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NBC offered a pair of puff pieces to the Big Apple. Anchor Brian Williams profiled hizzoner Michael Bloomberg. Rehema Ellis celebrated the "inspiring turnaround" at a pair of charter schools in Harlem in NBC's What Works series. At the Leadership Village Academy, students log ten-hour school days and are "transformed," testing in the top tier for reading and math.
Williams news hook for his wet kiss for the mayor was that Bloomberg is "mentioned more and more frequently" as a possible Presidential candidate. Bloomberg touted the New York City subway system, the importance of planting trees in city streets, the need to reform Social Security. Williams chipped in with Bloomberg's astonishing wealth--"the diminutive mayor…made his bones as a giant of the financial world"--his advocacy of gun control, his opposition to cigarette smoking, his ban of trans-fats in fast food and his plan to tax cars to reduce traffic congestion.
There was only one sour note in these two smooches. Williams seemed really uncomfortable riding the IRT with Bloomberg. "New Yorkers are not big on eye contact below ground," he observed. "How often does the unthinkable cross your mind?" he asked. "We are under the streets of this city, a lot of people down here--what we hideously, in the terrorism business, call 'soft targets.'" He dressed up his inquiry as a post-September-11th worry, but it came across as old-fashioned claustrophobia.
