The Perfect Mayor
What follows here is an unpaid, unsolicited, spontaneous endorsement of Carlos Danger for mayor of New York City. Carlos (aka Tony) is perfect for New York. He's trim, loud, and stupid. He is also fabulous and famous; never mind that he made his name as a cyber pecker on the Internet. In a town where name recognition is gold, who cares how you get there?
New York City is the place that gave the nation Woody Allen, David Axelrod, Alec Baldwin, Joy Behar, David Berkowitz, Biggie Smalls, Barbara Boxer, Al Capone, Mickey Cohen, Anderson Cooper, Chris Cuomo, Jimmy Fallon, Louis Farrakhan, Geraldine Farraro, Jane Fonda, Al Franken, Joey Gallo, Vincent Giganti, Whoopi Goldberg, John Gotti, Sammy Gravano, Bob Guccioni, Paris Hilton, and Eric Holder. Fugetaboutit!
Enough said! We shouldn't have to go through the whole alphabet. Although it was a shame to stop before we got to Eliot Spitzer. But, you get the picture. The Big Apple is the iconic urban putz factory, a pricy political schmuck smorgasbord. The great mystery of New York City history is why Al Capone had to go to Chicago to make his bones.
New York and wieners are made for each other. Or should we say Manhattan? When a New Yorker speaks of "downtown" or "the city," he isn't talking about Brooklyn, the Bronx, Queens, or Staten Island. The "city" is Manhattan. The other four boroughs are chopped liver. Pity and self-loathing outside of Manhattan is as New York as Nathans.
In the Parthenon of bizarre, the transition from Michael Bloomberg to Anthony Weiner should be seamless. Bloomberg found his groove as a political hermaphrodite, eventually evolving into a kind of white Marion Barry, a potential mayor-for-life; an ideal predecessor for Weiner, who seems to be a kind of anorexic Andrew Dice Clay, exhibitionist extraordinaire. Bloomberg is best known for handgun promotion and Big Gulp suppression.
The Big Gulp is a pour of carbonated sugar water the size of a trash can. Excess is the most enduring of big city values. Unfortunately, the Big Gulp captured Manhattan at the same time the Big Apple closed all those public restrooms at subway stops and in public parks.
If truth were told, all those public johns were hijacked by public Johns, urbane New Yorkers who hope to get lucky in toilets. The municipal outhouse became hookup hangouts. Before you knew it, unzipping was, like "wilding," a spectator sport. As they like to say; "If you can make it there, you can make it anywhere."
Instead of culling the Johns, the City closed the cans. After all, the al fresco sex crowd votes too. Today, you have to be a transit cop or Parks Department employee to take a pee in a public privy.
In short, New Yorkers are of two persuasions: those who do not think the Big Gulp is a national security threat and would like to deal with the inevitable consequences in private; and those who see a pissoir as a social laboratory where alternative lifestyles might be pursued. Carlos Danger is champion for the latter.
Alas, downtown urination is always a sometimes thing. Where to go, to go, is every cliff dwellers dilemma. Nobody takes a leak at the the Algonquin without investing in two or three gimlets. Indeed, Manhattan restaurants are the arbiters of global restaurant protocol; mandating etiquette like jackets and cravats, shoes, gratuities included no substitutions, and "restrooms for patrons only." Peeing at the Plaza without a reservation is out of the question.
So, downtown bladders have to look north and east for a free-range pit stop. Fortunately, you can urinate in almost any public space up in the Bronx and out in Brooklyn. Still, the other boroughs are not about to become privies for the Tiffany crowd. The Big Gulp had to go.
So there you have it, Bloomberg's legacy in a nutshell. The Big Gulp and the big city public toilet are history. Now what can we expect from Carlos Danger?
Campaign innovations are a safe bet. For the first time in urban campaigning, we can expect to see truth, and genitals, in advertising. Weiner's junk made him the man he is. Why tinker with success? Of course, there is some potential for backlash. Upon seeing a cut Willy, some voters might argue that the mohel threw away the wrong piece. Politics is, after all, ever a game of flinches.
Nonetheless, a wiener campaign serves yet another constituency, bird watchers. In the big city, a bird watcher is a flasher voyeur. NYC flashers are municipal buskers of a sort, and like many street performers, they have a following. Indeed, the Big Apple voyeur vote may never have to go to Central Park or Battery Park again to see a flasher. Strap hangers and bird watchers need only look up in any subway car to see a hairy canary.
All of this pales compared to the real bonus to be had when Weiner gets to Gracie Mansion. Anthony brings a bride to the game. Not just any girl, but Huma (does not rhyme with hummer) Abedin, Hilary Clinton's former right-hand man.
Here we must digress for lineage.
Anthony Weiner is a Billy Clinton protégé and Mrs. Weiner, aka Huma, is a Hilary protégé. The young Clintons were John F. Kennedy groupies. JFK, you might recall, was our first Oval Office voyeur. He used to like to peek while Camelot staffers diddled interns in the White House pool. When Clinton got to Washington, he honored the Kennedy legacy by playing 'kiss and swell' with interns too. Alas, Clinton's hobby morphed into 'kiss and tell.' Monica couldn't keep her mouth closed.
We would be remiss not to point out that Carlos Danger is the inevitable issue of progressive political evolution. Weiner, like any good molt, has an unassailable single-party pedigree. And for a New Yorker, he is only a few ticks below average. More importantly, he's Left on all the big issues of the day. And let's face it, what is democracy if not a look in the mirror. The Big Apple loves tube steak and Weiner loves the City.
Back to Huma. She is everything that Anthony is not; attractive, articulate, discrete, and intelligent. Not that Carlos is ugly, but he does have a nose that gets to the office five minutes before Anthony. Pinocchio works for any politician. Some say that it's hard to see what Huma sees in Tony. Wrong question! Better to ask who might be using whom?
The Weiner/Abidin union is a kind of sub rosa "two state" solution; a coming together of Jews and Arabs. Think of the possibilities. If the Huma paradigm goes global, Jewish men mated to Muslim women, the Mideast conundrum solves itself in a couple of generations. The Jews will be gone -- and we will have a "no state" solution, thank you.
Alas, mayor's wife is not the end game for Mrs. Danger. When Mrs. William Clinton gets back to Pennsylvania Avenue, Huma is in the catbird's seat for a cabinet post. With Manhattan on Madam Weiner's resume, Secretary of State is a pretty good bet. New York is ripe with all things foreign. And think of Anthony, as you do Bill, door mats laid before a better world. When you pair Tony's licentious liberality with Huma's irridentist Islamism, you can see the future: a world blessed with briskets and burkhas. Anthony Weiner and the Big Apple may not be a match made in paradise, but Mecca or Medina is close enough. And as for a flash mayor at Gracie Mansion; what's not to like? Vote for Carlos -- no stranger to danger.
G. Murphy Donovan is a graduate of Cardinal Hayes High School in the south Bronx, the progressive academy that expelled George Carlin for having a sense of humor.