The choice of Jessica Tisch has been hailed in many circles as a stroke of good fortune for New York City’s leadership. For some, however, there are memories of a time when a certain class of people simply accepted their civic responsibility and stepped up to answer the call to put society’s building blocks in order. Howard Husock is a Senior Fellow at the American Enterprise Institute; he appeared on the WOR Morning Show to say that Tisch should be lauded for making a selfless choice to serve the city she loves.
“Jessica Tisch has options in life,” Husock told host Larry Mendte. “Born with a silver spoon, and she decided she was going to go into counterterrorism in the NYPD, then she’s going to be the Sanitation commissioner? These are kind of thankless and scary jobs… A lot of people say, ‘Oh, she bought her way to the top, what are you praising her for?’ All I know is that Bill Bratton and Ray Kelly think she’s a great pick. They are the best police commissioners New York City has maybe ever had, so I’m going with their pick.”
Husock says the choice Tisch made may be met with cynicism by some, but once upon a time, Tisch would’ve been ridiculed if she had chosen any path other than public service. “Obviously, Jessica Tisch is not in it for the money. She’s part of a tradition we used to have in America that the elites- I know, elites are supposed to be bad, but sometimes they should do the right thing. We used to have a tradition where we had what were called ‘dollar-a-year’ people- they were ‘dollar-a-year men’ back then. And they basically volunteered in public service, because we don’t need big government, but we do need some government that works… so we need people to do the core government jobs because they’re selfless.”
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