There’s an old fable about a dog or some such loyal mammal helping out a snake, and getting repaid with a lethal bite. As the work animal lays dying, it asks the snake why it bit him.
“Because I’m a snake. That’s what I do,” replies the snake.
This fable comes to mind as city residents shake their head in wonder asking themselves why on earth did Mayor Bill de Blasio galavant off to Germany for politicking the day after NYPD Officer Miosotis Familia was murdered in cold blood.
Like the snake the answer is simple. De Blasio left town because he’s blind with ambition. It’s who he is as a politician.
This isn’t a put down. His ambition has been on display ever since winning his first city council race back in 2001. And as a staff reporter for Courier-Life and later News Corp, I had a ringside seat in watching him work the breakfast schmooze fests with the well-moneyed Hasidic Jews, rubber chicken dinners with powerful unions, and smoke-filled late night Bay Ridge restaurants and bars with Brooklyn’s Democratic Party bosses.
Hindsight being 20/20, it was easy to tell even back then that de Blasio was a man with a plan. And when the time came, Brooklyn’s powerful people backed him to win the City Public Advocate’s seat, where he often was a no-show to the office, while plotting out his successful run for mayor.
Here’s the thing, though. When it comes to political ambition, de Blasio may have met his match in Republican Assemblywoman Nicole Malliotakis, who is challenging him for mayor in November.
This daughter of Greek- and Cuban-immigrant parents, lobbied long and hard to run for the Southern Brooklyn/Staten Island Congressional seat when former Rep. Michael Grimm went belly up for not paying taxes on the restaurant he owned.
And after the GOP tabbed current Congressman Dan Donovan to run, she didn’t sit long before becoming Florida Senator Marco Rubio‘s New York presidential campaign director.
For Malliotakis to beat de Blasio is a longshot at best, but Republicans do see a narrow path to victory. And that path widens with every de Blasio trip out of the city and every SUV ride to a Park Slope gym for a late morning workout while voters toil at their nine-to-fives.
Malliotakis clearly doesn’t have de Blasio’s “progressive values.” She doesn’t have a cadre of snarky, identity politics people surrounding her. But she can clearly outwork the legendary lazy de Blasio. She comes off as somewhat defensive, but otherwise is pleasant. More importantly, she isn’t demeaning to the press, an attribute that de Blasio ironically shares with Trump.
While it’s a longshot, funnier things have happened in New York City politics. Just ask Rudy Giuliani, who beat the man who gave de Blasio his start in politics, former one-term Mayor David Dinkins.
But if de Blasio wins re-election as expected, one thing is a sure bet. You can expect to see our mayor on even more out-of-town trips heading into the 2020 campaign for the White House.
It’s who Bill de Blasio is.