For Immediate Release (6/17/98):
Robert Lederman, President of A.R.T.I.S.T. issued the following statement in connection to the Post's 6/16/98 editorial which follows this statement.
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Apparently my paintings of the Mayor are beginning to get to him, as indicated by the Post's editorial page making its second spirited attack on me in just 31 days [also see 5/17/98 "The ARTIST Hustle"].
Could it be that the Mayor himself thinks the dictator analogies are not without merit? Could he be worried that his climb to national office might fail, brought down not by highly paid lobbyists or multi-million dollar ad campaigns but by a street artist? One things' for certain; if the comparisons I've made were meaningless no one would be paying any attention to them. It's the Mayor's own increasingly bizarre behavior, public statements and policies that make my paintings, only a few of which contain any reference to Hitler, resonate with the public.
There's one historical point I'd like to make about the Hitler analogy. Long before Hitler began murdering Europe's Jews he instituted his own twisted version of urban quality of life. Like the Mayor's quality of life campaign, vendors, homeless people, minorities, political activists, artists, radicals and small business people had their property confiscated, were falsely arrested and were denied the due process and rights that the German constitution guaranteed. Hitler was strongly supported by big business and even in the U.S. he had many enthusiastic supporters among the wealthy class. Most Germans were as delighted by Hitler's clean up campaign as New Yorkers once were about Giuliani's. Hitler was also a big stadium builder, a mean-spirited control freak and an expert at media manipulation. As Hitler's reign continued and more and more people became the targets for his insanity, even his supporters became alarmed. Hitler eventually had to retreat to his bunker as much to protect himself from the German people as from the allies.
For my fellow Jews who point to the Mayor's close relationship to New Yorks' Jewish community as "proof" that he's no Hitler I can only say that for New York City's minorities and for its poor; for its street artists, vendors, cabbies and squeegee guys; for its CUNY students, libraries, hospital workers and community gardeners Mayor Giuliani is a despotic tyrant and violator of their rights.
Nevertheless I agree, he's still no Hitler, as yet. Give him a national office, control of the armed forces and the right to appoint Supreme Court judges though and he may surprise us all. Perhaps the Mayor's bunker is not such an absurd idea. If he keeps going in the direction he's now proceeding it may be a good place to hide from mobs of his fellow New Yorkers.
NY POST EDITORIAL 6/16/98
DEMONIZING RUDY GIULIANI
First things first: The $15-million project that made its laborious way through every conceivable political-clearance procedure in this obscenely over-regulated city is not - repeat, not - a secret "bunker" designed to protect the mayor, his family and his aides in the event of an apocalypse. It's an office facility on the 23rd story of an office building that currently houses the New York bureau of the United States Secret Service. This emergency command center isn't something out of a bad $100 million science-fiction movie. There will be no beds in it for Donna and the Giuliani kids to wait out Godzilla's wrath. There is no special "list" of officials who will be granted access to the facility in the event that a "Deep Impact"-like comet comes streaking toward the earth.
The idea of the facility, which was first proposed in November and was the subject of hearing after hearing before the City Council approved it last week, is so simple that most New Yorkers probably believe something like it already exists.
It will allow the mayor and other relevant officials to gather in the event of an emergency - a power outage, a phone outage, a massive water-main break or, most horribly, a terrorist attack. It will have back-up generators and phone systems so that city, state and federal officials can respond effectively to a crisis under any conditions. It will link up the city's cameras - like the ones on highways and in parks - so that officials can keep an eye on New York from a central location.
Makes sense? After the World Trade Center bombing and two sarin-gas scares, who would wish for anything less?
But as all the talk of a non-existent "bunker" indicates - as the use of the very charged word "bunker" most plainly indicates - the criticism that is being directed at City Hall has nothing to do with this plan and everything to do with a disgusting analogy that is getting appallingly respectful play these days.
We'll say it simply: Just because people don't like Rudy Giuliani doesn't give them license to compare him to Adolf Hitler.
The Hitler analogy is something that seems to amuse many people in this city. Cutesy stories have been written and published in the past week about an art installation on Madison Avenue called No York in which the mayor is depicted with a Hitler moustache.
This image was first bandied about by an obnoxious twerp who claims to represent a group called A.R.T.I.S.T. - but which really ought to be called M.O.R.O.N. - who is outraged that the mayor attempted to enforce plainly written statutes regarding sidewalk clutter in front of the Metropolitan Museum. For this, the twerp (whose name we shall never again use because he deserves no more public mention) imagines that Rudy Giuliani deserves comparison with the personification of evil in this century.
The Hitler analogy came trippingly off the tongues of taxi drivers and street vendors as well, who object to actions taken by the mayor that may make their lives more difficult. But again, this is something entirely different from consigning six million Jews to the ovens and gas chambers.
As the New York Times' gleeful seizure of the "bunker" story indicates, you don't have to be a cabbie, a vendor or a M.O.R.O.N. to issue forth such repulsive opinions. Journalists do it too. Michael Tomasky almost does it outright in a disgraceful article in the June 22 issue of New York magazine. He writes that Mayor Giuliani's governing philosophy is "a manifestation not of fascism, a word some Giuliani foes toss around too flippantly, but of totalitarianism."
He quickly takes it back: "I confess it sounds silly and overblown, and of course it is." But then he goes right on. "In Giuliani's city, suspicion is regularly visited on powerless people. ... It may be too much to give that mind-set a name that puts Giuliani on the same level as history's mass murderers, but one thing we can call it is anti-democratic ..."
Aside from being untrue - since when is taking on the city's immensely powerful taxi industry an assault on the "powerless"? - Tomasky's words are morally, politically and historically unacceptable.
Whenever a conservative politician advances an agenda that poses a true threat to the policies beloved of liberals and leftists, it's not too long before his enemies try to draw an analogy between that politician and Adolf Hitler. In so doing, they are the ones truly guilty of a totalitarian offense - the crime of denying an opponent his humanity.
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For information on this issue contact Robert Lederman (718) 369-2111; E-Mail:<ARTISTpres@aol.com>
To see the Giuliani portraits for yourself check out No-York City Museum #437 Madison Ave. (corner 49th St.) Ground level storefront 49th and Madison.
For info on the street artist and vendor issues go to: <http://www.openair.org/alerts/artist/nyc.html>
Also see: "Chronic Offender", Village Voice 2/24/98; Newsday 4/20/98 cover story "Under Giuliani City Has Repeatedly Stifled Dissent"; N.Y. Times 5/7/98 pg B4 "For Giuliani, A Different Big Picture"; Editorial: "the Big Chill" by Bob Herbert NY Times 5/31/98.; NY Times 6/2/98 "Vending Ban Widens: not Just Food But also Books and Art".
For information on the Federal lawsuit [Lederman et al v Giuliani] contact Andrew Miltenberg (212) 481-4242, attorney for the plaintiffs.