Joan Malin, President and CEO o Planned Parenthood of New York City, gave Bill de Blasio (D) quite a ringing endorsement:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/...
To truly address health disparities, our mayor will need to expand programs that help all women get the reproductive health care services they need, support economic equality and solutions that provide insurance coverage like the Affordable Care Act, ensure all NYC students have comprehensive sex education and much, much more.
That's why New Yorkers who care about women's health should vote for Bill de Blasio. De Blasio has been a steadfast champion for comprehensive sex education, access to reproductive health services and the rights and health of women across our city. De Blasio has also supported policies that make it easier for people to pay for health care. His opponent Joe Lhota, on the other hand, has supported delays of the Affordable Care Act.
De Blasio has described New York as a tale of two cities. That's all too true when it comes to health, including reproductive care.
We can no longer ignore the fact that the realities for women and girls living in some areas of the city are radically different than those living in others. Race, ethnicity, economic class and geography have sadly become risk factors for disease and death. In 2010, the infant mortality rate among black women was nearly triple the rate for white women, and was the highest in the Bronx. Maternal mortality rates are more than seven times greater for black women than for others. In 2011, black women and Latinas had the highest rates of new HIV diagnoses, making up more than 90 percent of new diagnoses among women. These disparities have turned our town into a Dickensian city, where too many are suffering.
And while teen pregnancy rates have fallen 30 percent in the last decade, the rates of unintended pregnancies and sexually transmitted infections continue to be unacceptably high in our poorest communities. In some parts of the city, nearly 7 in 10 pregnancies are unintended. Ending that will take a mayor who's committed to educating our young people about birth control -- and then taking that next step of making certain that they can get it when they need it.
De Blasio, with his long history of standing with the women and families of our city, is this candidate. - Huffington Post, 10/28/13
More below the fold.
Here's some more big news from the de Blasio campaign:
http://www.thenation.com/...
The Nation strongly urges its readers in New York City to not just vote for de Blasio but to vote for him on the Working Families Party line.
A vote for de Blasio on the Working Families Party line is a way of giving your vote some added,well, oomph. It’s a way to send a message that you applaud the progressive values that de Blasio embodies—even as he comes under blistering attack from the Murdoch press and other advocates for the status quo.
The Working Families Party is a progressive grassroots party founded in 1998 by a handful of community, union and progressive activists. The Nation in fact played a small but important role in the birth of the Working Families Party back in 1998, the first time we urged our readers to vote for the party’s ticket. These days, the WFP is on the upswing, racking up wins far afield from their original home in New York State.
Recent accomplishments include the “Pay it Forward” plan to tackle the student debt crisis that the WFP and some far-sighted elected officials initiated in Oregon. In Bridgeport, Connecticut, they are working with public school parents and teachers in the fight against the high-stakes testing of the corporate school reform crowd. In New Jersey, with SEIU, Citizen Action and other allies, they won paid sick days in Jersey City—and have a plan to take it across the state. The WFP strategy for building an organization that is “independent and relevant” is refreshingly sane and optimistic all at once.
In New York City, where the party has been organizing for fifteen years, the WFP has seen the fullest expression of its vision—their “long game” as columnist Harry Seigel recently wrote in the New York Daily News. - The Nation, 10/28/13
FYI, de Blasio is still kicking ass in the polls:
http://www.nydailynews.com/...
Democrat Bill de Blasio maintains a staggering 45-point lead over Republican Joe Lhota just a week before voters pick their next mayor, a New York Times/Siena poll released Monday finds.
De Blasio scores the support of 68% of likely voters to Lhota's 23% -- barely changed from the 68%-19% split reported in a Siena survey three weeks ago.
The new poll ran from Oct. 21 to 26, accounting for an Oct. 22 TV debate Lhota fans had cited as hope the GOP underdog might dig into the frontrunner's seemingly insurmountable lead.
But former MTA boss Lhota struggles on with a negative 25%-46% favorability rating -- and with only days to go before Election Day, more than a quarter of those expected to go to the polls still have no opinion of him.
De Blasio, the public advocate, has a healthy 62% favorability rating, compared to 22% who view him in a negative light. - New York Daily News, 10/28/13
In fact, such a lead is historical:
http://www.nytimes.com/...
Bill de Blasio is poised to win the race for mayor of New York City by a historically large margin, powered by optimism that he will bring about change and by overwhelming voter disapproval of the Republican Party.
Mr. de Blasio, a Democrat who is currently the public advocate, leads his Republican opponent, Joseph J. Lhota, a former chairman of the Metropolitan Transportation Authority, by 45 points among likely voters, according to a New York Times/Siena College poll. That lead, which has remained remarkably consistent in multiple polls over the last six weeks, suggests that Mr. de Blasio could win the most sweeping victory in a mayor’s race since 1985, when Edward I. Koch was re-elected to a third term with a crushing 68-point margin of victory over his opponents.
