What We Learn From The Multidimensional Ed Koch
As a kid growing up in the ’70s and ’80s, there were usually only two names coming out of the news-cycle from the Big Apple…George Steinbrenner and Ed Koch. That’s right, the owner of the Yankees and the mayor of New York, New York (the town so nice they named it twice or possibly the founders weren’t that creative, who knows?)
Koch, who died last week, was truly a maverick politician and completely unpredictable; which made him a joy to watch…albeit from a distance. When asked to define himself, he responded that he was a ‘liberal with sanity.’ Some would find it odd that Charles Manson described himself in the same way.
If there were ever a politician who was all things to all people…it very well may have been Koch. This is the guy who won his second term as the NY mayor while running on both the Democratic and Republican ticket. Democrats hated him because he supported the death penalty while Republicans loved him…because he supported the death penalty. The man had the chutzpah to endorse George W. Bush for the Oval Office in 2004, which in liberal-minded New York is a cardinal sin. In ’08 Koch endorsed Obama, then rescinded in ’10, gave it back to Barack in November of ’12 and then criticized BHO last month for backing off the Israeli/USA relationship. I haven’t seen this much yo-yo-ing since Bill Clinton was with Hillary..then Gennifer…then Hillary…then Paula…then Hillary…then Monica…then Hillary.
Regardless, Mayor Ed was able to mix it up over the smallest issues. In 1984 he resisted the idea of New York City adding a second area code, for fear it may divide the city. I don’t believe that Koch thought it would be a model for a Hotel Rwanda Hutu vs. Tutsi type of thing; but this New York we are talking about here, so maybe he knew what he was doing after all.
The tagline of Overrant is a George Will quote…’convictions cause conflict’, and that was surely the case with Mayor Ed Koch. He was a life-long Democrat but he stayed to the middle…not to secure votes but because he had convictions. You have to respect that regardless of your political slant.
Read more: http://overrant.com
