Holy "Dynasty", Batman! The de Blasio Saga Reads Like A Mini-Series for *Smart* People.

Yale, Smith, Italian immigrants, war heroes, alcoholism, union activism, McCarthyism, FBI creepsters, multiple name-changes, disillusionment, suicide, and finally.... regeneration.

Did I leave anything out? I've been a supporter since early-on, but there's a lot here that I didn't know. ( And wouldn't have guessed.) From today's NY Times:


>>>For a few fleeting years, Bill de Blasio had, in his words, a “classic American family life” with his father. He went with him to Little League and Boston Red Sox games, watched him grill steaks on the barbecue, joined him on evening rowboat rides.


But by the time Mr. de Blasio turned 7, family life had started to go bad. His father, Warren Wilhelm, was drunk and angry much of the day. At one family gathering, he fell to the floor and had trouble getting back up.

After he moved out, Mr. de Blasio’s mother was increasingly nervous about his visits with their children, worried that Mr. Wilhelm was driving while intoxicated.

In Mr. de Blasio’s eyes, his father was a tragic hero, a man who fought courageously in World War II, only to lose part of his left leg to the grenade of an enemy soldier he had just killed.

He returned with a Purple Heart but found his loyalty to the United States questioned in McCarthy-era investigations.

When Mr. de Blasio was 18, his father killed himself, firing a rifle into his heart while sitting in a car outside a motel in Connecticut.

Politicians often speak about the formative influences of parents: mothers who taught the importance of persistence, fathers who instilled a love of learning. But Mr. de Blasio, the Democratic nominee for mayor of New York City who has a big lead in the polls, has defined himself largely in opposition to his father.

At times, he felt so scarred that he wondered whether he could raise a family of his own.

“My father was a picture of courage in terms of his war service and strength, and yet in his decline, I learned primarily negative lessons,” he said in an interview. “I learned what not to do.”

He became so alienated from his father that he shed the name he was born with, Warren Wilhelm Jr., in favor of his childhood nickname, Bill, and his mother’s maiden name.

Mr. de Blasio said he was still struggling to understand how his father affected his life.

http://www.nytimes.com/2013/10/14/nyregion/from-his-fathers-decline-de-blasio-learned-what-not-to-do.html?hp