Rock on Vann, Fidler and Comrie

Rock Hachshaw is a person with a long memory. He just posted about Al Vann, Leroy Comrie and Lew Fidler— "all three voted for the vomitable extension bill"— and here is a bit:

Leroy Comrie had raised $211,624 from 683 people. This money was for his re-election to the council in 2005. I also exposed the fact that he had spent $193,629 of this money, and still had some other outstanding liabilities at that point. What was striking to me was the fact that Leroy Comrie had no primary opponent. He also had no challenger for the general election. As far as my recollection goes, his name appeared on the Democratic, Republican and Working Families Party lines. He may have even been placed on the Independent Party line for all you know. I found this disgraceful. He spent all this money for what purpose?

Rock gives a brief overview of all three of their long, long careers, and concludes:

My point is this: if elected officials are given significant times in office, but still fail to solve or resolve problems/issues; then why should their terms be extended?

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Bloomberg keeps The Angry New Yorker busy

The Angry New Yorker has many posts to add to the rants about Bloomberg's term limit extensions. Here are a couple:

• Bring in the Feds
  
  
• Term Limit Flip Flopper tries to explain herself.

And this one isn't on term limits, but it is about Bloomberg:

• Bloomberg: Let’s Cut NYC until it Burns

The City That Never Sleeps should probably be renamed The City With Bloggers That Never Sleep.

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NY GOP sours on Bloomberg

NY Post reports on Bloomberg's falling support within the NY state GOP:

Many Republicans had hoped Mayor Bloomberg, with his deep pockets and personal popularity, would fill the leadership vacuum and run for governor because term limits were expected to force him to leave office.

Months ago, Bloomberg even quietly sounded out retiring Buffalo US Rep. Thomas Reynolds and former Utica Sen. Raymond Meier about becoming the state GOP leader.

But the possibility that Bloomberg would run for governor ended with the City Council's decision last month to allow him to run for a third term.

The changed dynamic has led some Republicans to look to Red Apple/Gristedes supermarket mogul John Catsimatidis as a possible new state GOP force and potential candidate for governor.

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Long: Conservative politician against Bloomberg's term extension

The Daily News introduces us to state Conservative Party Chairman Mike Long:

He's certainly one of the more right-leaning members of the 26 plaintiffs who sued yesterday in federal court.

But Long insisted that he is not, unlike some of his compatriots, motivated by a desire to keep Mayor Bloomberg off the ballot in 2009, but rather due to his longstanding support of term limits as a concept and his belief that there should have been a referendum this time around.

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Scathing report on Bloomberg by Inner City Press

Inner City Press is not very happy with Bloomberg:

Mayor Michael Bloomberg, fresh from buying the chance to buy a third term despite the public passage of term limits, now apparently feels free to deploy lawless gangs to evict lower income New Yorker, all in the name of redevelopment.

On November 10, Bloomberg's housing and buildings Departments converged on a four-story building in Mott Haven in the South Bronx, intent on removing the residents. They never took them to court. Rather, they wrote pretextual vacate orders and called Con Edison to turn off the lights. They stood cackling in the half-light, ridiculing those they were evicting, many of them hard-working immigrants of the type Bloomberg pretends to respect.

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Am Law Litigation: Legal team could embarass Bloomberg

It's always interesting to see how the legal press reports on legal actions. AmericanLawyer.com reports on some of the personal implications of the lawyers involved in the newest suit against the mayor:

Given his loyalty to Giuliani, [Randy] Mastro's work on the legal campaign to block Bloomberg's efforts had already raised eyebrows even before he coauthored the coalition's complaint. "If Mastro succeeds in derailing Bloomberg's plan for another four years, he'd embarrass [Bloomberg]," wrote Jacob Gershman in a recent New York magazine story.

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The Neighborhood Retail Alliance continues with similar observations, and has this to say:

The idea that this gives the folks more choice is subjected to justified ridicule: "The lawsuit points out that in the past decade, only 2 of 107 incumbent council members lost a re-election bid. It also highlights Mayor Bloomberg’s many statements in favor of term limits over the past few years, as when he deemed some council members’ calls for a change to term limits “disgraceful” and criticized a proposal to resubmit the issue to a third referendum by saying, “I think the public has spoken twice and they’ve spoken quite clearly. I don’t know that you should keep shopping for a different answer.”

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Tons of press about suit against Bloomberg's term extension

There has been countless articles written in the last few hours about the new suit against Bloomberg's attempt to get a third term as mayor.

Before listing countless links, click here to read the text of the suit against the mayor. It's one of these new iPaper things.

If you're reading this, then you've probably already done a Google news search on the Bloomberg and "term limits." If not, click here.

Here's a sample of what much of the press has say. This is from a Newsday article:

"It was not legal or constitutional for the majority of the City Council and the mayor to enact this legislation, to award themselves another term in office," said Attorney Randy Mastro and civil rights lawyer Norman Siegel, announcing the filing of the 48-page legal brief.

Foes of the term-limits bill Bloomberg signed last week filed suit in federal court in Brooklyn. The suit claims voters' constitutional rights had been violated, saying voting is "a bedrock democratic principle."

The Gotham Gazette does a good job in painting a picture of the vast range of opponents to the mayor, representing all boroughs and political stripes. But do their efforts have any chance in succeeding? Azi Paybarah takes a stab at that question in his article in the Observer.

The NY Times also writes about arts groups which have gotten money from Bloomberg, have just gotten awards from him, and are- surprise- lining up to testify in his favor. The Gray Lady covered the new suit and press conference here, and writes about the upheaval after Darlene Mealy's vote in favor of the mayor here.

NY1 continues its regular coverage here, though you've got to wonder when they will realize that LetiTia James does not have a "c" in her name.

It's the articles on the periphery that are even more interesting. My San Antonio give some perspective on this fight. All the while, the Bloomberg LP is facing a suit for gender discrimination. Condé Nast has writes about it in "Mayor Bloomberg's Delicate Condition."

Whew! On a day when liberals are praising George W. Bush for gracefully handing over power to President-elect Barack Obama, you've got to wonder when we'll have a peaceful transfer of power in New York City.