Name: New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg Can't Fix The Knicks | David Letterman
Uploaded: 2025-11-03T16:00:39.000Z
Description: Watch the stand-up comedy video 'New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg Can't Fix The Knicks | David Letterman' from Letterman on Comedy Buff. Published 2025-11-03. Transcript available.

Watch the stand-up comedy video 'New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg Can't Fix The Knicks | David Letterman' from Letterman on Comedy Buff. Published 2025-11-03. Transcript available.

welcome to the uh program let me ask you first of all we it's taken you 28
years to invite me
no that's not true you know that's not true we invite you every day you're very
busy you've been
kind enough to be on the show several times but now you're a guest but the last
time i gave your
beard a key to the city that's right which we want back incidentally okay you
can have it you can
have it back um now we we always say the greatest city in the world explain to
people why in fact
this is the greatest city of the world because you do your show here yeah be
beyond that it's the big apple it's where things happen ed koch once said this
is where the world
comes to audition and things do start out here it's very diverse it's very big
it's a fun place to be
and it is safe and uh when you mentioned ed koch when you look back at mayors
that you have been
aware of in the city who did you admire who do you think did a good job well i
think each one of them
builds on what their predecessor left them left them and leaves some stuff to
be done and if you go
back and look at each one they made a contribution and if you think i'm going
to get between no i've won
a handful of things in the last nine years yeah i was thinking well this is
quite a a politician's answer
to a question uh now the other thing that i've noticed uh now after the attacks
uh on the city
and also washington obviously the skyline changed but in addition to that sad
change i have noticed over
the years that just generally new york city has a different look to it am i
right about that yeah people
are building here people are coming here uh world trade center area is being
rebuilt i was down there
today uh but you go throughout all five boroughs and this that what's changed
is people used to
leave the city because the schools weren't good today people in nassau county
lie about where they
live so they can send kids to new york city public schools is that right yeah
and uh in terms of the
ground zero project uh are we still in the middle of the controversy about
whether there will be a mosque
there whether there won't be a mosque well the issue is simply should the
government be involved
i happen to believe the first amendment says if you want to build a place of
worship pray any ways you
want to pray anybody you want to pray government shouldn't be involved whether
anybody has the
money to do it and they'll do it i don't know
and what what uh the outcome of that will be what as you see it now what is the
status these days
um the world trade center memorial is almost done it'll be done a year from now
other buildings are
going up uh what will be built in the surrounding neighborhoods i don't know
there is a mosque that
has been there for a few years there's another one just a few block more blocks
away uh but this is new
new york city so you have adult uh bars and you have all different kinds of
things that you'd expect
in a big city where are these adult bars you speak of where i guarantee you
there's an app on your ipad that'll tell you
oh my gosh um you rode the subway up here i did you frequently ride the subway
every day yeah and uh
you know with your driving record maybe you should ride this okay okay
my son is fascinated by the subway i think all kids love it it's very exciting
yep very exotic you go
downstairs and ride a big train and stuff like that do you do you ever you must
talk to people uh
the voters uh people that give you tips and criticism um they have suggestions
the uh one that's the most
important was some guy screamed at me fix the knicks i think i'm a good mayor
but i'm not that good yeah
but can't can't you can't you intervene now i know did your office take part in
the lebron james
shootout were you involved i said a number of nice things about lebron i filmed
lebron come on and all
that sort of stuff was worth zero yeah not that it makes much difference but do
you have an opinion on
his choice why uh uh if it wasn't new york then uh it was a bad choice i
thought uh i honestly thought
the guy should just stay in cleveland for another another segment on his
contract try it again there
be a hero and then maybe he'd be free to move around after that well he didn't
call me and ask me my
advice but you uh how did you get so damn rich
the truth of the matter is i was lucky enough to get fired really fired from
from my last job and
then i started a company and that worked out you know okay what was the job
from which you get fired
i was working on wall street yeah and they said it's not working anymore take a
hike um they weren't
that nice no actually they were and and so then you started uh the first i knew
of it was some sort of
news bureau in tokyo is that am i right about that it's a news bureau here and
in tokyo and in 60
countries around the world right and what was the seed of that idea where did
that come from uh because
at the company that i'd worked for before solomon brothers i'd built a similar
system and then they
didn't want to keep it going and i said well maybe i'd go off and they said
