Mayor Bloomberg announced that any city officials who don't agree with his policies can consider working elsewhere. Many believe he said as much to counter Fire Chief Peter Hayden's public testimony that the Mayor Bloomberg-endorsed plan for the NYPD to lead emergency response situations is deeply flawed. The Mayor's words, from the NY Times:

"My job is not to be angry; my job is to make sure that everybody works together. There are always going to be differences of opinion. But everybody, in the end, if they want to work for the city, is going to get together and work together and follow the decisions that the mayor was elected to make. I expect that to be the case here."

Later, in response to another question about Chief Hayden, Mr. Bloomberg added: "Look, we are going to have everybody working together to protect the people of the City of New York. And anybody that doesn't feel that they can do that doesn't have to - but they just can't work here."

Man, the Democratic hopefuls are going to have a field day/week/month with this... Gothamist understands what the Mayor is saying and we hate governmental gridlock, but he sounds whiny. The NY Times calls it a "not-so-veiled threat", and the NY Post suggests that Hayden has made a "turnaround" by saying the FDNY will follow the emergency plan, while it seems more like Hayden simply had to speak up for his conscience - and because he was subpoenaed - and now he's got to do his job. At present, Fire Commissioner Nicholas Scoppetta says that Hayden's job is not on the line; Gothamist imagines that if Hayden were pushed out, the firefighters' union would go to town. Hello, political chess.