Manhattan Institute For Policy Research | The New York Observer

Jeb Bush, Michael Bloomberg Speak at Snooty, Exclusive Club

Tue, 13 Nov 2007 14:56:30 -0500

At an education-themed event today hosted by the Manhattan Institute featuring Jeb Bush and Michael Bloomberg, something happened.

There's probably more to say. But despite the fact that the event was on the mayor's public schedule, and that the Manhattan Institute called around to invite reporters to watch, the press wasn't actually welcome.

After the mayor arrived, employees of the Union Club, where the event was held, began purging the room, plucking reporters...

Murdoch's NY Forecast Calls for Rain

Wed, 09 May 2007 07:12:03 -0400

Rupert Murdoch thinks New York State is headed for a crisis, he explained during a speech last night at Cipriani, where he and former Mayor Ed Koch were honored by the conservative Manhattan Institute.

Murdoch said that the Manhattan Institute's ideas about governance had helped improve public policy. “But," he said, "I think the storm clouds are threatening again.

"Not to be too pessimistic tonight, but the crisis has already begun.”...

Spitzer on Regulation

Mon, 04 Dec 2006 06:12:07 -0500

More on the potential conflict between the corporate watchdog role Eliot Spitzer has played for the last eight years and the economic cheerleader role he's about to take on: Here's a clip of Spitzer wearing his attorney general hat, defending the tough corporate accountability rules that Congress passed in the wake of his Wall Street investigations.

"When they limit our capacity to prosecute, they are doing something egregious and will harm investors across the...

Congestion Pricing For Manhattan Accelerates

Wed, 29 Nov 2006 06:47:27 -0500

Another sign the debate over congestion pricing for auto-heavy areas, if not congestion pricing itself, is coming our way: The Manhattan Institute (whom one would think would be against these things) is holding a breakfast next Thursday on the topic. And it seems like toll-foe David Weprin will be outnumbered. - Matthew...

Rudy at 90 Percent

Tue, 14 Nov 2006 12:00:00 -0500

Steve Malanga, senior fellow at Giuliani's preferred think tank, the Manhattan Institute, thinks that Rudy Giuliani's formation of a exploratory committee for president was as good as an official declaration. Almost. "Having talked to some of the people in Rudy's administration, I think they give it up to 90 percent chance that he will run," said Malanga. "The odds seem to be in favor of it." Malanga, along with a number of other Giuliani...

A Giuliani Conservative Tilts at Religion

Sun, 10 Sep 2006 20:00:00 -0400

Rudolph Giuliani has repeatedly extended the hand of friendship to Christian conservatives in recent months. But a leading member of a think tank closely associated with the former Mayor has just delivered a powerful jab to the face of the same constituency. Mr. Giuliani, long viewed with suspicion by the religious right because of his pro-choice, pro-civil-union positions, went so far as to campaign for former Christian Coalition leader Ralph Reed back in...

New Republic's Ivory Tower: Extra Phallic!

Wed, 06 Sep 2006 06:19:33 -0400

Yesterday, The New Republic introduced its readers to The Open University, its "first-of-its-kind blog, featuring America's top academics on today's top stories." As promised, there are lots of big-name professor types--the University of Chicago's Cass Sunstein, Harvard's Steven Pinker--and they've already taken on such weighty topics as "ideological amplification" and the demise of the HBO series "Deadwood." Also among the contributors is deposed Harvard president Lawrence Summers, who ran afoul of female academics by...

Weld's Takings

Thu, 23 Mar 2006 05:29:47 -0500

Bill Weld had his audition for the theoretically friendly, in fact polite but unenthusiastic, audience at a Crains New York Business breakfast at the Sheraton this morning. On the substance, the most striking point was his apparent retreat from his sweeping opposition to emininent domain at the Manhattan Institute not long ago. There, he framed his opposition to the Kelo decision as broad, and not limited to its endorsement of the role of a...

Manhattan Institute, California Style

Wed, 11 Jan 2006 11:06:00 -0500

The Manhattan Institute has a well-produced indictment of Albany out today, and a new Web site to go with it. Their bottom line is that the state taxes and spends too much, and the targets for blame are "the special interests," identified as teachers unions, public authorities, public employees, public "servants," and the plaintiffs' bar. It's hard to argue that any of those groups don't have a great deal of power over Albany, but it seems...

Mixing It Up

Thu, 15 Dec 2005 13:08:00 -0500

In a New York Sun article on Williamsburg’s Schaefer Landing, which will have 210 condos and 140 low-income apartments once it is finished next year, Manhattan Institute scholar Julia Vitullo-Martin asks if the rich will want to live next to the poor. (Why is that question never asked the other way around?) The thing is, people are already doing it all around town: about 30 buildings, mostly in Manhattan, have been financed by...

Some Politicians See A Kelly Candidacy in '09

Sun, 13 Nov 2005 19:00:00 -0500

New York clearly demonstrated its confidence in Mayor Michael Bloomberg by handing him an overwhelming victory in Tuesday’s election. But it is Police Commissioner Raymond Kelly who enjoys widespread credit for reducing crime, especially in conservative corners like the Manhattan Institute, the think tank that led Rudolph Giuliani to the light of zero tolerance.

According to a NY1/ Newsday poll released on Monday, 43 percent of New Yorkers believe that the city’s drop...

Some Politicians See A Kelly Candidacy in ’09

Sun, 13 Nov 2005 19:00:00 -0500

Wonk Fight!

Tue, 25 Oct 2005 10:09:00 -0400

The folks over at the liberal Drum Major Institute seem to have enjoyed the Times's story today on the Manhattan Institute's waning local influence, and add their own slap: "Certainly the Manhattan Institute has sensed a political opportunity to stir up xenophobia in the absence of contributing to a meaningful conversation about immigration policy in this country in this country. Maybe that's why Mayor Bloomberg doesn't listen to them. The scarier question for thoughtful Americans...

Manhattan Institute Takes a Dive

Wed, 06 Jul 2005 09:20:00 -0400

I'd sort of expected the free-speech conservatives over at the Manhattan Institute to appreciate how the logic of Steve Minarik's attack on the Drum Major Institute threatens them. Minarik's underlying point is that think tanks are arms of political campaigns, or movements, and thus should be regulated. And the conservative think tank's motto is "turning ideas into influence;" that sounds indictable by Minarik's argument. But partisan loyalties seem to be trumping ideological consistency in this case: "We...

Rudy Book

Thu, 26 May 2005 07:08:00 -0400

We suspect you'll be hearing a lot about Fred Siegel's new Rudy book, which we mentioned in our story this week. He's reading from it today at a Manhattan Institute event, and we suspect that's just the start of the kind of media blitz anything remotely connected to America's Mayor inspires. Anyway, Siegel has a website, where you can see the eerie yellow cover art and get a taste of Siegel's argument, which includes some...

Welfare Reform Reform

Mon, 25 Apr 2005 11:22:00 -0400

Around the time Human Resources Administration commissioner Verna Eggleston was making a cameo appearance at Mike's campaign launch, her agency quietly made a major -- and ideologically-charged -- policy shift. City Limits reports that in January, the city changed its workfare rules to allow all welfare recipients to count one year of full-time education as "work" and still receive benefits. (This option had already been available to parents; the new rule makes it available to...