Interview With the Vampires

KATIE COURIC: Thank you, Mayor Bloomberg, for sitting down with us. The other day, sir, you guessed that the Times Square bomber was “homegrown,” and now authorities have arrested a Connecticut man in connection with the case. Can you tell us anything about this naturalized American citizen person, whose identity we won’t mention because we don’t want our audience to think “Muslim,” even though part of his last name is “Shah” and his first name is “Faisal?”

MAYOR BLOOMBERG: He’s from Connecticut. I’m from Boston. How am I supposed to know? Especially since the Feds never tell me anything. After all, I’m a Republican… right?

COURIC: Yes, sir, but you’re also the Mayor of the City of New York. So let me get to the most important question: Yankees or Red Sox?

BLOOMBERG: As you know, Katie, I’m the mayor of all the people of this great city, including the ones in boroughs I’ve never been to. So that question’s above my pay grade, even though I’m a billionaire. Ha ha. Therefore, let me address your first question. Several of Mr. What’s-his-name’s neighbors in Bridgeport say he often complained that property taxes were too high — and, what’s worse, that he might have been recently foreclosed on. In Bridgeport, where you can buy a house for less than the price of a loaf of bread!

COURIC: Times is hard, sir.

BLOOMBERG: If I’d a known of his plight, I might have given him Gracie Mansion, because I certainly don’t need it. Anyway, investigators are trying to determine if he’s been seen within twenty miles of a Tea Party demonstration recently. That’s where we ought to be directing our inquiries, instead of the tired old “Sawx Suck/Yankees Suck” dichotomy.

COURIC: Good point, Mr. Mayor. So, do we know anything yet about his political affiliation?

BLOOMBERG: Well, his TV was tuned to Fox when agents checked his home, and they found fliers in his trash from Connecticut Republican senatorial candidate, that wrestling chick… Linda McMahon. Make of that what you will. More interesting, perhaps: he had canceled his New York Times subscription in mid-March, around the time President Obama signed the health care bill. Attorney General Holder told me he is very interested in the time line here. Very interested.

COURIC: Reports indicate that Mr. Shahzam might in fact be a Dem –

BLOOMBERG: That’s “Shahzad,” but we prefer to call him an American of Pakistani descent.

COURIC: Right. Anyway, What’s-his-name from Bridgeport – you know, that “white guy” who could have been a Tea Partier — admitted purchasing the SUV, rigging the explosives, and driving the vehicle to Times Square. How did the authorities get him to admit all this so soon? Was he Mirandized?

BLOOMBERG: On the plane when he was arrested. FBI agents and DoJ attorneys warned him repeatedly to stop declaring his guilt and providing information before they could read him his rights, but he insisted on incriminating himself over their objections.

COURIC: Unbelievable. In conclusion, is there anything you’d like to say to the people of New York about this so-called “near miss,” Mr. Mayor? Or is it simply yet another case of a clueless idiot fooling around with matches when, as we all know, the real enemy is still out there, lurking, in the heartland beyond the Hudson River?

BLOOMBERG: Well, the system worked, Katie. Once the bomb fizzled, we put all the pieces together with remarkable speed. Our ability to act when the danger has passed is so much greater now than it was after Oklahoma City and 9/11.

COURIC: Have you spoken to the president, sir? We assume that Barack Huss-excuse me!- Obama has been following these developments from Day One, right?

BLOOMBERG: Gaia bless you, Katie. I spoke with the president a few hours ago. He’s coming to the city to survey the area where the blast damage would have been the most severe, which will make for a great photo op. I understand that, a few minutes later, he and the First Lady will take in a matinee of The Phantom of the Opera and then dine at La Grenouille in midtown, in order to show the people of the United States that life goes on, even amidst the most horrible hypothetical carnage.

COURIC: That is so brave.

BLOOMBERG: Of course, we’ll have to shut the island of Manhattan while he’s here, ban all air travel into and out of the greatest city in the country and generally tie up traffic in the metropolitan area for hours and hours.

COURIC: It’s wartime. People have to make sacrifices. Me, I gave my driver the day off.

BLOOMBERG: Good for you, Katie. Me too. That’s the kind of fighting spirit that won the war.

COURIC: Which war?

BLOOMBERG: The next election. But I’m not even thinking about that yet. What do you think I am, a Democrat?