Naked Cowboy Drops Out Of Mayoral Race

Whoa: The Naked Cowboy, the barely-clad Times Square attraction, is no longer running for mayor—Mayor Bloomberg, City Comptroller Bill Thompson and City Councilman Tony Avella must be so relieved! The Naked Cowboy, also known as Robert Burck, had announced he was running in July, even staging a press conference and snazzy logo, but told the NY Times yesterday, "I’m absolutely dropping out...What I want to do is stick with what I do best. It’s probably why I look like a naked cowboy, and Mayor Bloomberg looks like a mayor." The Times adds, "The culmination of his struggle was a sharply worded letter he got Thursday from the New York City Conflicts of Interest Board, an agency he said he had never fathomed existed until the letter arrived, notifying him that he had failed to file the financial disclosure form as required," requiring Burck to pay a fine; the New York City Board of Elections also denied him a place on the ballot because of "deficiencies in his paperwork" (he apparently didn't get enough voters' signatures). Burck declared, "Politics is not fun and games. It’s serious stuff, and my mind was a little more dreamy."