Tag Archives: bloomberg

Council to Ask Banks to Describe Efforts to Aid Poor Areas – NYTimes.com

15 May

As a huge trading loss at JPMorgan Chase intensifies criticism of the nation’s big banks, the New York City Council plans to vote on Tuesday to require banks to make public their efforts to be socially responsible before the city decides where to deposit the billions of dollars it keeps in banks….

Cleveland and Philadelphia have had laws in place for over a decade similar to the one being proposed in New York, and now the financial crisis has led several other cities to consider them. Pittsburgh recently passed a bill that requires banks that want city deposits to submit community reinvestment plans every two years. Los Angeles, Boston, and San Diego are all considering similar measures.

It’s  a start, but Bloomberg is opposed, naturally.

via Council to Ask Banks to Describe Efforts to Aid Poor Areas – NYTimes.com.

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Obama and Romney Vie for Mayor Bloomberg’s Endorsement – NYTimes.com

2 May

This pretty much says it all: These days, plutocrats rule!

In an election year when partisanship has burned white hot and the economy has sputtered, two presidential candidates who agree on very little, Mitt Romney and Barack Obama, have reached a rare consensus: they are both determined to score the endorsement of Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg of New York, whose name is all but synonymous with Wall Street clout and nonpartisan politics.

Now, their pursuit of the billionaire mayor is headed into overdrive, with both campaigns making the kind of conspicuous ring-kissing gestures that are reserved for their most sought-after political allies, even though the candidates publicly disagree with the mayor on a range of issues.

via Obama and Romney Vie for Mayor Bloomberg’s Endorsement – NYTimes.com.

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NY press corps yucks it up with Bloomberg – Occupy Wall Street – Salon.com

8 Dec

Another rich guy fiddles while Rome burns:

Bloomberg made sure to crack a few jokes at the expense of Occupy Wall Street, whose encampment he ordered forcibly cleared on November 15, by way of a surprise paramilitary style raid. Reporters attempting to cover the police action were harassed, assaulted, and barred from viewing the area — for their own protection, Bloomberg later claimed. (Congressman Jerrold Nadler, who represents the Financial District, has since called on Attorney General Eric Holder to launch an investigation.) All told police arrested twenty-six journalists.

In response, the New York Times, along with The Associated Press, the New York Post, the Daily News, Thomson Reuters, Dow Jones & Company, WABC, WCBS, and WNBC sent a strongly-worded letter to Police Commissioner Ray Kelly denouncing the NYPD’s conduct during the raid.

None of this stopped New York City’s press corps from laughing it up with the mayor last night.

via NY press corps yucks it up with Bloomberg – Occupy Wall Street – Salon.com.

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Bloomberg Says Some Protesters’ Issues Are Unfounded – NYTimes.com

8 Nov

Asked about the passions that fire the Occupy Wall Street crowds, Mr. Bloomberg gave an oh-puhleeze purse of his lips. Some complaints, he said, are “totally unfounded.”

“It was not the banks that created the mortgage crisis,” he said. “It was, plain and simple, Congress, who forced everybody to go and give mortgages to people who were on the cusp.”

Few of us can easily transcend our class and cultural context. But as a city and a nation are riveted by the 99 percent, Mr. Bloomberg often sounds like a man trapped in his 1 percent golden roost.

Actually, with his billions, it’s more like 1% of 1% of 1%. Whereas those poor Cengressional suckers are only in the 1%, or, in some cases, the 1% of 1%. So I guess it’s class warfare between the 1% and the .01%

Maybe if these guys get into a good fight some spare change will fall from their pockets and we can use it to house the homeless.

via Bloomberg Says Some Protesters’ Issues Are Unfounded – NYTimes.com.

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Bloomberg Says Occupy Wall Street Tent City Is Not Covered By Freedom Of Speech

18 Oct

Bloomberg is 100% in favor of CYA.

“I’m 100 percent in favor of protecting — 1,000 percent in favor — of giving people rights to say things, but also we have to protect those who don’t want to say anything,” he said according to Bloomberg News. “There are places where I think it’s appropriate to express yourself and then there are other places that are appropriate to set up a tent city, and they don’t necessarily have to be one and the same.”…

Two-in-three New Yorkers back the protests, with an even larger majority supporting the continuation of the protests, according to a Quinnipiac Poll released Monday.

via Bloomberg Says Occupy Wall Street Tent City Is Not Covered By Freedom Of Speech.

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