With four weeks until election day, Bill Thompson has pulled within eight points of Michael Bloomberg, according to a SurveyUSA poll.

Thompson leads among voters under 50. He also leads in Brooklyn and the Bronx.

Meanwhile, a recent NY Times article speaks to the issue on which Thompson can win -- term limits. It's why several people lost their bid for a third term, why Speaker Christine Quinn got barely over 50% in a three-way race, and why others survived a challenge with less than 50%.

Since he signed the new law, Bloomberg has repeatedly claimed that the City Council changed term limits, as if he had nothing to do with it. Coincidentally, he signed the law on November 3, exactly one year before this year's election day. (The timing was designed to take focus away from what the Campaign Finance Board was doing to help Quinn, but that's another story.)

Bill Thompson has to hit Bloomberg hard on term limits.  read more »

According to the NY Times, in 2006 as the fight to rezone Willets Point was heating up, then-Deputy Mayor for Economic Development Dan Doctoroff had a meeting with Claire Shulman, who had been the Queens Borough President from 1986-2001. At that meeting, they agreed to create a Local Development Corporation (LDC), with some of the funding coming from the Economic Development Corporation (EDC).

According to Shulman, this LDC hired lobbyists, specifically the Queens lobbying firm Parkside Group, to lobby city officials for the mayor's plan. She is quoted in the article as saying, "We hired lobbyists from the time we began, because we were told it was something we were supposed to be doing." The Times also reports that a Parkside Group spokesperson "said Ms. Shulman hired it to lobby, among other duties."

The problem is, LDCs aren't allowed to lobby. Neither is the EDC, or (apparently) anyone funded by the EDC.  read more »

Bill Thompson is quoted in the NY Post as saying that he's "not averse" to modifying the Taylor Law. Michael (excuse me, "Mike") Bloomberg is clearly opposed to it.

The Taylor Law prohibits unionized government (or public authority) workers from staging any kind of work stoppage. The concept behind the law is that we as a society cannot afford to have our police or firefighters go on strike. The transit strike a few years ago pointed up just how damaging some work stoppages can be.

The problem is that when workers can't strike they can't force management (the government or public authority) to negotiate. "Mike" Bloomberg forced police officers to go almost five years without a contract, because he refused to negotiate with them. It can make one wonder what damage could be done when the morale of our first responders is affected by the mayor's refusal to treat them with dignity.  read more »

Michael (excuse me, "Mike") Bloomberg has made a big deal of how test scores for NYC schoolchildren have risen to seemingly astronomical heights. A closer examination, of course, reveals that while city tests -- the ones he and his puppet, Joel Klein, control -- seem to show significant gains, scores on the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) tests show virtually no change at all over the past several years.

It would seem that when Michael Bloomberg writes the tests, kids show progress, but when someone else writes the tests the result is far different. This doesn't even take into account the fact that teachers are now wasting valuable class time giving practice tests; in theory, test scores should improve across the board if those practice tests are any good.

The anomaly to date has been state tests, given by the Board of Regents. Scores on these tests have risen statewide, and especially so in NYC. Michael Bloomberg doesn't control these tests, so he could claim that they are proof that his and Klein's methods work.

Until now.  read more »

At a press conference, Mayor Bloomberg announced, regarding the city's economy, that "I’m reasonably optimistic that we’ve turned the corner.” When Azi tried to ask him if his rationale for extending term limits was -- but Bloomberg cut him off, saying it wasn't a serious question. Moments later, Bloomberg called Azi "a disgrace."

Someone's a disgrace, all right; decide for yourself.