Either Associated Press reporter Sara Kugler is bored or has a crush on Mayor Michael Bloomberg. There is no other justification for her 1,100 plus word article.
NEW YORK - For all of his billions, Mayor Michael Bloomberg lacks one thing all the current presidential candidates proudly display: a spouse.Unless I missed the memo, Bloomberg hasn't said he's running for President. Actually Kugler points this out herself but not till she has rambled on for more than 900 words.The country has not elected a bachelor president since 1884, when Grover Cleveland won the White House despite newspapers huffing that "a man who will not marry a woman and take care of her has no right to be a president."
Singles haven't had much luck getting nominated either. The last unwed candidate chosen by a major party was Adlai Stevenson, the divorced Democrat who lost to Republican Dwight Eisenhower twice in the 1950s.
Bloomberg, 65, has a companion of seven years, Diana Taylor, and essentially lives with her. Their arrangement and his star-studded past love life would present him with new political territory to navigate if he runs.
In a race where spouses are playing a visible role -- and one happens to be a former president -- it's hard to guess how the nation would react to a bachelor candidate, says Anthony Eksterowicz, a James Madison University political science professor who is teaching a seminar on first ladies.
There is speculation that he won't run for president without first marrying Taylor, whom he met in November 2000 when they were seated next to each other at a budget commission dinner.We can put the Bloomberg for President talk along with the Charlie Crist for VP and a brokered GOP convention speculation in the same receptacle. The garbage can. None of these things are going to happen, so why does the media waste time and ink writing about them?
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Tags: Associated Press, Michael Bloomberg, Sara Kugler
Comments (1)
Long, content-free puff pie... (Below threshold)1. Posted by Jim Addison | December 11, 2007 2:16 PM | Score: 0 (0 votes cast)
Long, content-free puff pieces like this do serve a purpose: opening the door later on. When times get tough, politicians are most likely to turn to/confide in reporters who have been kind to them in the past.
The biggest hurdle is getting it past the editors and into the paper itself. Unless, of course, they are publishing it for the same reasons . . .
The alternative explanation is that they are trying to pump up his already over-swollen head until it explodes, and have an exclusive . . .
1. Posted by Jim Addison | December 11, 2007 2:16 PM |
Score: 0 (0 votes cast)
Posted on December 11, 2007 14:16