The New York Post’s editorial board doesn’t appreciate Mayor Bloomberg meddling in the lives of New Yorkers:

Will Mayor Bloomberg and his newest Dr. Buttinsky ever let New Yorkers live in peace?

Don’t bet on it.

Indeed, Mike’s new health commissioner, Tom Farley, seems determined to top the impressive imperial record of his predecessor, “King” Tom Frieden — in dispensing increasingly intrusive, heavy-handed healthy-living “advice.”

Based, of course, on their definition of “healthy living.”
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A Times reader reminds the newspaper how much voters care about the term limits issue.

Via The New York Times:

To the Editor:

Re “For New York City Comptroller” (editorial, Aug. 24):

I wish that your editorial endorsing City Councilman David Yassky for comptroller had told us how he voted on term limits. This is an important issue to many of your city readers.

Twice we voted for term limits, and Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg supported them as well. Now he claims that he is indispensable, and the craven members of the City Council, with a few exceptions, have agreed.

Your endorsements should clearly state whether the candidate voted to disregard our wishes regarding term limits and whether the candidate accepted contributions from real estate developers.

Naomi Z. Katcher
New York, Aug. 24, 2009

“Ms. Harris, 55, advised the mayor not to push for a revision of the city’s term limits law and seek re-election, warning him that the move could sully his image as a reformer.”

Bloomberg Should Have Listened to Her Advice.

Via The New York Times:

Many bosses reward hard-working employees with a pat on the back. Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg can build monuments to them.

The mayor, a billionaire, has quietly given at least $1 million to stamp the name of his most trusted deputy at City Hall on a new academic center at her alma mater, Franklin & Marshall College in Lancaster, Pa., according to two people familiar with the arrangement.

The unusual gift, in honor of Patricia E. Harris, the first deputy mayor, highlights what many say is a hidden glue that helps keep Mr. Bloomberg’s extraordinarily loyal, long-serving administration together: the mayor’s money, or at least the promise of it.
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* Azi Paybarah has the video of Bloomberg saying he’s not running against anyone.

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* Azi Paybarah reports that In response to all those New Yorkers who feel that Bloomberg’s television ads are overkill, the mayor said simply, “don’t watch.” He also said he doesn’t have time to watch television, and didn’t watch last night’s Democratic mayoral debate. Why? According to the AP, Mayor Bloomberg feels he has no challengers in the election. Huh — so why spend nearly $40 million before the general election?

* Bloomberg found himself forced to give a deposition for the third time in three months, reports NY1. This time around, a judge is trying to determine whether FDNY entrance exams in 1999 and 2002 intentionally discriminated against black and Hispanic applicants.

* Baseball site Bugs and Cranks says Bloomberg has poor baseball fan etiquette:

Not an implicit sign of support for the mayor? Is Mr. Doba kidding?

Via David Freedlander and City Hall News:
Quinn Staffer Joins Bloomberg Campaign

Andrew Doba, a spokesman for Council Speaker Christine Quinn, has taken a leave of absence from his government job to join the effort to re-elect Mayor Michael Bloomberg.

Though Quinn has come under criticism among some Democrats for failing to commit to endorsing the Democratic mayoral nominee, people close to the speaker and Doba himself stressed that his new position should not be read as an implicit sign of support for the mayor.
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Several people having been pointing out these two stories to us tonight as must-read stories. One involves City Council Speaker Christine Quinn — the other, Mayor Bloomberg. Both involve allegations of misuse of taxpayer money. For Quinn, it means using city employees to help her further her campaign. For Bloomberg, it means using city money to form a non-profit group to lobby on behalf of his mayoral plans for Willets Point in Queens.

Via The Village Voice:
Speaker Quinn Pads Campaign Staff with Council Staffers

In Mid-July, Jan Messerschmidt, the manager of City Council Speaker Christine Quinn’s re-election campaign, sent out a letter to supporters. In just over a month, Messerschmidt bragged, the campaign’s “more than 90 volunteers” had logged thousands of door-to-door man hours, garnering enough signatures to put Quinn on the ballot in District 3, which spans from Soho to Hell’s Kitchen.

It turns out that many in Quinn’s touted group of dedicated volunteers have a strong personal interest in her being reelected — indeed, their jobs may rely on it. According to documents the Voice has obtained, thirty-one of the “more than 90″ volunteers are current staff members on the City Council.
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It’s nice to hear The New York Post skewering Mayor Bloomberg for comparing himself to Robert Moses right before the second anniversary of the Deutsche Bank fire that caused two firefighters their lives. Of course, Wayne Barrett was pointing this out more than three weeks ago in The Village Voice — and no one seemed to be paying much attention. Better late than never.

Via The Post:

Say what you want about Robert Moses; he knew how to tear a building down.

That’s more than Mayor Bloomberg can claim on the second anniversary of the blaze that killed two firefighters at Ground Zero — despite his recent rhetorical attempt to assume the mantle of Gotham’s controversial Master Builder, who re-shaped much of the city in the mid-20th century.
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The Voice’s Roy Edroso reminds us in Runnin’ Scared that since 1997, cops have arrested 430,000 citizens for possession of small amounts of weed — with many of the arrests happening under Bloomberg’s reign.

Yes, this part of the story is well known, but time has provided another wrinkle: You would expect Mayor Bloomberg, who has admitted to not only using but also enjoying cannabis, and who appeared on Coed magazine’s “10 Most Successful Potheads” list, to be less of a narc than Mayor Giuliani was. But surprise: 40,300 of these arrests were made in 2008 alone, and Bloomberg has officially outstripped Giuliani as the drug-bustingest New York Mayor.

The article goes on to discuss, as stoners tend to do, the legal charades by means of which cops can drag you to jail for what should ticketing offenses. (Short version: don’t voluntarily give up evidence.)

See the Runnin’ Scared blog

Hold your horses New York — who’s asking Mayor Bloomberg about a fourth term? Why would anyone even want to imagine such a thing?

Via Elizabeth Benjamin and The Daily Politics:

Asked today whether there’s any guarantee he won’t try to seek a fourth term if his current bid for a third works out, Mayor Bloomberg didn’t exactly rule out the possibility.
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