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I had to catch a train in Washington last week. The paved street in the traffic circle around Union Station was in such poor condition that I felt as though I was on a roller coaster. I traveled on the Amtrak Acela, our sorry excuse for a fast train, on which I had so many dropped calls on my cellphone that you’d have thought I was on a remote desert island, not traveling from Washington to New York City. When I got back to Union Station, the escalator in the parking garage was broken. Maybe you’ve gotten used to all this and have stopped noticing. I haven’t. Our country needs a renewal.

And that is why I still hope Michael Bloomberg will reconsider running for president as an independent candidate, if only to participate in the presidential debates and give our two-party system the shock it needs.

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Despite that very good spin, Goldman Sachs lost $2 billion worth of market value as its shares fell 3.4 in trading over the course of the day ("oh man, some guy says Goldman Sachs is evil? I HAD NO IDEA" -- the market). Thankfully, one hero stands ready to defend Goldman Sachs from public scorn: New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg.

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On Tuesday, one lucky group of New York City journalists were treated to an evening of drinks, pizza squares, and funny gift exchanges at Mayor Michael Bloomberg's annual Holiday Party for local press.

In attendance this year were reporters from the New York Times, the New York Post, the New York Daily News, CBS, Fox, and other outlets. The journalists, no doubt straining to retain their “objectivity” throughout, were able to schmooze with dignitaries such as Bloomberg’s longtime partner Diana Taylor (who sits on the Board of Directors for Brookfield Properties, the retail firm that partially owns Zuccotti Park) and Paul Browne, spokesperson for the New York City Police Department.

Bloomberg made sure to crack a few jokes at the expense of Occupy Wall Street, whose encampment he ordered forcibly cleared on November 15, by way of a surprise paramilitary style raid. Reporters attempting to cover the police action were harassed, assaulted, and barred from viewing the area -- for their own protection, Bloomberg later claimed. (Congressman Jerrold Nadler, who represents the Financial District, has since called on Attorney General Eric Holder to launch an investigation.) All told, police arrested at least ten journalists.

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Bloomberg, again threatening vaguely to make that presidential run that the American people are decidedly not calling for, told MIT last night that he doesn't even need to be president, because all of his autocratic desires are fulfilled by running America's most populous city as his private fiefdom.

“I have my own army in the NYPD, which is the seventh biggest army in the world. I have my own State Department, much to Foggy Bottom’s annoyance. We have the United Nations in New York, and so we have an entree into the diplomatic world that Washington does not have,” Mayor Bloomberg said.

I'm not entirely sure what he means by having his own "State Department." The city's independent nonprofit tourism agency, maybe? But he didn't mention that his army also comes with its own international (and questionably legal) intelligence-gathering apparatus, just like the CIA and FBI, except without any sort of oversight, congressional or otherwise.

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The mayor held a press conference later to say:  “The First Amendment protects speech.  It doesn’t protect the use of tents and sleeping bags to take over a public space.”  Previously, the mayor had declared:  “New York City is the city where you can come and express yourself.  What was happening in Zuccotti Park was not that.”  The protesters, he went on, had taken over the park, “making it unavailable to anyone else.”  I suppose it could be said that any demonstration makes a given space “unavailable to anyone else.”  And as for “expressing yourself,” well, that’s not what the First Amendment says, either.

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"Bravo to Bloomberg's Occupy Wall Street eviction," goes the headline on its editorial published this morning.

The fact that the eviction was done in violation of a court order doesn't bother them:

The amorphous agglomeration known as Occupy Wall Street had transformed a space intended for open community access into a round-the-clock shantytown — and they claimed that the First Amendment guaranteed their right to do as they pleased.

This is not constitutional wisdom. This is self-important, self-indulgent bilge. And a Manhattan Supreme Court justice who ordered a halt to the eviction pending a hearing needs to emphatically so state.

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This royal order, which made big headlines last week, was all about intimidating imagery. Just as King John had hoped, the iconic photograph to emerge from the sweep was a front-page Denver Post photo of a heavily armed police officer menacingly guarding the Capitol -- a deliberate visual message telling the despot's subjects to retreat or face consequences. He later told a reporter that he was aiming to preemptively crush "something that could easily catch on."

Back on the East Coast, it was much the same, as His Majesty King Michael Bloomberg issued a decree stating that as a benevolent despot, he would "allow" his Manhattan subjects to occupy Wall Street (as if the mayor has the power to grant -- or withhold -- democratic rights). But then King Mike quickly sent his police force in for mass arrests, standing down only after a wave of outrage from the larger serfdom watching on television.

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There is little chance that the protesters will comply with a temporary removal request -- and zero chance that they will willingly leave for good.

