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Do you all want to see a personal story about how Michael Bloomberg's political/philanthropic giving exerts influence over liberal Democratic institutions?
In 2011 I was working at the center for american progress, the main democratic party-aligned think tank. I was at the weblog covering Occupy Wall Street. So obviously Bloomberg was a hot topic.
I wrote a story about how Michael Bloomberg's then-girlfriend was on the board of Zucotti Park which is where the protesters were. I noted she was drawing over $100,000 in compensation from them, which to me was a lot of money (money at that point my career I'd never seen).
It turned out CAP was soliciting money from Bloomberg. So its president, Neera Tanden, wrote some emails to me and my boss scolding me over the story.
She asked if we were aware that CAP was soliciting money from Bloomberg. We said yup, we are.
Then she said it was low to go after his girlfriend. I mean, she was pulling in $100,000 from the park he just ordered police to clear of protesters. He deployed riot police to do this!
It was a clear conflict of interest. Then she explained that December was always a tough time of year to be raising money for CAP...
Bloomberg has given tens of millions if not more to liberal organizations, campaigns, nonprofits, I think over the course of his campaign you will find a lot of folks are hesitant to say or do anything critical towards him because he has so much money and he's a giver.
Let's remember he funds basically the entire gun control movement in the US (Everytown, Moms Demand). He also finances...you know...an entire news conglomerate
I don't think Bloomberg has much of a chance winning his race. It's extremely weird to try and win a Democratic primary by entering on Super Tuesday. He'd be better off doing a Perot-style independent run, provided he had popular issue positions (be he doesnt)
But he has more favorable position than anyone else who could possibly try this gambit because a big part of the liberal/Democratic sphere will just lay off of him because he has so much of his money in everyone's pockets. This kind of situation feels unique in American politics
Here's another good example of how fearful Democrats are of offending or insulting Michael Bloomberg (at least publicly) https://theintercept.com/2016/07/27/dnc-insults-muslims-by-giving-michael-bloomberg-a-starring-role-at-convention/
Oh and that time John Podesta, a very loyal Democrat who chaired Clinton's campaign in 2016, endorsed Michael Bloomberg against the Democratic candidate for mayor https://thehill.com/blogs/blog-briefing-room/news/61785-podesta-endorses-bloomberg
To some extent this is what the Bernie Sanders candidacy has been about since 2016. The idea that American politics is dictated by money and the need to raise it. Sanders first candidate in history to prove you dont need big money https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2019/apr/28/bernie-sanders-v-the-democratic-establishment-what-the-battle-is-really-about
Money is how the Dem/Republican establishment operates, it's what Michael Bloomberg, Neera Tanden, Joe Biden, etc. know from working in politics for decades and I can hardly blame them for adopting this view given their experience. But Sanders proved another path is possible too.
Everyone's going to deny it but this is 100 percent true -> https://twitter.com/davidsirota/status/1198346176401006592
It's the same reason only Martin Scorcese was willing to come out and say the Marvel Cinematic Universe movies are meh. Disney owns so much of the market you can't actually afford to offend Bob Iger.
Will anyone ask Bloomberg to divest from all of his business interests and philanthropies as he runs for president? That was a real issue for Trump, Bloomberg is like 50 times richer than Trump.
