Unity 08 Founders Move to Bloomberg

A few weeks ago I was contacted by Unity 08 to sponsor Mayor Mike as a candidate in their primary. I said that I would certainly consider it, but I never heard back from them. I always felt that Unity 08 would be a victim of their own good intentions, and it now appears that their founders have come to the same conclusion and moved to a more concrete goal:

The founders of Unity08 - a bipartisan push to reform presidential
elections - are quitting to launch a national effort to draft Mayor Bloomberg
for the job.

Doug Bailey and Gerald Rafshoon plan to announce next week that they're
poised to recruit Bloomberg for a White House run if the major parties pander to
their extreme wings, according to Unity08 and sources.

...

But in almost two years, Unity08 has attracted 124,000 members and raised
just $1.5 million. It's scaling back its operation and dropping plans for an
online primary in June.

Well, I guess that explains why I never heard back from them...

Early March Decision?

While the NY Times is running a story about the growing impatience of waiting for Bloomberg to make a decision about 2008, CNN is running a story that Mayor Mike will make his decision in March:

New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg will decide by early March whether he will
pursue an independent bid for the White House, a source close to the mayor told
CNN.

The source, who is very familiar with the mayor's deliberations, said Bloomberg is
assessing his chances in a potential bid for the presidency.

The source said the mayor -- who has been widely speculated as being
interested in running for the White House as an independent -- has had data
collected but hasn't started to analyze it yet.

It has been widely circulated that Bloomberg is conducting extensive polling to see how viable he will be as a candidate in 2008.

I agree, it does not make sense to announce before Super-Super Tuesday on February 5th. A Bloomberg candidacy hinges best on the two parties nominative very partisan creatures.