favor in not fighting the hospital closing more fiercely.Watch the video here for more on Quinn's role in the St. Vincent's controversy.

But this was only one of many hospital closings under Quinn's watch as council speaker. An online excerpt from an anti-Quinn book has delves into her record regarding hospital closings. Similar to how mayor Michael Bloomberg has developed a list of schools for co-location, there was a commission, the Berger Commission, which created a list of hospitals to shut down. Quinn was invisible in the fight to oppose the closures until very late in 2006, shortly before the Commission's recommendations went into effect, January 1, 2007. For more see: Roots of Betrayal: The Ethics of Christine Quinn, available now for a free preview on Scribd.

Thompson has been dogged by his long-standing ties with an executive who thrived while Bedford-Stuyvesant's Interfaith Hospital suffered financially. See Wayne Barrett, WNYC: Strange Ties in Bill Thompson's Brooklyn Backyard

Had Thompson come [to a June 2013 demonstration], he would have been protesting against his own one-time business associates. In 2010 and 2011, as the hospital plunged toward bankruptcy, Thompson was serving as a paid member of the advisory board of a Kurron sister company, working intimately with the owner – a man named Corbett Price who’d been his friend since the 1990s and whose family, employees and firm have donated nearly $20,000 to Thompson campaigns, starting with his first race in 2001.
During that time, Kurron and Price have cut a trail of financial and medical mismanagement, run-ins with regulators and public controversies – not least repeated clashes with healthcare unions – up and down the Eastern Seaboard.
So Thompson’s paid ties to Kurron – during a period when he was planning a second run for the mayor’s office after his near-victory over Michael Bloomberg in 2009 – raise important questions about his attentiveness to detail, his judgment and his choice of associates.

See also Amsterdam News and Perdido Street School.

THOMPSON'S AUDITING MIS-STEPS
From RBE/Perdido Street:
CITYTIME SCANDAL: Greg B. Smith / NEW YORK DAILY NEWS
Mayoral candidate William Thompson ignored councilwoman's pleas to audit CityTime program, sources say

Back in 2010, Wayne Barrett reported on Thompson's "damning" connection to Michael Bloomberg that may have had something to do with his refusal to audit Bloomberg's CityTime project:
Bloomberg and Thompson: The (Really) Odd Couple: Now it can be told: The surprising ties between the billionaire mayor and the poor slob who ran against him.
Postscript: see this important new piece at Perdido Street: Bill Thompson Used Pension Funds To Pay Off Cronies, Donors And Connections.

SCHOOL ISSUES
DeBlasio's Call to Speaker Quinn for a moratorium on school co-locations

The NYS Regents Chancellor that was a key player in creating NYS's APPR, appointing Commissioner John King, and quite possibly the Advance teacher evaluation system in New York City.

Have reservations on the testing overemphasis in New York City teaching and learning? One of the major architects of this, Merryl Tisch, is Chairwoman of the Thompson for Mayor committee. That thought alone should give you pause. Read and listen to her words on Common Core, testing and Thompson here and here, and here for her impact on New York State education.

CIVIL RIGHTS AND POLICE ISSUES
Daily Kos: NYC Mayor: Bill de Blasio (D), The Only Candidate Who Will End The Stop-And-Frisk Era
DeBlasio rightly criticized Thompson's stop and frisk position as too weak. On June 28, when mayor Bloomberg in the morning actually said that the police (NYPD) were stopping white New Yorkers too much and minority New Yorkers too little, deBlasio went on the offensive on the same day, saying that it he had "better numbers, the numbers that have come from the NYPD for years showing that almost 90 percent of those stopped are innocent in every way, shape or form. Which confirms the very point. We're not going after suspects in specific crimes. … Stop-and-frisk is being used with an incredibly broad brush."
DeBlasio pointed out that Quinn and Thompson were no better on racial profiling, that Quinn voted against the racial profiling bill. He pointed out that Thompson also opposed that bill and opposed the police oversight inspector general bill. Quinn wants to keep NYPD commissioner Ray Kelly, who has spearheaded Bloomberg's aggressive, broad sweep of black and Latino youths and men.