fine go off and do it on
your own and it certainly worked didn't it so far i saw a thing today where and
it's probably
embarrassing you're like the tenth wealthiest person in the world or something
that's not embarrassing
yeah what am i what am i talking about try it sometime yeah i could well uh and
and then people
like uh uh bill and melinda gates their foundation uh they're talking about uh
people of your financial
status uh should uh readily divest uh half of what they're worth and i know you
agree with that as
well right um when we see each other after the show backstage i was hoping you'd
sign the pledge too
i'll sign right i go if that meant you and i could go places together i would
be happy to go places
together straight to the poorhouse probably uh what did how would you have
handled the uh the economic
explosion or whatever you want to call it of two years ago did did the
administration do what was
needed to be done more or less what would you have done i think when everything
came apart the
administration had to do it hank paulson and uh bernacki were the real heroes
uh if the banking system had
fallen apart the repercussions would have been horrendous for not only our
economy and everybody
else after that congress got involved in the stimulus and that debatable
whether or not that made a
difference but we'll see with time yeah and and uh new york things look pretty
good i'm guessing today
we this year we have generated 10 of all the private sector jobs in the country
wow all the new ones
wow 100 of those in the city that's a remarkable statistic well because people
come here they want
to be here they come because of shows like yours because of all the other
culture adult bars adult
bars adult bars are clearly part of it that's what capitalism is all about uh
they come because the
streets are safe and clean and the schools are getting better speaking of
streets what what happened
to broadway i remember uh you you and i were showed up at a thing together and
one of your assistants or
aides came up to me and uh he said everything all right and i said yeah except
the mayor's turned
broadway into a petting zoo what the hell's going on it is we don't stop at petting
in the city
but it's explain what broadway is now and how it's improved uh not only the
quality of life but the
economy of the area well broadway is a big tourist magnet people come and they
can walk they go into
the stores they sit they have a cup of coffee they socialize with each other it's
a big magnet and the
stores love it because there's more foot traffic and actually traffic is better
because a diagonal
street really screws everything up so now you're back to the old straight and
square streets and they're
working very well and traffic has improved or it's just gotten worse somewhere
else no you can actually
it's interesting you can measure it because when you get in a cab it sends a
signal to the central
dispatch and then when you get out it sends it and so we can measure how long
it takes to get from one
point to another and the computer says on balance or throughout the city
traffic's a little bit better
so so you're telling me that the cab traffic is actually monitored via
computers yeah sure and the nice
thing is if you were to forget your suitcase in a cab just call 311 they'll ask
you where you got the into
the cab where you got out and we'll call the cab driver and get your luggage
back now that's a joke
right no it happens all the time it really does it really does it really does
no sure because the cab
driver knows that we know being monitor that it was in there and they it's
amazing how the light of day
makes people honest and do you do you you um you're in your third third term
third and you you love this
job i'm guessing right i get the feeling that people who get the the privilege
of running this
city really fall in love with the well but you like your job it comes through
and i love mine yeah sure
yeah yeah and thoughts after you uh or how many terms is going to be another
this no public would
not stand for another one but i was thinking actually my next career maybe
something like a
talk show maybe 11 35 at night on cbs something like that
uh keep thinking um uh uh what was i going to ask you oh in terms of uh of uh
of uh running uh oh
the tea party what do you what do you think of the tea party well people are
annoyed people are
frustrated people are disappointed in government both sides of the aisle both
ends of pennsylvania avenue and
every once in a while we have these groups that get together and say i'm not
going to take it anymore
and try to change it you saw that with perot you saw that with mccain i think
this is another one
some of these people will get elected and then once in office they'll realize
that anger is not a
strategy to manage or to govern and they'll drift more towards the middle and
hopefully function i i thought
when this happened it's the perfect american thing to have done people like you
mentioned unhappy they're
losing money the jobs are going away of course they're unhappy we are all
unhappy so they want to
change and do something about it so now i feel like they're more than welcome
to get in there and try
to do something about they have to have real ideas they have to ideas that are
legal and practical and
that they could get other senators and congressmen to agree to because they'd
have to build a constituency
to pass them and get the president on board so he doesn't veto it it's not easy
you got to implement
and that's not governing is not easy nothing is easy and and is it is it beyond
