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American Morning

Mike Bloomberg Is Not Giuliani II

Aired December 31, 2001 - 08:24   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

REGIS PHILBIN, "LIVE" CO-HOST: Well Rudy Giuliani will always be a special person in my heart. He came to this city when it was pretty bleak and almost single-handedly rebuilt the city, turned it into a more civilized place, cleaned it up, made it a happier town. He really did some remarkable things, and I'll always be indebted to him for making this a better, safer place to live, and I'll always remember him as being one of the champions of our time. Good job Rudy. We're going to miss you.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

LEON HARRIS, CNN ANCHOR: Well can you imagine being Mike Bloomberg right now? Well Mr. Bloomberg has never been mayor before. In fact, you know he's never held any public office before, but he is ready to follow in Rudy Giuliani's footsteps, but stand on his own two feet in the process. That job might seem like a tall order to some, but not to Bloomberg.

One certain award-winning political reporter who knows Giuliani and Bloomberg well is Marcia Kramer and she's covered politics in New York for the last 20 years or so, and she is with our affiliate, WCBS- TV in New York. Folks may also know that Marcia is the reporter who asked Bill Clinton if he inhaled, and she joins us this morning. Happy New Year to you. How are you?

MARCIA KRAMER, CNN AFFILIATE, WCBS-TV: Happy New Year Leon. How are you?

HARRIS: I'm fine. Thanks for joining us today. Listen, I was just -- I just had something whispered to me about we were talking about when Mike Bloomberg is going to be sworn in. I understand that it's not going to happen after midnight tonight. When does it happen?

KRAMER: No actually -- it actually happens at 11:00 today when he goes to the city clerk's office and pays believe it or not, the princely sum of 15 cents and he becomes the mayor of the city of New York. It goes back 100 years. It's a standing city tradition -- that you go to the city clerk's office, you pay 15 cents, and then you become mayor of the city of New York. No 15 cents, you're never mayor.

HARRIS: Yes. KRAMER: So he's going -- 11:00 he's going to pay his money and he's going to be mayor and then know whatever happens, he still will be the mayor of this city of New York if you know anything goes wrong with the swearing in at midnight tonight.

HARRIS: Yes, funny how that works out. They raise the fees -- politicians do on everybody else, but not on themselves -- 15 cents ...

KRAMER: There you go, 15 cents.

(CROSSTALK)

HARRIS: So this is not a deal that's got anything to do with security concerns or anything.

KRAMER: No they've done it, you know year-after-year. I mean it's a standing tradition in New York City government, but every time it happens, people are always surprised because they think, you know, why do you have to go to the city clerk's office and it's just tradition in the city of New York.

HARRIS: Yes.

KRAMER: So 11:00 today he's officially the mayor and Giuliani's no longer the mayor.

HARRIS: Now -- so tell us about this man, Mike Bloomberg, because you know I don't think that we have seen -- I know I haven't seen very much about him as a person at all in the press, even though this man was, you know, in the forefront of getting plenty of coverage when he was running for the office here. What do you know about this man as a person and how he fits into the office?

KRAMER: Well you know I had a very interesting conversation with him the other day when he told me that he's very much aware of the success that Ed Koch (ph) had as mayor and the success that Rudy Giuliani had as mayor. And what he says is that both of these people were larger than life; that they were very much concerned about fighting for the city, and Mike Bloomberg says that he knows that the people of New York expect a mayor to fight for the city; to be combative; and he's going to be combative for the people of the city of New York. I think you're going to see him develop as a larger than life personality -- much as you saw Ed Koch or Rudy Giuliani develop.

HARRIS: Yes but see they were also combative in controversial and sometimes outrageous characters. Are you saying that he's going to transform himself into this kind of character?

KRAMER: Well you know, he's a different stripe of cat. He comes from Massachusetts and he even told me the other day that he -- of his two parents, his father was outgoing; his mother was much more uptight, and he says he takes after his mother. But he says he understands that the play on the stage in New York, you have to push yourself to be a character, and I think that what we're going to see is that he's going to push himself to be a character and fit in with New Yorkers.

HARRIS: Yes. Well I know one thing he's done is to establish his own character, if you will, is this idea of him staying where he -- where he lives right now. He's not going to be moving into Gracie Mansion the historic...

KRAMER: No.

HARRIS: ... residence of New York Mayors past. Why not and is that going to be any source of controversy there do you think?

KRAMER: Well he's not going to move in because he likes the house he lives in on the upper east side. He's got a beautiful townhouse, but you know, listen, Mike Bloomberg has decided he's not going to be Giuliani II. He's going to be Mike Bloomberg, and I think there's no greater sign of his trying to strike out on his won than the fact that he picked Al Lyter, a pitcher for the New York Mets, to be the master of ceremonies at his inauguration. I mean Rudy Giuliani was the Yankees ...

HARRIS: That's right.

KRAMER: ... I'm picking a Met pitcher. Now look, this isn't an actor. This isn't a guy who's trained to do any kind of master ceremonies, but he picked a pitcher for the New York Mets because he wants to say I'm on my own person and I'm not Rudy Giuliani and I think that's a really strong message.

HARRIS: Well, that alliance with the -- with the -- with the mayor's office has done well for the Yankees. The Mets are probably going to look and see if that's some sort of good talisman for them. Well -- but as I understand it, though, he's also got a different problem -- speaking of sports allegiances here, he's still a Boston Celtics fan you say?

KRAMER: He's still a Boston Celtics fan. In fact he gave me this whole long big lecture about how basketball is a much more cerebral sport than baseball, and that he grew up under a Celtics -- I'm going to remember this now -- Red Auerbach.

HARRIS: That's the man. That's the man.

KRAMER: Red Auerbach and I guess Bob Cuzzi (ph) is another man -- you know this is ...

HARRIS: There you go.

KRAMER: ... you know this is before my time, thank God. But he loved the team. He loved the dynamics of the team and that's the sport that he likes. But I think you're going to see it in everything that he does. I mean this is a man who's decided that he needs to travel to the beat of his own drum here in New York and that New Yorkers who have accepted these larger than life characters on the stage before, are going to accept him with his own character, which he hopes to make larger than life.

HARRIS: All right.

KRAMER: I mean look what he's going to do at City Hall. He's going to reconfigure all of City Hall so that he can have a different kind of management style where he sits in the middle of a large room with all of his advisers in the same room.

HARRIS: Yes. Finally, real quickly if you can, what is going to be his first mission though -- the first thing that he establishes as the issue that puts him on the map there.

(CROSSTALK)

HARRIS: Any idea?

KRAMER: Absolutely schools -- he's going to try -- well, he's got to -- he's got to solve the budget crisis; he's got a $4 billion budget gap and then he's going to try to fix New York City schools, which is an incredibly difficult task.

HARRIS: He's going to have to solve that problem with the Boston Celtics first Marcia. That's just -- take it from me from being on the outside looking in -- OK?

KRAMER: OK.

HARRIS: Marcia Kramer of WCBS TV in New York. Thank you very much, appreciate the time this morning. Happy New Year to you.

KRAMER: You too.

HARRIS: All right.

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