DEBLASIO ADDRESSING CLASS ISSUES
Bill de Blasio Runs as the Anti-Bloomberg, June 17, 2013 6:11 pm By Carlos Rodríguez Martorell | Via Voices of NY
And this one, by progressive man of letters, George Packer, in the NewYorker: BILL DE BLASIO’S VISION

On May 30th, at the New School, the candidate sketched a powerful picture of the issue that he wanted to put at the center of the race: the city’s “inequality crisis.” “Right now, as we’re gathered this morning, one New Yorker is rushing past an attended desk in the lobby of a majestic skyscraper,” de Blasio began. “A few miles away, a single mother is also rushing, holding her two young children by the hands as they hurry down the steps of the subway entrance…” The first New Yorker is thinking about how to profit from the bull market in stocks; the second is trying to figure out how to pay her grocery bill.
Yet, as Packer noted, the timing did not work well for deBlasio, as his speech generally coincided with Anthony Weiner's reentry into politics via a last minute run for the mayoralty.

ENDORSEMENTS FROM STARS, PROGRESSIVE ACTIVISTS
With deBlasio's strong stands on issues of civil rights and economic justice it is little surprise that in July he received the endorsements of central Brooklyn Congresswoman Yvette Clarke and singer, actor and veteran civil rights activist Harry Belafonte. Earlier, in March, former NY ACORN executive director Bertha Lewis endorsed him. In May, he received endorsements from actress Susan Sarandon and Russell Simmons, hip hop impresario, both longtime advocates of progressive causes. Also that month, actress --and public school parent-- Cynthia Nixon lent her support to deBlasio's campaign. At the start of August, The Nation endorsed deBlasio for mayor, touting his proposals to narrow the city's huge inequality gap (documented here and here). The same month, education professor and activist Diane Ravitch also endorsed deBlasio. And many UFT members are commenting on an 8/29 posting on its Facebook page, on how out of touch the union is, and wondering why Thompson and not deBlasio.
UPDATE: UFT DESPERATION: Apparently the UFT is putting out false literature, claiming that Thompson is promising retroactive pay raises. Pathetic that they feel that they have to stretch the truth to have Thompson win. And there's this equally unsettling news of UFT desperation from NYC Educator blog's comments:

"Chapter leaders have been asked to go to every teacher in their schools and gauge the level of support for Thompson. to engage those who are wavering or unsure of who they are supporting, and to try to gin up as many votes as they can for Thompson."

It would be understandable if this was about a thoroughly labor candidate coming from the ranks of workers, to represent workers. But Thompson is an old-time hack pol, lining his pockets with contributor cash.

DEBLASIO POLICY STATEMENTS, AND PUBLIC ADVOCATE STATEMENT ON HOSPITAL CLOSURES IN BROOKLYN
*One New York. Rising Together
*A Progressive Vision for a Thriving New York City Tech Industry
*Street Safety Plan
*A Progressive Vision for the Film and TV Industries in New York City
*Distance Matters: What Closing Two Hospitals Would Mean for Brooklyn

So, there you have it, evidence in some nutshells that Quinn and Thompson have not done well by the citizens of New York City, and how deBlasio, while not a few progressives' (including this writer) dream candidate, is far better than the two former front-runners.

UPDATE: *Bloomberg employing a racist double-standard *Bloomberg and other media and political critics are racist for bringing up the ads with Dante. *Bloomberg's classist remark missed in all the media reaction

Why would I make such a flat-out statement?

Because: Nearly all politicians haul out their families, whether it be a family shot at home, or the whole bunch tramped out onto the election night stage, it is common place. And if pundits do not call it shameless exploitation when they do it, then they should not do it when members of the deBlasio family campaign for making statements and appearances in favor of him.

Yes, it is not that unusual for children of candidates campaign for their parents. So when we hear reactions of "racist" in response to Dante's ad for his father and we ignore history in the modern media era, we think it racist to be intolerant of Dante's ad and not critical of parallels. Think of the daughter of John McCain. Who screamed racist or exploitative when she campaigned and blogged for him, and wrote a book, My Dad,John McCain? She was so busy campaigning for him she said that she was to busy to have a love life. Her subsequent memoir indicated that she nearly overdosed on Xanax on election day.h 

And spouses campaign on their husband's behalfs. Did anybody call it racist when Jackie Kennedy did a campaign spot en espanol for voters to vote for her husband John?
Did anyone say racist when Callista appeared with Newt Gingrich with amazing frequency in his presidential bid last year? 

So, deBlasio shouldn't campaign with his wife because she's black? If you say that and ignore the history of modern American political tradition, then that's racist.

