Brooklyn, NY – Sen. Kruger You Are Overblowing It, Bloomberg Never Uttered Hitler In Remark

Brooklyn, NY – A fuming state Sen. Carl Kruger and other city pols yesterday demanded that Mayor Bloomberg apologize for referring to the failed policy of appeasing the Nazis when he was describing his reluctance to negotiate with the state Senate.

“We are not Nazis! We are legislators!” Kruger said.

Kruger said he wanted an apology on behalf of “millions of people that lost family in the Holocaust,” which included his own relatives.

“Even to raise the name of Hitler, in and of itself, should have a public rebuke and is worthy of an apology,” added Kruger (D-Brooklyn).

But Bloomberg — who, in fact, never uttered Adolf Hitler’s name — didn’t budge, insisting that he was talking only about the futility of endless rounds of negotiations regarding mayoral control of the schools.

The mayor on Friday blasted state senators for what he characterized as stalling on a bill that has already been approved by the Assembly.

“I mean, we could be doing so many more things, and instead we’re spending our time talking,” Bloomberg said on his weekly radio show.

“If you remember Neville Chamberlain, no matter how many times you said yes, that’s the starting point for the next round. There’s always more, more, more. I think that just the time for that is over.”

Chamberlain was the former British prime minister whose policy of appeasing Hitler is considered one of the greatest diplomatic blunders in history.

Speaking at a Bronx conference with the rest of the “Four Amigos” — Sens. Hiram Mon serrate of Queens and Pedro Espada and Ruben Diaz Sr. of The Bronx — Kruger said they were open to nego tiating a deal on school governance that would include more parental input.

“Mayor Bloomberg has indicated he does not want to change a period or a comma on the Assembly bill,” Espada said.

Bloomberg wants the mayoral-control bill to move forward without tinkering with the old law, which expired earlier this month.

Yesterday, Bloomberg’s spokesman insisted the mayor wasn’t comparing senators to Nazis.

“It wasn’t an analogy at all — the mayor was talking about endless negotiations in general,” Stu Loeser said in an e-mail to reporters.

“The former prime minister’s name is now synonymous in the American lexicon with appeasement and endless negotiations.”

In light of a personal conversation with the Mayor, Assemblyman Dov Hikind (D-Brooklyn) and Councilman Bill de Blasio (D-Brooklyn) have cancelled their scheduled press conference denouncing Mayor Bloomberg’s alleged remarks likening New York State Senators to the Nazis. The Mayor reiterated that he did not hear the reporter’s question which led to this regrettable flap.

“After personally speaking with the Mayor, I became convinced that he did not hear the question which the NY1 reporter posed to him,” Hikind said. “In this case, I have decided to give the Mayor the benefit of the doubt. But this unfortunate incident is a prime example of why we all need to be more cautious about what we say publicly.”