uh governing this country
it seems like the problems now are greater than they've ever well you know my
mother's 101 and
she'll tell you the good old days were never the good old days yeah that things
really are better we
just don't remember it that way and i still think this is the most wonderful
country in the world this
is the land of opportunity and what we've got to do is make sure we have more
immigrants coming here
because that challenges all of us and creates jobs we've got to fix the fiscal
problem social security and
cost of medical care and those kinds of things and we've got to improve public
education so
the people who are unemployed will have the skills to match the jobs that are
available and that's
what does not exist today your mother is 101 yep that's amazing congratulations
to you and to your mother
i can't thank you enough now i know i every now and then there's an article
about you in one of the papers
and uh i know you own a home in in london well which do you prefer new york
what are you doing in london
honestly what um what goes on over there i don't know i mean they have a queen
we have queens
you know they have beef eaters we have beef eaters i don't know yeah uh okay
you put some thought into
this i can see absolutely uh what's the problem in albany are things all right
in albany things are
not all right in all things are not all right what are we going to do in albany
uh hopefully replace a
lot of people because that's the only ways to fix it yeah fiscally how are
things in albany disaster
yeah uh a job you might be interested in no terrible job really why is it a
terrible because
i've got the best job in the world the city you can meet everybody you can talk
to everybody the
state is so spread out as governor it's really hard to do also mayors around
this country every mayor
will tell you they have the best job because you actually can do some things
governors and presidents
reallocate monies and things like that but mayors work right you know closing
roads and putting
dumpsters outside your house and things like that and we mentioned earlier ram
emmanuel wants to be
mayor of chicago is that is that a good fit do you know him much uh i know him
very well i don't know
whether he's made the decision to do so he's talked about it before i can tell
you richie daly was one
of the great mayors in history for the whole country he really did a
spectacular and we we often hear
uh rumblings that you're going to join the obama administration or that there
might be even an
exploration into running for president any of this of interest to you uh none
really no i mean i've
got the best job in the world right although i have a job that uh john lindsay
said was the second
toughest job in the world the first being uh the president yeah but then ronald
reagan said the way
lindsay does it it is yeah but the kind of thing i like about you is uh there's
no equivocating with
you we get it left we get it right but we get it by god and uh we shut up and
we take it
right that's exactly right i respect other people's right to be wrong
what's the deal what's the deal with i got two questions what are we going to
do about the rats
honest to god there's like 10 million rats on on manhattan forget the other bros
and and the bed
bugs what what are we going to do uh we're going to try to export them
elsewhere yeah but the rats came
in you brought the rats in to kill the bed bugs is that what it was uh actually
the bed bugs are probably
tougher is is this uh alarming or just something that's uh fun to report in the
paper no it's fun
reporting the papers the bed bugs nobody knows why they came back they've
almost been eradicated
but rats are a function of every major city and keep going after them and keep
it under control which
will never eradicate them you know uh i i read uh recently a book about uh a
colony more than a
colony perhaps uh communities of people who actually live uh beneath the the
streets here in manhattan
do you know that to be a fact uh that is not true it's not true it is not true
there are about 2500
people that live in the city on the subways and the streets that sort of thing
we interface with all
of them all the time they have substance abuse or psychiatric problems and we
try to bring them in
and give them counseling but they go back on the streets and if you take a look
at the 2500 it's like
one out of every 3500 in the in the in the city because we have 8.4 million
people that is dramatically
less than any other big city yeah well i will say uh personally in all the
years that i've been here
in new york city it's never been better oh you're nice thank you very much
thank you for your time
always a pleasure thank you mayor michael bloomberg ladies gentlemen

New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg Can't Fix The Knicks | David Letterman

welcome to the uh program let me ask you first of all we it's taken you 28
years to invite me
no that's not true you know that's not true we invite you every day you're very
busy you've been
kind enough to be on the show several times but now you're a guest but the last
time i gave your
beard a key to the city that's right which we want back incidentally okay you
can have it you can
have it back um now we we always say the greatest city in the world explain to
people why in fact
this is the greatest city of the world because you do your show here yeah be
beyond that it's the big apple it's where things happen ed koch once said this
is where the world
comes to audition and things do start out here it's very diverse it's very big
it's a fun place to be
