Mayor-Elect of New York Bill de Blasio
The #1 reason why I threw whatever influence I have in
encouraging you all to support Bill de Blasio, is taking
the megaphone that comes with being New York's Mayor from a Wall Street billionaire and giving it to
this guy:
De Blasio acknowledged his hope of using his office as a bully pulpit to advance a liberal policy agenda nationwide.
Mayor Bloomberg did so for climate change, immigration and gun control, using his own personal fortune.
De Blasio acknowledged he doesn't have the same kind of cash, but said he “ran a campaign with very limited resources, it didn’t stop me from succeeding.”
...
“So what we have to do is organize it and amplify it. We don’t have to create it from whole cloth. And that’s where I think the facts on the ground are more important than how much money I have.”
De Blasio -- who surfed a towering wave of Bloomberg fatigue to a landslide win -- also said he had "a lot of respect" for what Mayor Bloomberg did on some of those national issues, but would take a more "grassroots" approach himself, with a focus on economic matters.
“I think there’s a progressive movement in this country that’s having a real effect… Hearing each of my colleagues lay out what happened in their elections... It’s clear something is happening around this country and that the inequalities we’re facing are becoming just fundamentally unacceptable,” de Blasio added.
I had to bold that. Fundamentally unacceptable. Hear hear. Go
national, Bill.
Gearing up towards a big national election in 2016, Demcorats all over have to be resolved and united that that election should be about dividing the pie more fairly and restoring upward mobility in this country. We are living in a 21st Century Gilded Age and it has to stop. The 99% message is sinking in, and being amplified. That is what got Bill de Blasio the landslide mandate. He will have to fight hard to win on policy, as will we all over the next 10 to 20 years. But we do have to begin, and that starts with getting the message out from every perch we can sieze. Occupy Wall Street was just the beginning.
We've got ourselves a Pope talking about this stuff, and now some high profile mayors, including Marty Walsh up in Boston. The number of voices will grow because the ground is fertile. The massive pushback against Third Way from all Democratic grassroots quarters, pushing Larry Summers out at the Fed, and the bubbling up of protests at Wal-Mart and McDonalds is only tilling good ground for strong Democrats. It is the main reason why Hillary Clinton would be wise to run on this message, and not more 90's era Wall Street-ism.
As for Mayor de Blasio, I'm hoping for a barn-burner of a speech at City Hall on New Year's Day. When the whole world will be watching.