Bloomberg's Ego In '08

One of the most persistent stories in the New York press these days is the guessing game about whether Mike Bloomberg will run for president. We have so come to take politicians' statements at face value that a firm unambiguous denial, such as that of Hillary Clinton in 2004, Condoleeza Rice this year and Bloomberg earlier this year does little to stop the feverish speculation. My guess is it is largely a product of political reporters who are under pressure from their editors to fill up the pages. Maybe that's why Bloomberg's two-minute meeting with President Bush on the tarmac at JFK airport resulted in days of speculation, wherein even the color of Bloomgerg's tie was the subject of tea-leaves reading.
My firm suspicion is that Bloomberg initially intended, as he told me in a 2003 interview, to retire and spend his senior years living the good life while giving away perhaps billions of dollars to charitable causes. Not a bad life. But the success of his 2005, no-expense spared campaign has him obviously rethinking . And with a political advisor, Kevin Sheekey, who has gotten rich off him seeing multiple dollar signs in a national campaign -- imagine the $80 million spent in New York multiplied across 50 states -- the ego that drove Bloomberg to run for mayor is obviously wondering how far this wave can carry him.
There's a reasonably good chance that Bloomberg is just having fun with the speculation, enjoying how the media reads into his every pronouncement. And being seen as ambitious and upwardly mobile serves his political ambitions by saving him from being a lame duck.
Then again, when Bloomberg sells his media empire he'll become one of the richest men in the world, and his unbridled ability to spend and encouragement from his amen corner could make a Bloomberg 08 campaign a reality.

Rockets' Red Scare

Sure it's scary that the North Koreans are playing with bombs. But before we get out of control, Iraq-style, it's of primary importance to assess one thing that we ought to have the right think-tank experts on hand to be able to assess, or we're in big trouble.
That is, does Kim Jong-Il want to die?
It's a simple enough question. Because he is surely intelligent enough to know that lobbying any kind of missile at the United States will result not just in his downfall, but his death, too, as we would certainly level Pyongyang in retaliation. Mutual assured destruction has been the law of the earth for almost 60-years now, and it's held up primarily because the one power who can throw us into a long nuclear winter, Russia, is a thriving civlized culture that wants to survive. The question is whether the same thing can be said for both North Korea and Iran. Is their hatred of and paranoia over America driving them crazy enough to open Pandora's box.
The paranoia part of it is particularly intriguing. For all the highly paid talking heads on CNN the other day, it was an unknown e-mailer whose comment was read during "The Situation Room" who made the most insightful observation.
The question is not whether we are taking a strong enough stand against Iran and North Korea, the observer wrote, but whether our president declaring these countries part of an axis of evil, then invading part of that axis, is what's driving them to behave this way in the first place.'
A question well worth pondering.