In fact, it is so common-place for candidates to have their families (or their partners) by their sides in public or in campaign literature, that it sometimes raises eyebrows when a candidate almost NEVER even refers to them, let alone has photos of them in any campaign lit. Readers will remember a barrage of Bloomberg lit four years ago --yet do you remember any photos with his family members? Could it be that they are less than thrilled with the idea of their likeness being used to support him in campaign lit? Do we sense some jealousy on Bloomberg's part.

Aside from that, Buzzfeed did some research into Bloomberg's own campaigning history. It is in stark contrast to the conditions that he dictated to Bloomberg. Here are the highlights of their reporter Andrew Kacynski's research:

“I mean he’s making an appeal using his family to gain support . . . It’s comparable to me pointing out I’m Jewish in attracting the Jewish vote.

Yet this is precisely what he did eight and twelve years ago.

According to a report from Newsday during his 2005 campaign Bloomberg, who is ethnically Jewish but not observant, sent out “an eight-page mini-magazine with photos of ‘Mike the Mensch’ wearing a yarmulke. A headline atop one of its pages proclaims: ‘Orthodox Jewish Families a Priority For Bloomberg.’”
Likewise in 2005, according to the New York Times wearing a yarmulke while speaking to Hassidic [sic] Jews in Brooklyn “appeared on a dais adorned with blue balloons that read ‘Mike the Mensch.’”
During his 2001 campaign for mayor, Bloomberg also sent direct mail to Jewish voters as well pointing out the fact he was Jewish.
The “glossy direct-mail” items read “he learned from his parents,” and went on “Mike Bloomberg for Mayor — Protecting Our Community.”
The brochures said “has been an active supporter of many volunteer and non-profit organizations,” naming specifically the the Anti-Defamation League and the American Jewish Committee.

So, Bloomberg called deBlasio a racist for allowing his family to appear or speak on his behalf. He is apparently practicing a double-standard. (OK, there's another issue here: the Bloomberg wouldn't or at least didn't campaign for him.)
The defenses were zingers yesterday. The other Democratic candidates are to be credited for defending deBlasio and his family. --Curious how tepid Quinn's remarks were, though.
Former NY ACORN executive director Bertha Lewis gave a most tweetable defense: From Capital New York:

“Big Mikey says that Bill de Blasio is a racist. I mean: What?! Seriously?! Because he’s a father, a husband and a man who is proud of his family of color?! Well I am, too. And if Bill de Blasio’s a racist, so am I! So are we all,” she declared at the event. “Big Mike, your days are numbered. Come Tuesday maybe you’ll finally get the message: no fourth term for you.”

DeBlasio's wife and daughter also responded to Bloomberg's charge:

“Do I look like an inanimate object or a tool?” she said, laughing [in] disbelief. “I walk. I talk. I make my own decisions.”
Mr. de Blasio’s daughter Chiara further mocked the suggestion, from Capital New York:
"Everything I do for the campaign is my decision," said Chiara, "and I think that—or at least I suspect, I wasn't born 20 years ago—that my dad did not know he was running for mayor and he did not seek to marry a black woman to put her on display."

Video from Capital New York:
Again, we need to be mindful of American political tradition in the modern era, otherwise criticizing the appearances of the deBlasio family is a racist double-standard. Or maybe there's festering jealousy going on, on mayor Bloomberg's part.

BLOOMBERG'S CLASSIST REMARK IN THE NEW YORK MAGAZINE ARTICLE:
Somehow missed in all the hubbub over Bloomberg's racism allegations was his casual expression of his blatantly classist view of the way that urban economies should run. Note what he said, emphasis added:

"The way to help those who are less fortunate is, number one, to attract more very fortunate people. They are the ones that pay the bills."
He has left out the working class and the middle class. He is saying, "make a healthy environment for the richest and everyone else will be taken care of." This is classist because it is disregarding the worth and the working lives of the working people. This is classic trickle-down economics, straight out of the economic policy playbook of Ronald Reagan, the man on whose coattails D'Amato was elected in 1980. This is the ignored issue in Bloomberg's interview, and the looming issue facing New York: how can we make this city livable, affordable for the mass of the population? By the status quo, we have the hedge-funders and the oligarchs, the very large lower income working class, and a shrinking middle that are thinking of leaving because the city's cost of living is unaffordable.

The UFT's Thompson Endorsement, After UFT's Lauding of Kings' Evaluations How Will Members Respond?

Late Wednesday afternoon, at the Delegate Assembly, the United Federation of Teachers endorsed Bill Thompson for New York City mayor.  That's of course the official word.

