Up to their same
old dirty tricks

Mike Lupica

You want to know the latest con, maybe the last he needs, from Michael Bloomberg on this stadium deal for the Jets? Just follow Bloomberg's own words, even if it is clear by now that this mayor will say anything to get what he wants. Suddenly, this close to the vote from the International Olympic Committee vote on the site for the 2012 Summer Games, Bloomberg - and his cheerleaders on the editorial pages - are telling you that the Olympics aren't essential to getting this stadium deal done.

Really?

When did we make that turn for home, exactly?

Because it has been the Olympics or bust all the way, from Bloomberg and Governor George Pataki and Deputy Mayor Daniel Doctoroff, who seems to have disappeared into the Federal Witness Protection Program. It was that way with all the boys from NYC2012 like Jay Kriegel, who used to be somebody in the John Lindsay administration about a hundred years ago, and now seems thrilled these days to have a regular paycheck and something to do. Like spend your tax money and tell you that it's real good for you. Another phony on the take here.

But this all starts with the imperial mayor of New York. As recently as the other day, Bloomberg was actually quoted in the New York Times as saying that if we don't do everything in our power to get the Olympics, we will have failed America. Wow. I knew we were supposed to believe we were very bad New Yorkers if we didn't go along with Bloomberg and all his political flunkies on this boondoggle.

Now we're unpatriotic.

These guys play rough, even when talking out of both sides of their mouths.

Everybody acts as if the postponing of Friday's vote by the Public Authorities Control Board was some sort of time-buying victory for Bloomberg and Pataki. Here is the reality of what happened. Assembly Speaker Shelly Silver, who is still hanging tough as he should on this, let Pataki know that if he forced this vote now, that Silver was going to call a 1 o'clock press conference announcing he was voting no on the $300 million that Bloomberg and Pataki need from this obscure controls board to move forward.

After that there was a real big dustup between the governor and the mayor, with each of them wanting the other guy to deliver what they saw as this terrible news to the public. Bloomberg lost. Imagine how crestfallen Jay Cross of the Jets felt, thinking he was this close to paydirt. And I do mean paydirt. Cross is called team president of the Jets. It is the funniest and most misleading job description in town. He doesn't know whether a football is blown up or stuffed. He was given this job to get a stadium in Manhattan built for Woody Johnson. I am told that if this stadium deal goes through, Cross might eventually get as much as $20 million from Woody Johnson.

Really, though, Cross is no different than Bloomberg and Doctoroff, the developers' boy, and everybody else involved in this monumental con:

He's doing it for Jets fans, Cross says.

Sure he is.

Cross is just one more developer for whom Bloomberg and Doctoroff want to roll over. Forget about the Jets for the moment. Listen to what you are being told, in the late innings. After two years, you are now told that the Olympics would just be the cherry on top of the ice cream sundae. After all the threats and bullying and smoke and mirrors, after everything All the Mayor's Men have said, now they change the game one more time. Why? Because we have been playing by their rules all along, that's why.

Now Shelly Silver and Joe Bruno, if they have the guts to stand in there all the way, are all the taxpayers have left. Everybody just assumes Silver in particular doesn't have the stomach for this fight, that he will cave over this weekend and give Bloomberg what he wants.

And it is only an outrage that the redevelopment of downtown Manhattan is seen as some sort of bargaining chip. Somebody should tell Silver that he will be remembered better for standing up to these guys than he ever will be for getting more office buildings built downtown.

Shelly Silver and Joe Bruno should know they have their personal honor on the line here. They have the ability not to look bought and paid for, which is all this mayor understands. They should hang tough until the end, despite the representation from Bloomberg's best bootlickers that Silver and Bruno are somehow bad and only the mayor is good. They should keep saying the only thing that has ever made sense:

If you get the Olympics, we will build you this stadium.

If not, go build your football stadium in Queens, where it belonged all along.

Only in Bloomberg's New York - he probably thinks that has a nice ring to it - is a stadium for the Jets the only way to develop the Hudson Railyards, the only way to create jobs, the only way to grow the city. Bloomberg will say anything. Now he says the 2012 Games some kind of sidebar, that jobs are the issue. To the end, he only tries to con everybody on this obsession of his when his lips are moving. He has turned out to be a smalltimer with big money. Silver and Bruno have the chance to be better.