Bloomberg briefly visited the park last night, and his office later released a statement declaring, "As the protest has continued, Brookfield has expressed concern about its inability to clean the park and maintain it in a condition fit for public use. Brookfield conveyed these concerns in a letter they sent to the City."

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Deputy Mayor for Operations Cas Holloway explained the decision in a statement last night:

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This is a billionaire despot who weekends in Bermuda and doesn't come home for municipal emergencies; deliberately lands himself recession-blind headlines describing him as "baronial"; makes sure public workers plow his street while the Big Apple's citizens die; and now, most recently, declares that he has the extra-constitutional power to decide who is "allowed" in New York City and who is not. As the New York Times reports (emphasis added):

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Jim VandeHei and famous email newsletter author Mike Allen are spearheading the campaign (which has already been unfavorably reviewed by CJR). Here, they explain why America was crying out for Politico Primary:

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In other words, Bloomberg himself not only controls the NYPD, but also has a hand on the levers of power at Brookfield Properties, the huge real estate firm that owns Zuccoti Park (aka Liberty Square).

Bloomberg's girlfriend is Diana Taylor, a former state banking official who is now an executive at the investment firm Wolfensohn & Co. She has for years been the unofficial first lady of New York. She is also on the board of Brookfield.

The connection was first reported by the blog LittleSis.

I've asked the mayor's press office whether Bloomberg has discussed the protesters and the park with Taylor; I will update this post if I hear back.

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The mood during the afternoon march was elation and a sense that something is happening. Nurses, teamsters, service workers, teachers and bus drivers were all well represented. It remains difficult to impose a simple narrative on Occupy Wall Street, so here are a few thoughts and observations, in no particular order:

The goals question: The union folks at the rally Wednesday were far more demand-oriented than the hardcore occupiers who have been sleeping in lower Manhattan since Sept. 17. The most common theme in the union signs and speechs at the rally outside City Hall was to simply tax the rich. One of the chants I heard was representative: "How do we cut the deficit? End the wars! Tax the rich!"

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Let's start with Mayor Michael Bloomberg, who is at the moment clearly struggling with his natural impulse to throw every protester in jail without charges for the crime in interrupting the business of the city's truly important people. His impassioned plea to the people currently participating in the Occupy Wall Street protest: The banks are our friends!

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Of course, the unsigned editorial is very reasonable. It's a Bloomberg View editorial, and the Bloomberg brand is all post-partisan reasonableness. But the bottom line is that billionaire mayor and hypothetical third-party presidential candidate Michael Bloomberg opposes the Democratic president's plan to raise taxes on billionaires. Why? Out of greed or self-interest? No, of course not! Because it's "silly."

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Here we have the modern political bazaar, and it wouldn't be complete without the most reliably ridiculous troupe of all: the Third-Party Fetishists. Out of all the other sideshows, they are the ones most aggressively ramping up their 2012 act at the moment.

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In his speech, Mr. Bloomberg said state lawmakers have a clear choice: "Do you want to be remembered as a leader on civil rights? Or an obstructionist?"

"On matters of freedom and equality, history has not remembered obstructionists kindly," the mayor said. "Not on abolition. Not on abortion. Not on women's suffrage. Not on workers' rights. Not on civil rights. And it will be no different on marriage rights."

Here's the situation in Albany right now: Marriage equality has passed the Democratic-led state Assembly, as it has multiple times in the past. It's stalled in the Senate, which, as always, is deadlocked. Tempers are flaring. Equality advocates now accuse Republicans of deliberately delaying in order to kill the issue without a vote.

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No doubt "Battle for Brooklyn" will be of most interest to New Yorkers, and particularly to people who live or work in the city's most populous borough. But the film's basic situation -- local residents and community activists vs. the development schemes of major politicians and big business -- is an archetypal element of urban life, one that can be found in almost any city, large or small, from Maine to California. What distinguished kazillionaire developer Bruce Ratner's plan to remake the center of "America's fourth-largest city" (to borrow the boosterish phrase of Brooklyn Borough President Marty Markowitz) was primarily its size and audacity, along with the fact that the ensuing battle turned very ugly and inevitably attracted the attention of the national media, much of which is headquartered a few miles away across the East River.

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But is he actually considering running? So far, all we have in the way of evidence is a report from a friend that Alec thinks Weinergate may give him a chance to slip in among the candidates. The actual quote given from the source/friend of Alec's?

"Alec said, 'Hey, maybe this changes the race. The dynamics have shifted."

Which doesn't mean Baldwin is going to run for anything. He's just like, commenting on the political atmosphere, man. Who isn't right now? It's just pure speculation, until he actually comes out and says something to the press. And even then, it might not mean anything, since he mentions something about running for office every six months or so.

That being said:

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