” CNN Town Hall with Michael Bloomberg – ‘A Different Kettle of Fish’ ” – February 26, 2020.

          I  watched  the  CNN  Town  Hall  tonight  to  pay  keen  attention  to  Mayor  Michael Bloomberg’s performance one on one with the moderator and audience. 

          It was quite revealing and pleasing to me to watch him answering questions convincingly eliciting applauses periodically from the audience. It was also in contrast to his debate performance last week which most rated as unsuccessful.  

       B  What made the difference clearly perceptible ?

          Two aspects deserve mention :  1.  He made himself different from the usual political debaters ;  and  2. He highlighted his significant accomplishments in the context of the issues of importance in this election cycle.

          1.  What struck me as highly unusual but in no way against the accepted rules and standards of any debate/behavior of debaters (or question answer session)  was the fact that he didn’t use any of the customary goody goody words or gestures like –  ” a good question ” ;   “I’m glad that you asked this question ” ;   ” thank you, thank you for raising this question ” … … in a manner of pleasing the questioners even while proving that he behaves well on stage. He was stone faced and responded in a crisp and effective way to every question. I did not notice any dissatisfaction from any of the audience. It was remarkable. As a manager it may well be the right technique to remain unemotional. Whether it will succeed in politics or not, I am not sure.

          2.  Figure below represents Michael Bloomberg’s mayoral accomplishments as he himself emphasized :

          (a)  Michael Bloomberg recounted the Gun Control measures as ‘stringent background checks,  and reduction of suicides rates’  as important to preventing Gun Violence. Banning automatic AK47 weapons, insisting on background checks, red flags on ..  as key preventive and precautionary measures – he cited.

          (b)  He talked eloquently about improvements made in New York schools during his term as Mayor, specially bringing 23 schools being listed in the top 25 in 2014 from  ‘nil’  when he took charge in 2002 January. Education to reform the knowledge and mind set of people from young age is what he firmly believed in.

          (c)  Speaking of Climate Change as dangerous to humanity, he detailed his plan to shift coal workers from difficult jobs to other productive ones through ” training ” .  Citing the number of coal workers in the 1920s of 1 million  getting reduced to 2 lakhs in the 1980s and  to 50000 now,  he pointed to the decrease as evidence of improvement being made in this context. Accepting that coal workers in West Virginia cannot be migrated to California for work on Solar power, he pleaded for training, AI, and other means to enhance the value of workers for new jobs.

          Conclusion :  Michael Bloomberg has presented himself as different and more effective in this Town Hall. He also showed himself to be an individual with characteristics one may not witness among politicians, but one who is ready to strive for the welfare of people and most importantly one who wants to beat Donald Trump in the general election. That he is different from Donald Trump is as clear as he is  different from others in the pack of Democratic competitors.

   ” Dieu avec nous “

   Thursday, February 27, 2020 –  7.59 a.m. (IST)

   Tidbit :  ” Aim was to get his soundbite and not the truth ” –  Michael Bloomberg on attacks against him by other debaters in the last debate in Nevada.