and it is safe and uh when you mentioned ed koch when you look back at mayors
that you have been
aware of in the city who did you admire who do you think did a good job well i
think each one of them
builds on what their predecessor left them left them and leaves some stuff to
be done and if you go
back and look at each one they made a contribution and if you think i'm going
to get between no i've won
a handful of things in the last nine years yeah i was thinking well this is
quite a a politician's answer
to a question uh now the other thing that i've noticed uh now after the attacks
uh on the city
and also washington obviously the skyline changed but in addition to that sad
change i have noticed over
the years that just generally new york city has a different look to it am i
right about that yeah people
are building here people are coming here uh world trade center area is being
rebuilt i was down there
today uh but you go throughout all five boroughs and this that what's changed
is people used to
leave the city because the schools weren't good today people in nassau county
lie about where they
live so they can send kids to new york city public schools is that right yeah
and uh in terms of the
ground zero project uh are we still in the middle of the controversy about
whether there will be a mosque
there whether there won't be a mosque well the issue is simply should the
government be involved
i happen to believe the first amendment says if you want to build a place of
worship pray any ways you
want to pray anybody you want to pray government shouldn't be involved whether
anybody has the
money to do it and they'll do it i don't know
and what what uh the outcome of that will be what as you see it now what is the
status these days
um the world trade center memorial is almost done it'll be done a year from now
other buildings are
going up uh what will be built in the surrounding neighborhoods i don't know
there is a mosque that
has been there for a few years there's another one just a few block more blocks
away uh but this is new
new york city so you have adult uh bars and you have all different kinds of
things that you'd expect
in a big city where are these adult bars you speak of where i guarantee you
there's an app on your ipad that'll tell you
oh my gosh um you rode the subway up here i did you frequently ride the subway
every day yeah and uh
you know with your driving record maybe you should ride this okay okay
my son is fascinated by the subway i think all kids love it it's very exciting
yep very exotic you go
downstairs and ride a big train and stuff like that do you do you ever you must
talk to people uh
the voters uh people that give you tips and criticism um they have suggestions
the uh one that's the most
important was some guy screamed at me fix the knicks i think i'm a good mayor
but i'm not that good yeah
but can't can't you can't you intervene now i know did your office take part in
the lebron james
shootout were you involved i said a number of nice things about lebron i filmed
lebron come on and all
that sort of stuff was worth zero yeah not that it makes much difference but do
you have an opinion on
his choice why uh uh if it wasn't new york then uh it was a bad choice i
thought uh i honestly thought
the guy should just stay in cleveland for another another segment on his
contract try it again there
be a hero and then maybe he'd be free to move around after that well he didn't
call me and ask me my
advice but you uh how did you get so damn rich
the truth of the matter is i was lucky enough to get fired really fired from
from my last job and
then i started a company and that worked out you know okay what was the job
from which you get fired
i was working on wall street yeah and they said it's not working anymore take a
hike um they weren't
that nice no actually they were and and so then you started uh the first i knew
of it was some sort of
news bureau in tokyo is that am i right about that it's a news bureau here and
in tokyo and in 60
countries around the world right and what was the seed of that idea where did
that come from uh because
at the company that i'd worked for before solomon brothers i'd built a similar
system and then they
didn't want to keep it going and i said well maybe i'd go off and they said
fine go off and do it on
your own and it certainly worked didn't it so far i saw a thing today where and
it's probably
embarrassing you're like the tenth wealthiest person in the world or something
that's not embarrassing
yeah what am i what am i talking about try it sometime yeah i could well uh and
and then people
like uh uh bill and melinda gates their foundation uh they're talking about uh
people of your financial
status uh should uh readily divest uh half of what they're worth and i know you
agree with that as
well right um when we see each other after the show backstage i was hoping you'd
sign the pledge too
i'll sign right i go if that meant you and i could go places together i would
be happy to go places
together straight to the poorhouse probably uh what did how would you have
handled the uh the economic
explosion or whatever you want to call it of two years ago did did the
administration do what was
needed to be done more or less what would you have done i think when everything
came apart the
administration had to do it hank paulson and uh bernacki were the real heroes
uh if the banking system had
fallen apart the repercussions would have been horrendous for not only our
economy and everybody
else after that congress got involved in the stimulus and that debatable
whether or not that made a
