by Matt Barr

Viewing Giuliani through the lens of Bloomberg

September 11 (and contrarian Reason writers) aside, Rudy Giuliani's burnishment of the Big Apple is rightly celebrated as a historic achievement borne of innovative and strong leadership. Giulani's successor as Mayor, Mike Bloomberg, won a re-election for the ages this week, beating Fernando Ferrer by 20 percent. Fiorello LaGuardia had "only" managed to best Jeremiah Mahoney by 19 points in 1937; Giuliani had his own cakewalk in 1997, a 17 point squeaker. (Owing to higher turnout, Giuliani received more votes in 1997 than Bloomberg did this year.)

How will conventional wisdom use Bloomberg's triumph as a lens through which to view Giuliani's tenure? Things haven't gotten as dramatically better under Bloomberg compared to Giuliani as they did when Giuliani took office from David Dinkins. But pundits are already poking around the question: whether Bloomberg's ability -- which some doubted, possibly even Giuliani himself -- to keep the city clean, safe and prosperous means Rudy wasn't all that. Davidson Goldin writes in the New York Sun today (subscribers or Nexis):

When Mr. Bloomberg took charge nearly four years ago, there was no guarantee the city would continue prospering in the basic ways. Perhaps Mr. Giuliani's success had been unique to his unique leadership style, or a descendant of the economic boom that couldn't survive the bust - or simply a fluke. We simply didn't know, and the September 11 attacks offered only more reason for uncertainty.

But crime is still down, the welfare rolls are still down, the subways are still safe, the streets are still clean(er) and park playgrounds still have places for children to play. With these once-broken wheels of government humming along, Mr. Bloomberg could pursue the policy ideas that most mayors can only dream about.

What's wrong with that? Nothing's wrong with that, and it is a testament to both Bloomberg and Giuliani that Bloomberg's tenure as mayor has been so thoroughly endorsed by New Yorkers. But Giuliani isn't currently (officially) running for anything. The question whether it took Rudy Giuliani to make New York governable again -- a sensible restatement of Goldin's questions above, at least with regard to an economic boom or a fluke -- will surely be answered "no" by opponents in 2008's primaries. A historic Bloomberg triumph gives them more ammunition.

Needless to say, if New York had regressed these last four years, critics would have said Giuliani had no better than papered over the city's real problems. It's not as though a Bloomberg landslide is detrimental to Giuliani's legacy. But the fact remains that it becomes plausible now to fritter away Rudy's waste-reducing, crime-fighting, pro-business reforms, as though it doesn't matter who's Mayor, the city will prosper anyway.

At a minimum, pointing to the greater margin of victory and the more enthusiastic endorsement of city opinion leaders, critics and primary opponents can grudgingly accept New York's renaissance under Giuliani but wonder aloud whether it could have been so much better for so many if only a man like Bloomberg had been in charge in the 90s. When the editors of the New York Times can print "Three other mayors played a part in pulling New York out of its hole. But under Michael R. Bloomberg, everything came together," as they did in "enthusiastically" endorsing Bloomberg, it's evidence not of a short attention span but arguably of an affirmative effort to diminish Bloomberg's predecessor.

Assuming success for Bloomberg in his second term, which we all, including especially Rudy Giuliani, hope for, the reinvention of Rudy will only get worse.

This post cross posted on the Rudy for President blog, where you'll find another post-Election Day wrapup too.

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