Primary Day
As the saying goes, all politics are local. Yesterday was Primary Day in New York. I’m pleased with the results of the primary for mayor and city council.
I’ve felt funny these last few months as the gay community has rallied around openly-gay candidate Tim Mains, a current city council member. The pressure has been that, if you’re gay, you should support Tim Mains—a justification I think is just plain stupid.
But considering I’m active in the community and have five local gay community groups as clients, it put me in a difficult position considering I felt Tim was too outspoken and devisive—good attributes in a councilman and I’ve always voted for him in that job—but not good attributes for a mayor.
Further, I have friends and clients active in the Democratic Party, and the party itself has expressed interest (in the longer term) of switching their web site to me. The party backed city councilman Wade Norwood. I saw Norwood as the party machine candidate, beholden to Albany. I vote for people, not cogs and wheels. He’s also been devisive on council, although in a different way than Mains.
The ringer was Chris Maj, whose platform consisted of legalizing drugs and prostitution. As much as I feel the “war on drugs” is the wrong tactic and even with the soft spot I have for rentboys, both are non-starters for me.
Ever since it was even rumored he was considering the job, my vote was for former police chief Bob Duffy. I’ve seen the man in action. He’s not afraid to get his hands dirty, but in general, he delegates responsibly and lets his people do their job without interference.
He straightened-out the force and put through an unpopular reorganization, reducing seven precincts to two. This had exactly the intended effect of reducing administrative levels, and reducing response times to calls by having more officers in the street and available to move from one place to another. He’s sought, and gotten, cooperation from the county sheriff, the state troopers and the feds in several succesful joint operations.
In short, he just gets things done and isn’t afraid to delegate or to ask for cooperation to do it. Nor is he afraid to go up against the union, the press and even public opinion to do what he thinks is right. And that’s the type of guy I want for mayor.
Fortunately, the majority of voters agreed with me yesterday and went against the party machine, and against single-issue politics and voted Bob Duffy as the Democratic Party’s candidate for mayor in November.
I can now rejoin political discussions with friends and clients. The last thing this city needs is more fucking lawyers running things, so we need to make sure Republican challenger, attorney John Parinello, doesn’t win in November.
As for city council, well it’s unfortunate we lose Mains and Norwood. I felt they were good where they were. However, we get to keep Bill Pritchard, also openly gay, and have gained two other grassroots candidates for the at-large positions.
I’m hoping this signals an overall change in the electorate which will build through the governor race next year and president the year after that. The party’s role is to support candidates, not manufacture them, and single-issue politicians don’t belong in the job.