Mr. de Blasio’s overwhelming lead in poll after poll has sent students of local politics scrambling for the history books. Although Mr. de Blasio is unlikely to surpass Mr. Koch’s re-election margin, he is flirting with a record win for a non-incumbent; that record is currently held by Abraham D. Beame, who won election in 1973 with a 40-point victory margin, the largest in an open race since five-borough elections began in 1897. - New York Times, 10/28/13
By the way, not only will de Blasio make a great Mayor, he already makes a great landlord:
http://www.nytimes.com/...
But one role that Mr. de Blasio quietly and fully inhabits every day is that of small-time landlord, at a modest duplex one block west of his home in Park Slope, Brooklyn.
Covered in light gray siding and fronted by a thin strip of porch and a patch of concrete, the duplex was bought for $612,500 in 2004 by Mr. de Blasio’s mother, Maria Wilhelm. Then living alone in Westchester County, she wanted to be closer to her son and his family, and Mr. de Blasio and his wife, Chirlane McCray, were co-signers of the mortgage. The duplex, on 11th Street, is 500 feet away from the townhouse where the couple live with their children, Chiara and Dante.
After his mother died in 2007 at age 89, Mr. de Blasio, then a city councilman, rented out both apartments: a two-bedroom on the ground floor and a one-bedroom on top.
Mr. de Blasio, a Democrat, then became the city’s public advocate, a post in which he has put slumlords in his cross hairs. So how was and is Mr. de Blasio as landlord?
“I don’t have one negative word to say about Bill and Chirlane,” said Ellen Mittelholzer, 30, a French teacher who lives in the second-floor one-bedroom apartment with her husband, a software engineer. After Ms. Mittelholzer and her husband found the apartment on Craigslist, the real estate agent tipped them off that the owner was the public advocate. “Great; I don’t know what that is,” Ms. Mittelholzer said she thought to herself.
The real estate agent also said that there was a vetting process and that the owners wanted to meet the prospective tenants. So an hour before signing the lease, the couple went to Mr. de Blasio’s home, where they were warmly greeted by Mr. de Blasio and Ms. McCray, ushered into the living room and offered tea and cookies. “We chatted for an hour, and they’re completely down to earth,” Ms. Mittelholzer said. - New York Times, 10/28/13
It should also be noted that the next Mayor of New York City is also quite a romantic:
http://www.nydailynews.com/...
Q. Had you been a big dater before?
A. A big dater? Yes, I had dated a lot! But I was not involved in a meaningful relationship at that moment. It had been almost a year since I had been in a serious relationship, so my antennae were up... I always say when I introduce her, for me it was some version of love at first sight, and Chirlane felt absolutely nothing!
Q. What happened next?
A. I didn't know how she would feel if I called her up. And I didn't know anything except for fairly superficial information about her...So I picked up the phone with the intention of asking her out to lunch, But before I got there — I was in the middle of my pleasantries and she cut me off and she said: ‘WHAT DO YOU WANT?’
Q. Where did you go for that first date?
A. We went to lunch at Scallions, (a vegetarian restaurant in lower Manhattan that no longer exists) and we both connected really easily, really understood each other and we sort of weren't supposed to, right? - New York Daily News, 10/28/13
And while de Blasio and his opponent, Joe Lhota (R), don't see eye to eye on everything, They agree on two things. The first is the call for immigration reform:
http://www.latinospost.com/...
Both candidates have laid out their plans to aid the immigrant community living in New York City. The two candidates promise to establish ID cards for the undocumented to allow them to better integrate themselves into the community. De Blasio goes one step further by promising to allow undocumented immigrants access to New York driver’s licenses to make streets safer “by getting undocumented people who are already driving on our streets into driver’s education classes and covered by auto insurance.”
The Democratic candidate also outlines other ways he plans to help immigrants, including ending cooperation with federal "Detainer Requests" on minor violations, improving school systems for non-English speaking immigrant students and providing legal help for those hoping to become citizens.
Meanwhile, his Republican counterpart proposes a vaguer plan. “Additionally, I have laid out a comprehensive vision for a strong economy, improved education system and safe streets free from violent criminals,” Lhota states on his website. “We must ensure that New Yorkers from all five boroughs and all nationalities, ethnicities and backgrounds, have access to quality education, good-paying jobs that can support a family and safe neighborhoods.” - Latino Post, 10/28/13
The second thing they agree on is changing the date for the next debate:
http://www.nydailynews.com/...
The final mayoral debate was pushed back a day after Bill de Blasio and Joe Lhota agreed on something — it was a bad idea to hold it on the first anniversary of Hurricane Sandy.
Officials at the Campaign Finance Board, which runs the debates, announced Sunday night the face-off — the third between the candidates — would be held Wednesday night instead of Tuesday. - New York Daily News, 10/28/13
The election is Tuesday, November 5th. If you would like to donate or get involved with de Blasio's campaign, you can do so here:
http://www.billdeblasio.com/