At his weekly news conference two days ago, talking about New York City’s shortage of lifeguards for its public pools as the simmer months approach, New York City Mayor Eric Adams said,
“How do we have a large body of people that are in our city and country that are excellent swimmers and at the same time we need lifeguards? The only obstacle is that we won’t give them the right to work to become a lifeguard.”
He really said this. He did! I wouldn’t lie to you about something like that. That’s what the mayor of New York City said, and he wasn’t joking.
After the predictable response (well, Adams apparently is incapable of predicting it, but almost everyone with their cerebrum installed properly would be), the mayor’s attempt at “walking back” his idiocy only raised more doubts about his intellectual fitness (or rather, eliminated them). Adams suggested that illegal immigrants (he called them “migrants,” which doesn’t change what they are) could fill other key jobs in the city, in nursing and food service , for example. “Why people want to just hang onto swimming when I listed that we need to allow people to work,” he said. “Let people work.”
- Yup, let’s allow people to break our laws and defy our immigration procedures, and be rewarded for it. Good plan! Why should any American respect our laws when elected leaders like Adams take that position? Senator Marsha Blackburn (R-Tenn) asked: “Do other Democrats like Joe Biden think breaking the law is qualification for employment in our country?” Why yes, Marsha, they do.
- Somebody explain to the mayor that attaching any skill or characteristic to an entire group is at the core of stereotyping and bigotry. May I assume that Adams, as a black man, has great rhythm and can play a mean banjo?
- Q: Since apparently wading or swimming across the Rio Grande is regarded as a career credential, why don’t our DEI obsessed Ivy League colleges extend swimming scholarships to these talented and buoyant “visitors”?
- A: Because “not drowning” doesn’t make someone an “excellent swimmer.”
The signature significance test: Would any public figure who isn’t an idiot say this in a public forum, even once, without intending to be funny?
I don’t think so.
Ethics Alarms 
This is funnier than Hillary Clinton’s assertion that coal miners in West Virginia could be taught how to code.
Life guarding at the beaches and public pools of NYC was a summer gig for young men and women. I know I was one. It is not a lifetime employment trajectory.
Of course the pool of potential lifeguards was geater than because learning how to swim was considered a life skill. A life skill that was taught in some public schools, at the YMCA, in the Scouts, at PAL (Police Athetic League) camps, the CYO (Catholic Youth Org.), many other faith entities, and at the very public pools that require lifeguards,
But that was then, now I doubt any life skills are presented anywhere in the city except the skill it takes required to reach victimhood status so as to recieve benefits.
‘Bouyant visitors’ You owe me a keyboard . That’s stuck in the old funny bone for some reason, I can’t stop giggling.
OK, maybe I am dense, but I missed the illegal immigrant connection. I thought he was admitting that NYC has so many regulations that the path to becoming a lifeguard is not worth the trouble.
Look to “we won’t give them the right to work to become a lifeguard,” Michael.
Getting all these illegals work permits and drivers licenses ASAP is a big concern. It’s key to Adams getting reelected. Getting illegals to work is top of mind in NYC politics. NYC is caught in a bind. They are under a court order to give illegals all sorts of stuff. So, if the illegals work and get paid, they’ll need less stuff from NYC. Of course, this will take jobs away from, you know, NYC citizens and taxpayers and legal voters, but you can’t say that out loud. Conclusion: He’s a dope.
My DEI addled brain assumed the comment was going to be about getting more black kids able to work as lifeguards in the NYC public swimming pools. But I couldn’t figure out which excellent swimmers he was talking about given poor black kids are all too often unable to swim and at risk of drowning when they try to.