difference but we'll see with time yeah and and uh new york things look pretty
good i'm guessing today
we this year we have generated 10 of all the private sector jobs in the country
wow all the new ones
wow 100 of those in the city that's a remarkable statistic well because people
come here they want
to be here they come because of shows like yours because of all the other
culture adult bars adult
bars adult bars are clearly part of it that's what capitalism is all about uh
they come because the
streets are safe and clean and the schools are getting better speaking of
streets what what happened
to broadway i remember uh you you and i were showed up at a thing together and
one of your assistants or
aides came up to me and uh he said everything all right and i said yeah except
the mayor's turned
broadway into a petting zoo what the hell's going on it is we don't stop at petting
in the city
but it's explain what broadway is now and how it's improved uh not only the
quality of life but the
economy of the area well broadway is a big tourist magnet people come and they
can walk they go into
the stores they sit they have a cup of coffee they socialize with each other it's
a big magnet and the
stores love it because there's more foot traffic and actually traffic is better
because a diagonal
street really screws everything up so now you're back to the old straight and
square streets and they're
working very well and traffic has improved or it's just gotten worse somewhere
else no you can actually
it's interesting you can measure it because when you get in a cab it sends a
signal to the central
dispatch and then when you get out it sends it and so we can measure how long
it takes to get from one
point to another and the computer says on balance or throughout the city
traffic's a little bit better
so so you're telling me that the cab traffic is actually monitored via
computers yeah sure and the nice
thing is if you were to forget your suitcase in a cab just call 311 they'll ask
you where you got the into
the cab where you got out and we'll call the cab driver and get your luggage
back now that's a joke
right no it happens all the time it really does it really does it really does
no sure because the cab
driver knows that we know being monitor that it was in there and they it's
amazing how the light of day
makes people honest and do you do you you um you're in your third third term
third and you you love this
job i'm guessing right i get the feeling that people who get the the privilege
of running this
city really fall in love with the well but you like your job it comes through
and i love mine yeah sure
yeah yeah and thoughts after you uh or how many terms is going to be another
this no public would
not stand for another one but i was thinking actually my next career maybe
something like a
talk show maybe 11 35 at night on cbs something like that
uh keep thinking um uh uh what was i going to ask you oh in terms of uh of uh
of uh running uh oh
the tea party what do you what do you think of the tea party well people are
annoyed people are
frustrated people are disappointed in government both sides of the aisle both
ends of pennsylvania avenue and
every once in a while we have these groups that get together and say i'm not
going to take it anymore
and try to change it you saw that with perot you saw that with mccain i think
this is another one
some of these people will get elected and then once in office they'll realize
that anger is not a
strategy to manage or to govern and they'll drift more towards the middle and
hopefully function i i thought
when this happened it's the perfect american thing to have done people like you
mentioned unhappy they're
losing money the jobs are going away of course they're unhappy we are all
unhappy so they want to
change and do something about it so now i feel like they're more than welcome
to get in there and try
to do something about they have to have real ideas they have to ideas that are
legal and practical and
that they could get other senators and congressmen to agree to because they'd
have to build a constituency
to pass them and get the president on board so he doesn't veto it it's not easy
you got to implement
and that's not governing is not easy nothing is easy and and is it is it beyond
uh governing this country
it seems like the problems now are greater than they've ever well you know my
mother's 101 and
she'll tell you the good old days were never the good old days yeah that things
really are better we
just don't remember it that way and i still think this is the most wonderful
country in the world this
is the land of opportunity and what we've got to do is make sure we have more
immigrants coming here
because that challenges all of us and creates jobs we've got to fix the fiscal
problem social security and
cost of medical care and those kinds of things and we've got to improve public
education so
the people who are unemployed will have the skills to match the jobs that are
available and that's
what does not exist today your mother is 101 yep that's amazing congratulations
to you and to your mother
i can't thank you enough now i know i every now and then there's an article
about you in one of the papers
and uh i know you own a home in in london well which do you prefer new york
what are you doing in london
honestly what um what goes on over there i don't know i mean they have a queen
we have queens
you know they have beef eaters we have beef eaters i don't know yeah uh okay
you put some thought into
this i can see absolutely uh what's the problem in albany are things all right
