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City Council Speaker Christine Quinn is currently holding a press conference declaring her support for the mayor's proposal to extend term limits. Her announcement ends Quinn's remaining mum on her official stance since Mayor Bloomberg announced his intentions to maneuver for a third term bid almost two weeks ago. It also reverses the vow she made last year to uphold the two voter referendums in support of term limits.
Quinn had originally intended to make a run for mayor herself next year, but backed out of the race when her close political ally Bloomberg finally threw his hat in the ring after months of speculation. The mayor's decision to run gave Quinn an easy out of a campaign that looked like it would be an uphill battle after what has been a scandalous year for the Speaker.
Opponents to the mayor's plan are not surprised at Quinn backing it. To them this is just the inevitable next step in what they see as a series of handshake deals and back room agreements, including Ronald Lauder dropping his opposition of extensions and the mayor secretly going to the heads of the Big Three city papers looking for their support. "It's been carefully choreographed from the get-go," said Councilman John Liu.
It appears to be a banner day for Bloomberg's plan to stick around New York as mayor for another four years. In today's Post, Ed Koch says he hopes that Bloomberg's re-election will no longer make him "the last of the three term mayors." He also lays out why he has no problem with the term limit laws being amended without a voter referendum saying, "It makes sense on paper, but it would be no more representative of the public than allowing the council to decide the issue itself."
Photograph by Martha Burzynski on Flickr
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Definitely no surprise here.
I agree with John Liu.
These people disgust me.
as the dead kennedys said ... bedtime for democracy .. (again)!
I didn't vote for Quinn nor bloomberg,
I knew she was a khunt from the get to.
you have some decent council members but she's not one of them. I liked the guys who went after Con Ed and the mayor didn't like them making faces at city hall.
I'm so upset with Koch.
I expected this from Quinn. She's a jellyfish. Bloomberg has her in his pocket.
What get's my goat is the fact Lauder and Bloomberg forced the issue. We didn't ask for a change to the term limits. I hope this all blows up in their faces.
There will be a public hearing about term limits at City Hall on October 16 and 17.
Is that Cartman's mom?
Bloomberg supports McCain and not Obama.
Term limits was a sham, an ad campaign bought for by a spoiled rich trust=fund brat, right-wing Republican billionaire, Ron Lauder, who, in revenge for losing to Rudy in 1988, spent millions of his own dollars out of spite to f*ck all the rest of those who won.
Since no one had the money to spend to rebut his campaign, the voters fell for it, hook, line and sinker, and voted to limit other voters' right to choose whom they wanted to represent them.
Just as ad campaigns can convince us that Coke is better than Pepsi, so too did this ad campaign work - to the detriment of democracy. That is, if you don't want a politician, don't vote for that politician (like what happened to Marty Connor this year, or Koch or Dinkins, or Bush 1).
But Lauder's ad campaign convinced us that every poltician is corrupt = except the ones WE vote for. What a joke!
Does it matter if the City Council tinkers with it? Or, do you want to rely on a spoiled trust-fund brat like Lauder controlling elections?
They definitely need to get the actress who played Rhonda Pearlman on The Wire to play Quinn in the movie version of this.
Regardless of it's history: Term limits was voted in by the people of NYC twice. This end run is just a cheap trick by the Mayor and the City Council.
Me, I'm voting against the Mayor any member of the council that supports it.
that's scott stringer in drag.
The City Council has the chance to "tinker" with term limits because Bloomberg and Lauder made it an issue. I don't believe you have a grasp on what is going on here. There is subversive activity at City Hall to overturn a law that was voted on by the people of NY. I don't trust Bloomberg, Lauder or Quinn.
What was Quinn waiting for? She held out as long as possible to see where the political wind was blowing. Quinn is just another phony who doesn't have the guts to do what is right.
The only thing that could possibly stop a 3rd term for Bloomberg(given his public approval) is outrage over term limits being overturned. It doesn't seem like the public outcry is there at the moment, so unless that changes before election time we'll see another term for Bloomberg. I don't know if that's a good or bad thing. There's also the danger that people will vote for the opposition, regardless of who it is, just out of spite for term limits being overturned and put an incompetent leader into office. I wish leadership in this city was more left wing, but Bloomberg has done pretty well overall.
Let's not be so anxious to rid ourselves of the current Mayor. If you let Democrat political clubs have their way, it'll be hack-time again. The new person will come in with all the baggage. The jobs will be handed to incompetents and it'll be right back to the bad old days.
If Quinn had a chance of beating Bloomberg, do you think she'd go for this?
Under any circumstance it would be tough - and with the phony-budget scandal, she had no chance.
Her plan now is to wait him out, and hope that Weiner gets a post in the Obama administration.
Bloomberg is not a Maverick. He's done well for his crowd, the billionaires, real estate and Wall Street. If the future is wrestling with the hacks in the NYC party machine then so be it. But the answer isn't to hand over electoral politics to the men who are rich enough to buy it.
I don't give a caca if the mighty Quinn is all for lifting the ban on term limits. I just don't want her and her council approving it without a referendum. And if and when they do, because none of us are going to do anything about it, I will not vote for him or any of the council I can vote for come the next go round. Another masses rape.
I don't give a caca if the mighty Quinn is all for lifting the ban on term limits. I just don't want her and her council approving it without a referendum. And if and when they do, because none of us are going to do anything about it, I will not vote for him or any of the council I can vote for come the next go round. Another masses rape.
I would like to ask Mayor Bloomberg how my wife and I who earn in the top 5% of income in this country can not afford to rent let alone purchase a decent 2 bedroom apartment in Manhattan? Who here can answer this?
"It makes sense on paper, but it would be no more representative of the public than allowing the council to decide the issue itself."
Bull crap.
This an embarrassment. These politicians have lost my support with their self-serving act.