It’s troubling that Barack Obama saw fit to shuttle to New Jersey three times to campaign for Democratic incumbent governor John Corzine,(multi-millionaire former CEO of the dreaded Goldman Sachs) but, apparently at the behest of employees, cronies and philanthropic dependents of billionaire New York City mayor and Republican turned independent Mike Bloomberg, he couldn’t bring himself to cross the Hudson River and help out his Democratic challenger, New York City Comptroller Bill Thompson.

Corzine was beaten by five percentage points, 49-44, by Republican challenger Chris Christie. Ditto the other high profile gubernatorial candidate supported by Obama, Virginia’s R. Creigh Deeds, who the President campaigned with twice. Deeds was trounced by Republican Robert F. McDonnell by a 20 point margin. Not so Mike Bloomberg, who after circumventing two referendums in which New York voters approved term limits in order to run for a third term, spent $100 million of his own money and barely squeaked through with a 51,000 vote victory. (Thompson’s campaign spent less than one-tenth what Bloomberg did.)

It’s bad enough that Democrat Obama didn’t see fit to support New York’s Democratic mayoral candidate (who also happens to be a Black man). Even worse is that evidently neither policy differences nor principles influenced his decision. The President bowed to pressure from Bloomberg campaign employees, and assorted Bloomberg beneficiaries, allies, and strange bedfellows, both inside and outside his administration.

According to news reports, Geoffrey Canada, head of the Harlem Children’s Zone and recipient of at least $600,000 in donations from the billionaire mayor, did the mayor’s bidding and called Valerie Jarrett and successfully encouraged her to urge the president not to get involved in the mayor’s race. (You have to wonder why the story that revealed Canada’s involvement and other pressure applied by Bloomberg operatives didn’t run until election day.)

Canada wasn’t alone. Support for Thompson from Democratic elected officials and so-called “Black leaders” was too often tepid or non-existent, whether motivated by moola, access, or a chance to get inside the White House. Al Sharpton, come out, come out wherever you are!

But these “leaders” are fairly useless anyway, and would have been irrelevant if Barack Obama had been present. His enthusiastic endorsement would have grabbed the attention of the electorate, galvanized voters who otherwise stayed home, and very likely have erased Bloomberg’s slim margin of victory. Then we would have awoken to a new mayor with new ideas, instead of four more years of an arrogant, spoiled billionaire who thinks nothing of breaking the rules and using his fortune to buy a third term.

Jill Nelson 11/6/09 – The blog with the musical notes!