Bloomberg: Protesters 'really hurting small businesses and families'
Michael Bloomberg. Azi Paybarah, via flickr
12:35 pm Nov. 2, 20113
Mayor Michael Bloomberg said yesterday that Occupy Wall Street protesters were focusing their attention on the wrong people. And today, Bloomberg said the protesters are "really hurting small businesses and families" with their prolonged stay in Zuccotti Park.
"I think increasingly you’re seeing that the community, businesses and residents in lower Manhattan feel that they are the ones that are being occupied," Bloomberg said, when asked about the protesters at a press event in Central Park, where the mayor helped paint the finish line for the upcoming New York City Marathon.
"This isn’t an occupation of Wall Street, it’s an occupation of a growing, vibrant residential neighborhood in lower Manhattan, and it’s really hurting small businesses and families," he said, according to a transcript of his comments sent to me by someone who was at the event. "I don’t think there’s anybody in the city that has been a stronger defendant of the First Amendment than this administration and I have been. We worked hard to protect the demonstrators’ First Amendment rights, but other people have rights too. And I am very concerned about the other people’s rights, as well as those of the protesters. Last week, as you know, we removed the generators and fuel from Zuccotti Park for safety reasons, and we are constantly monitoring the situation to preserve public safety, and to guarantee the rights of all people in the city. And no one should think that we won’t take actions that we think are appropriate when we think they are appropriate."
The New York Post reported this morning on a cafe that laid off 21 workers after their business declined following the start of the protests on September 17. Bloomberg's remarks today are a return to the tone he took when the protests began, when he said the protesters were trying to "take jobs away from people in this city." He also said at the time that it was "not good for tourism," a viewpoint that has evolved over time.
In recent days, officials who represent the area, including liberals who generally support the aims of the protest, have become increasingly insistent that the ancillary quality-of-life issues created by the protesters be addressed by the city.
Are you kidding ? The businesses and residents of the wall street area are the mega rich .5% of the 1% ... Hell ya they are being occupied. The residents should be embarrassed ... maybe we can see some of these community meetings show up on Youtube. Maybe they should try selling their million dollar apartments. What a joke time to throw this dictator Bloomberg out.
So why doesn't Bloomberg ask his girlfriend, who sits on the board of the park, to comply with city law and evict them? Why does he instead make speeches saying that congress is to blame for the sub-prime mortgage meltdowns (when he knows that in fact it was ACORN, one of the groups now funding the OWS occupation of our downtown park)? Bloomberg, just because you want to be Obama's new treasury secretary, you make New Yorkers deal with a park full of Nazis, Communists, anarchists, CAIR, Hezbollah and Muslim Brotherhood supporters. Thanks a lot.
notit:
So your contention is that ACORN has somehow been in control of the lending policies at all of the major banks and lenders since 2002? Because that's essentially what your assertion means. Whether ACORN is good or evil is completely irrelevant. They do not set SEC or FED policy, and they damn sure don't set mortgage rates or lending standards.
You can try to blame the borrowers all you want, but it's a total copout. Nobody ever got a mortgage unless the bank agreed to lend them the money. It is the BANK's job to make sure it loans in an intelligent manner that mitigates as much risk as possible. It doesn't matter how many idiots out there wanted to buy a million dollar home with a 50K/year income - if they couldn't demonstrate an ability to pay, they should never have gotten the money. Period.