Bloomberg Attends Third Party Bipartisan Forum
The “bipartisan forum” convened by David L. Boren, the president of the University of Oklahoma and a former Democratic senator, and Sam Nunn, with Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg as the guest of honor.
Last month, the former senators suggested that they would consider urging Mr. Bloomberg to mount an independent presidential campaign if the major-party nominees do not formally embrace bipartisanship to address the nation’s problems.
“Today, we are a house divided,” the two men explained in their invitation. “We believe that the next president must be able to call for a unity of effort by choosing the best talent available — without regard to political party — to help lead the nation.”
Sphere: Related ContentNYTimes: But despite the swirl of speculation around Mr. Bloomberg and his presidential prospects, the mayor spoke only briefly at the panel and gave no hint of whether he might run as an independent. He did not take questions from reporters and left quickly when the event ended so that he could return to New York for the wake on Staten Island tonight
In their invitation to the event, Mr. Boren and Mr. Nunn, also a former Democratic senator, said, “To say the obvious, the presidential debates thus far have produced little national discussion of these and other fundamental issues and plans to address them.”
Yet the panel discussion, with its star-studded political cast and lasting more than an hour, did not produce much discussion of issues, either.
A statement of principles drafted by the participants and read at the start of the panel did not advance any specific proposals, but pointed to a number of problems in terms that, one imagines, few presidential candidates of either party would disagree with: Budget and trade deficits that are “out of control,” 50 million Americans are without medical insurance while “the cost of medical care continues to spiral,” and there is “reckless neglect of our infrastructure.”
“If we don’t solve the process problems, the institutional problems in American politics, none of the rest of this will matter,” Mr. Boren explained. “That’s why we’ve challenged the candidates specifically: Don’t just say, ‘Oh, we’re for bipartisanship.’ Are they ready to appoint a truly bipartisan cabinet like we had in Britain during World War II? Are you ready to set up bipartisan working groups, what I’ve always called mini-cabinets?”
