Ken or Boris?

Liked this artice from the NYT

The irrepressible mavericks Ken Livingstone and Boris Johnson are the only two men to have held the office of Mayor of London since it was created — Ken from 2000 to 2008, Boris from 2008 to now. And one of them will win another term in the election in May. It says much about both of them that they are instantly recognizable from, and almost invariably referred to, by their first names. Otherwise, they have nothing in common.

Ken: In office, this veteran of the Labor Party’s far left fulfilled some of the grimmer predictions that he’d convert City Hall into a free-range zoo for the left: he formally apologized for London’s role in the slave trade; acknowledged President George W. Bush’s visit by hosting a “peace reception,” to which Bush was not invited; and fondly imagined the mass lynching of the Saudi royal family. He also proved shrewdly amenable to business and building and unclogged London’s sclerotic streets with a bold congestion charge.

Boris: Forever giving the impression of having either just waked or not slept, he has negotiated a rigorously orthodox Tory path through education, journalism and politics — Eton, Oxford, The Times, Member of Parliament for the impeccably snooty constituency of Henley-on-Thames. Yet he has horrified nobody more than his generally strait-laced political allies. He has also aroused a certain amount of confused, furtive affection in people who would not normally vote Conservative without a pistol to the temple. And the most visible legacy of his term is a citywide bicycle-rental scheme first mooted during Ken’s second term but irreversibly known as Boris Bikes.

Whom to vote for?
Neither shows any inclination to be anything but himself. Ken recently suggested that a constructive reaction to the financial crisis might be to “hang a banker a week until the others improve.” Boris described Ken’s St. Patrick’s Day celebrations as “lefty crap.” Either way, it won’t be boring.

we say, if Ken gets back in, just wait till there is a freedom of information request as to the daily consumption of Wiskey. nuff said.