Thursday, November 7, 2013

The ACA and the de Blasio family of New York

There are a couple of things I meant to write about yesterday, but the day got away from me, so here I am, a day late, because this blog is a record of sorts, a place to post the things I want to remember, or share with my children, and so better late than never.

1. What Elizabeth wrote on her blog yesterday is the clearest explanation of the Affordable Care Act that I have read anywhere, and she accomplishes this with such economy of words! Please go and read it here.

2. Democrat Bill De Balsio won a whopping 73 percent of the vote to become New York City's new mayor on Tuesday, and I'm so excited to welcome this real world family from Brooklyn and say goodbye to the wealthy blueblood businessman and his entitlement and patronage. The de Blasio family is different from any that has ever occupied Gracie Mansion, in that his wife is a beautiful dark-skinned black woman who was a lesbian before they met and fell in love, his 19-year-old daughter sports flowered headbands and piercings and his son, 15, has an afro out to here. All three were very visible in the campaign of this 6 foot 5 giant of a man raised by his Italian single mother after his troubled alcoholic father, a war veteran possibly suffering from PTSD, committed suicide. De Blasio has said his father taught him what not to do. What he did instead was create a loving and close-knit family in which the children clearly feel free to express who they are. How will he govern? I have high hopes based on his unabashedly liberal politics and history, and the fact that he and his family are everything New York purports to be about, but too seldom is. There's more on them here.





7 comments:

  1. This really is just about the most awesome thing ever. Dang, Angella- what a gorgeous family! Well done, New York City! Well done!

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  2. Ever since a friend posted a great article on de Blasio's wife and I read it, I have been 100% Team de Blasio. I'm thrilled enough that I would even consider trying to find a job in NYC, to be there through the best of times. Lucky y'all!

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  3. I love that picture of the four of them at the microphone - such a fine looking family!

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  4. I do love the urban diversity represented by the DeBlasios. They are such a New York family. We'll all be better off when we can similarly love each other and move beyond our rigid categories.

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  5. I'm ashamed to say I hadn't heard of DeBlasio until he was elected. I knew everyone was excited and then I saw the above image on tv and understood why. It is very exciting, isn't it? We will keep going forward.

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  6. Love that guy and that fro on his boy. Yes and yes!

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  7. It's so weird to me how we basically knew nothing about the deBlasio's and now here they are! It'll be interesting to see whether he will be able to do anything to reverse the growing plutocracy that is New York City -- well -- the entire country, no?

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