Text by Sohrab Saadat Ladjevardi
Three days ago my union endorsed Bill de Blasio to be the next Mayor of New York City. Honestly I don’t know whether he’s the right guy to be on the J4JA bandwagon. I don’t know what he has promised the union…us. But in case he forgets the J4JA campaign, I promise you that I and my musician friends and colleagues – who believe and are active in this campaign – will remind Mr. Blasio of all the promises he did to our Local 802 President Tino Gagliardi. Today I registered to vote. This will be the first time for me voting!! I have no idea who I’ll vote for…de Blasio? Hmm…will do my research. Try to meet him and ask him how he would clean up the NY jazz music club scene. I’m old enough not to believe what politicians promise in their election campaign. President Obama is a good example for this. What Mr. Obama promised during his election campaign and what he has achieved as the president by now are two worlds.
Anyway I can’t endorse Bill de Blasio at this time because I still don’t know what he really stands for (but please watch the video below in which he announces his candidacy). In the next weeks I’ll try to find out why my union endorsed him. I’ll try to find out why the leader of the campaign Bob Cranshaw what he thinks of this man. Are we really endorsing a politician who wants to fight for the J4JA campaign? Or is his intention only to use our votes and money to win the election?
