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Christopher X. Brodeur is a journalist, artist, cartoonist, political activist, and two-time political candidate for the mayor of New York City.

Biography

Christopher Brodeur has been involved in politics throughout his 15 years in New York City, including many encounters with Mayor Rudy Giuliani from 1997-2001. He was arrested 6 times (with no convictions) while Giuliani was mayor. These arrests were mainly for protesting what he felt were Giuliani's crimes. Brodeur claims these include federal violations of the Clean Air Act, adultery, and mob ties. His accusations of Giuliani's mob corruption include Giuliani giving $100,000,000 to construction firms Brodeur felt were mob connected for construction of the Staten Island and Coney Island stadiums. The city, under Michael Bloomberg, paid him $35,000 in 2003 to settle one of his Giuliani era false arrest lawsuits. In total, he has been arrested without a resulting conviction over 23 times, successfully defending himself against the police, City Hall, and the DA Robert Morgenthau through video, etc. In addition to protesting, he wrote and drew political cartoons for the New York Press newspaper. He remains very intense about political corruption and has long claimed he could make a better mayor for New York City than any of the past 300. He won about 4% of the Democratic votes in the New York City primary after doing minimal campaigning, being barred from all debates, receiving little coverage on most media outlets, and spending under $200. His 4 opponents all spent over $5,000,000 on their campaigns. The winner was Fernando Ferrer, whom Brodeur insists is a Democratic Machine candidate. He is still campaigning as a write-in candidate for NYC mayor in 2005 and promoting his 100 INNOVATIONS FOR NYC.

Platform

He has a list of 100 innovations he would like to make as mayor and uses that as his political platform. They range from fundamental political change (making it illegal for politicians to lie, making all mass transit free like the now-free Staten Island ferry) to the mundane (designing bathroom doors to open out, not in, outgoing mailboxes in all hallways to save the Post office money). He also espouses left-wing social ideologies, portraying himself as the only mayoral candidate in 2001 to support same-sex marriage, legalized suicide and drug use. Brodeur singles out the NYPD, FDNY, US military, public schools and public libraries as proof that Socialism works well and is very popular, characterizing them as goverment run monopolies. Many of his planks regard consumers in New York City, who in his view experience a terribly high rate of artificial inflation. He would like the support of consumer and workers' rights to be the responsibility of the government, whom he thinks should investigate and police big business.

Campaign

He spent roughly $120 on his campaign in 2005, distributing little pamphlets and running a website. His goal was simply to allow voters to research his website, view his ideas, and spread the word. He also decided against spending his own money on expensive campaign events, leaving him little expense as a candidate. This compares sharply to Democratic primary candidate Gifford Miller who spent over $6,000,000 on his campaign and was beaten by Brodeur in the Bronx (6% to 4%). Brodeur also came in second against 4 more heavily funded Democrats in many election districts like Washington Heights, where he beat Miller, Anthony Weiner, and C. Virginia Fields without any campaign visits. The 3 trailing candidates spent over $5,000,000 each to Broedeur's $120.

Distinction

Christopher X. Brodeur, or CXB as his supporters call him, diverges from mainstream politics in a variety of ways. He claims the war between liberals and conservatives is a fake one; the real war, he believes, is that between taxpayers and the government, although many simply lose interest. He also campaigns on uncommonly touched issues saying that the most important issues are the most neglected in our mainstream politics.

External links

Official campaign site for '05

Op-ed by Brodeur to L-magazine

• People from New York City
• New York politicians
• Living people