Old, Addled WSJ Board Member Flips Out Over NYC's Bike-Sharing Program
The rich have a complicated relationship with New York City mayor Michael Bloomberg. They enjoy that he has developed a city that caters almost exclusively to them, but hate that it is almost exclusively theirs. There are now also those pesky little plebeians riding around on their brand-new bicycles (read: death chariots).
Enter Wall Street Journal editorial board member Dorothy Rabinowitz to set the record straight about New York City's new bike-sharing program, CitiBike. Suddenly, Bloomberg is now the enemy, because he has once again empowered bicyclists, with their haughty green agenda. He never listened to what the people (wealthy old conservative women) wanted. Even worse, he has defaced the beautiful neighborhoods of downtown New York with these CitiBike stations, which somehow pose an imminent fire threat.
That's not to say Rabinowitz's outrage isn't grounded in some version of reality, because it's true that bicyclists consistently break the law, and people are going to be struck and hurt by tourists on these bicycles. That's inevitable. But so are people getting hit by the dangerous amount of cars in Manhattan and the city grinding to a virtual halt every single day because of congestion.
"Do not ask me to enter the mind of the totalitarians running this government," Rabinowitz says, echoing other insane rhetoric. She then lays out a scenario where a bike-share program represents the kind of runaway totalitarianism that is the usual practice of her kind, the corporate elite. Except she hates bicycles, so she's confused. Nobody consulted her. Dorothy confused. Dorothy angry.