The fact is, while the UFT did have forums in every borough, with all the Democratic candidates, before Anthony Weiner flew into the race, the fact is the fix has been in for Thompson.

First, behind the scenes, the momentum of the organization moves like a dynasty. Though she is in D.C., running the American Federation of Teachers (or AFT) Randi Weingarten is still playing an outweighed role in the union, as Perdido Street captured in his citation of the Daily News blog. Whatever idea, inclination she has, gets picked up by the group. So, when the unsettling alignment of Weingarten, New York State Regent Merryl Tisch (along with Alphonse D'Amato) became apparent with the Thompson campaign, the hand-writing was on the wall that the fix was in for Thompson. (Although, it's interesting: the one time that Weingarten is progressive, stepping out of the eduform talking points, calling for a moratorium on the high-stakes use of standardized Common Core tests, the UFT is staunchly silent and ignoring her advice. Granted, she should reject the VAM tests and Common Core outright; an enthusiastic Common Core supporter, she's more likely trying to co-opt the popular uproar over the VAM use of Common Core and other tests ....)

Second, the presentation of the popular reception at the UFT boro mayoral forums was suspicious at last month's DA. Reps from the different boroughs gave thumbnail reports of the mood. Hello? The UFT has the staff and time to count the preference cards that attendees submitted. Yet, where were these tallies this month or last month?

Third, yesterday's DA was all theater. So, the Executive Board met (unusually) immediately before the DA, probably pre-empting president Michael Mulgrew's characteristic self-aggrandizing time-wasting poor imitation of an Las Vegas stand-up comic schtick. But everything else made it apparent that this was to be presented as an endorsement by acclamation. For, all of a sudden, right after they endorse, none other than Thompson himself is there; and all of a sudden they have UFT campaign placards all ready for distribution. The guest contributor at ICEUFT blog captured it best in "DA REPORT: THOMPSON CORONATION": "Peter Lamphere tried to raise a point of order that the debate was one sided. This was ruled out of order. The vote was then held. Thompson was endorsed by the Delegates and then he appeared out of nowhere and addressed the crowd."

The irony, that progressives can hope for, is that people disgusted with the UFT leadership's being out of sync with the regular rank and file teachers on evaluations, selling us the historic John King-imposed Advance teacher evaluation disaster a blessing of fairness, will figure that whomever the UFT endorses is bad news, and will vote more sensibly in the primary for John Liu or Bill de Blasio (the latter of which made headlines last night in the Daily News as, "Chris Quinn-Bill de Blasio Mayor Brawl Steals Anthony Weiner's TV-Debate Debut Thunder").

Liu and de Blasio appear more teacher-friendly, when candidate positions are compared.

UPDATE:
NYC Educator points out in Thompson Says No Raises for Teachers, to Near-Universal Acclaim of UFT Delegate Assembly that [four years ago] Thompson said flat-out that teachers did not deserve the salary increases that other city employees got. [NYC Ed cited this Daily News article.]

What happens when you publicly announce teachers don't deserve the raise all other city employees got between 2008-2010? Well, you get the UFT endorsement, of course. Now it's a little more complicated than that, of course. During the last mayoral run, it appeared that Thompson and the UFT were BFFs.

UPDATE:
The UFT, desperate for Thompson to win, is peddling in its campaign literature the mis-truth that Thompson is promising retroactive pay increases, as Perdido Street School blog has pointed out.

UPDATE:
Keep checking Perdido Street School blog. He regularly updates on the latest nonsense surrounding the UFT's unfathomable Bill Thompson endorsement for NYC mayor. The latest best stuff from PSS:

To be frank, while Thompson is talking some about changing Bloomberg's school policies, a lot of his education agenda is little different from Bloomberg's education agenda.

Thompson is not anti-charter. [Thompson has privately dined with charter school backers.]
Thompson will not charge charter schools rent for stealing space from public schools.
Thompson wants to add more days to the school year and more time to the school day.
Thompson praised Bloomberg for refusing to give teachers the 4%/4% pattern raise every other union in the city got.
Thompson wants to continue mayoral control.
Sure, there are some subtle changes Thompson says he wants to make to Bloomberg's policies, perhaps around the emphasis on testing, but I'll believe those changes will happen when I actually see them happen and not until then.
Plus, with APPR state law forcing both increased state testing and increased local testing, it's hard to see how Thompson can change the insane testing schedules we have these days anyway even if he wanted to (which I doubt he does, in any case.)